Invasion of the Hectopascals

[Speke-EZY]

So it's official!

At first I thought it was just Liverpool ATC having a joke,but no such plausible explanation. Everyone else is doing it!

Millibars are no more...the QNH is now given in Hectopascals.

They sound like something I used to be issued with to suck for a sore throat which wasn't deemed serious enough to keep me off school.

The actual numerical value seems to be exactly the same as before.

Which does beg the question...WHY? What does this achieve?

Perhaps the ICAO have moved to Brussels or Strasbourg.

Let's have altitude in fathoms or leagues (on the QNH of 998 ectoplasms...whatever!)

[coaxingtin]

Afraid so. It's been pending for a while as most, if not all, of Europe uses the ICAO term. The numerical values are exactly the same, only the terminology has changed. Meanwhile, the USA (and others) soldier on with Inches of Mercury!

[Speke-EZY]

Hopefully,the barometric pressure will remain above 1000 "megapixels" most of the time,so nobody will have to bother saying it very often...this also makes the weather nicer! :-)

[Speke-EZY]

Apart from being just damn difficult to remember,let alone pronounce (and probably impossible for a Frenchman to say) this ridiculous change-for-change's-sake imposes an unnecessary extra syllable into the already crowded dialogue between controllers and aircrew. Most pilots refuse to read back "hectopascals" and simply quote the QNH in numbers. Good for them! If anyone out there works in the industry may I suggest you lobby your company for a switch back to the perfectly sensible and much more user-friendly millibars. Lets get this bureaucratic crap out of aviation!

Have a nice flight!