Vital Role in World Airline Industry

Telecommunications play a vital part in the world airline industry where there is a need for speedy
contact over long distances, and where the sheer size of the number of people and freight being carried today
would overwhelm systems lacking the most modern technology.
Most of the world's airlines have highly advanced systems, although some of them have tended to be
outpaced by the explosive growth enjoyed by the industry over the past decade, particularly in areas such as the
Middle East, parts of Africa, and the Far East. Estimates made at the beginning of the 1970s of the number of
messages which would be passed by 1980 proved in most cases to be far too low, with the result that there was
a scramble during the late 1970s for new equipment.
But while the equipment is available, the highly skilled manpower needed to operate it and to service it
remains scarce for the airlines which have to compete with the many other users of advanced
telecommunications. Most of the bigger airlines now have their own training schools, while the smaller ones
send their trainees to schools such as that operated by International Aeradio at Bath. There is still a residual
glamour about working for an airline for some recruits, and the prospect of cheap staff travel also attracts
people.
Airline communications break down into four main sections: radio, teletype, telephone and data
processing. Radio is used for passing messages between ground and the airliners, although in remote parts of
the world it may also be used for messages between various bases. Each operator will have a selective call band
over which it can pass company messages to its crews in flight wherever they are.
Routine low-speed internal company messages generally come over the company teletype system, but in
most airlines they have reached such large numbers that they are distributed by computer.
SITA, the international airlines communications consortium, and a similar organization in the United
States, play a major part in this vast message-passing operation. Saudia, the national airline of Saudi Arabia, a
medium-sized operator, passes, for instance, 30,000 routine low-speed messages every 24 hours, rising to
40,000 in 24 hours at the peak travel season.
It is in the area of data communications that telecommunications have had, and will continue to have,
the greatest impact on the airline industry, however. To take the case of Saudia again, the airline is to install its
own in-house computer in 1982, but in the meantime "piggybacks" on the British Airways computer at West
London air terminal 3,000 miles away for its reservations, and on the Alitalia computer in Rome for its
engineering inventory.
The link with the BA computer BABS in London is achieved by way of land lines in both Saudi Arabia
and Britain and in between by satellite, one over the Indian Ocean, the other over the Atlantic. Reservations
clerks in Jiddah can interrogate BABS by way of their keyboards and have the answer back on their video
screens in the amazingly short time of two seconds.
When Saudia installs its own computer, it will cope not only with reservations and the engineering
inventory at present carried in Rome, but such extra tasks as payroll, finance, flight-crew scheduling, and flight
operations rosters.
Modern telecommunications help Saudia to answer up to 7,000 calls a day at its Jiddah office alone, 90
per cent of them being replied to within 20 seconds against an airline industry average of 80 per cent.
Computer and telecommunications sharing is common in the airline industry. British Airways' BABS, in
fact, holds the schedules for 70 airlines, in addition to its own, and also provides the airline with facilities for
payroll calculations, pensions, accounting, statistics, cost control, component control, flight planning and in-
flight data analysis.
 The system uses a vast network of communications links around the world consisting of more than 50
computers linked to 3,500 visual display units and 1,000 teleprinters in 650 cities. The network extends from
Oslo and Helsinki in the north to Cape Town and Christchurch in the south, and east to west from Tokyo and
Auckland to Los Angeles. BA has worked out that BABS represented 800 man-years to establish.
The system is equipped with four million characters of high-speed memory and more than 4,200 million
characters of backing storage. BABS holds details of every flight for a year ahead and full booking details for
some 15 million passengers a year.
The airline's offices, and those of many others, have access to the BABS system through a worldwide
communications network of satellite, cable and microwave links operating at speeds of up to 9,600 bits per
second.
Offices in such faraway places as Australia and South Africa receive replies to booking requests in two
or three seconds. The computers in London handle such inquiries at the rate of 60 per second at peak times, and
in total the system handles more than 1,250,000 messages every day. BA offices around the world can also
make hotel reservations for passengers through BABS and can ask it for package-tour bookings and fares
quotations. Later this year, each office with a computer terminal will be able to use the computer in London for
the construction of fares, in the past a laborious and time-consuming task with enormous possibilities for error
and therefore, loss of revenue for the airlines.

