A area update: End-of-swing staffing

Dear A area,

Damien and I met with Raelyn and Tasha this afternoon to discuss our end-of-the-swing staffing and how insanely short we are at the end of the night. We collaboratively agreed to move a 14 shift to a 15 on a rotating basis, starting on Sunday, Feb. 9. (If you have a nine-hour 13, that would become a nine-hour 14. And if you have a 10-hour 12, that would become a 10-hour 13.)

With our agreed-upon schedule, we’re currently above guides during the middle of the afternoon every day, which has been really helpful for us the past two years to help with our changeover. However, because we’re so short on the back end, we’re going to move one person by one hour so that we can get through the end of the night and balance things out.

I don’t think will make our schedule perfect by any means — we need a bunch more people to do that — but I think it will at least make the end of the night workable.

Our fatigue rules will limit the people who are eligible to be moved. And it will result in some people’s schedules being changed post-publishing, since Damien and Raelyn published through March 8 today. The agency has pledged to not change anyone’s schedules inside of seven days, and they’re going to solicit for volunteers if you want to move to a later shift. If you currently have a shift that ends between 9:30 and 10 p.m. and want to move an hour later, please let Damien or Raelyn know.

And you will need to double-check your schedules later on to see if you’ve been shift-balanced to a later shift. (I expect the agency to also notify you in writing of the change).

This change will result in quite a few people being moved in the short term, but after dear Kevin Brothers returns to the floor following his Art. 5 detail, we will gain a late body for five days in the week. So theoretically, there shouldn’t be a lot of people being forced into later shifts over the course of the year (until the next shoe drops).

Please let me or Damien know if you have any questions about this.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: I want your feedback

Schedule feedback

We’re now in Week 2 of having our new basic-watch schedule, which was obviously a big change from previous years due to the new fatigue-mitigation rules.

After being on my new schedule for one day last week, it was obvious to me how drastic a change it is for our end-of-the-swing changeover to the mid.

I’m currently working on what we can do to adjust our end-of-the-swing staffing so that we’re not so short on the back end. Please expect to hear more from me about this near future after I’ve had a chance to speak with management.

In the meantime, please let me know what feedback you have with the schedule and/or any issues you’ve run into.

TMIs for short-staffing situations

Section 6 of NATCA’s fatigue MOU with the agency states the following: “If implementation of the provisions contained in this Agreement results in a reduction of available staffing during a shift, the Agency commits to ensuring traffic is mitigated to address the staffing reduction. In any facility where the Union believes the Agency has violated this Section, the NATCA Regional Vice President and the Service Area Director, or their designees, shall meet to review the data and if necessary, develop a plan to address the issue”

Given our staffing situation, I can’t imagine a world in which we’re not going to need to use TMIs at some point this year. For a long time, attempts have been to create a local CWG that would meet and come up with TMIs to help each sector at Seattle Center. However, I don’t anticipate this happening before we’re going to need TMIs to help us when we end up really short as a result of the new fatigue rules.

I intend for us to come up with a list of TMIs for each A area sector and have them ready in the near future. I would really like your ideas and feedback. Please let me know what TMIs you’d like to see implemented in the event that we have short staffing in the A area.

C area meeting

Dearest Matt Coughlin, myself, and Jared Simpach (our airspace supe) met with our C area counterparts to review our airspace and procedures with them.

Among the things we discussed:

We are working toward an agreement for us to take airspace from Sector 9 and create a shelf over YKM between FL200-230 so that we don’t have to point out airplanes to them incessantly during north-flow operations.

We’re working to streamline procedures for airplanes landing southwest of Seattle (we want them all crossing our boundary at FL240), as well as CLS landers (we also want them to cross the A area boundary at FL240).

We also discussed low-performing jets and the possibility of them crossing the boundary at FL240 and stacking the Seattle-area airplanes above (provided they don’t stack an LPJ with another LPJ).

And we agreed to make permanent the trial period for airplanes that don’t have a metering delay to be given PD to FL240 instead of crossing the metering fixes at FL260. I want to recognize that opinions on this change have been mixed — some like it a lot, and some don’t. My rationale in agreeing to it is that I believe it’s the right thing to not force the airplanes down early.

I asked Amanda Crumbley to reiterate to the C area controllers to use caution about sequencing an airplane with a delay in front of an airplane with no delay and the fact that they need to descend and slow the second airplane in that scenario.

End-of-mid splitting of sectors

I received feedback recently about our end-of-the-mid changeover to the day shift, and the possibility of having a procedure that states that the first person who gets there should split off a second sector instead of getting the mid person out, and then the second person who gets there gets the mid person out.

Now that our day-shift people can get here at 5 p.m. — and have been arriving at that hour — I think the need is significantly less than it was last year when it would routinely get busy between 5 and 5:30 p.m.

That being said, I would like feedback from you all about whether we should make this change, or continue to operate as we have (with us splitting it off first on an as-needed basis). Please let me know what you think.

Certification

Congrats to Bryan Murphy for getting certified on D1/31!

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: OT assignments and more

Dearest A Area,

It's been a minute since I last updated you, and I have a bunch of items. Here they are:

Overtime in conjunction with approved leave

Over the past three years, we have collaborated with management to do everything possible to avoid assigning overtime to people in conjunction with leave.

