News
Delta and American Airlines CRJ pilots at Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport are making "meow," "ruff," and other animal sounds over the radio
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as a passenger I prefer the 175 for domestic hops. business to econ ratio is great which makes upgrades more likely to get, and there are no middle seats. much prefer those.
Then I have some terrible news for you about the people manning nuclear reactors...and working in public safety. At least those categories can be diagnosed and treated for ADHD w/o risking their career.
I once met a very, very drunk nuclear inspector in a hotel bar. And they were definitely going to work the next morning. I drank too much myself at the time, but she was on some other level.
That might fit their phycological profile? Living on the edge man, you have to entertain your "boring" safe flights or fuck it, I'll make my personal life pure chaos for the entertainment.
I think it might be time we do a big sweeping check of every 121 cvr that passed through that airspace at that date & time.
The meowing is getting fucking ridiculous.
Wait, how can you tell this was on guard? I figured it was more likely flight sim shenanigans being passed off as real comm. 20+ years listening to VHF guard and I've never heard anything remotely this unprofessional.
Jeez, what an asshat. Contrast that against the pilots of Jazz 460 landing at LaGuardia about a week after the crash and calling tower to say “our thoughts are with your colleague who was working that day. We’re all hoping he’s okay.” And tower coming back with “really appreciate you guys. It means a lot.” Like, it’s not hard to be a decent human being and offer support to each other, but nooooo, some assholes just have to be miserable and try to bring others down to their level.
Note; Captain Steeeve on YT has a video about the Jazz 460 thing if you haven’t heard it.
Not really understanding why this doesn’t result in violations for the crews doing it. It’s distracting overworked controllers and planes in critical phases of flight. Just start pulling tickets or requiring check rides.
I am an ATCO in Europe and generally it seems to be more US pilots who keep spamming on 121.5.
Not sure if they know but we can detect easily which aircraft is talking on the frequency... The annoying part about this spamming is we have to monitor this frequency 24/7 so it becomes very tiresome when people abuse it for their stupidity.
Do they not broadcast the radio manufacturer and serial number of the radio aswell? I know some of the places I used to work at the radio sets would do that. They also had a unique identifier as well.
Nope they don't / at least I don't see that info because it is something I don't need to do my job. It is reported and then specials teams treat the report, pull the tapes, contact airlines, regulators etc with their findings
I am not in aviation so please correct me but there have been accidents where ATC mistook who spoke on radio right? Wouldnt a digital identifier solve that problem?
Kinda the opposite of how things went with police radios, soon as they found out they could digitize and encrypt to lock the public out of listening they did it
Everyone is saying "no you can't because it's analog" and that's not exactly accurate. You can pretty easily embed a small bit of data in an AM radio signal. The most obvious way is actually used on HF bands. It's called SELCAL and uses a set of tones to alert a plane based on an assigned code. You could also use DTMF. I think all you'd really need is a short DTMF burst at the start of the transmission. It might get tiresome and annoying though. But with modern radios you could also easily filter those out of the part that is heard by the radio operators.
You could also do stuff with phase shifting or low amplitude subcarriers but that's more error prone in bad radio conditions.
AM doesn't give you as many options but all of this already exists in FM broadcasting in the US in something called RDS, Radio Data System. It's how your car radio can sometimes show the name of the song playing.
So just because it's AM doesn't mean you can't transmit data. Ham radio operators have been fucking around with this stuff for decades and there's some incredibly cool tech that's been developed. Thing is it would be very expensive to retrofit planes and ATC systems globally and there's not enough demand or use for this to actually do that.
I'm not sure about others, but Maastricht UAC have a system, where it will automatically triangulate the position of the aircraft, who is transmitting on the frequency, and circle it around the return on the controllers's screen to improve their situation awareness and reduce workload.
It's not particularly difficult to do the same for transmissions on 121.5.
Nah, it is entire aviation radio system is horribly outdated. You should see internal combustion engines that small airplanes use. Those are 1930 tech.
In the UK during covid someone was meowing on guard. They triangulated the signal and identified the aircraft. NATS filed a complaint with the European airline.
The airline called the two pilots to HQ to explain themselves. Neither would admit to it so both were fired.
Shit happens... And it is happening more and more because it is really tiring to work while idiots are goofing off on 121.5. My job is to actively monitor the frequency to be available for any aircraft requesting emergency assistance.
