Narrative:

Several tfrs were going active and there was no preparation at the sector for this. All of this happened while I was conducting OJT and the traffic volume and patterns were already being affected. When I assumed control of the sector some tfrs were displayed at the sector even though they were not active yet. I assume those were placed there by tmu (definitely not drawn on by the previous controller). Five minutes later those depicted tfrs vanished for unknown reasons. The controller in charge announced tfr areas a and B were now active. I had no idea what areas a or B were. I was then given a sheet of paper listing 4 tfr areas and there lat/longs. While instructing my developmental on how to use the draw tool to display circular areas we discovered the lat/longs provided on the sheet of paper were not the correct format that eram uses for its draw tool. When we got our first circular tfr depicted on our display we then looked to our not-so-informative sheet of paper to find out the radius of the tfr only to find it not listed there. The controller in charge then went to tmu and found out the proper radii for areas a and B and ~10 minutes after they went active; we had our tfr's properly displayed. Around 15 minutes later it was announced that tfr area D was now active. To find area D we went back to our trusty sheet of paper and entered that on our display. Of course no radius was listed so another trip to tmu was made by the controller in charge. When finally displaying area D we found it was exactly the same as area B. Another trip to tmu was made by the controller in charge and we then learned that area D was not active; area C was active and area B was no longer active (area D which is the same as area B would be active at a later time). The controller in charge didn't see it coming but we again needed the radius of area C to properly display it on our monitor. Now imagine trying to conduct OJT while all this is going on. Imagine you are the developmental being trained while all this is going on. Yeah.come up with a better plan! If you need each sector to manually draw tfr's onto their monitor then give them plenty of time to do so during less busy time and before such airspaces go active.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZAU Controller describes situation where he is trying to display a TFR on the radar scope; and has to go back to the TMU multiple times to find the correct radius.

Narrative: Several TFRs were going active and there was no preparation at the sector for this. All of this happened while I was conducting OJT and the traffic volume and patterns were already being affected. When I assumed control of the sector some TFRs were displayed at the sector even though they were not active yet. I assume those were placed there by TMU (definitely not drawn on by the previous controller). Five minutes later those depicted TFRs vanished for unknown reasons. The CIC announced TFR areas A and B were now active. I had no idea what areas A or B were. I was then given a sheet of paper listing 4 TFR areas and there lat/longs. While instructing my developmental on how to use the draw tool to display circular areas we discovered the lat/longs provided on the sheet of paper were not the correct format that ERAM uses for its draw tool. When we got our first circular TFR depicted on our display we then looked to our not-so-informative sheet of paper to find out the radius of the TFR only to find it not listed there. The CIC then went to TMU and found out the proper radii for areas A and B and ~10 minutes after they went active; we had our TFR's properly displayed. Around 15 minutes later it was announced that TFR area D was now active. To find area D we went back to our trusty sheet of paper and entered that on our display. Of course no radius was listed so another trip to TMU was made by the CIC. When finally displaying area D we found it was exactly the same as area B. Another trip to TMU was made by the CIC and we then learned that area D was not active; Area C was active and Area B was no longer active (Area D which is the same as Area B would be active at a later time). The CIC didn't see it coming but we again needed the radius of Area C to properly display it on our monitor. Now imagine trying to conduct OJT while all this is going on. Imagine you are the developmental being trained while all this is going on. Yeah.Come up with a better plan! If you need each sector to manually draw TFR's onto their monitor then give them plenty of time to do so during less busy time and before such airspaces go active.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site and automatically converted to unabbreviated mixed upper/lowercase text. This report is for informational purposes with no guarantee of accuracy. See NASA's ASRS site for official report.