Our rationale has been that we didn't want to give that benefit away -- that if you were on leave, you knew you wouldn't be assigned OT in conjunction with it.

However, due to the implementation of the FAA's new fatigue rules, this is no longer feasible.

I believe that having a limited week every three weeks will be a much-needed improvement in our lives. We can't keep working all of the overtime that we've worked over the past several years.

That being said, the change will obviously have a major impact on our ability to be fully staffed. We already had two controllers get assigned OT in conjunction with approved leave in the first pay period of the new schedule, and we had multiple people scheduled in the third new pay period. I anticipate this continuing intermittently throughout the year.

I sat down with Tasha, our new operations manager, last week. One of the things we discussed was this issue and my expectations for management complying with Article 38 of the contract, which states:

"An employee shall be relieved of an overtime assignment when, in the judgement of the agency ... personal circumstances make it impossible for the employee to perform the overtime duty."

I expect management to continue to relieve us of specific OT assignments if we come to them and advise them that we have personal circumstances preventing us from working the shift. Please bring along any receipts that you have -- ie, plane tickets or hotel reservations. We had to straighten out one supe last year about this article. If you need to use it in the coming year and get any pushback, please let me know and I will address it with management.

OT memo

In PP5 (the third one of the new schedule), there were two shifts that we weren’t able to staff to guides due to our still-awful staffing. We agreed with management to leave those shifts blank on the OT memo that gets placed next to our headset box. If you’re limited for that week but are interested in volunteering for a blank OT assignment, please advise management and you shouldl be given that OT shift (on a first-come-first-serve basis).

Management is prohibited from asking you to work any OT shift during your protected week, but you are entitled to volunteer to work an OT shift if you desire.

Should management at any point in time attempt to pressure you into working any OT shift during your limited week, please let me know so that I can speak with them about it.

Certifications

In going through my previous updates, I realize how much the fall and now winter have gotten away from me. It's been far too long since I included trainee certifications in an update.

Congrats to Zoe Martin for getting certified on D3/12 and D2/32; Kenny Hobbs for getting R2/32; Jim Wang for getting D2/32; Jared Davis for getting D1/31; and Derek Harris for getting R2/32.

I appreciate all of you and am excited for you to continue your training careers.

Art. 5 volunteer

We need an Art. 5 volunteer to train an R-side student in the lab between April 7-May 15. Please let me know if you're interested.

Area refresher volunteer

We need a volunteer (or two, ideally) to help with our annual area refresher training between March 24-28. Let me know if you're interested in volunteering.

New CIC class

There will be a class for new CICs on March 22. If you're a CPC but not a CIC and want to be one, please let me know.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Another bid update

Dearest A area,

CPC bidding update

Annual-leave bidding for CPCs is complete. Thanks so much to Damien, Derek, and you all for helping us to once again get through five rounds of bidding so quickly.

As you hopefully saw in an email from Drew over the weekend, the OT MOU has been signed. Briefings to cover the MOU are taking place throughout the week.

Damien and I will be speaking with each of you on a person-by-person basis over the course of the week to record your bid. We have a main copy that we’re entering the bids on, and there are two other copies for you to review. When you bid, you’ll let us know if you want to be on the yes-list or no-list, and separately, whether you want to be available or limited. Depending on where you fall seniority-wise on your crew, you’ll also be able to pick which rotating week that you’ll have off. (If you’re at the bottom of your crew seniority-wise, you get whichever set of dates that is left.)

As this is a completely new process, please don’t hesitate to let me or Damien know what questions you have.

Bid book opening

Now that our CPC bidding is complete, it’s time to open up the bid book for spot-leave requests. CPCs can begin making spot-leave requests for the 2025 bid year (Jan. 12, 2025-Jan. 3, 2026) starting at 10 p.m. PST on Sunday, Dec. 1, 2024.

Any spot-leave requests made before that time will be deleted.

Trainee bidding update

We have been plodding through the trainee bidding process so far. I would’ve hoped for us to be further along at this point than we currently are. When you’re up to bid and get notified, please bid as quickly as possible so that we can move things along faster.

The first pay period with the 2025 bidding schedule will be published the week of Dec. 8. This means that you have until Sunday, Dec. 8 to bid time off for the first pay period of the new bid year (Jan. 11-Jan. 24). If you want to bid dates off during that pay period, you need to bid it before Dec. 8. At that point in time, those dates will be taken off bidATC.

If you want time off during that pay period but don’t want to bid it, you can submit spot-leave requests for PP3 on Dec. 8. Once we have completed bidding, you’ll be able to put spot-leave requests in for any date on the calendar.

As far as the OT MOU goes, trainees each have one designated slot for limited or available, depending on whether you’re an R-side or a D-side. The only exception to this are the T-F R-sides and the S-M R-sides. Because there are two R-sides on those two sets of days off, the senior person gets to pick one slot, and the other person gets the other designated slot. (As I am rereading this, I anticipate you all having questions about this process. Please reach out to me if you do, and I’ll answer them.)

