I have a question. It goes as follows:- Why does the pilot everytime after he gets an order from the ATC he says Roger
e.g. ATC:Your cleared to land.
Pilot:Roger

Please reply! ???

Yeah, but where did the term 'Roger' come from? 

I hate the term "Roger". It has the potential to be the cause of loads of accidents. Certainly this side of the pond you never say the "r" word unless it is replying to something very menial or trivial. When receiving a message from ATC you should always read it back as you understand it - then if you have misunderstood the message then ATC can correct you.

Eg, "Hotel Alpha Charlie 1-7, cleared land, wind 250/15"

Reply, "Clear land, Hotel 1-7"

Charlie

Quote:


  ORIGINS OF ROGER WILCO 

Incidentally according to the “Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins” by William and  Mary Morris(Harper Collins, New York, 1977, 1988).  ROGER -- "in the meaning of 'Yes, O.K., I understand you -- is voice code for the letter R.  It is part of the 'Able, Baker, Charlie' code known and used by all radiophone operators in the  services in the 40's - 50's.

From the earliest days of wireless communication, the Morse code  letter R (dit-dah-dit) has been used to indicate 'O.K. -- understood.' So 'Roger' was the  logical voice-phone equivalent."  Also from “I Hear America Talking” by Stuart Berg Flexner (Von Nostrand Reinhold Co.,  New York, 1976).“Roger! A code word used by pilots to mean ‘your message received and  understood’ in response to radio communications; later it came into general use to mean ‘all right, OK.’ Roger was the radio communications morse code word for the letter R, which in this case represented the word ‘received.’ ‘Roger Wilco’ was the reply to ‘Roger’ from the original transmitter of the radio message, meaning ‘I have received your message that you have received my message and am signing off.” Wilco implies "I will comply"

Then of course there is the "Roger Beep" (Di-Dah-Dit) which legend has it was innovated by the Space Missions as a quick way to "Roger it" No source for this "but have it on good authority - by a guy who was there" hi hi. From the DX Reflector Ok, I have heard and seen a half dozen explanations, now here is one from one who has "Been there- Done That". "Roger" in both military and government communications definitely came out of the old cw days (and yes I did send/receive cw messages at the beginning of my career). The "R" was sent as a confirmation of receipt of a message,or a portion of a message. "R" was used, not "QSL". In voice communications , it thus became "Roger".

Even in front-line operations such as by forward observers (I did that too). We used Roger and Negative You had to be completely confident in what you were sending or receiving after all, it could , and often was, life or death as to what got thru the communications lines.  I cringe almost every time I hear any military movie communications. WILCO means: I will comply with your orders. OVER means I have finished my transmissions and turn the channel  over to you to transmit. CLEAR means I am finished with this communication and am standing by on the channel. OUT means I have completed transmission and am completely finished and closing this station or switching to another channel. So you can see why I cringe with "Roger Wilco Over, Clear and Out" WHAT DID  HE SAY??

Navy Pilots say the use of Roger Wilco is frowned on, use one or the other as applicable.

In addition to "R" Roger, early CW use for "correct" was Morse "C", this carried over to the phone circuits as "Charlie". This is still used by Morse ops and can still be heard on some military voice circuits as in "That's Charlie" or "That's a Charlie readback". Usually following a readback of a message and meaning 'that is correct'. One will also see the occasional reference to FOXTROT messages as in the "DO NOT ANSWER" also encountered on military circuits. This is also from the CW "F" meaning 'do not answer'.

You should never use Roger to reply to things like landing clearances, and especially not hold-short clearances. In fact most ATIS recordings say to "readback all hold-short instructions".

This is a vital step in making sure that you didn't mis-hear the controller's instructions. Also, if you DON'T readback your instructions the controller will usually ask you to readback anyway.

Wull, I'll tell ya.......


It's because English is the international aviation language.    AND, some countries that use Nien(sp), Germany for example, for no might become confused, theoretically.
IMO, the typical, English speaking, German, is smart enough to know better.  It's the same reason early aviators yelled "CONTACT" instead of......."are the points OFF?"    "NO, there ON!"   "what........turn them ON!"     "NO......OFF, OFF!....AAaaahhhhh!!!"
NOW, in comparison, if German were used as the int'l language, I'm thinking.....we here in the US, would be all screwed up!
Aren't we the only ones STILL not using the metric system.          I've been up for two days and I'm running out of Coffee......is it starting to show?
You'll find that pilots in the US that fly int'l frequently still do use "niner" and say things like "switch to frequency one-one-niner DECIMAL seven", as opposed to point.
We tend to forego many things, the longer we fly. I had to get out two text books and do an internet search to explain how to figure out Pressure Altitude, without using an Altimeter, today!   I used to teach that stuff!!

Quote:


The reason for overpronuncing certain phrases dates back to the early days of radio communications. The quality of reception wasn't as good as it is today so you would say "Fi-ev" for five because saying it that way makes it much easier to hear on the other end even through static and poor equipment. You'll notice that he's turning many one syllable words into two syllables so they are less likely to be drowned out by a burst of static.

Probably today such language isn't nearly as necessary but the old school types still do that because it's the way they learned to communicate on the radio.

What Mobius said is correct, you read back anything that has numbers in it to avoid mistakes. I rarely (if ever) use "roger" it is always something like "turning right to heading 2-9-0, skyhawk 73M".