In the scene in The Incredibles where Helen (Elastagirl) is flying the plane, her use of radio protocol is exceptionally accurate for a movie. The terminology used hints that she has had military flight training. In the director’s commentary Brad Bird says that actress Holly Hunter insisted on learning both the lingo and its meaning.
- “VFR on top” means she is flying in the regime of Visual Flight Rules ‘on top’ of a cloud cover.
- She requests “vectors to the initial”, or directions on how to get to the initial landing approach.
- “Angels 10” is her altitude call, ten thousand feet. This is a military term. Civilian flights use the term “flight level”.
- “Track east” is her direction of travel.
- “Buddy spike(d)” is a US military brevity code meaning “friendly anti-aircraft radar has locked on to me, (please don’t shoot)”.
- “Transmitting in the Blind Guard” is a call on the emergency frequency where 2-way communication has not been established.
- “Abort” is also a military brevity code, a directive meaning “stop the action/mission/attack”.
god i love when actors/ voice actors are intent on using correct lingo for things like this
its so easy to BS this sort of thing and sometimes it might work but it’s vastly more impressive when they actually use correct terminology
She also uses the handle “India Golf Niner-Niner” or, in the NATO Phonetic Alphabet, IG99.
The Iron Giant (1999), also directed by Brad Bird.
THE INCREDIBLES WERE MY FUCKING SHIT OKAY I FUCKING LOVE ELASTIGIRL AND EVERYTHING ABOUT HER