Specifically, they say that if (they think) you’re breaking a rule. When you get to a phase of flight that you have the bandwidth to do so, they’ll give you a phone number to call after you’ve landed. From there you might just get chewed out by a grumpy controller, or they might set the gears in motion for some sort of formal discipline.
ATC here. It's not always because someone is grumpy or for formal discipline.
I only gave a Brasher Warning one time, only because my trainer told me to. I suppose it depends on the culture/facility, but where I learned it, they had more of the attitude that it was to have an informal conversation to find out what happened and what the pilot and/or controller can do differently next time.
After my supervisor talked with the pilot and listened to the tapes, we discovered that my control instruction was ambiguous and that I should be more clear next time (and the pilot should follow the minimum altitudes on the approach plate).
I landed at a class C (KAVL) without switching to tower from approach. I don't think they were training controllers that day but the same two controllers were on both freqs... rolled off and sent my call "off at echo" and got a nice "traffic calling approach say again".
Didn't get the dreaded number to call on the air since they knew the school... filed a NASA report and nothing else came of it. mistakes happen.
Related, on a check ride with the chief instructor while a controller was training he absolutely chewed the controller out on the air for giving me an immediate turn instruction at ~350' AGL. I don't think that was called for and it made me feel horrible and made the rest of the flight awkward. But from that day on I was much more comfortable with a simple "unable" when I got weird requests.
A good point indeed! There are certainly grumpy controllers and a time for discipline, but there is a strong culture around continuous improvement and safety throughout aviation. A phone number from a controller is not nearly as adversarial as, say, getting pulled over by highway patrol, even though in a lot of ways the two events are analogous.
> After my supervisor talked with the pilot and listened to the tapes, we discovered that my control instruction was ambiguous and that I should be more clear next time
This sounds like a slightly painful process, but I bet it saves a lot of lives. Amazing.
And the reason they have to say it nowadays is due to a court case where a pilot found out he was being investigated for a deviation that allegedly happened many months ago. It was ruled that without a timely warning no sanctions can be taken. So it’s a little bit like the “Miranda rights” of aviation - at least you know you might be in trouble and have time to prepare.
