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Apologies if this is an elementary question. If I look at a diagram for parts of a plane, they don't distinguish verbally between left/right. If I try Googling for, say, "right wing" or "left wing", well you can guess the result!

Suppose I wish to identify a feature, say, the topmost left-side wing of a triplane, how do I do it?

enter image description here

Camille Goudeseune
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chasly - supports Monica
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    Why isn't "right upper" or "left lower" adequately descriptive? – Ralph J Jan 12 '21 at 14:24
  • @Ralph - maybe it is. That's what I wasn't sure of. I wanted to comment on a photo and didn't know the correct terminology. I'm used to sailing - boats don't have a left and right, they have a port and starboard. Road vehicles have nearside and offside (driver's side). I'm assuming from your comment that planes have left and right sides. Does this also apply to the lights they must display when flying at night? Left and right nav lights? – chasly - supports Monica Jan 12 '21 at 17:44
  • Okay, I see where you're coming from. Answer provided -- see if this gives you what you're after. – Ralph J Jan 12 '21 at 21:09
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    @chasly Due to sensible countries having the drivers seat on the right-hand side, 'left' and 'right' are more sensible than nearside and offside in many conversations about road vehicles. – MikeB Jan 13 '21 at 13:53
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    @chasly-supportsMonica If you describe something as being on "the left side of the boat", everybody will know what you're talking about. Boat people aren't dumb, just overly pedantic about vocabulary. – Sneftel Jan 13 '21 at 14:00
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    @Sneftel - I don't think you have done any serious sailing. There are very good safety reasons for using port and starboard. One very basic one is if your small vessel is about to be run down by a large one. On the radio you don't want to get into conversations such as, "Do you mean your left as you face me or do you mean my left as I'm facing you?" – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 15:47
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    @chasly-supportsMonica The same confusion can occur even in aircraft written documentation. Even a phrase like "the left side when looking towards the front of the plane" is ambiguous: does it mean "when you are sitting in the cockpit looking forwards", or "when you are standing on the ground in front of the plane looking backwards"? – alephzero Jan 13 '21 at 15:59
  • @chasly-supportsMonica Yes, I know the reasons. My point stands. – Sneftel Jan 13 '21 at 16:02
  • @You may stand by your point but your point doesn't stand up to scrutiny IMHO. But let us cease this. It is off-topic. – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 16:06
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    @Sneftel Even people who can't tell left from right can learn that the port side is the one with the red navigation light. If they don't know the difference between port and vinho verde, they shouldn't be allowed anywhere near a boat ;) – alephzero Jan 13 '21 at 16:07
  • @alephzero - This confusion about who is facing where, was a major reason for my asking the question. In the photo I provided, my left is not the same as the pilot's left. That was what would concern me, were I to refer to the "left" wing when describing the photo. – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 16:27
  • @chasly-supportsMonica: "I don't think you have done any serious sailing." - as someone else who hasn't done any serious sailing, your comment now leaves me wondering why a conversation like "Do you mean your port side or do you mean my port side?" would be preferrable in any way. – O. R. Mapper Jan 13 '21 at 17:02
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    @ O. R. Mapper - The reason is that, on a ship, left and right have different meanings than port and starboard. L and R refer to a person and P and S refer to the ship. For example, the order: "Move to port!" is different from "Move to the left!" There are various articles online. Quote: "Port and starboard unambiguously refer to the left and right side of the vessel, not the observer. That is, the port side of the vessel always refers to the same portion of the vessel's structure, and does not depend on which way the observer is facing." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_and_starboard – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 17:25
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    @O. R. Mapper - P.S. "Move to port!" is unambiguous. However, if I give the order, "Move left!" then the crew member is justified in asking "My left or your left?" Why? Because people walk around on ships. They can be facing in any direction when the order is given. Incidentally, this leads me to wonder about rear gunners in aircraft and how they called directions to the pilot and vice-versa. – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 17:37
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    @chasly-supportsMonica, probably by the clock face analogy: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clock_position the rear gunner would face six o'clock. – ilkkachu Jan 13 '21 at 18:45
  • @ilkkachu - That sounds very convincing. Of course, in the air there are three dimensions. I wonder how they cope with that. – chasly - supports Monica Jan 13 '21 at 18:53
  • @chasly-supportsMonica Oddly enough, when we had an observer with a plexiglass bubble in the C-130 to scan for airborne threats, the clock positions were grease-penciled around, starting with "R1" thru "R5", 6, and then "L7" thru "L11". So the observer's callout (mainly to the pilot) would be a threat at "right 3 oclock high" or "left 8 oclock low". The priority was clear communication to the guy with the controls, and getting him the left/right then clock position then high/low/level was what was found to work best. HE was always facing front, so there, "left/right" worked fine. Go figure! – Ralph J Jan 13 '21 at 19:41

