Airlines sometimes choose a very unusual call sign for their pilots to use when communicating with Air Traffic Control. This is a unique word or couple of words to let other pilots know which airline to look out for in the sky.
Passengers would never really know about this as it is not something relevant to them. When looking into it though, some of these are very interesting.
A Standard Call Sign Is King
Most airlines use a pretty standard call sign. For example, American Airlines use the word American, Air Canada use Air Canada, Air India use Air India, Alaska Airlines use Alaska and Avianca use Avianca. You can see where this is going so I won’t go on.
Unusual Call Signs
Sometimes a call sign is related to another aspect of the airline or its branding. This is why you get something like Shamrock for Aer Lingus thanks it appearing on their aircraft tails or Speedbird for British Airways.
Call Sign List
The call signs below are the most unusual as there seems to be no relation whatsoever between the airline name and the call sign. I can work out some but others are just baffling.
Africa World Airlines – Blackstar – a reader advises in the comments at the bottom, “The symbol of Ghana is a black star.”
Airnorth – Topend – flying at the top end of Australia.
Air Guyane Express – Green Bird.
Atlas Air – Giant.
BA CityFlyer – Flyer – makes sense!
BMI Regional – Midland – BMI used to stand for British Midland.
Canadian North – Empress – a reader advises, “Canadian Pacific used Empress, and tended to name their planes ‘Empress of [wherever].’ Canadian North began life as the subsidiary of CP’s successor Canadian Airlines and inherited the old CP callsign.”
China Airlines – Dynasty.
Comair – Commercial.
easyJet Switzerland – TopSwiss.
First Choice Airways – Jetset.
Flybe – Jersey – a reader advises, “Flybe was at one point Jersey European Airways.”
Hong Kong Airlines – Bauhinia – a reader advises, “The bauhinia is an orchid which is used as the emblem of Hong Kong.” There you go!
IndiGo Airlines – IFly.
A Few More
Kalitta Air – Connie – a reader advises, “Conrad ‘Connie’ Kalitta owns Kalitta Air”. Mystery solved!
Lufthansa CityLine – Hansaline – a reader advises, “Apart from it being a mix of Lufthansa and Cityline, the Hansaline was I think the name of a shipping line that emerged from the Hanseatic League, a powerful shipping and trading alliance in the North and Baltic seas. Lufthansa itself was named as such because it was a “Luft Hansa”, literally an Air Hansa, or a Hanseatic League of the air.”
JetStar Japan – Orange Liner – Jetstar’s colours are orange.
Neos – Moonflower.
Norwegian (Long Haul) – Norstar.
St Barth Commuter – Black Fin – no, they don’t have black fins, I checked!
Thomas Cook Airlines – Kestrel.
Titan Airways – Zap.
Trans States Airlines – Waterski – a reader advises, “From their original mission: bringing people to Lake of the Ozarks, MO – most likely to enjoy water-skiing and other aquatic activities!”
Virgin Australia – Velocity – the name of their Frequent Flyer programme.
Virgin America – Redwood – a reader in advises, “for the Redwood pine trees in Northern California where San Francisco is located.”
Quite a mixed bunch of call signs there. It would be interesting to know the background to some of them. Happily, as you can see, some of my generous readers have contributed to the story, which is wonderful.
Call Signs From The Past
Perhaps one of the most famous call signs is the one for Pan Am. This was Clipper and all their aircraft names also featured the word, so it was quite common. Continental Micronesia had Air Mike for theirs which was a short version of Micronesia and a common nickname for the airline.
Overall Thoughts
It is interesting to see some variation from the standard call sign. Whether this is a good thing or a bad thing is neither here nor there but it does show a bit of creativity which is never a bad thing.
Do any of you know the reasons behind any of the call signs above? I’d love to hear about them if you know. Thank you for reading and if you have any comments or questions, please leave them below.
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Featured image by Mark Brouwer and Air Florida image by Peter Duijnmayer.
Pan Am image via panam.org. All other images via Wikimedia Commons.
A few comments to clarify.
