Welcome to English as a Second Language podcast number 1,258, Causes of Plane Crashes.
This is English as a Second Language podcast, episode 1,258.
I'm your host, Dr Jeff McQuillan, coming to you from the Center for Educational Development in beautiful Los Angeles, California.
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This episode is a dialogue between Angelica and Corey about what is always bad news a plane crash.
When a plane falls down out of the sky,
Let's get started.
So the book I'm writing starts with a plane crash.
What caused it?
It doesn't matter.
That's not part of the story.
But characters have backstories.
So you should have a backstory for the plane crash.
Okay, the plane crashed because of mechanical failure, or better yet, pilot error.
What happened?
Was it because the pilot misread the instruments or had a problem navigating?
I don't know.
Maybe he or she was incapacitated due to an illness.
What kind of illness?
Forget it.
Let's say instead that it happened because of an act of God.
Like a lightning strike?
That's not very likely.
Okay, how about some problem with the flight crew that caused the cabin to depressurize and the plane to go into a tailspin?
What was the problem with the flight crew?
It doesn't matter.
Maybe a member of the flight crew was a hijacker.
And it was an act of terrorism.
Okay, let's say that's what happened.
Happy?
But wait, who was the terrorist?
What were his aims?
And what was his cause?
You know what?
I think you should put that in your book.
Angelica says to Corey, so the book I'm writing starts with a plane crash.
Notice Angelica begins the sentence with the word so.
So has become in English crash.
In many cases nowadays the same as um or well or other, what we call filler words, words people use to begin a sentence that don't really have any specific meaning.
Angelica could have just said, the book I'm writing starts with a plane crash.
Plane, P-L-A-N-E, refers to a machine that flies in the air.
A plane usually has two what we call wings W-I-N-G-S, which are like arms that extend or go out from the side of the plane.
Now what you don't want to happen if you are in a plane is a crash.
C-R-A-S-H.
A crash is when a plane falls out of the sky or hits something And usually bad things follow.
Bad things happen when that happens to a plane, when it crashes.
The verb to crash C-R-A-S-H is used when any kind of vehicle, like a plane or a car, hits something that it's not supposed to.
In this case, a plane crash refers to when a plane usually hits the ground at a very fast speed and explodes or is damaged in some way.
Angelica is writing a book about a plane crash.
Corey asks, what caused it?
Meaning, why did the plane crash?
The cause, C-A-U-S-E, of something is the reason something happened.
Angelica says, it doesn't matter.
Meaning, it's not important.
That's not part of the story, she says.
Corey says, however, that the characters have backstories.
So you should have a backstory for the plane crash.
The word backstory B-A-C-K-S-T-O-R-Y refers to the information about a character or someone in a book, play movie or TV show before they appear in the story.
So it's, if you will, the history of that character, of that person in the story.
Before the story begins.
Now, why is backstory important?
Well, because in order to understand a story, every character, every person in the story needs to have some sort of history, some sort of reason why they do what they do or why they are in the story.
And so the backstory is the story of the characters, of the people in a story, before the story begins.
I hope that makes sense.
Backstory is one of those words that gets used a lot here in Los Angeles where, of course, many of the movies and television shows are written, often at some of the cafes I go to.
Every time I go to a cafe here in Los Angeles, there's usually someone working on a script S-C-R-I-P-T.
A script is the dialogue or what the people say in a movie or a TV show.
Corey is saying that the plane crash needs to have a backstory.
There needs to be a reason for it.
That is somehow part of the story or the book that Angelica is writing.
Angelica says, okay, the plane crashed because of mechanical failure, or better yet, pilot error.
Mechanical M-E-C-H-A-N-I-C-A-L refers to something in a machine or something related to a machine.
Failure, F-A-I-L-U-R-E, is when something goes wrong, when there's a problem with something.
Mechanical failure would be when something goes wrong with some part of the plane.
Angelica says the plane crashed because of mechanical failure, but then she comes up with another reason, or better yet she says pilot error.
The phrase better yet, Y-E-T, is used when you have a better idea than the one you just mentioned.
In this case, Angelica first says the plane crashed because of mechanical failure, and then she thinks of a better reason.
So she says better yet, pilot failure.
P-I-L-O-T, error, E-R-R-O-R.
The pilot is the person who is in charge of or who is guiding the plane, usually in the front of the plane.
There are often two people in front of the plane the pilot and what we call the co-pilot C-O-P-I-L-O-T.
The co-pilot is the person who helps the pilot fly the plane, or who flies the plane if the pilot is not able to.
Error.
E-R-R-O-R is when something goes wrong or, in this case, when a person makes a mistake.
When a person errs E-R-R-S.
So pilot error would be when a pilot makes a mistake, which, of course, we don't want to happen.
Corey says, what happened?
Was it because the pilot misread the instruments or had a problem navigating?
Corey is trying to find out more about why Angelica's pilot made a mistake in her book.
One reason could be that the pilot misread, M-I-S-R-E-A-D.
To misread.
The past tense is spelled the same but pronounced differently.
Misread means to read or look at something, but not do it carefully.
Do it in such a way that you make a mistake.
Instruments refer to things on the airplane, in this case that indicate or show how the plane is doing, how high the plane is flying, what direction the plane is flying in, and so forth.
So if a pilot misreads the instruments on the plane, the pilot is not looking carefully enough and getting the wrong information, if you will, from the instruments or not the correct information.
Corey also suggests that perhaps the pilot had a problem navigating.
To navigate...
N-A-V-I-G-A-T-E means to determine which direction you are going in a car, boat, or a plane.
