Narrative:

I had just received a briefing and taken the sector. As soon as I said I had the sector; several tasks needed to be completed that were behind because of the briefing. Mainly changing aircraft to the appropriate next frequency. I ended up switching aircraft X to the next sector frequency without a handoff and ultimately violating their airspace. I had a handoff side at the time. Aircraft X was direct to a fix and during the briefing; the aircraft was in handoff status at 31000 feet behind another aircraft X at 29;000 feet. Aircraft X requested a descent to 29;000 feet and the person I was relieving stopped the flash and descended aircraft X to 29;000 feet. I was watching the aircraft's speed since they would now be at the same altitude as aircraft X in front of them and they had about a 10 knot overtake; but 10 miles longitudinal separation so not much of a concern. Shortly thereafter; the person I was relieving slewed over an area in the south part of the sector where the next sector had radar contact on a group of aircraft that needed to be switched and he said 'all of these aircraft can be shipped'. I think in my mind I included aircraft X in that group and didn't pay close enough attention to the data block. I did a scan and remember making sure the speed was ok with aircraft X in front of them and at 29;000 feet their speed ended up being about the same so I switched aircraft X apparently without a handoff. If I'm not mistaking; I shipped the aircraft while he was still in our airspace and it would have been helpful if the next center sector would have called us and told us they were talking to aircraft X and we needed to flash them to us. I'm not certain that was the case and if it was; they may have not had time to make that call before an airspace violation would have happened anyway. This was a mistake on my part for not scanning close enough for the details of the aircraft's status. There were maybe a few outside contributors that could have helped avoid this situation. Handoff controllers are also responsible to hand off aircraft and if the person I was relieving that took back the flash on aircraft X then descended them would have flashed them to the next sector again after the descent clearance; it wouldn't have happened. On my part; a better scan of the data block and being careful not to assume anything. In this case I believe I assumed this aircraft was flashed on again and in the group of aircraft the controller being relieved said could be shipped without really paying attention to the data block. The other issue that I have noticed is since the data block justification was last changed with the updates that included portal fences; I've found myself shipping aircraft without a handoff more frequently because of the appearance of the data block. Fortunately in other cases the mistake was caught before an airspace violation occurred. I was speaking with a veteran controller who has years of experience and he was saying since they changed the data blocks; he does this about once a week compared to about once every [few] months that he used to do it. Something about the appearance of the data blocks now makes the 'right' indicator less obvious when you're busy.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZOA Center Controller reported forgetting to handoff an aircraft to ZLA Airspace.

Narrative: I had just received a briefing and taken the sector. As soon as I said I had the sector; several tasks needed to be completed that were behind because of the briefing. Mainly changing aircraft to the appropriate next frequency. I ended up switching Aircraft X to the next sector frequency without a handoff and ultimately violating their airspace. I had a handoff side at the time. Aircraft X was direct to a fix and during the briefing; the aircraft was in handoff status at 31000 feet behind another Aircraft X at 29;000 feet. Aircraft X requested a descent to 29;000 feet and the person I was relieving stopped the flash and descended Aircraft X to 29;000 feet. I was watching the aircraft's speed since they would now be at the same altitude as Aircraft X in front of them and they had about a 10 knot overtake; but 10 miles longitudinal separation so not much of a concern. Shortly thereafter; the person I was relieving slewed over an area in the south part of the sector where the next sector had radar contact on a group of aircraft that needed to be switched and he said 'all of these aircraft can be shipped'. I think in my mind I included Aircraft X in that group and didn't pay close enough attention to the data block. I did a scan and remember making sure the speed was ok with Aircraft X in front of them and at 29;000 feet their speed ended up being about the same so I switched Aircraft X apparently without a handoff. If I'm not mistaking; I shipped the aircraft while he was still in our airspace and it would have been helpful if the next Center sector would have called us and told us they were talking to Aircraft X and we needed to flash them to us. I'm not certain that was the case and if it was; they may have not had time to make that call before an airspace violation would have happened anyway. This was a mistake on my part for not scanning close enough for the details of the aircraft's status. There were maybe a few outside contributors that could have helped avoid this situation. Handoff controllers are also responsible to hand off aircraft and if the person I was relieving that took back the flash on Aircraft X then descended them would have flashed them to the next sector again after the descent clearance; it wouldn't have happened. On my part; a better scan of the data block and being careful not to assume anything. In this case I believe I assumed this aircraft was flashed on again and in the group of aircraft the controller being relieved said could be shipped without really paying attention to the data block. The other issue that I have noticed is since the data block justification was last changed with the updates that included portal fences; I've found myself shipping aircraft without a handoff more frequently because of the appearance of the data block. Fortunately in other cases the mistake was caught before an airspace violation occurred. I was speaking with a veteran controller who has years of experience and he was saying since they changed the data blocks; he does this about once a week compared to about once every [few] months that he used to do it. Something about the appearance of the data blocks now makes the 'R' indicator less obvious when you're busy.

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.