3 Answers3

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While boats use port & starboard, aircraft (at least in the U.S.) generally don't. "Left" and "Right" work well for most things; when talking with flight attendants (on a large aircraft), "captain's side" and "first officer's side" serve the same purpose as "port" and "starboard" (i.e. the port or captain's side is the same side of the vehicle, regardless of whether it's on an individual's left or right at the moment). For maintenance purposes, the engines and certain other left/right-side components are referred to as the #1 and #2 (and #3 and #4 if you have them), and when talking with a pushback crew (who are in front of the airplane facing it -- so their "left/right" is opposite that of the pilots) it's common to refer to "the #1 side" (i.e. captain's) or "the #2 side" (i.e. F/O's). When we would back up the C-130, the loadmaster on the cargo ramp looking behind us would direct "turn toward #1" or "turn toward #4", which worked out nicely.

But, I don't think I've ever heard of wings referred to as #1 & #2, or really as anything other than left & right. (Those who've flown on aircraft carriers may report a different experience while at sea, I've not done that.) I'd say that the most general case would be to refer to a left/right wing, or on a biplane left upper, right lower, etc, and in a triplane, I'd have to assume left middle (or, perhaps less likely, left center) wing.

The Nav lights are generally referred to as left or right, at least in my carrier's operation. You could refer to them as "the red nav light" or "the green nav light" but I don't think that's particularly common.

Various different organizations will have their specific conventions, but as a general case, plain (or, "plane") English works well & is a good place to start until the preferred local terminology is introduced.

Ralph J
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  • Thanks. I'll digest that for a while to see if your answer raises any extra queries on my part. For the moment though it seems pretty comprehensive. – chasly - supports Monica Jan 12 '21 at 21:34
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    When I was in the Air Force, the official position was that almost everything was numbered, left to right. This nomenclature was routinely used for engines, but even though if officially applied to wings as well, I don't recall hearing anybody ever actually use it for them. – Jerry Coffin Jan 13 '21 at 17:59
  • @JerryCoffin Yeah, anybody who mentions "the #2 wing" probably gets a sideways glance most of the time. "Left engine" and "Right engine" would be easy enough, but "left inboard" and "right outboard" start to get cumbersome, so #2 and #4 are easier there. (Might be fun to try to describe the different motors on the B-36 without numbering them... but probably not very efficient!) – Ralph J Jan 13 '21 at 19:35
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    @Jerry Coffin - That numbering holds for weapons stations as well. F-16, Sta 1-9, left to right. Sta 1 is the left wingtip, Sta 9 is the right wingtip. – WPNSGuy Jan 13 '21 at 23:53
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Any lateral confusion is dealt with in Ralph J's answer. The rest is straightforward:

For a biplane or triplane, vertical confusion should be eliminated by the usual upper, middle, lower.

Is there one uppermost wing or two?

This becomes clear in context. "The wing" without further qualification means the entire primary lifting surface, whether or not it is interrupted by the fuselage (for an airplane, but not for a bird!). "The left wing" or "the left uppermost wing" means the left half thereof.

Camille Goudeseune
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Don't overthink it. It's simple; left top (or upper), mid, and bottom (or lower), and right top (upper), mid, and bottom (lower) are perfectly clear and precise. On a biplane, just take out the mid, and on a monoplane, it's just left or right.

You can substitute port for left and starboard for right, but if the audience is outside the aviation/boating world, most people won't know what you're talking about and will have to look it up (and some pilots will also have forgotten and have to check which is which), so the majority of the time left and right is used.

John K
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