Part 2: say it on the radio, get it checked item by item
The simulator plays the controller. You choose the frequency, press to talk, and get a breakdown of exactly what was right, what was missing and why it matters.
About the practical test
The practical part assesses spoken radiotelephony: making calls, reading back clearances and handling distress and urgency situations with an examiner. Public reports of the DGCA draft CAR (September 2025) describe a practical of about 30 minutes with a 50% pass mark. These figures are not verified against the final CAR; check the current DGCA notice for the format that applies to you.
Our exam-style runs (six scenarios, a timer per scenario, no hints) are modelled on that publicly described format. They are practice, not a reproduction of the examination.
One turn, start to finish
Fictional aerodrome and frequencies, as in all our scenarios.
- 1. ATC transmits. You hear it in the ICAO pronunciation (“tree”, “fife”, “niner”), or read it if you prefer.
- 2. You reply. Hold the push-to-talk button and speak, or type. You can correct the transcript before it is sent.
- 3. It is checked. Runway 27, Alfa, QNH 1009 and your call sign at the end — each is a separate item with its own weight.
- 4. ATC reacts. Miss a safety-critical item and the controller corrects you, just as on a real frequency.
What is checked
- Call sign
- Present, complete, in the right place, and abbreviated only after ATC has abbreviated it first.
- Station addressed
- Calling the unit you are actually talking to, on that unit's frequency.
- Read-back items
- Runway, heading, level, QNH, frequency, squawk and clearance limits — each checked as a value, not as a word match.
- Phraseology
- Standard words such as WILCO, AFFIRM and REQUEST; non-standard words like “okay” or “yes” are flagged.
- Order
- Where order matters, for example the elements of a MAYDAY message.
- Procedure
- What the situation calls for: holding short, reporting, and MAYDAY preferably spoken three times.
How the score works
Every item has a severity. Safety-critical items (a wrong runway, a missing call sign, an unread altimeter setting) weigh three times a minor item. A turn passes at 75% with no critical item missed.
You get up to three tries per transmission, and each retry costs 10% of that turn. Transmitting on the wrong frequency costs two points from the scenario. After the last try the simulator shows an example transmission and moves on; the turn counts as not passed.
Values are compared, not spellings: “runway two seven” and “runway 27”, or “QNH one zero zero niner” and “QNH 1009”, are the same item. Each scenario lists accepted alternative wordings for its phrases, and the example answers are illustrations rather than the only correct wording.
When we are not sure, we say so
Speech recognition makes mistakes. If the recogniser reports low confidence, a value was matched approximately, or a critical item is missing from a voice transcript, the result is marked uncertain and you can check the transcript, edit it, or say it again. Scores are practice feedback from our scenarios, not a prediction of an examiner’s decision.
Your microphone and your data
Voice recognition uses your browser’s built-in speech service. In Chrome and Edge that service is run by the browser vendor, which processes the audio to return text; we receive only the text. We never upload or store recordings. An optional replay of your own last transmission stays in your browser’s memory and is discarded when you leave the page. Details are in the privacy policy. If voice is unavailable or you prefer not to use it, every scenario works by typing.
SkyRT Academy is an independent training platform. It is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or acting on behalf of the DGCA, the Department of Telecommunications or ICAO.