Narrative:

There was a weather system moving through the area; and there were lots of deviations from many sectors. I was instructed to open sector 17; which had been combined with sector 18. I opened it up and had a few airplanes; a couple IFR and a VFR. It was light traffic. After a couple of minutes an aircraft; I believe an airbus; checked on my frequency. I did not have a handoff. I located the aircraft; and at this moment realized that the aircraft was being rerouted into my sector for weather. Socal approach had shut off sector 20 and all of the los angeles inbound traffic from the east; as well as some satellite airport traffic. I quickly became aware that all of these aircraft would be transiting my airspace. I immediately called for a d-side; who arrived pretty quickly. During this time I had numerous aircraft report on my frequency without a handoff. If any coordination happened I was unaware of it. These aircraft don't normally transit the sector; and certainly not the way they were coming. I think I went from three aircraft to nearly 20 in less than 5 minutes. All of these aircraft were on headings (although no coordination was accomplished regarding the headings and altitudes). I had a bunch of aircraft; mostly landing lax; and most were tied with at least one other aircraft and many were in conflict with each other and several deviating for weather. There was as much frequency congestion as traffic congestion. The pilots seemed to be unaware of what was happening; and many were reporting minimum fuel. Prior to the d-side arriving I had multiple landline calls from other sectors. It was a nightmare scenario that I've never experienced before at this sector; at this facility; or any of the other three facilities that I've been a certified radar controller. I can honestly say that this was a first.I don't believe that I lost separation between aircraft. I gave a descent clearance to an aircraft when an aircraft was 1;000 ft below him; but caught it right away and stopped the aircraft from descending. There were a few other close calls; but I believe 5 miles or 1;000 ft were maintained. Someone told me that two aircraft were 900 ft apart for one radar update; but that can easily be explained by mode C variance. Other controllers said that I did a good job under the circumstances; but I really don't feel so. I felt completely overwhelmed and behind. I did not feel like I had control of the sector or a good plan of action. It was too many airplanes too fast and I didn't have the knowledge of who was doing what and why. I didn't even have radar handoffs on everyone. I did the best that I could do with what I knew and the airspace that I had. Sorry that I don't have any call signs. There were so many aircraft so quickly that I simply don't remember.something needs to be set up in an LOA (letter of agreement) with socal approach that when they shut off the flow; it isn't a wild free-for-all with aircraft. There needs to be some procedure in place to handle this scenario; and it can't be 'just ship the planes to sector 17.' this is a huge swiss cheese hole. Sector 17 is a complex; busy sector; and it isn't capable of handling all of its traffic plus all of sector 19 and sector 20's traffic. It's not possible. So some procedure needs to be made by the area that sectors 19 and 20 are in and socal to handle this scenario. It's a terrible idea to just pass the buck on to someone else.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZLA Controller reports of becoming overloaded with traffic during a weather session. No coordination had been made reference headings or altitudes. Aircraft were just handed off to the Controller.

Narrative: There was a weather system moving through the area; and there were lots of deviations from many sectors. I was instructed to open Sector 17; which had been combined with Sector 18. I opened it up and had a few airplanes; a couple IFR and a VFR. It was light traffic. After a couple of minutes an aircraft; I believe an airbus; checked on my frequency. I did not have a handoff. I located the aircraft; and at this moment realized that the aircraft was being rerouted into my sector for weather. SoCal Approach had shut off Sector 20 and all of the Los Angeles inbound traffic from the east; as well as some satellite airport traffic. I quickly became aware that all of these aircraft would be transiting my airspace. I immediately called for a D-Side; who arrived pretty quickly. During this time I had numerous aircraft report on my frequency without a handoff. If any coordination happened I was unaware of it. These aircraft don't normally transit the sector; and certainly not the way they were coming. I think I went from three aircraft to nearly 20 in less than 5 minutes. All of these aircraft were on headings (although no coordination was accomplished regarding the headings and altitudes). I had a bunch of aircraft; mostly landing LAX; and most were tied with at least one other aircraft and many were in conflict with each other and several deviating for weather. There was as much frequency congestion as traffic congestion. The pilots seemed to be unaware of what was happening; and many were reporting minimum fuel. Prior to the D-Side arriving I had multiple landline calls from other sectors. It was a nightmare scenario that I've never experienced before at this sector; at this facility; or any of the other three facilities that I've been a certified RADAR controller. I can honestly say that this was a first.I don't believe that I lost separation between aircraft. I gave a descent clearance to an aircraft when an aircraft was 1;000 ft below him; but caught it right away and stopped the aircraft from descending. There were a few other close calls; but I believe 5 miles or 1;000 ft were maintained. Someone told me that two aircraft were 900 ft apart for one RADAR update; but that can easily be explained by Mode C variance. Other controllers said that I did a good job under the circumstances; but I really don't feel so. I felt completely overwhelmed and behind. I did not feel like I had control of the sector or a good plan of action. It was too many airplanes too fast and I didn't have the knowledge of who was doing what and why. I didn't even have RADAR handoffs on everyone. I did the best that I could do with what I knew and the airspace that I had. Sorry that I don't have any call signs. There were so many aircraft so quickly that I simply don't remember.Something needs to be set up in an LOA (Letter of Agreement) with SoCal Approach that when they shut off the flow; it isn't a wild free-for-all with aircraft. There needs to be some procedure in place to handle this scenario; and it can't be 'just ship the planes to Sector 17.' This is a huge Swiss cheese hole. Sector 17 is a complex; busy sector; and it isn't capable of handling all of its traffic plus all of Sector 19 and Sector 20's traffic. It's not possible. So some procedure needs to be made by the area that Sectors 19 and 20 are in and SoCal to handle this scenario. It's a terrible idea to just pass the buck on to someone else.

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.