MAYDAY or PAN PAN: distress, urgency and priority
Two words, two meanings, and the exam wants the exact boundary between them. Distress needs immediate assistance. Urgency does not. Around that boundary there are a handful of fixed phrases, and a priority list that decides whose message is handled first.
Distress and urgency
| MAYDAY (distress) | PAN PAN (urgency) | |
|---|---|---|
| Condition | Threatened by grave and/or imminent danger and requiring immediate assistance | A condition concerning the safety of an aircraft or other vehicle, or of a person on board or in sight, which does not require immediate assistance |
| Signal | MAYDAY, spoken three times | PAN PAN, spoken three times |
| Priority | Highest | Second |
Making the call
- Use the frequency in use. You do not need to change to another frequency to make the first call.
- Start with the signal three times: MAYDAY MAYDAY MAYDAY or PAN PAN, PAN PAN, PAN PAN.
- Then, when time permits, the name of the station addressed, your identification, the nature of the emergency, your intentions, and your position, level and heading.
Fixed phrases
| Situation | Say |
|---|---|
| A protected medical transport | PAN PAN MEDICAL |
| A station passes on a distress message for another aircraft | MAYDAY RELAY |
| The controlling station imposes silence on all other stations | STOP TRANSMITTING – MAYDAY |
| The distress traffic is over | DISTRESS TRAFFIC ENDED |
Message priorities
Annex 10 ranks aeronautical messages in six categories. In order, from the highest:
- Distress calls, distress messages and distress traffic
- Urgency messages
- Communications relating to direction finding
- Flight safety messages
- Meteorological messages
- Flight regularity messages
Where students lose marks
- The “immediate assistance” test. If the question says immediate assistance, it is distress. If it says safety but not immediate assistance, it is urgency.
- MAYDAY RELAY, not “PAN PAN RELAY”. Relaying a distress message uses the distress word.
- Silence is imposed with MAYDAY in the phrase. STOP TRANSMITTING – MAYDAY, not “silence mayday”.
- Priority 3 is direction finding. It sits directly below urgency, and flight regularity is the lowest of the six.
Study aid, not the regulation. The reference is ICAO Annex 10 Volume II, section 5.3, and SERA.14095.
Quick answers
What is the difference between MAYDAY and PAN PAN?
MAYDAY is the distress signal: grave and imminent danger that requires immediate assistance. PAN PAN is the urgency signal: a condition concerning safety that does not require immediate assistance.
How many times is MAYDAY or PAN PAN spoken?
Three times, at the start of the call.
What does PAN PAN MEDICAL mean?
It is the signal for a protected medical transport.
What is the order of message priorities?
Distress, urgency, direction-finding, flight safety, meteorological and flight regularity messages.
Make it stick
Fly the Distress & Urgency drill: every item is a streak you have to land.