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The suffix "super" is used for the Airbus A380.
For air ambulance services or other flights involving the safety of life (such as
aircraft carrying a person who has suffered a heart attack), "lifeguard" is added
to the call sign.
For flights in which life is not in direct danger (such as transporting organs for
transplant), the call sign prefix "Pan-Pan-Medical" is used before the normal
call sign, e.g. Pan-Pan-Medical Three-Three-Alpha, Pan-Pan-Medical Northwest Four-Five-
Eight, or Pan-Pan-Medical Singapore Niner-Two-Three. Pan Pan (pronounced "pahn-pahn") is
the voice radio signal for "urgent", while Mayday is the voice radio signal for "distress".
The word may be omitted for air ambulance services with assigned call signs, especially when
they have notified air traffic control operators that they are on an air ambulance mission at the
beginning of their flight and do not change from one controller to another.
The Life Flight air ambulance service, for example, might simply identify as Life-Flight Three.
An aircraft that has declared an in-flight emergency will sometimes prefix the word Mayday to
its call sign.
Formerly one of the rarest call signs, "Concorde", was once used to identify British Airways
Concorde aircraft.
The intent of this call sign was to raise the air traffic control operators' awareness of the
unique performance of the aircraft and the special attention it required.
The call sign was appended to British Airways' normal radio call sign, e.g. "Speedbird-
Concorde One”.
In normal service, Air France did not use it at all; its Concorde flights simply used the standard
Airfrans call sign.
A - Z of Flight
June 2017
www.alliance-airways.net
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