The Importance Of Fatigue In Air Traffic Control

Fatigue in air traffic control is one of the largest contributing factors to stress in the control tower. This is mainly due to the fact that air traffic controllers must be fully alert and ready to provide split second instructions to aircraft to avert conflict. If controllers are fatigued they become challenged with impaired cognitive abilities, and are slower to make decisions, ultimately making them more vulnerable to mistakes. Air traffic controller fatigue has been attributed as a factor over the years in a number of accidents, including near misses and runway collisions (Carter, 2011).

Throughout the years the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) have closely researched the contributing factors behind aviation related accidents that involved pilot and controller error. The common theme that both organizations found was that most of the contributing factors to aviation related accidents involving controllers consisted of: fatigue, stress, and poor training. Once the NTSB and FAA identified these critical areas of failure, they took measures to improve both the scheduling and training of air traffic controllers. For example, as late as 2007, following the investigation into the 2006 crash of Comair Flight 5191 that killed 49 people, the NTSB recommended increasing the number of

breaks given to air traffic controllers, offering fatigue awareness training and making changes to controller schedules (Carter, 2011). More recently, the National Academy of Sciences listed in its 2014 report that schedule changes significantly affect the controller workforce and that the FAA should, as a matter of priority, continue its efforts to develop an improved scheduling tool capable of creating efficient controller work schedules that incorporate fatigue mitigation strategies (FAA, 2015). The academy further mentioned that, the FAA should collaborate closely with the National Air Traffic Controllers Association in implementing this improved scheduling capability, notably in adopting schedules that reflect science-based strategies for managing the risks associated with controller fatigue (FAA, 2015).
The NTSB and FAA also took further measures to address fatigue and stress issues and decided to conduct a comprehensive internal review of their organizational practices to identify additional underlying issues that causes fatigue and stress in ATC operations. To accomplish this task, Carter (2011) mentioned that former transportation Secretary Ray LaHood ordered a top down review of controller duties and scheduling practices, and the Federal Aviation Administration's former administrator, Randy Babbitt, announced staffing increases from one controller to two at towers open 24 hours. Additionally, the FAA has increased time off between shifts from eight to nine hours and it has banned the long-standing practice of working a midnight shift after a weekend to arrange a three-day weekend (Carter, 2011).
Even though the leadership within the NTSB and FAA felt that they were doing their best to address the issues of controller fatigue and stress in a timely manner, the air traffic controllers still did not feel that their issues and concerns were being properly handled by leadership. The National Air Traffic Controllers Association, which represents 20,000 controllers, engineers and other safety-related professionals in the United States, said the steps don't go far enough (Carter, 2011). They also made further proposals to their leadership and explained that the entire National Airspace System (NAS) needs to be examined because they were working with antiquated technology that was also imposing stress and fatigue on controllers.
Don Brown, a veteran Atlanta International Airport air traffic controller of 25years and feels that there are other issues that need to be addressed in order to improve controller performance and safety in the NAS, in addition to optimizing controller scheduling and training. In Fallows and Brown’s (2011) article Brown states that:
It's important to understand the basic math of the National Airspace System.

The system is run from the runways. Runway capacity is finite. You can only put so many airplanes on the ground in a given period of time. If an airline schedules more airplanes than a runway can handle in a certain period of time, nobody can change the laws of physics to make it work out. There will be delays. If a thunderstorm passes over the Atlanta airport it can wipe out all five runways for an hour. Controllers can't get that capacity back. It's gone. You can't push those 151 operations that didn't happen into the next hour (fallows and Brown,

2011).
Brown feels that inefficiencies in the NAS system and inefficiencies in airline scheduling, compounded with marginal weather conditions are also contributing factors to controller stress. From a big picture prospective, when an inexperienced controller shows up to work fatigued, and is burdened with using antiquated technology at a busy airport that has reached maximum air traffic throughput, and the weather is marginal, that controller will definitely experience increased levels of stress. Their chances for making mistakes will also exponentially increase because of the challenges they are being faced with.
Most people aspiring to become air traffic controllers understand that there is an inherent amount of stress involved in the job. However, once a person has successfully completed ATC training, they are fully educated in the complexities of the job. They have also achieved an understanding that no matter how stressful their job may become, it is their responsibility to safely de-conflict and track the movement of aircraft, and coordinate airspace; they should also understand that although no human is perfect, mistakes must be kept to minimum. Lastly, stress presents a serious challenge in air traffic control and requires air traffic controllers to develop coping resources to effectively deal with work-related stress (Tshabalala and de Beer, 2014).