VE1AB, VA3ABC, VO1ZZ or VY2ZZZ. In the case of states such as Liberia or Panama, which are flags of convenience for ship registration, call signs for larger vessels consist of the national prefix plus three letters (for example, 3LXY, and sometimes followed by a number, i.e. For the UK company, see, Unique designation for a transmitting station, Learn how and when to remove this template message, International Civil Aviation Organization, Australian Communications and Media Authority, "CALL SIGNS/LETTERS - The Museum of Broadcast Communications", "FCC: Wireless Services: Ship Radio Stations: Licensing", United States Call Sign Policies (Early History), United States (FCC) Call Sign Reservation and Authorization System, Internet Radio Uniform Callsign (IRUC) program, Fictional Story About Military Call Signs, Broadcasting undertaking callsigns possibly available for assignment, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Call_sign&oldid=987302733, Articles needing additional references from March 2013, All articles needing additional references, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License. Voluntary ships (mostly pleasure and recreational) are not required to have a radio. Among the more interesting of the research findings was that "higher noise levels do not create confusion, but do intensify those confusions already inherent between the words in question".[30]. Later editions included the Morse code signal as well. [1] Such spelling alphabets are often called "phonetic alphabets", but they are unrelated to phonetic transcription systems such as the International Phonetic Alphabet. One of the firmest conclusions reached was that it was not practical to make an isolated change to clear confusion between one pair of letters. Flag Customs and Procedures, How to Properly Observe Customs and Courtesies in the Air Force, About the Humanitarian Service Medal—Who Receives It and Why, Enlisted Job Information About Navy Ratings, A Look at U.S. Navy Submarine Service, Pay, Charlie Mike (CM) — "Continue mission. [5], Today, the primary purpose of a callbook is to allow amateur radio operators to send a confirmation post card, called a QSL card to an operator with whom they have communicated via radio. [ˈælfa, ˈbraːˈvo, ˈdeltɑ, ɡʌlf, ˈliːmɑ, ˈɔskɑ, siˈerɑ, ˈtænɡo, ˈuːnifɔrm, ˈviktɑ, ˈjænki]. The U.S. adopted the Joint Army/Navy radiotelephony alphabet during 1941 to standardize systems among all branches of its armed forces. Both the meanings of the flags (the letter which they represent) and their names (which make up the phonetic alphabet) were selected by international agreement. Confusion among words like Delta and Extra, and between Nectar and Victor, or the unintelligibility of other words during poor receiving conditions were the main problems. It was defined in one or more of CCBP-1: Combined Amphibious Communications Instructions, CCBP3: Combined Radiotelephone (R/T) Procedure, and CCBP-7: Combined Communication Instructions. [34] Because the ITU governs all international radio communications, it was also adopted by most radio operators, whether military, civilian, or amateur. The International Radiotelephony Spelling Alphabet, commonly known as the NATO phonetic alphabet or the ICAO phonetic alphabet, is the most widely used radiotelephone spelling alphabet.
Beginning in 1922 and for several decades, Canadian radio (and later, TV stations) were assigned call letters (or call signs) beginning with "CF", "CH, "CJ", "CK" or "10", followed by two letters which would be exclusive to one station. port and starboard) in which the first two digits indicate the nominal length of the boat in feet.
Numbers 10–99 are spelled out (that is, 17 is spoken "one seven" and 60 is spoken "six zero"), while for hundreds and thousands the English words hundred and thousand are used. Originally, both ships and broadcast stations were assigned call signs in this series consisting of three or four letters. In military missions, the use of the phonetic alphabet has been used to communicate with the chain of command as to what phase of the mission has been successfully performed. The United States Navy, United States Marine Corps, and United States Coast Guard use a mixture of tactical call signs and international call signs beginning with the letter N. In the British military, tactical voice communications use a system of call signs of the form letter-digit-digit. Written 'nine' in the examples, but pronunciation given as 'niner', CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (, International Civil Aviation Organization, Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials-International, Learn how and when to remove this template message, Alliance for Telecommunications Industry Solutions, International Telecommunication Union, Radio, Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, Allied military phonetic spelling alphabets, "SGM-675-55: Phonetic Alphabet for NATO Use", "ATIS Telecom Glossary (ATIS-0100523.2019)", "Joint Publication 1-02: Department of Defense Dictionary of Military and Associated Terms", "Where does the term "Bravo Zulu" originate? NATO and the U.S. military use the same phonetic alphabet, and it is widely accepted and used in international radio communications on the sea, air, or land. ". List of Military Call Letters and Phonetic Alphabet, Flags and Pennants Used by Navy and Sailing Vessels Worldwide, How the 24-Hour Military Time System Works, Learn About the United States Flag Raising Procedures at Reveille, Air Force Job: 1N2X1 Signals Intelligence Analyst, Military Funeral Honors, Customs, and Traditions, What the Three Bullets Tradition Represents