A publication of the National Air Traffic Controllers Association
Issue link: http://natca.uberflip.com/i/889675
During the week of Sept . 12th the ATOC group held a continuity of service demo (C SD) in the TTL at ZME. Four SME s from ZFW and ZME alon g with two SME s from D10 traveled to ZME to evaluate the feasibility of working ZFW airspace from ZME. The test put ZME controllers in the TTL to work airspace from ZFW. The test was designed to see how much traffic a controller, who is not familiar with a particular piece of airspace, could work without any training. Each controller was given a packet just minutes before the test that explained the airspace boundaries and the procedures that would be used for both arrivals and departures at DFW airport. The procedures were reduced to a level that had one arrival and one departure stream with 20 miles in trail on each. The ZFW controllers were in the TTL to answer any questions the ZME controllers had about the operations during the test. The initial resul ts were positive and the controllers from both centers agreed that with certain restrictions in place they would be comfortable with this scenario. Additional TTL problems were run with increases in routes and traffic. It was determined that without specif ic training on the airspace, the traffic volume would not be able to reach normal capacity. However, once the ZFW controllers were put on the R side to work the traffic, the only major factors that would reduce volume is the limited access to flight data . During a center outage, the neighboring center is unable to share data with the TRACON fully contained within the center that is offline. This means that all handoffs between the TRACON and center must be made manually. ATOC is continuing to work with en gineers, ERAW and TAMR to find a solution to this problem. Mr. Grider has reached out to NATCA safety and training to begin discussions on what type of training and regulation changes will need to be made to protect controllers and the safety of the NAS du ring a contingency event. Mr. Grider , after returning from ZME , has been actively engaged with the ATOC office to summarize the findings from the CSD and begin the work of drafting a document that outlines the lessons learned from the demo. This document will be the basis for an instructional guide assisting facilities that are actively developing their contingency plans. It will be a road map to help facilities address issues that they identify while designing new contingency procedures. Mr. Grider alo ng with several members of the ATOC group have also been very busy assisting the facilities that have been affected by the resent hurricanes in the US, Puerto Rico and Virgin Islands. The group is working hard to capture as much information as they can to make sure any future outages like these can be handled more effectively. Mr. Grider traveled to the Tech Center in New Jersey to participate in the BCP 23 sector demo. The demo was designed to show the ability to combine multiple test beds at the Tech Ce nter and have live RADAR feeds on 23 sectors. The BCP plan is to utilize 3 test beds during an activation to allow up to 40 sectors to be worked simultaneously. Several items were discovered during the demo that will need to be addressed before the BCP cou ld be activated. Mr. Grider is continuing to work with the BCP office to find solutions to all of the issues that were identified. AUTOMATED TERMINAL PROXIMITY ALERT (ATPA) Mike Sanders (SCT) represents the membership as the Article 114 Representative fo r ATPA. Mr. Sander's report is below.