The Australian Defence Air Traffic System (ADATS) did not automatically process all system messages generated by The Australian Advanced Air Traffic System. In cases where transponder code changes were not automatically processed, the risk controls in place were not able to effectively ensure that the changes were identified and manually processed.
The ATSB is satisfied that the safety action undertaken, and action in progress, will satisfactorily address the safety issue.
A Safety Advisory dated 18 March 2013 was distributed to Department of Defence (DoD) controllers on 19 March 2013. The document referenced the findings of the Directorate of Defence Aviation and Air Force Safety’s investigation. The documented purpose of the Safety Advisory was to address three internal recommendations:
One of the intents of the Safety Advisory was to provide awareness to controllers that the PMQ needed to be thoroughly checked prior to inadvertent deletion of important information.
In addressing the recommendation for the implementation of measures to ensure the correct allocation of transponder codes, the Safety Advisory advised controllers to ‘consciously ask themselves what needs to be done with the information they receive during coordination between different agencies.’
The document also highlighted to controllers the importance of ADATS conflict alerts and instructed controllers that all PCA and CA alarms were to be considered legitimate and that:
…all necessary control instructions to ensure separation between conflicting aircraft are to be issued in the interim until the alarm is proven to be something other than legitimate.
On 31 July 2014, the DoD also advised that 44 Wing would work with Airservices Australia to ascertain if the implementation of change messaging between the ADATS and The Australian Advanced Air Traffic System was feasible.
The safety action taken by DoD required that individuals be more vigilant in their processing of Problem Message Queue (PMQ) traffic and coordinated details but did not address the influence of increased workload in the Planner position that could result in not all tasks, including the manual processing of messages from the PMQ, being completed in a timely manner. However, the introduction of Flight Data Operators (FDOs) at a number of Defence air traffic control establishments may reduce workload in the Planner position and allow more time for the processing of PMQ traffic and coordinated details. As such this safety action, in conjunction with the provision of FDOs should address this safety issue.