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Round 2 and trainee bidding are both live

Dearest A area,

Sweet Damien and sweet Derek successfully negotiated the reallocation of bid slots today, and Round 2 is underway. Thank you all for your patience.

Trainee bidding is also underway. One quick note for the trainees: If you’re an R-side, your available lines are the white ones. If you’re a D-side, your available lines are the pink ones. The system is designed to only let you bid one or the other, but I want to make sure that all of the trainees understand which is which. If you have any problems while bidding, please let me know.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: The latest on bidding

Bidding update

We’re waiting to meet with management before resuming Round 2 of our bidding. Damien and Derek are scheduled to meet on Friday to negotiate the reallocation of leave slots and the trainee lines. As soon as we’ve come to an agreement, we will turn on Round 2 for CPCs and commence bidding for the trainees.

Dream sheets

I placed requests for AWS schedules – the so-called dream sheets – on the floor tonight. The deadline to fill them out is Thursday, Nov. 21.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Annual-leave bidding starts Friday morning

Thanks for everybody’s assistance in getting us through a large portion of the BWS bidding today.

We will be turning on Round 1 of annual-leave bidding in the morning. In Round 1, you get to bid up to 10 days in two different blocks of time, as usual, and we get three slots per day, except four slots on July 4, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve.

Following Round 1, we will sit down with the agency and negotiate the reallocation of slots before we commence Round 2.

We anticipate management advocating strongly for lowering our summer slots from 3 to 2. Additionally, we anticipate them advocating strongly to lower slots from 3 to 1 for the six weeks of the year in which we’ll be doing classroom training. One of those weeks is area refresher; four weeks are IST; and the last week is for a new training the FAA plans to administer – Operational Contingency Planning (I wish I was making that up.)

Accordingly, if you plan to bid leave during those dates and it’s the most important thing to you, I strongly suggest bidding them in Round 1 when there are three slots available for each day. After that time, it’s highly likely that there will only be slot per day and that it will be much more difficult to bid them off.

Here are the dates for each of those weeks:

Area refresher: March 24-28

IST: May 4-17, Nov. 30-Dec.13

OCP: Nov. 17-21

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Notes about bidding

Good morning, everybody.

I wanted to send out a quick note before we commence bidding this weekend. As many of you know, my sweet, sweet father-in-law passed away unexpectedly this week. I want to say thanks to every single person who’s reached out and expressed love and concern for myself and my sweet wife. I still can’t wrap my brain around the fact that he’s no longer with us. Please, please tell the people you care about that you love them. Life is so short, and you never know when someone is going to be gone.

I had intended to send out a long update earlier this week with a whole bunch of things in it. That’ll have to wait for a later date.

But I do want to send out a few notes before we begin bidding:

Based on the feedback we received at the facility level, we’re going to start BWS bidding and annual leave bidding at separate points. We’re hoping to start BWS bidding today, and we’ll turn on annual leave bidding after we’ve gotten through some of the BWS bidding.

Due to the new nationwide fatigue-mitigation rules, we’ll also be bidding limited slots for OT. Several people have expressed interest in bidding this ASAP so that they can plan their annual bidding around it, which I totally get. However, the OT MOU is still being negotiated at a facility level, so we can’t bid it yet. Damien and I have been working with other people in the facility to develop a form for that part of bidding. As soon as the MOU has been agreed upon and signed, we’ll start bidding for those limited slots. Radar trainees will bid limited slots with CPCs and will have slots that only they can bid (so we can keep all of the CPC slots balanced across the workweek).

I will be in and out of availability this weekend. If you have bidding questions or run into any problems, please reach out to Damien (253-350-9068) or Derek (360-510-5913).

Please log onto bidATC now to ensure that you can log in and that you’re signed up to receive notifications when it’s your turn to bid. When you look at the overview of lines in bidATC, it appears as though all of the lines are 8-hour days. However, all of the mid lines have 9-hour swing shifts and a 6-hour 530 shift on the day preceding the mid. The rest of the lines are 8-hour shifts.

For trainees: I hope to have you all bidding by the end of next week. As soon as we’ve completed the BWS bidding for CPCs, we’ll sit down with management and agree upon BWS lines for you. Then you’ll start bidding. For first-time bidders, I will try to find you all before you bid. But please reach out to someone if you have any questions.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: 2025 basic watch schedule update

Buckle up for a long update.

BWS schedule negotiations

Thank you kindly to everyone who responded to our BWS survey. We received responses from 29 of the 45 NATCA members in the A area.

Here are all of the results of that survey:

We’re exploring the possibility of making every schedule an AWS. Would you be interested in working an AWS schedule (this includes 7-hour shifts, 9-hour shifts, 6-hour shifts before a mid, and potentially a 10-hour shift)?

• I would prefer to work straight 8-hour days but I would be OK with my line being an AWS line: 14 people

• Yes, I would prefer to have an AWS schedule: 13 people

• No, I am strongly against working an AWS schedule: 2 people

Would you be interested in working straight days?

• Yes: 18 people

• No: 11 people

Would you be interested in working straight swings?

• No: 21 people

• Yes: 8 people

Would you be interested in working straight mids?

• No: 25 people

• Yes: 4 people

Would you be interested in working straight mids on a rotating basis (ie, one week of straight mids, followed by another week or non-mids)?