Angelica doesn't have an answer to Corey.
She says, I don't know.
She doesn't know, of course, because she's just inventing these things as she's talking.
She's just making them up which, of course, is what all authors, all writers do, but Angelica hasn't thought about it very carefully.
Corey then says, maybe he or she, referring to the pilot, was incapacitated due to illness.
To be incapacitated I-N-C-A-P-A-C-I-T-A-T-E-D means to be unable to use your body, or perhaps your brain, because you are either sick or injured.
If you are incapacitated due to an accident.
Because of an accident, you may be unable to walk, for example.
You may have broken your legs.
That would be a case of being incapacitated, unable to do what you normally do.
Capacitated comes from the word capability, which is able to do something.
So incapacitated is not able to do something.
Angelica isn't interested in this discussion.
She says let's say instead, in place of the reasons she's already given, that it happened, that is, the plane crashed because of an act of God.
The phrase act of God usually refers to an event that people have no control over, that wasn't caused by anything human beings can do or have done, such as a flood or an earthquake or a hurricane.
These are also sometimes called natural disasters things that happen that are not caused by human beings.
Corey says, like a lightning strike, he's giving an example of an act of God.
And one of those examples is a lightning, L-I-G-H-T-N-I-N-G, strike, S-T-R-I-K-E.
Lightning refers to an exchange of electricity either within clouds above in the sky or between the earth and a cloud.
Usually there's a loud sound, which we call thunder, T-H-U-N-D-E-R, that you hear after lightning.
Lightning is usually... indicated by a bright flash of light.
Corey says a lightning strike is not a very likely or probable thing that would cause a plane crash.
Angelica then changes her mind again.
She says okay, how about some problem with the flight crew that caused the cabin to depressurize and the plane to go into a tailspin?
The flight crew, C-R-E-W, refers to the people who work on the airplane.
Not just the pilots, but also the people in the back part of the plane who are giving you drinks and making sure everyone stays in his or her seat.
The cabin, C-A-B-I-N, refers to the main part of the plane where everyone sits.
The cabin is where most people in the plane sit.
The very front of the plane where the pilots are is usually called the cockpit, C-O-C-K-P-I-T.
So you have the cabin, which is where everyone sits, other than the pilots, who are in the cockpit in the front of the plane.
If a cabin depressurizes, it loses the pressure that is normally inside of a plane.
That allows you to be able to breathe in the plane.
When a plane goes up very high in the sky, it has to be pressurized in order to allow people inside of the cabin to breathe normally.
But if it depressurizes, that can cause the plane to crash.
One way a plane can crash is to go into a tailspin.
T-A-I-L-S-P-I-N
A tailspin is when a plane falls from the sky down to the ground, often by spinning around in a circle.
Angelica suggests that the plane crashed because the flight crew did something to cause the cabin to depressurize and the plane went into a tailspin.
Corey says, what was the problem with the flight crew?
Angelica is getting impatient.
She says, it doesn't matter, meaning it's not important.
She said that already, of course, earlier in the dialogue.
Corey then comes up with another possible reason for the plane to crash.
He says, maybe a member of the flight crew was a hijacker and it was an act of terrorism.
A hijacker H-I-J-A-C-K-E-R is a person who uses violence or some other threat to take control, usually of an airplane, in order to do something bad, sometimes to get money, other times to escape from the authorities, people who may want to arrest that person, or sometimes to cause damage with the plane itself.
An act of terrorism refers to any violence committed that is done in order to make people afraid or to try to achieve some sort of political or military goal.
We are all, sadly, aware of acts of terrorism nowadays.
Angelica says, okay, let's say that's what happened.
Happy?
Meaning, are you happy now that I have taken your reason as the backstory for the plane crash?
Corey apparently is not happy.
He says, but wait, who was the terrorist?
What were his aims?
That is, what was he trying to accomplish?
What was he trying to do?
And what was his cause?
Meaning, what was his political cause? motivation for doing what he was doing.
Angelica says, you know what?
I think you should put that in your book.
Angelica is telling Corey that he should write his own book and he can put all of that information, all of these reasons, into his own book, and And he should stop trying to make Angelica think of reasons for the plane crash for her book.
Now let's listen to the dialogue, this time at a normal speed.
So the book I'm writing starts with a plane crash.
What caused it?
It doesn't matter.
That's not part of the story.
But characters have backstories, so you should have a backstory for the plane crash.
Okay, the plane crash because of mechanical failure, or better yet, pilot error.
What happened?
Was it because the pilot misread the instruments or had a problem navigating?
I don't know.
Maybe he or she was incapacitated due to an illness.
What kind of illness?
Forget it.
Let's say instead that it happened because of an act of God.
Like a lightning strike?
That's not very likely.
Okay, how about some problem with the flight crew that caused the cabin to depressurize and the plane to go into a tailspin?
What was the problem with the flight crew?
It doesn't matter.
Maybe a member of the flight crew was a hijacker and it was an act of terrorism.
Okay, let's say that's what happened.
Happy?
But wait, who was the terrorist?
What were his aims and what was his cause?
You know what?
I think you should put that in your book.
There's no script writer air here on ESL Podcast, thanks to the wonderful work of our scriptwriter, Dr Lucy Say.
From Los Angeles, California, I'm Jeff McQuillan.
Thanks for listening.
Come back and listen to us again right here on ESL Podcast.
English as a Second Language Podcast is written and produced by Dr Lucy Say, hosted by Dr Jeff McQuillan.
Copyright 2016 by the Center for Educational Development.