Lexical Pronunc Translation/

Collocations Example Word family
item iation Definition
sheer (a) /ʃɪr/ (of size or The sheer size of The sheer size of the sheerly
weight) very engine makes it difficult to
large transport.
overwhel /ˌəʊvə to be too to completely, The number of refugees overwhelming
m (v) ˈwelm/ much to deal totally, almost, overwhelmed the relief
with suddenly overwhelm agencies in the area.
outpace /ˌaʊt to grow or to outpace demand/ State forecasts show that
(v) ˈpeɪs/ develop more supply/ inflation demand for water will
quickly than be outpaced by sb/ outpace supply by 2030.
something sth
else
be far too used to The proposed budget for
low describe an education is far too low to
amount that is address the needs of our
much lower schools and students.
than what is
expected or The salary offer for the
desired. used position was far too low,
when considering the level of
expressing experience and expertise
dissatisfaction required.
or concern
about the
value being
discussed and
implies that
an increase or
 improvement
is necessary.
scramble / a hurried a scramble for After the death of the scrambling
(n) ˈskræmbl attempt to get dictator there was an scrambler
/ something unseemly scramble for
power among the generals.
manpower / the supply of trained/skilled The industry has suffered
(n) ˈmænpaʊ people who manpower, from a lack of manpower.
ər/ are able to manpower shortage,
work manpower planning
scarce (a) not easy to scarce resources Food and clean water were scarceness
find or get becoming scarce. scarcely
residual remaining residual benefits I still felt some residual residually
(a) after most of bitterness ten years after
something my divorce.
has gone
glamour the special Hollywood glamour The downhill race was one glamourous
(n) exciting and of the glamour events of glamourously
attractive the Winter Olympics. glamourize
quality of a
person, place,
or activity
recruit (n) a new Raw recruits About 14% of new recruits recruital
member of an are from ethnic minorities. recruitment
organization,
especially the
army
consortiu an form a consortium, The Severn Tidal Power
m (n) organization consortium of Group is a consortium of
of several big construction and
businesses or electrical companies.
banks joining
together as a
group for a
shared
purpose
piggyback to use piggyback on/ off/ The mobile phone
(v) something onto sth company managed to
that already break into European
exists or has markets by piggybacking
already been off existing networks.
done
successfully
to do
something
else quickly
or effectively
inventory the amount of a big/ large/ low About half of the shop's
(n) goods a store inventory inventory was damaged in
 or business the tornado.
has for sale at
a particular
time, or their
value
payroll (n) a list of the a payroll tax The company is growing payrolling
people fast, adding another 100 payrolled
employed by employees to its payroll
a company over the last year.
showing how
much each
one earns
roster (n) a list of duty roster If you look on the duty
people's roster, you'll see when
names, often you're working.
with the jobs
they have
been given to
do
pension an amount of a government They receive a generous pensionable
(n) money paid pension pension, typically 75% of
regularly by a state pension, last pay drawn.
the comfortable/ decent/
government generous pension, Her new job offers a
or a private pension plan/ company pension scheme.
company to a scheme
person who
does not work
any more
because they
are too old or
have become
ill
man-year a unit of the But before the advent of
(n) work done by data-processing capacity,
one person in the actual analyses would
a year have taken man-years of
composed of clerical toil to complete.
a standard
number of The project will take five
working days man-years to complete.
fare (n) the money bus/train/rail, etc. Train fares are going up
that you pay fare again.
for a journey plane/air fare
full fare
in a vehicle
such as a bus a one-way/round trip
or train fare
a single/return fare
quotation the price that fares quotation We decided to go with the
(n) a person or lowest quotation.
company says
they will
charge to do a
piece of work
teletype a printing The teletype is ticking out
(n) device messages.
resembling a
typewriter The teletype machine
that is used to looks like an electric
send and typewriter.
receive
telephonic
signals
teleprinter a type of The ideal arrangement is
(n) electric to have a teleprinter
printer used communicating between
in the past for the two rooms.
sending and
receiving A teleprinter is really a
messages machine which sends a
down a phone typewriter message over a
line telegraph circuit.