• No: 21 people

• Yes: 8 people

Would you be interested in working two or three mids per week (the mid shifts would be at the start of the workweek)?

• No: 22 people

• Yes: 7 people

For 2025, we don’t have the staffing to include 10-hour schedules 🫠. For future reference, if we had the staffing, would you be interested in working a 4-day, 10-hour schedule as follows: Swing, swing, RDO, mid, mid?

• Yes: 15 people

• No: 14 people

If we abandoned a rattler schedule and built a schedule with straight day shifts, straight swing shifts, and straight mids, approximately 45% of controllers would get a line with straight days, 45% would be forced into straight swings, and about 10% would be on mids. Given that, would you prefer we kept the rattler schedule as part of our BWS, or would you prefer to eliminate it?

• Yes, keep the rattler: 19 people

• No, do straight lines: 10 people

As you can see, there are a lot of different opinions about how we should proceed schedule-wise. After reading through these results and having myriad conversations with a lot of people, here’s the direction that we’re headed:

I am going to advocate for a hybrid schedule in 2025 that keeps rattler mids, has AWS schedules built into every line, and includes a handful of straight day-shift lines and straight swing-shift lines.

Several notes:

We are choosing to not build lines with straight mids for several reasons: I’m concerned about how safe it would be for those people to work non-mid traffic on an irregular basis. I’m concerned with backfilling those mids when the midders have annual leave. I’m concerned with how we’d replace the midders if they were to lose their medical or retire or otherwise be unable to work their mids. I’m concerned with how we’d backfill those mids when the midders unexpectedly need to use sick leave.

I’m very intrigued by the long-term idea of filling the mid shifts using 10-hour lines (two swing shifts, RDO, and then two mids), but as I have discussed with many of you, we do not have the staffing to adopt that schedule this year. I am not going to agree to a schedule that leaves us super short on multiple shifts.

I recognize that about half of people said in our survey that they’d prefer to work eight-hour days instead of all AWS schedules. One of our biggest goals in creating schedules has been to try and create a balanced schedule given the staffing limitations that we face. That’s why we’re pursuing an AWS schedule rather than a traditional schedule with eight-hour shifts. Damien and I built a bunch of schedules (and by “Damien and I,” I mean Damien did all of the work). One of the specific things we looked at was building the AWS schedule we’re pursuing and comparing that against a schedule that contained AWS schedules for the midders and eight-hour days for everyone else. The schedule with all AWS lines gives us much better coverage across the board than the other one.

I spoke with Barry tonight about dream sheets, and I anticipate us being able to follow our normal process again this year. If you do feel strongly about not working an AWS schedule, you’ll have a couple of options. One of them will be to request eight-hour shifts on the dream sheets. I can’t promise that will be accommodated, but – as long as we’re able to follow the same dream-sheet process as usual – I promise that they will be closely looked at and considered.

Because many people do want to work straight lines, the schedule we’re pursuing contains four straight-day lines and three straight-swing lines.

Damien and I met with management today to start negotiating. We are in agreement with management about keeping our 2025 guides the same as 2024, with the long-term goal of increasing the day-shift numbers when we get healthier staffing. We are scheduled to meet again in two weeks, and I hope to conclude our negotiations at that time.

Damien has put in an incredible amount of work for us throughout this process, from attending schedule telcons to creating a bunch of different schedules to lending his expertise in trying to figure out what’s the most fair and balanced way to proceed. When you see him, please tell thanks for everything that he does behind the scenes for us!!

I left several copies of the proposed schedule on the floor, and here is a digital copy of it. I am here to answer any questions you have and to listen to your feedback.

NUW ATC-0 event

The previously scheduled NUW ATC-0 event will take place on Saturday, Sept. 21 during the morning shift. A bunch of TMIs will be put into place to help Sector 3/12, including miles-in-trail from YVR Centre and Seattle Tracon and no METER delays for 3/12 going to Seattle or Vancouver.

The NUW LSC group has been working on creating an updated checklist based on things that have worked in previous ATC-0 events. The checklist will be on the floor this Saturday. Please let me or Matt Coughlin know if you have feedback about the checklist and what you like/don’t like.

Certification

Congrats to Taylor Choate for getting certified on his final two D-sides. I’m stoked to get you and Cody upstairs as soon as possible for R school!!

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Please participate in BWS survey

Dearest area,

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to fill out our AWS survey and provide feedback. It’s really helpful.

If you haven’t already, please take a moment to respond to our survey. We want to capture as accurate of a snapshot of the area’s opinion as possible.

Thank you kindly.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: 2025 BWS survey

2025 BWS survey

Damien and I are continuing to develop a schedule for 2025 that conforms to the new fatigue-mitigation rules and is as good of a schedule as possible given the horrible staffing situation that we’re currently in.

Building any schedule is difficult, and this year is especially tough. As your rep, my goal is to always represent you all individually and collectively as well as I can. It’s impossible to build a schedule that everyone wants, but our goal is to build a schedule that gives us as much coverage as possible and is what the majority of people want while also protecting those at the bottom of our seniority list.

