COMMUNICATION AND COORDINATION BETWEEN AIRWAY FACILITIES SITES: IMPLICATIONS FOR OPERATIONS CONTROL CENTERS

Abstract : This report examined the communications and coordination patterns between Airway Facilities centers, specifically between the Operations Control Centers (OCCs), General National Air Space Maintenance Control Centers, and Air Route Traffic Control Center Maintenance Control Centers. Data were collected from a representative sample of facilities, broken out by region, via the Communication and Coordination Questionnaire. This questionnaire enabled Human Factors Engineers to provide a baseline for the frequency of communications, the modes of communications used for coordinating management and maintenance events between these facilities, as well as a measure of task cohesiveness within and between facilities. The findings showed that: the most frequently used communication modality for a number of events were telephone communications. Task cohesion between facilities was above average, but task cohesion declines as the distance from a facility to its regional OCC increases. The results provide direct suggestions for the transition team responsible for the new OCC conversion regarding the standardization of the OCCs.