Civil Aerospace Medical Institute

Report No: DOT/FAA/AM-06/20

Title and Subtitle: Developing Temporal Markers to Profile Operational Errors

Report Date: August 2006

Authors: Pounds J, Rodgers MD, Thompson D, Jack D

Abstract: A commonly held view is that system and human vulnerabilities, whether they emerge at a common moment or over a situation, can form links in a chain of events resulting in an air traffic operational error (OE). However, this truism has not led to the development of better techniques for profiling this progression. If we generally accept that OEs evolve over time, then OEs have temporal characteristics.

By better understanding these temporal characteristics, we will better understand how vulnerabilities become links in a chain so that resources can be allocated effectively to develop mitigation strategies. Two activities were conducted to develop the temporal markers (TMs) framework. First, air traffic subject matter experts identified objective (or calculable) points that can be identified a traffic situation. These points could differ at the point in time they occur, but they would occur in some form in most, if not all, OEs. A list of TMs was generated and tested using archival en route OEs. Using the framework is straightforward.

This preliminary evidence suggests that temporal profiling could help to discover trends across OEs that are not currently being systematically examined. A larger set of OEs could be tested with this method to accomplish this. Ultimately, the technique should be used for all OEs in the national airspace so that a TM database could be developed for OE trend analysis.

Key Words: Air Traffic Control, Timeline, Chronology, Operational Error, Vulnerabilities, Human Error, Incident Investigation

No. of Pages: 17