In the spirit of that, we want you to participate in the following survey. Our intent is to gather as much data as possible so that we can make informed choices with management when we sit down to negotiate with them.

Access the survey by visiting this link.

TPFB

Dearest Matthew Simpson recently created a splendid new TPFB piece of art. If you’re interested in creating any merch with it, feel free to use his work. (He also created this second treatment.)

Thanks

Thank you all for being you. I genuinely could not be more proud to be your rep and stand shoulder-to-shoulder with you all, despite the shitty situations we’ve been put in.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: We need an Art. 5 volunteer

Art. 5 volunteer

We need an Article 5 volunteer to instruct a D-side class between Oct. 21 and Dec. 6. Please let me know ASAP if you are interested.

VYR handoffs

I’ve been working on getting our Canadian friends to hand off airplanes sooner – and to call if we haven’t accepted the handoff by the boundary.

In situations like this, I am loath to involve management. I strongly prefer we try to work it out controller-to-controller. I was able to have one of our co-workers reach out to them the other day and communicate our requests about the handoffs.

In that conversation, the Canadian controllers said they’ll try to do better. They said they feel like they have a great working relationship with us, and they want that to continue. (I feel the same way about them – I feel like we’ve had a great relationship over the years.) They have been pummeled staffing-wise the last few years. In their Eastern complex, for example, they bid about 30 controllers a few years ago … and only bid like 16 last year. Resultantly, I think that when it comes to South and Princeton, those sectors are always combined and the controller is getting consistently annihilated, which is why they’re so slow to initiate handoffs to us or call about them.

I just worked a session on 3/12, and it seemed like the message got through. They were handing airplanes off to me way earlier than before and shipping them a lot sooner.

That being said, please advise me if you continue to notice problems with the handoffs and I’ll take further action, as needed.

Certifications

Congrats to Aaron McMorran for becoming certified in the A area! I feel incredibly lucky and thankful that we have him with us.

And congrats to Zach Rush for getting on 1/31!

In solidarity

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: 2025 BWS and NUW ATC-0 event

A area update

2025 BWS schedule

Now that we have some concrete information about how the new fatigue rules will be implemented for 2025, Damien and I have been having many internal conversations about how we should go about building next year’s schedule.

There are obviously many different paths we could take. I feel strongly about not going down the path of straight days, straight swings, and straight mids unless we’re forced to do so in future years. That path would be really cool for our most-senior people who could get straight-day lines. But that would leave everyone else with straight swings or mids.

Based upon the conversations that Damien and I have had, as well as conversations we have had with many of you, we are looking at building a schedule that has the same basic structure as this year’s schedule but would incorporate AWS lines into everyone’s schedule and conforms with the new rules. If you had a mid, your line would be: 9-hour day, 9-hour day, 8-hour day, 6-hour day, 8-hour mid. For everyone else, it would be: 9-hour day, 9-hour day, 8-hour day, 7-hour day, 7-hour day.

Staying with the same basic structure ensures that we will have as much coverage as possible across the week.

Going the AWS route would actually give us more better coverage with the new fatigue rules than just doing regular 8-hour days, and I think that the vast majority of us would like to have shorter days near the end of our work weeks.

That being said, I want feedback from you all to verify that. We have created a draft schedule for your review. Please look at it and let me or Damien know what you think. And let me know if you have strong negative feelings about incorporating AWS schedules into our BWS.

I have been asking Barry every week about whether we can start negotiating our schedule. We need to get going. Thus far, management has been telling him that he’s not allowed to talk with us about schedules yet 🫠. I will keep you all updated when we finally get going.

NUW ATC-0 event

Dearest Matt Coughlin and I have been working for the past several months regarding the planned NUW ATC-0 event on Saturday, Aug. 17. Working in conjunction with Amy, as well as NATCA leadership outside the building, we tried and tried to get them to postpone this outage … since it is literally going to take place during the worst time of the year.

Unfortunately, we have been unable to stop this from happening. It feels very frustrating to type those words. They were able to move up the starting time of this outage to 0600, and they’re claiming that they will be doing some pre-work in order to finish several hours earlier.

Two SMEs from NUW will be at our facility to help lend their expertise while we work their airspace. Barry told me that they are controllers. I asked why they couldn’t work their airspace using our equipment, and was told that they can’t do it because they haven’t been trained on our equipment (which is an incredibly frustrating answer to hear considering this is a planned outage).

But them actually being there will be helpful. Additionally, Matt and I developed a list of TMIs to reduce the amount of traffic in 3/12:

• No YVR arrivals from Sector 7.

• Sector 12 won’t meter anyone to YVR.

• Sector 3 won’t meter anyone to SEA.

• There will be no NUW training ops

• We should get 15 MIT for aircraft entering 3/12, including SEA and YVR departures.

• All MARNR arrivals from YVR west will be routed over MARNR.

I will be there on OT that morning. If you have questions or concerns, let me know.

YVR handoffs

Late handoffs from our Canadian counterparts have become more and more of a problem. It has become clear that they have very different expectations than we do about making/taking handoffs. I expect them to initiate a handoff promptly and call us if we have not accepted the handoff before the airplane enters our airspace.

