Mysterious Origins- Mayday

Mayday is an emergency procedure word used internationally as a distress signal in voice procedure radio communications. It derives from the French "venez m'aider", meaning "come help me".

It is used to signal a life-threatening emergency primarily by mariners and aviators, but in some countries local organizations such as police forces, firefighters, and transportation organizations also use the term. The call is always given three times in a row ("Mayday Mayday Mayday") to prevent mistaking it for some similar-sounding phrase under noisy conditions, and to distinguish an actual Mayday call from a message about a Mayday call.

 

Mayday calls

Making a false distress call in the United States is a federal crime carrying sanctions of up to six years imprisonment and/or a fine of up to $250,000, and restitution to the Coast Guard.

If a mayday call cannot be sent because a radio is not available a variety of other distress signals and calls for help can be used. A mayday can be sent on behalf of one vessel by another, using a convention called a mayday relay (see below).

Civilian aircraft making a mayday call in United States airspace are encouraged to use the following format (omitting any portions as necessary for expediency or where they are irrelevant):

MAYDAY, MAYDAY, MAYDAY; (Name of station addressed); Aircraft call sign and type; Nature of emergency; Weather; Pilot's intentions and/or requests; Present position and heading, or if lost then last known position and heading and time when aircraft was at that position; Altitude or Flight level; Fuel remaining in minutes; Number of souls on board; Any other useful information.

History

The Mayday procedure word originated in 1923 by Frederick Stanley Mockford (1897–1962).  A senior radio officer at Croydon Airport in London, Mockford was asked to think of a word that would indicate distress and would easily be understood by all pilots and ground staff in an emergency. Since much of the traffic at the time was between Croydon and Le Bourget Airport in Paris, he proposed the word "Mayday" from the French "m’aider" ("venez m'aider" meaning "come help me").

Before the voice call "MAYDAY", SOS was the Morse Code equivalent of the MAYDAY call. In 1927, the International Radiotelegraph Convention of Washington adopted the voice call MAYDAY in place of the SOS Morse Code call. The MAYDAY was defined as corresponding to the French pronunciation of the expression “m'aider”


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