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Inside Listening and Speaking 2 Unit 1 Assessment Audio Script

The document summarizes an audio script about an airplane accident that occurred in 1977 on the Spanish island of Tenerife. Due to foggy conditions and miscommunication between pilots speaking different languages and air traffic control, a KLM Boeing 747 took off from the runway while a Pan Am Boeing 747 was still on it, resulting in a collision that killed over 500 people.

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128 views2 pages

Inside Listening and Speaking 2 Unit 1 Assessment Audio Script

The document summarizes an audio script about an airplane accident that occurred in 1977 on the Spanish island of Tenerife. Due to foggy conditions and miscommunication between pilots speaking different languages and air traffic control, a KLM Boeing 747 took off from the runway while a Pan Am Boeing 747 was still on it, resulting in a collision that killed over 500 people.

Uploaded by

Lâm Duy
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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Inside Listening and Speaking 2

Unit 1 Assessment

AUDIO SCRIPT

[M1: Male Student; F1: Female Student]

M1: Hi, Holly. Have you finished your research for our presentation about the airplane
accident?

F1: Yeah. I thought I would focus on the lessons learned after the accident.

M1: Maybe we should begin with what happened.

F1: That’s a good idea, Ralph. What did you find out?

M1: The accident occurred at 5:06 p.m. on March 27th, 1977 at the airport on the
Spanish island of Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands off the coast of North Africa. On
that morning all planes were told to land at the smaller Tenerife airport instead of the
main airport, Las Palmas which was temporarily closed.

F1: Wait. I think we should project a map of the islands so people can see where the
accident happened. I don’t think many people know where the Canary Islands are.

M1: That’s a great idea, Holly. I’ll make a note to find a good map.

F1: Let’s move on to exactly what happened.

M1: Okay … One of the planes was a Dutch KLM 747. The other plane was an American
Pan-Am 747. While the planes were waiting for the Las Palmas airport to reopen, a
thick fog rolled in and visibility on the runway was poor. When the Las Palmas airport
finally reopened, the planes proceeded to the runway to await instructions to take off.
It was still foggy, so the pilots couldn’t see each other. Since the airport did not have a
ground radar, the only way the air traffic controller knew where the planes were
located was from the pilots’ reports over the radio. As a result of several
misunderstandings, the KLM plane started to take off while the Pan-Am plane was still
on the runway. The KLM plane didn’t leave the runway in time and hit the Pan-Am
plane at over 160 miles per hour. All of the 248 passengers on the KLM plane died, and
348 of the 396 passengers on the Pan-Am plane died—a total of 583 people. It was the
biggest disaster in aviation history. What do you think, Holly?

F1: I think you did a good job, Ralph. Now, I’ll summarize what went wrong and the
lessons learned from the accident.

M1: Okay, go ahead.

F1: Well, a whole sequence of events led to the disaster that day. First, there was the
need to divert all planes to the smaller Tenerife airport. Second, the weather. Heavy fog

© Oxford University Press. Permission granted to reproduce for classroom use. 1


Inside Listening and Speaking 2
Unit 1 Assessment

meant the pilots and the controller couldn’t see each other very well. Third, since there
was no ground radar, the controller depended on the pilots to tell him their location by
radio. Fourth, there was miscommunication because of language differences. The KLM
pilots spoke Dutch, the Pan-Am pilots spoke English, and the controller spoke Spanish.
English is the common working language in the aviation industry, but investigators
believe there was a misunderstanding. The transcript of the conversation revealed that
the KLM pilot had said, “We are now at takeoff,” and the controller had responded,
“Okay.” The KLM pilot may have interpreted “Okay” as an approval for takeoff. After
the disaster, air traffic controllers and pilots must use expressions like Wait for
departure and only use the word takeoff when they are allowed to take off. Also, after
the accident a ground radar was installed at Tenerife airport. So, hopefully a disaster
like this will never happen again. That’s it. I think we’ve covered everything.

M1: Yes, I think so, too.

© Oxford University Press. Permission granted to reproduce for classroom use. 2

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