I have been working with Amy and Mike Sellman about what our best options are for dealing with this. I would strongly prefer to talk with our Canadian union counterparts and leave management completely out of it. I was told that may or may not be possible.

But I want to make sure this gets resolved.

BLI handoffs

We’ve been seeing another wave of double handoffs from BLI, associated with DATA and OLD messages. If you accept a handoff on a BLI departure, and then you see a second handoff or the other two messages, please turn that in to the desk so that they can track them.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Happy Fourth

Happy Fourth of July, everyone!! If you’re working today, please enjoy some BBQ compliments of the employee association. All of the food has been laid out in the B area.

I have some updates:

Art. 5 volunteer

Our next Art. 5 volunteer opportunity to teach in the TTL will be a D-side lab between Aug. 19 and Oct. 10.

If you are interested in volunteering, please let me know ASAP.

PD to FL240 (not 260)

Next week, a 90-day trial will commence in which the C area will have the option to give PD to FL240 instead of issuing a crossing restriction during periods of metering, provided the aircraft doesn’t have a delay and they aren’t sequencing it with other METERED airplanes.

I have received quite a bit of feedback on this procedure already, which I appreciate. For a long time, I have hated how we unnecessarily push airplanes down to FL260 when they don’t have a delay and don’t have other airplanes near them. That is why I agreed to the trial.

One significant note: The trial was slated to have the C area give PD to 260. However, after receiving some really good feedback, I had them change it to 240 so that we have the non-verbal means of knowing what we expect the airplane to be doing.

Please let me know if you encounter issues with this new procedure.

OM training rep

Dearest Mike Ollerman has replaced Kevin Thomson as our area training rep. He’s still getting up to speed, but I’m very excited to have him in this role.

YVR reroutes

YVR Centre requested and ZSE approved them to reroute some planes into our airspace over the coming weekend (Friday to Monday) due to their staffing.

While this was a disaster when it first rolled out last year, it seemed like it became less of an issue over the course of the year (once they started to move about half of the planes they were originally moving).

That being said, please look out for yourself and others and ask the supe or CIC if you need anything.

(Please note that the irony of us doing this for them given our absurd staffing isn’t lost on me.)

Certification

Congrats to Zoe Martin on getting certified on D1/31!

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: A Area controller makes crucial catch

Dearest A area,

Greetings and salutations.

Kenny Hobbs earns “Safe Hands Player of the Month” award

Talk about coming through in the clutch.

Sweet Mr. Kenny Hobbs and his wife had been expecting their second child to arrive any day when Mrs. Hobbs’ water broke last week.

Just minutes later, the baby arrived into the waiting arms of Kenny inside the confines of their Buckley home.

Both mother and child, whom they named Wrenley, are doing well.

Congrats to Kenny and his family.

(Please note, this is the second time I have gotten to write a news story on a Hobbs brother. I wrote a story on his brother Travis, who’s in the B area, 17 years ago.)

To open or not to open, that is the question

With the arrival of our summer guides, which includes the return of the 0630 shift, I’ve had a few people ask me about whether we should be opening a third sector during the hour between 0530-0630.

I am not, nor will I ever be, a big believer in staffing chairs. I believe in trying to design our guides so as to provide us with the coverage that we need, and then we open and close sectors as needed.

Having said that, I do believe that having the 0630 shift provides us with insurance and flexibility during that first hour. We had to fight pretty hard to be able to keep that shift for part of the year. It will be a whole lot easier to keep it when we negotiate next year’s schedule if we can show them data that we use the extra body during the busy periods of the year.

Resultantly, on days when we have all of the early bodies (our three 6s and the 0630), I suggest opening 3/12 as soon as three people have arrived at work, and then the fourth body can get our break rotation going when they arrive.

Please don’t treat this as a hard and fast rule. If you think you should pursue a different plan because of  traffic, training, or any of the myriad other things that are involved in our work, please feel free to do so.

I trust all of us to continue to use our best judgment about opening and closing sectors.

One of the things I’m most proud about our area is the fact that if management allowed us to not staff the desk for an entire day, I have no doubt that we would manage the area without any interruption.

Next year’s schedule

While we’re on the topic of next year’s schedule, I’ve fielded a few questions about our preparations for next year’s MOU negotiations.

Given all of the uncertainty about the potential implementation of new fatigue rules, I’m waiting for now to get more information before we proceed.

I don’t want to get into the weeds trying to come up with brand-new schedules when we don’t know what will emerge out of the collaboration process between NATCA and the agency.

Sector 3’s west-side BUEC upgraded

Sweet Matt Coughlin has been working with various parties for almost a year to address the fact that if we lose the west-side transmitter for Sector 3, we can’t talk to airplanes in the northwest part of the sector.

The FAA just installed an upgraded radio tower for the BUEC transmitter at HQM. From the conversations that I had beforehand, I had been led to believe this new tower would reach all the way out to DOLFF. However, based on the coverage map Chatty and I received, it appears the coverage might not make it all the way there. 

Please test it out in the coming days and let me or Chatty know if you think it reaches any farther west than the old one did.

