En Route Operational Errors: Transfer of Position Responsibility as a Function of Time on Position

Civil Aerospace Medical Institute2008PDFTech ReportBailey, LarryPounds, JuliaScarborough, AlfretiaUnited States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration. Office of Aviation. Civil Aerospace Medical InstituteUnited States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration. Office of Aviation. Office of Aerospace MedicineUnited States. Department of Transportation. Federal Aviation Administration. Office of Aviation. Civil Aerospace Medical InstituteUnited StatesAir traffic controlAir traffic controllersHours of laborHuman errorHuman factorsEnroute traffic controlOperational errorsPosition ReliefDOT/FAA/AM-08/16Public DomainOperational Errors (OEs) can occur anytime while a controller is on position. However, the historical trend has been that a higher percentage of OEs occur early on position and then tapers off as on-position time increases. This trend has been consistently observed across the different air traffic options and time of day. Past efforts at reducing OEs that occur early on position have focused on improvements associated with the position relief briefing. Despite these efforts, nothing has been able to reverse the trend in OEs. We conducted a retrospective analysis of enroute OEs to determine if there were human factors considerations unrelated to the position relief briefing checklist that may explain why OEs occur early following a position transfer. Our results suggest that position transfers differ by type (replacement vs. providing workload reduction) and the amount of time available (time pressure vs. no pressure). Moreover, the human factors considerations differ between the type of transfer and the amount of available time. Although the position relief briefing checklist is well grounded in human factors principles, the checklist itself is insufficient for assessing the various states of mind a controller is operating under immediately following a position transfer.121