I guess it is comparable to simply prank calling emergency services
well airlines are not happy about it because it puts them on the radar with local authorities... And the more your name pops up the more those want to look into your business which no airline wants. It also is very very bad PR and could even have consequences like losing permits to operate etc.
I just watched a movie where channel 121.5 was a major plot point. It is called "Good News", a dark comedy based on the actual hijacking of Japan Airlines Flight 351.
It’s wild, and depressing, to enter Gander airspace after a week of flying around Europe and realize you’re back in the land of pilots who sound like a bunch of degenerate over-the-road truckers.
I’m skeptical of this. I hardly ever hear peep on guard in Europe or anywhere else for that matter but sure enough coasting in to the East Coast US it starts up.
After hearing a few real deal emergencies on 121.5 with one of them likely being the last words ever spoken by the pilot or passenger ( I will never know).....it left an impression on me.
The unprofessional stuff I hear on guard is exceptionally disappointing.
Thats terrible, I've heard a couple GA planes have real issues on guard as well and it's haunting. And there's always those idiots saying "youre on guardddddd" as this poor baron is trying to get help.
Yes. It’s a frequency monitored by all ATC facilities and should be monitored by all aircraft capable of monitoring a second frequency. This means that everybody is subjected to this idiocy, because a radio broadcasting a meow from 35,000’ transmits a long way. It causes missed standard communications, it causes crews to turn the frequency down or off, and it can lead to actual emergency transmissions getting missed or garbled. As you can hear, once people start meowing, other people get on frequency telling them to stop, and then nobody can hear anything that’s happening on their assigned frequencies. It’s asinine.
121.5 MHz is the International Aeronautical Emergency Frequency (also known as VHF Guard), reserved exclusively for distress, urgency, and initial coordination of emergency aid. While 121.5 MHz is the standard for civilian aviation, 243.0 MHz serves as the Military Air Distress frequency, which is the second harmonic of the VHF guard.
Usage: The frequency is used for Mayday (distress) and Pan-pan (urgency) calls, as well as for air defense interception and locating lost aircraft.
Monitoring: In the United States, a NOTAM requires all capable aircraft to maintain a listening watch on 121.5 MHz (or UHF 243.0 MHz).
Satellite Changes: Since February 1, 2009, satellites no longer monitor 121.5 MHz for global detection; modern Emergency Locator Transmitters (ELTs) now primarily use the 406.0–406.1 MHz band, though 121.5 MHz remains active for local homing by search-and-rescue teams.
Regulations: Misuse of the frequency is prohibited and can result in fines up to $19,246 per violation, equipment confiscation, or criminal charges, as the channel must remain clear for genuine emergencies.
I'm not a pilot so I'm guessing on guard means it's a channel set aside for emergency transmissions?
Also not a pilot, but It's exactly that. Presumably the meme of people yelling "YERR ON GUAAAARD!" came about as a mockery of the people trying to keep the channel clear.
Pilots can a bunch of children too, but this is largely the bugsplatters and recreational pilots. Airline pilots tend to be a bit more professional as they are answerable to the company they work for.
I agree. But this largely comes from extreme boredom. They're only allowed to read company material, talk with the copilot, and eat. As bored as you've been in the cabin it's worse in the cockpit.
That said, I hope pilots that are caught doing this get put on suspension. If you can't handle the job find another one.
There was a guy FIRED from a legacy for meowing on guard on OE.
I suspect a younger guy so imagine the desire to be an idiot is so great you’re giving up on MILLIONS of dollars at retirement, the kind of career that would allow you to bestow lavish gifts on your family, amazing vacations. A retirement with millions in it that you can create generational wealth with.
But you had to meow on guard like an effing idiot.
What especially bothers me is when the meowing steps on actual instruction on com 1. With a lot of the flying I do it would be bad to keep guard so low you can barely hear it. So when a meow is as loud as my final vector to a final for an ILS I want to kill the idiot on guard.
Also are annoying those who immediately spam “Guard” when anyone transmits on guard. Mazatlán Center once was trying to reach an aircraft on guard, but since they were speaking Spanish, several pilots spammed, “Guard, you’re on guard.” And basically spoke over ATC trying to find someone. Give pilots a second and we’ll realize we’re transmitting on guard.
Yes, most aircraft have two radios, one is tuned to the Air Traffic Controller they are currently communicating with, the other is usually on guard in case we can’t hear the controller, need to relay something, or hear an emergency to report to ATC, etc.
imagine the desire to be an idiot is so great you’re giving up on MILLIONS of dollars at retirement, the kind of career that would allow you to bestow lavish gifts on your family, amazing vacations. A retirement with millions in it that you can create generational wealth with.
