Pilots communicating with passengers in diff. languages?

Question

If a pilot is able to speak a few different languages, do they or are they allowed to make announcements to passengers in the different languages? And I am talking about when the majority of passengers speak those languages. I don't mean something like making announcements in French for a domestic flight within India.

Yes I'm totally aware that English is the language that is used in aviation, but my question is are pilots allowed to or do pilots often communicate with PASSENGERS in a different language. Not all passengers understand English and if the pilot is able to speak another language, passengers can know about the flight info and can receive the pilot's welcome aboard message? Some pilots like to communicate with passengers more instead of letting the flight attendants make all the announcements right?

Answer 1

The correct answer to your question is YES! Pilots/First Officers are allowed to make announcements to the passengers in languages other than English, although not all are multilingual. In this day and age most passengers speak some english but the pilots of INTERNATIONAL flights to/from foreign countries MAY repeat the announcement in the language of the country in which that airline is based out of courtesy to a majority of non english speaking passengers or if it is warranted by safety concerns.

Now that was easy, wasn't it.

Answer 2

There is no regulation about what language is used inside of an aircraft. The regulation only provides what must be told to the passengers. Normally, since English is the international language, all safety announcements are made in English as well as the home country of the airline, or the language of the majority of the passengers.

I have been on airlines where everything spoken was in the language of the airline (Russian, on a flight within Russia) and on many many flights where everything is said in English.

But as a pilot myself, there is no regulation about what language to use inside the aircraft. That is upto the airline and the pilot. And this is even though ALL crewmembers must speak english to different proficiencies based on their jobs.

Answer 3

Pilots usually make announcement on english (every time) and on the airlines homelanguage (like swedish on a swedish airline) or any language that both the pilot and the majourity of the passanger talks (like swedish when departing from sweden if the pilot talk swedish). Hope it helps! Johan

Answer 4

Look i am from greece..Flying within greece the communications with the atc are made in english but captain adn first pilot communicate in greek..Langauge used for communication with the passengers and the crew is greek..But in summer a lot of pilots speek also in english to the passengers..(Thats because there are a lot of turists..)But usually it doens't happen..They communicate in their native langauge...
But for international flghts..they "have " to speak greek-english and the langauge spoken in the country of departure or arrival..For example-Flight 507 to munich from athens--Pilot speaks first greek then english and then german (if he can speak german)...
(For the anouncements and safety instructions pre-recorded tapes are used))

Answer 5

ENGLISH IS THE INTERNATIONAL LANGUAGE IN AVIATION!!
HOW MANY WAYS ARE YOU GOING TO HAVE TO BE TOLD THIS?????

Answer 6

What's your question, exactly?