Certification

Congrats to Cody Edwards for getting certified on Sector 3/12. Keep it rolling.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: We need a new training rep

Area training rep

Dearest Kevin Thomson has decided to step aside as our A area training rep. I really appreciate all of the time, attention, and care Kevin has put into our area’s training over the past couple of years.

With KT departing that role, we need someone to replace him. The vision is that this person will be a peer to the training supe. I expect them to be given time to review documentation on all of our trainees, making sure that things like training-team meetings and skills checks are completed in a timely manner. They’ll also provide input on pretty much all things training and be a resource for our trainees.

Upcoming elections

To reiterate a message you’ve been hearing and will hear all this month: Please participate in our upcoming national NATCA elections.

I still strongly believe that we as individuals make up this union. Our union represents us individually and collectively. It’s up to us to make our voices heard and to vote for people who will represent us the way we think we should be represented.

KT BBQ

Although Kevin Thomson won’t be our training rep any longer, he will be hosting people for a potluck and pickle ball tournament at his place on Saturday, June 15. If you’re reading this email, please show yourself as being invited. Here is a sign-up sheet that Kevin created: KT pickle ball party.

Certifications

Congrats to AJ for getting certified on R1/31!

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: About last week’s ATC-0 event at NUW

NUW ATC-0

So I picked quite a week to be on annual leave during the five-day NUW ATC-0 event.

To every single person that worked during those five days, thank you. Thanks for your professionalism, skill, and teamwork in working situations that we shouldn’t have to be working.

We’ve obviously experienced a rash of these events in the past year.

I have been engaging with management to try and get specific information about what’s being done on the TELCO side to create actual redundancy so that these things stop occurring so frequently.

And work on the NUW CWG continues. If you have input or thoughts on how we can more safely operate the airspace in the future, please let Derek Adams or Matt Coughlin know.

Should you ever find yourself in the hot seat of working NUW’s airspace in the future, please know that as your rep I will 100.00-percent support any decision you make to limit operations if you need to do so to keep the operation safe. 

VIP movement

As you’ve probably heard in the news, the Seattle area is scheduled to have a VIP movement this weekend. One of my complaints about these events is that we’re not properly briefed before we plug in and work them.

The airspace office has been creating a briefing package for affected personnel, and I discussed with Barry the importance of making sure that we’re actually given time to review it before we plug in. Take whatever time you need to familiarize yourself with the operation before you assume a sector, and don’t hesitate to ask questions if you have any.

SOP draft

Sweet Chatty worked extensively (with the help of sweet Kuma Nakada) to create an A area SOP, which will combine various documents related to each of our sectors. A draft copy of the SOP is on the floor. Please take a moment to review it when you’re able and give Matt any feedback that you have.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: Oh hi

Good afternoon, everybody. I have a bunch of items today. In no particular order:

A area LSC reps

After being a bedrock of the LSC over the past few years, Kelly Schielke is stepping down so as to give other people a chance to be involved.

Sweet M’Lynda will be representing us on the LSC in her stead. Sweet Kevin Thomson is our other area LSC rep.

As you observe both good and bad safety-related issues in our operation, please take them to those two. I believe the LSC can and does make a big impact when people take the time to bring safety-related concerns to them.

YVR handoffs

I want to relay information about one of the quirks of CAATS to you all: Canada’s version of ERAM doesn’t build held-TOC messages like ERAM does. This means that anytime that they initiate a handoff on an airplane equipped with CPDLC, their system generates a TOC message as soon as we accept the handoff.

I had wondered why YVR sometimes waits until airplanes are near their boundary before they initiate the handoff, which can be problematic if you’re working 3/12 and you’re busy. The reason is that if they initiate a handoff and we accept it, their system immediately ships them to us.

I have asked whether this will be fixed at some point, and I was told we don’t know if Canada will change their functionality.

In the meantime, I want to give everyone a heads up: If you see a limited heading your way and it is a CPDLC-equipped plane, the Canadian controllers may not initiate the handoff until near the boundary.

(Separately, I’ve fielded a few complaints of them being slow to initiate handoffs of non-CPDLC airplanes, and I intend to address this with them in the near future.)

Staffing

Every time that I sit down with management, we discuss our staffing and the fact that we don’t currently have enough CPCs in our area. We’ll raise our guides for the summer beginning on June 2, and we’ll be in the same situation that we’ve been in over the past four years, which is to say: We won’t be able to staff to those guides because we don’t have enough bodies. When I think about that simple fact – and I think about it all the time – I feel exasperated, frustrated, and angry that the agency hasn’t done more to get us to a healthier place.

We have collaboratively agreed to not schedule people for overtime in conjunction with annual leave over the past few years, and I currently have no plans to agree to change that approach.

But it’s less than ideal to start out a summer day knowing that at best we’ll be minus-1 and need to have seven or eight positions open during our peak times of the day. It’s beyond unacceptable that the agency hasn’t allocated enough resources for us to be able to staff to our guides – to the number of bodies that we all agree we need to safely conduct the operation – over the course of four years.

I have tried to tell anyone who would listen that we need help – to no avail. We thankfully have a large number of trainees now, and mathematically the odds are in our favor that we’ll get to a better place at some point in the future. But we’re not going to be there this year and possibly not next year.

