<< >> NASA ASRS Report 1581186, September 2018

B777 captain reported ATC increased the flight crew workload and stress level due to a communication breakdown and late runway change.

Attributes
ACN	1581186
Time
Date	201809
Local Time Of Day	0001-0600
Place
Locale Reference	SBCW.ARTCC
State Reference	FO
Environment
Flight Conditions	IMC
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	B777 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Final Approach
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Approach Captain Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Multiengine Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 90 Flight Crew Total 10425.82 Flight Crew Type 4043.05
Events
Anomaly	ATC Issue All Types

Narrative:

Was initially told to expect ILS 9R about 50 to 60 miles from landing. Then; some 10 minutes later and much too close to landing; [we] were given an almost never used runway and approach. The approach controllers accent and english was very hard to understand requiring her to repeat the new approach clearance 4 times before all three of us agreed that the new runway was now ' left' and not the usual [runway] 9R; and that the approach was RNAV 9L zulu. This; in a very radio congested regime; required a lot of time. This added greatly to crew stress and time to rebrief a seldom used approach.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: B777 Captain reported ATC increased the flight crew workload and stress level due to a communication breakdown and late runway change.

Narrative: Was initially told to expect ILS 9R about 50 to 60 miles from landing. Then; some 10 minutes later and much too close to landing; [we] were given an almost never used runway and approach. The approach controllers accent and English was very hard to understand requiring her to repeat the new approach clearance 4 times before all three of us agreed that the new runway was now ' LEFT' and not the usual [Runway] 9R; and that the approach was RNAV 9L Zulu. This; in a very radio congested regime; required a lot of time. This added greatly to crew stress and time to rebrief a seldom used approach.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.