24 March 2009

"Leeroy Jenkins, this is tower speaking"

Okay, a feature that kind of annoyed me in the Black Hawk (this should be a weekly series, as there are many things to annoy one) is the fact that the helmet microphones are not voice operated. Rather, in order to talk to the crew, you have to click a microphone switch, and the selector knob on the transmitter has to be set to "intercom". If it's not, you wind up transmitting out of the cockpit.

Which has led more than one aviator into a trouble spot. See, there's this guy I know (awesome dude) that likes to say, upon taking off, "All right, chaps, let's do this... LEEEEEROOOOY JEEEENNKKINSS!!!"

Only this one time, this really awesome dude had his selector switch on the air traffic control frequency at the time. Good thing I, erm, the guy just shut up when the tower asked who it was.

So please, Sikorsky, install a voice-activated intercom system (ICS). Please....

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