Activities

Reading comprehension

The objective of this activity is to get specific information from a text about airport codes written in standard language and also to write the answers by using the appropriate structure.

Read the following text and then answer the comprehension questions below with complete sentences.

Airport codes

All airports have an airport location identifier, commonly known as airport code, which is often, but not always, the abbreviated form of the common name of the airport.

The origin of airport and location codes –which can be quite confusing– can be traced to the National Weather Service (NWS) in the early years of the 20th century. The NWS used to tabulate data for cities and gave each one a two-letter identifier. So, when air travel exploded, existing airports put an X at the end of their identifier, hence LAX for Los Angeles International Airport. A government official then drafted the three-letter system we have in place today, which effectively produces 17,576 different combinations. This has further evolved to include four-digit identifiers with numbers in the code.

The International Air Transport Association (IATA), the International Civil Aviation Authority (ICAA), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) and the International Organization for Standardization (IOS) are collectively responsible for assigning these codes, of which there are a few main types:

  • Airline Codes (e.g., DL is the IATA’s code for Delta).
  • Airport Codes (e.g., ORD is the IATA code for Chicago O’Hare).
  • Aircraft Codes (e.g., 320 is the IATA code for the Airbus A320).
  • Country Codes (e.g., US is the IOS country code for the United States).
  • Location Codes (e.g., GVA is the IATA code for Geneva; locations can also include bus stations, ferry ports, heliports and metropolitan areas, to name a few).

Airports are uniquely represented by their IATA airport code and ICAO airport code.

The assignment of a three-letter alphabetic code is governed by the International Air Transport Association (IATA) Resolution 767, and it is administered by IATA headquarters in Montreal. The codes are published biannually in the IATA Airline Coding Directory.

Many codes are simply the first three letters of the city name. The codes are not quite unique: 323 of the 17,576 possible codes are used by more than one airport.

IATA codes are an integral part of the travel industry, and are essential for the identification of an airline or a logistics company, its destinations and its traffic documents. They are also fundamental to the smooth running of hundreds of electronic applications which have been built around these coding systems for passenger and cargo traffic purposes.

While the IATA codes are the most familiar airport codes, the 4-letter International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) airport codes are also common. The ICAO airport code is a four-letter alphanumeric code designating each airport in the world.

These codes are defined by the International Civil Aviation Organization and are used by air traffic control and airline operations such as flight planning. They are not the same as the IATA codes which are used for airline timetables, reservations, and luggage handling. ICAO codes are also used to identify weather stations, whether or not they are located at airports.

Unlike the IATA codes, the ICAO codes have a regional structure. In general, the first letter is allocated by continent and represents a country or group of the ICAO flag countries within that continent. The second letter generally represents a country within that region, and the remaining two are used to identify each airport. The exceptions to this rule are larger countries that have single-letter country codes, where the remaining three letters identify the airport.

In the United States and Canada, most airports which have been assigned three-letter IATA codes use the same code with leading “K” or “C” as their ICAO code; e.g., YYC (Calgary International Airport, Calgary, Alberta) and CYYC, IAD (Dulles International Airport, Chantilly, Virginia) and KIAD.

Comprehension questions:

  1. How are airports identified?
  2. When did the airport codes originate?
  3. What types of airport codes are there?
  4. What are the differences between the IATA and the ICAO codes?
  5. What other facilities are identified with ICAO codes, apart from airports?
  6. Why are IATA codes important, according to the text?

Suggested answers:

  1. Airports are usually identified with an airport location identifier, which is usually the abbreviated form of the name of the airport.
  2. Airport codes originated in the early years of the 20th century.
  3. There are two types: the IATA and the ICAO codes.
  4. The IATA codes have three letters and the ICAO codes have four letters. On the other hand, IATA codes are used by air traffic control and airline operations such as flight planning, whereas ICAO codes are used for airline timetables, reservations and luggage handling. Moreover, unlike the IATA codes, the ICAO codes have a regional structure.
  5. Apart from airports, ICAO codes also identify weather stations.
  6. According to the text, IATA codes are important to identify an airline or a logistics company, its destinations and its traffic documents. On the other hand, they are also important to run the electronic applications for passengers and cargo traffic purposes.

Listening comprehension

The objective of this activity is to practise the listening skills in order to understand the most important information in an oral text about airline tickets.

Download and listen to the text. Then answer the comprehension questions below.

Airline tickets ( 711.5 KB )

Comprehension questions:

  1. How would you describe an airline ticket?
  2. What is the common shape of a boarding pass?
  3. Which are the functions of the airline employee at the gate door?
  4. When does the stub have a notation such as “CHECK IN REQUIRED”?
  5. Why are travellers advised to get to the airport at least 45 minutes to an hour prior to departure time?

Suggested answers:

  1. It looks like a booklet with long, narrow leaves printed on heavy stock paper.
  2. It is usually a printed card perforated about two inches from the end.
  3. He/She has to detach the main part of the boarding pass from each passenger’s ticket and keep it.
  4. When the system cannot pre-reserve a seat, or exit row seating was requested, or, in the case of tickets bought more than one month prior to the flight.
  5. In the event of a heavily booked flight, getting there early increases the chance of being able to get a seat.

Transcription:

Your airline ticket and boarding pass

When you get your online ticket from your travel agents or from the airline, it would look like a booklet with long, narrow leaves printed on heavy stock paper. Each of these cards is devoted to one flight segment of your trip. The last card is your receipt. The receipt is what you would typically give to your employer if you would travel on an expensive account.

When you get your ticket, you should check to see that there is one card for each flight segment. This card is your boarding pass, which you will need to present to get on the plane. The form of the boarding pass varies from airline to airline, but a common method is to print it on a card perforated about two inches from the end.

As the passengers are standing in line waiting to get on the airplane, there is an airline employee at the gate door who detaches the main part of the boarding pass from each passenger’s ticket and keeps it. You will be left with the small stub. Keep it! It’s important.

In some cases, the ticket will not have the boarding pass, even for domestic flights. If for some reason the assistant cannot pre-reserve a seat or exit row sitting was requested or in the case of tickets bought more than one month prior to the flight, the airline will not issue a boarding pass that far in advance. To most airlines, the stub that would be the boarding pass, will have a notation such as: check-in required.

The traveller should look for this notation and if it is found, the traveller should check-in at the podium to have a boarding pass issued. If multiple segments have ‘check-in required’, all the boarding passes should be able to be issued at the same time at the first check-in point unless the flight note for one or more segments is particularly heavy and seat assignments have not been given out for them.

The traveller is advised to get to the airport at least 45 minutes to an hour prior to departure time to take care of this, not necessarily because it takes that long, but in the event of a heavily-booked flight, getting there early increases the chance of being able to get a seat. Inexperienced travellers should also be made aware that in some cases the boarding pass is a separate ticket-like item that may be stapled to the actual ticket.

Irregular forms in the past participle

The goal of this exercise is to review the irregular forms of the past participle.

On a piece of paper, write the following irregular verbs in their past participle form:

  1. go
  2. be
  3. have
  4. do
  5. speak
  6. buy
  7. think
  8. find
  9. break
  10. see
  11. hear
  12. put

  1. gone
  2. been
  3. had
  4. done
  5. spoken
  6. bought
  7. thought
  8. found
  9. broken
  10. seen
  11. heard
  12. put

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