1) Africa World Airlines indeed chose “Blackstar” because that is the national symbol of Ghana. I was the person who came up with the idea of using that name and the rest of our certification team there concurred. 🙂
2) The allocation of Radio Telephony callsigns is done by ICAO on the request of the competent authority in a member state (usually the CAA or equivalent) as per criteria set out in ICAO Document 8585. The criteria are reproduced from Document 8585 as below :
a) the telephony designator chosen should attempt to resemble the name of the aircraft operating agency or its function and be distinct and dissimilar from any other telephony designators in Doc 8585. Ideally it should reflect correlation between the three letter designator, the telephony designator and the name of the aircraft operating agency or its function (examples: ARO – ARROW – Arrow Aviation; RAJ – RAJI – Raji Airlines);
b) in order to reduce the length of transmission the telephony designator should be brief, comprising if possible one word of two or three syllables. It should not exceed two words;
c) three letter designators may not be used in phonetic form as telephony designators. However, telephony designators of long standing (such as KLM or TWA) may be retained, provided that an acceptable alphabetic representation is used (example: KAY ELL EMM); and
d) the telephony designator should be easily and phonetically pronounceable in at least one of the following languages: English, French, Russian, Spanish.
3) You would be surprised how difficult it is to find an appropriate RT designator nowadays and get it approved. The most recent RT designator I had allocated (a few months ago), we had to go through SIX different iterations and combinations of 3-letter code and RT designator before it was accepted. It’s no longer as simple as it was just a few years ago, let alone in the old days where pretty much anything you wanted was available for assignment.
Sean, you win comment of 2017 with that bad boy! That is really interesting information you’ve provided there. I’m currently studying my MSc in Air Transport Management and we have been becoming familiar with the various ICAO and IATA documents among other things. We certainly hadn’t gone over this one yet, so I am delighted you took the time to provide it here!
Great to know the information about Blackstar was correct and even better to hear from the person who suggested it.
I guess it’s all about keeping everything to some kind of standard, even if it does cause a bit of behind the scenes pain. Six different iterations sounds like a bit of a nightmare – glad to hear you got there in the end though.
Thanks again for all of that, I truly appreciate it!
Canadian Pacific used Empress, and tended to name their planes “Empress of [wherever].” Canada North began life as the subsidiary of CP successor Canadian established to serve the north, and got the old CP callsign (Canadian used the uninventive “Canadian” callsign).
Great information there! Thanks so much for sharing that, I’ll update that information into the post. I think Empress sounds really classy.
I have visions of China Airlines with a Joan Collins image on the tail….
Hahahaha! Now that’s funny… I don’t think so though! 🙂 Be fun to see, however!
Flybe was at one point Jersey European Airways.
Africa World Airlines is Ghanaian. The symbol of Ghana is the black star (see national teams like football and the Olympics)
Nice, I didn’t know Flybe had a different name in the past. I had a feeling it was related to Jersey in the Channel Islands somehow, so I guess it all makes sense. Nice one regarding Africa World Airlines as well. I’ll update the post to reflect all this – thanks for taking the time to help me out! Appreciate it!
Virgin America uses Redwood for their call sign. It comes from them being a San Francisco based airline. Once the merger is complete I’m sure they’ll use the Alaska call sign.
Oh, I didn’t know that. I’ll have to add it to the list – pretty cool. I guess it works in as a double meaning due to the red in their colours too. Thanks for that!
I should actually clarify my comment. The Redwood call sign is for the Redwood pine trees located in Northern California where San Francisco is located.
Even better, thanks very much!
Chautauqua Airlines was a good one too
Yes indeed!
The bauhinia is an orchid which is used as the emblem of Hong Kong. A stylised one is the icon that appears on the Hong Kong flag and in government logos and stuff.
And apart from it being a mix of Lufthansa and Cityline, the Hansaline was I think the name of a shipping line that emerged from the Hanseatic League, a powerful shipping and trading alliance in the north and baltic seas. Lufthansa itself was named as such because it was a “Luft Hansa”, literally an Air Hansa, or a Hanseatic League of the air.
I always love learning new things, so thanks very much for that. I know exactly what the bauhinia is from seeing it but I never knew its name.
Nice info on Lufthansa too – also something I didn’t know. Really appreciate you taking the time to comment and inform! Good stuff!
Trans States gets theirs from their original mission: bringing people to Lake of the Ozarks, MO — most likely to enjoy water-skiing and other aquatic activities!
Excellent, I had no idea and thought it one of the strangest choices of all. Thanks for taking the time to let me know – one less mystery for me to solve!
Conrad “Connie” Kalitta owns Kalitta Air. That one’s free; most of the others are easy to look up.
Thanks for taking the time to let me know. I had no idea – appreciate it!