Section 2. CONTRACTIONS

  1. DEFINITION

A contraction is a word, title, or phrase represented in shortened form for the purpose of brevity. Contractions facilitate communication and thus are a vital part of the Federal Aviation Administration's (FAA) everyday communications process.

  1. USE OF CONTRACTIONS
  1. Contractions lend freedom to communication(s) in general correspondence. Without them, written communication becomes cumbersome.
  2. Contractions save space on telegraphic circuits, tabulating and computer equipments, charts, drawings and reports.
  3. The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) is the focal point for world-wide use in the international aeronautical community.
  4. Standard ICAO abbreviations and codes are to be used, wherever possible. These are available in ICAO document 8400.
  1. RULES FOR DEVELOPING CONTRACTIONS

To form or use contractions, the following rules must apply:

  1. Signs and symbols included as part of a contraction are limited to those available on FAA communications equipment.
  2. Contractions composed of both upper and lower case letters cannot be used in telegraphic communications.
  3. In some cases, a contraction may include letter and number combinations.
  4. A contraction should retain an alphabetical similarity to the longer word or phrase.
  5. Three-character contractions are no longer to be coined due to possible conflict with Location Identifiers in an automated and voice response environment.
  6. Words of five letters or less are not to be contracted.
  7. Excessively long contractions will not be adopted.
  8. Prepositions, conjunctions, and articles should be omitted in forming contractions. The slant may be substituted, if necessary.
  9. A pronounceable word should be attained, if possible, when contracting a phrase.
  10. Abbreviations that are unique to a particular publication must not be listed in this order.
  11. A contraction may have more than one meaning. There are four different categories which constitutes this rational. These categories are air traffic, general, meteorological (weather) and international aeronautics (ICAO).
  12. In cases where a contraction may be unfamiliar to the recipient, spell out the word or phrase the first time it is used and follow it with the contraction in parenthesis.
  13. Contractions stated should read fluently with the remainder of the text. If questionable, the recipient should refer back to the originator.
  14. The contractions in this order may normally be used for any derivative of the root word. If confusion would otherwise result, variations may be shown by adding the following letters to the contraction of the root word:

    Suffix

    Contraction

    able

    BL

    al

    L

    ally, erly, ly

    LY

    ary, ery, ory

    RY

    ance, ence

    NC

    der

    DR

    ed, ied

    D

    ening

    NG

    er, ier, or

    R

    ern

    RN

    ically

    CLY

    ive

    V

    iest, est

    ST

    iness, ness

    NS

    ing

    G

    ity

    TY

    ment

    MT

    ous

    US

    s, es, ies

    S

    tion, ation

    N

    ward

    WD

  1. RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING CONTRACTIONS

Requests for new contractions, changes, or deletion of obsolete contractions must be approved by:

FAA Headquarters, Mission Support Services
Policy (AJV-P)
600 Independence Avenue, SW.
Washington, DC 20597

Requests must be submitted electronically to 9-AJV-P-HQ-Correspondence@faa.gov.

Recommendations must include a description of the need for a proposed contraction and the frequency of its use.