in Military Funerals, List of Strengths for Resumes, Cover Letters and Interviews, Army Job Description for MOS 88K Watercraft Operator, VOR: A Look at the World's Most Reliable Navigation Aid, Retreat Ceremony U.S. Some users believed that they were so severe that they reverted to the old "Able Baker" alphabet. Other words were tested and the most intelligible ones were compared with the more desirable lists. According to a report on the subject: The results showed that many of the words in the military lists had a low level of intelligibility, but that most of the deficiencies could be remedied by the judicious selection of words from the commercial codes and those tested by the laboratory. The phonetic alphabet, or "spelling alphabet", replaces letters and numbers with code words. Originally aviation mobile stations (aircraft) equipped with radiotelegraphy were assigned five-letter call signs (e.g. Stew Smith is the U.S. military expert for The Balance Careers, a Veteran Navy SEAL Officer, and a freelance writer and author. International Civil Aviation Organization. The ITU-R Radiotelephony Alphabet is used by the International Maritime Organization for international marine communications. Evidently a formatting error with the boldface. The resulting alphabet was adopted by the International Commission for Air Navigation, the predecessor of the ICAO, and was used for civil aviation until World War II. In addition, a suffix following the initial call sign can denote a specific individual or grouping within the designated call sign, so F13C would be the Charlie fire team. Currently, all signs in aviation are derived from several different policies, depending upon the type of flight operation and whether or not the caller is in an aircraft or at a ground facility. Merchant and naval vessels are assigned call signs by their national licensing authorities. Because there was only one telegraph line linking all railroad stations, there needed to be a way to address each one when sending a telegram. In most countries, the aircraft call sign or "tail number"/"tail letters" (also known as registration marks) are linked to the international radio call sign allocation table and follow a convention that aircraft radio stations (and, by extension, the aircraft itself) receive call signs consisting of five letters. Furthermore, the pronunciation prescribed for whiskey begins the voiced [w], although some speakers use the voiceless [ʍ] here, particularly in Scotland and Ireland (wine–whine distinction). During the 1946 Second Session of the ICAO Communications Division, the organization adopted the so-called "Able Baker" alphabet[9] that was the 1943 US–UK spelling alphabet. In the United States, voluntary ships operating domestically are not required to have a call sign or license to operate VHF radios, radar or an EPIRB. In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique designation for a transmitter station. Unused suffixes can be used for other call signs that do not fall into the standard call sign matrix, for example the unused 33A call sign is used to refer to the company sergeant major. To change one word involves reconsideration of the whole alphabet to ensure that the change proposed to clear one confusion does not itself introduce others.[2].
To create the alphabet, the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) assigned codewords acrophonically to the letters of the English alphabet, so that letters and numbers would have distinct names that would be most easily understood by those who exchange voice messages by radio or telephone, regardless of language differences or the quality of the communication channel.
The experience gained with that alphabet resulted in several changes being made during 1932 by the ITU.
[12], "Callsign" redirects here. In most countries, unscheduled general aviation flights identify themselves using the call sign corresponding to the aircraft's registration number (also called N-number in the U.S., or tail number). Many mobile telephony systems identify base transceiver stations by implementing cell ID and mobile stations (e.g., phones) by requiring them to authenticate using international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI). Most major airlines use the alphabet to communicate passenger name records (PNRs) internally, and in some cases, with customers. NATO uses the regular English numeric words (Zero, One, with some alternative pronunciations), whereas the ITU (beginning on 1 April 1969)[7] and the IMO define compound numeric words (Nadazero, Unaone, Bissotwo…). Mobile phone services do not use call signs on-air because the phones and their users are not licensed, instead the cell operator is the one holding the license. For example, it is often used in the retail industry where customer or site details are spoken by telephone (to authorize a credit agreement or confirm stock codes), although ad-hoc coding is often used in that instance. In a few instances where none of the 250 words could be regarded as especially satisfactory, it was believed possible to discover suitable replacements. The most well known and used on-line QSL databases include QRZ.COM,[6] IK3QAR,[7] HamCall,[8] F6CYV,[9] DXInfo,[10] OZ7C[11] and QSLInfo. Call signs are allocated with different prefixes depending on the area of the country where the amateur lives when … For instance the message "proceed to map grid DH98" could be transmitted as "proceed to map grid Delta-Hotel-Niner-Ait". However, in the United States a pilot of an aircraft would normally omit saying November, and instead use the name of the aircraft manufacturer or the specific model.