I'm based in Italy and fly only within europe. All countries seem to have there own little procedures even though it is getting better all the time.
Some phrases that i hear all the time in Italy;
"via alpha line up and cleared for takeoff"
"quebec november hotel 1028" for qnh
"descend zero niner zero level" instead of descend flight level 90
For taxi clearances in europe you would get either taxi to holding point rwy xx or taxi to holding position rwy xx. If you are used to US phraseology the latter can be mistaken for a line up clearance.
Another problem in europe is communication in the native language. The worst place is France where all the french airlines including air france refuse to speak anything other than french. I think that is totally unacceptable from a safety point of view. All other major airlines in europe stick to english though, even alitalia (except for when they ask for short cuts and better flight levels).
I flew with a captain a few months back who speaks french. Flying into paris he heard an air france flight busting an altitude, which if it would have been a non french airline would have been a big deal, the controller however didnt care much about it, but just cleared the aircraft back up to its original cleared altitude.
Some phrases that i hear all the time in Italy;
"via alpha line up and cleared for takeoff"
"quebec november hotel 1028" for qnh
"descend zero niner zero level" instead of descend flight level 90
For taxi clearances in europe you would get either taxi to holding point rwy xx or taxi to holding position rwy xx. If you are used to US phraseology the latter can be mistaken for a line up clearance.
Another problem in europe is communication in the native language. The worst place is France where all the french airlines including air france refuse to speak anything other than french. I think that is totally unacceptable from a safety point of view. All other major airlines in europe stick to english though, even alitalia (except for when they ask for short cuts and better flight levels).
I flew with a captain a few months back who speaks french. Flying into paris he heard an air france flight busting an altitude, which if it would have been a non french airline would have been a big deal, the controller however didnt care much about it, but just cleared the aircraft back up to its original cleared altitude.
