PA announcement
Any announcement over the aircraft's public address system — safety ones scripted by the operations manual, the rest by the purser.
Definition
A PA announcement is anything spoken to the cabin over the aircraft's public address system, using the handset at a crew station. Some are regulatory — the safety demonstration, seatbelt-sign announcements, emergency commands — and are scripted word for word in the operations manual; others, such as welcome, descent and delay updates, follow a template the crew adapt. The PA overrides the entertainment audio, and the flight deck can use it too.
What it means for you
Who makes which PA is a rank matter: the purser or senior crew member owns the welcome and arrival announcements at most airlines, and juniors take the scripted safety ones or the second-language version. A clear, unhurried PA is one of the fastest ways to be noticed by a check flight attendant, and a garbled one is the fastest way to lose a cabin. Many airlines assess your speaking voice at the assessment day for exactly this reason.
In practice
On a Turkish Airlines flight the PAs run in Turkish and English, and a crew member with a third language relevant to the route is usually asked to add it; on Emirates the languages spoken by the crew are announced by name at the start of the flight.
Go deeper
Related terms
3 terms- PurserRoles & ranksThe crew member in charge of the cabin on a flight: briefs the crew, reports to the captain and owns the service and the paperwork.
- Safety demonstrationSafety & trainingThe mandatory briefing before take-off on seatbelts, exits, life jackets, oxygen and the safety card — by video or crew demonstration.
- Seatbelt signSafety & trainingThe illuminated sign controlled by the pilots that obliges passengers to sit and belt up — and tells crew what service is allowed.