mSparks43
commented
5 years ago Yes, I dont have a (good) list of airport callsigns.
current method is a file containing airport callsigns, currently with one entry "EGLL","Heathrow" Which would otherwise just be "London"...
I Just added "KSFO","San Francisco" "KSJC","San Jose"
Which I'll check with the next AI server update, feel free to drop any more ICAOs you find like this in this issue, I'm expecting to start on some of the more gritty airport comms detail at the start of May.
It seems as though when dealing with locale names, only the first word of the name is being used-- likely intentionally and likely for the sake of brevity. ie: "San Francisco International Ground" becomes "San Ground." Problems arise when you have multiple similarly named entities in the same area.
The best example of this I've found so far, is the SF Bay Area [KSFO/KSJC/KOAK] in which numerous airports in the area start with "San." However, everybody on the radio says "San ground", "San radar" etc. and it is very unclear who is taking to who about where.
I can see why this would be a problem as there probably isn't a very good algorithmic way of determining how many words are used as an identifier. Some of the time it isn't so bad, as you are on SF Ground or SF Tower and it can be assumed-- but if things proceed in a realistic manner and you are handed off to NORCAL and then Oakland Center... it would get fuzzy very quickly as the Center frequencies continue to refer to everything a "San x".