One of the things I am most proud of representing the A area is the fact that no matter what happens, we get the job done. I expect us to continue making things work because that’s who we are. We take care of each other. We care about each other.  But I do feel like – and I’ve expressed this sentiment to management – that we get punished for making it work.

I share all of this with you in the spirit of letting you know where we’re at. If you have suggestions or ideas for what could be done to get us out of the hole we’re in sooner, I am and will faithfully remain all ears

Sick leave

With it being basically impossible to get spot leave over the coming months, using sick leave will remain the only way to guarantee yourself off the schedule. When you need to use sick leave, I strongly suggest not discussing your usage on the floor.

Paystubs

One of our members kindly advised me that on a recent paystub, they were issued two hours of credit instead of two hours of overtime. I strongly suggest that you continue to check each of your paystubs for accuracy when they come out.

Certifications

Congrats to Derek Harris for getting certified on D3/12. I’m very excited for you to get back upstairs for R school.

Congrats to Taylor Choate for getting certified on D2/32. Keep being you.

And congrats to Aaron McMorran for getting certified on R2/32. I have said this many times, and it bears repeating: Hearing AJ’s voice talking to airplanes in the A area is the best thing that’s happened to our morale in years.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

YVR delays

The following sentence may surprise you: The Vancouver metering delays passed from Canada’s TMU to us may or may not be wanted/needed by YVR arrival.

All of these delays come from a national TMU facility in Canada. From discussing this with several parties, I believe that one person is responsible for issuing delays to airplanes from many airports. Resultantly, those delays often don’t get issued in a timely manner.

When you’re working Sector 12 (alone or combined) and you’re really busy, it can be infuriating to receive big delays for airplanes that are already inside of your sector.

I have been working with management for awhile to try and get these delays issued sooner. What we came up with is that we told Canada’s TMU that if they issue YVR delays to airplanes who are already inside of Sector 12, we may or may accommodate the delay (workload-permitting).

However, management never communicated this to the workforce. I asked Barry when we met recently if I could just go ahead and share this with you, and he said that would be great.

So here I am.

If we’re sitting on 3/12 with nothing to do and the supe/CIC walks over to us with YVR delays for airplanes we’re currently talking to, I expect us to meet those times. If YVR Arrival calls and asks us to delay airplanes, I expect us to accommodate them to the maximum extent possible. But if we’re busy and we get handed TMU delays on airplanes that are already inside of our sector, I expect us to use our best judgment. If we don’t have time to meet the delay, we don’t have time. Canada has been advised that we may or may not be able to accommodate their delay request if they don’t give it to us promptly.

C area metering

We recently agreed to make permanent the metering trials that we’ve been conducting with the C area — i.e., if there’s a delay, they issue 250 kts, and if there isn’t, they don’t.

We also agreed to conduct a trial period of allowing the C area to issue a PD descent to FL260 if the airplane doesn’t have a delay and doesn’t need to be sequenced with other airplanes who do have delays.

I feel strongly that we shouldn’t be pushing airplanes down unnecessarily. That being said, we agreed to do a trial rather than make this a permanent change so that we can see it on the floor and ensure there are no unintended consequences.

Once this trial period begins, please let me or A area airspace rep Mathew Coughlin know if you observe problems or otherwise have concerns.

Route channelization order

Our route channelization order will be updated later this spring. Chatty and I have several items that we plan to update, but if you have input on anything you’d like to see changed, please advise me or him.

New certification

Congrats to Cody Edwards for getting certified on D1/31!

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821

A area update: How schedule requests are being addressed

Schedule requests being addressed

Article 32 of the contract states that shift-change requests “shall normally be approved/disapproved within two hours of when the request was made.” Similarly, Article 34 of the contract states: “Leave requests for future shifts shall be approved/disapproved subject to staffing and workload within two hours of when the request was made.”

The whole point of having those time limits in the contract is to ensure that the agency can’t just sit on requests and refuse to approve them because conditions could change later.

Practically in our area, many of our requests have taken a lot longer than two hours to be approved. Supes have left requests in pending status for a number of reasons, most notably because they generally prefer to approve/deny requests that pertain to their upcoming shifts, if able.

Recently, we have had a new supe come to the area who wants to follow Article 32 and 34 to the letter. They are regularly logging into Web Schedule and addressing every pending request (and by “addressing,” I mean they’re just clicking the “deny” button on almost all of them).

As your rep, I am definitely not going to tell them to violate the contract. I want them to comply with the contract in everything that we do.

But I do want to raise awareness about this issue. If you see that a request that you made has been denied, it doesn’t necessarily mean that you won’t get what you want. It just means that, at a minimum, a supe has logged into Web Schedules and has complied with the contract. They may or may not have put much thought into it.

When you make a request and see that it’s been denied, I highly suggest looking at who the supe is scheduled to be for the shift in question, and then ask them to re-look at it.

And on the supe side, I have discussed this with Barry and asked his supes to be more proactive in re-looking at requests that they may mistakenly believe have been closely looked at.

Certifications

It’s been a minute since this happened, but congrats to Anthony Greer and Derek Harris for getting certified on D2/32. Keep at it, gentemen.

In solidarity,

Dan Rasmussen

801-860-3821