NASA · Aviation Safety Reporting System
Air traffic Controller reported being distracted with briefings and sector updating while an aircraft descended below its assigned altitude.
What is ASRS?
The Aviation Safety Reporting System is NASA's voluntary, confidential, non- punitive incident-reporting system, established 1976. Pilots, controllers, dispatchers, and maintenance technicians file reports describing safety- relevant events. NASA de-identifies every report before adding it to the public database. Reports are not investigated by NASA, the FAA, or the NTSB — they represent the reporter's perspective.
Pilot narrative
Verbatim from the de-identified NASA record. First-person account by the
reporter. NASA strips identifying details (names, company, specific time);
anonymization placeholders are ZZZ,
X, Y.
I gave Company "reduce speed to 170 then descend and maintain 9 thousand." It was read-back correctly. Right after I passed on a PIREP to a Supervisor and gave a relief briefing to split off half of my airspace. I frequently give 8 thousand as an altitude assignment in this area so it didn’t catch my attention when they descended below 9. However the moment they descended below 8 thousand I stopped the descent and climbed them back up. The MVA was 075 but rose to 080 before they got to 080. I did not report this to the supervisor because I have been issued a proposed 1-day suspension due to allegations brought forth by the same Supervisor. I feel extremely uncomfortable working around this person.
NASA classification — Anomalies
- ATC Issue
- Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural
- Inflight Event / Encounter
NASA classification — Assessments
- Contributing Factors / Situations
- Human Factors
- Primary Problem
- Human Factors
ASRS reports are voluntarily submitted, de-identified by NASA, and represent the reporter's perspective. The presence of reports on a topic cannot be used to infer prevalence in the National Airspace System. The authoritative source is the NASA ASRS Database Online at asrs.arc.nasa.gov ↗.