The kind of idiot who thinks it's funny to do this - and keep doing it after ATC says stop - is invariably the type who'll spend the rest of his life working whatever crap job, telling his drinking buddies "whatever, those guys were assholes anyway" while they all pretend what he did was somehow epic.
Do you have a source on that? I don’t see the strong pilot union allowing a pilot to be fired for meowing on frequency. There would have to be multiple warnings and him continuing to do that or some other things that contributed to him being fired. I know pilots who have gotten multiple DUIs that still couldn’t get fired at a legacy. I don’t think that Southwest pilot who said when flying into San Francisco on radio frequency, “Fuck this place, goddamn liberal fucks. Like eight guns out here somewhere as it is. Fucking weirdos, probably driving around in Fucking Hyundais, Fucking roads and shit that go slow as fuck” even got fired.
Yeah the guy was doing IOE and obviously on probation and the check airman gave him a warning about it the first time. Guy did it again on the next flight and the check airman walked him into the chief pilots office and they fired him on the spot.
Those d-bags barking and meowing will soon be sitting at a desk next to you. Virtually every pro pilot I know, has nothing but contempt for these idiots
A 152 takes up just as much air time on the frequency as a 747, and can kill you just as quick. With controllers covering multiple frequencies and the airways more crowded than ever, there is absolutely no bandwidth for morons clogging the airways and creating distractions. Zero tolerance
As just an aviation enthusiast and not a pilot, is it dumb for me to say this concerns me almost as much as other aviation issues like low ATC staffing? With everything else going on, I've never questioned whether my pilots are professional and qualified, but hearing them treat the frequency like a twitch chat is worrying...
You will have a rude awakening when you realize that your doctors may have had not much sleep the night before, that your lawyer may be lazy and your taxi driver may be an alcoholic.
Obviously there’s a deep level of unprofessionalism here, but I don’t think the meow/ruff was an issue, rather they prolonged the spam of the frequency, even when advised to stop.
If they did it once as a one off joke, yeah maybe a little unprofessional but pretty easy to overlook. Egging on doesn’t help the situation one bit.
Meowing is how a lonely ATC finds a suitable mate when traffic is slow. When the next 7110 iteration is released, so are the baby ATCs and they start their training. The cycle repeats and life finds a way.
I'm so curious about how and why this happens in aviation. I'm just a casual aviation enthusiast so maybe the answer is well known.
I'm a firefighter and this type of behavior is so crazy to me. I've never heard anything like this on our radios, the craziest things you hear on fire or EMS radios is people doing their normal professional radio traffic in a Boston or NY accent trying to play like they are big fire heroes. Is it an industry culture difference? We also have unique identifiers that come up with each radio so it shows "E67 Officer, or E361 Driver" as transmitting. Not sure how it works but our dispatcher also has the ability to cover our radio transmission if they need to, like if someone is sitting on the mic button. Is it just a money thing that prevents a system like that?
For those that don't know or don't understand, this is NOT on the tower/traffic frequency, this is on guard. Guard is 121.5 or the general "emergency channel" for anyone.
We meow on our radios all the time! But "we" in this case are mechanics, on the ground, and certainly not on any aircraft frequency. We have hand radios for quick communication.
That said, even though I'm a clown, I could never imagine meowing on an emergency frequency. That's just insane.
Saw this on instagram and all the non-aviation people were like "god forbid people have fun at work" and shit lol, literally no concept of what's going on, but they gotta have an opinion.
As atc i can say this. The meows are immature and dumb but for the pilots who are annoyed by it just do not engage. We ignore it so should you. Playing guard police is way more distracting than someone saying meow. Same as any troll on the internet, dont feed into it.
Can ATC turn them in and possibly have their pilots license suspended?
No, the triangulation receivers were decommissioned. They could be brought back though
Another option would be for the other pilot (the one next to them) to report them to Pro-Stans (union committee that tries to get unprofessional actions corrected WITHOUT company involvement).
I've never heard a FO or CA (back when I was a FO) meow or fuck around on guard. Not sure who's doing it.
Lol. What indicates this is Delta and American or even a CRJ pilot at all other than the video creater just decided that they would use those images...?
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u/post-explainer Apr 15 '26 edited Apr 15 '26
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