Narrative:

I came into work and knew right away weather was going to be nasty and the volume was going to spike. After working a sector for about an hour and talking with the controller on another sector; I knew the weather was closing over the airspace. I made management aware. A supervisor was aware as was tmu (traffic management unit) of the situation developing as they had formulated a plan in the form of a tmi (traffic management initiative) to help us out for the night shift since we were short staffed. Again; this was a known situation and would have been briefed to the operations manager taking the night shift. The situation was still under control once the day shift left; and apparently this led the operations manager to cancel the pending tmi that was put into place to help us because in the operations manager's opinion; everything was working still. This is the result of them being woefully unqualified to be an operations manager (OM); and their overall negligence in their position.the tmu and the operations manager did their jobs in preparing for this shit show; this isn't on them; this is 100% the OM's fault. The OM deliberately created an unsafe situation for the flying public through their incompetence and dereliction of duty or just general negligence; but more about that later. It's a miracle that there wasn't a loss of life. Later; the situation was rapidly spinning out of control as numerous sectors were going red according to the tsd (traffic situational display); and it wasn't just a little red; it was spiking as the holes in the weather were rapidly closing and in so doing forcing all east bound aircraft south. Three other sectors were all red with some in the low to mid 30's of aircraft despite whatever management claims to the contrary. If they claim otherwise; they're either lying or being deliberately deceptive; more on that later as well. I then remember getting overwhelmed as I was trying to help out my fellow controllers in the adjacent sectors by rerouting and dumping aircraft to miss red sectors.I was doing this because there was a lack of leadership from the OM. I vividly remember our supervisor asking for guidance and leadership from the OM; to which they simply froze and had no answer to anything; she nervously just ran around with deer in the headlights expressions. Our flm was left without any support from her; and as a consequence; we as the controllers were left vulnerable as well. It was clear that she didn't have any idea on what to do; so we simply ignored her; the big distraction that she was; and just started dumping and rerouting planes. It got to the point to where there was no other sectors to move the planes into either via route or altitude to avoid other sectors which were simultaneously all red. I told the OM we need to hold aircraft and keep them from entering; and she simply ignored me; so I became more forceful at which point she said no don't hold them. It was clear that we were going to be leaderless from the top the rest of the night; the only thing the OM knows what do is to cut our breaks short whenever they come around which is often hours in situations like these.the OM decided that we were in an emergency situation and decided to make a controller work a shift in excess of 10 hours; an emergency situation created by the OM's own doing. But even with the emergency situation; there wasn't a tmi put out; there wasn't any help until later; as the OM is lethargic in their responses due to their overall lack of abilities in their position as an OM. As the night progressed and we became shorter staffed after all the people that were held over went home; with at least one going over 10 hours on the shift; we actually stayed as busy or worse. I finally got to the point of being able to leave for a break; realizing the lack of empathy and concern for the controllers; I decided to buy pizza for the area so at least everyone would have dinner; and on that break they cut that short as well. There was never any acknowledgment for dinner or fatigue of the controllers. I come back from my shortened break again and opened up a sector during a brief lull in the action only to be overwhelmed again with the aircraft all capped at 27;000 feet and below to alleviate pressure from other sectors. I found myself going red with a seemingly endless flow of aircraft; all screaming about light chop or wanting higher to which the answer was a very professional unable. Finally after about 2-2.5 hours on position; I was able to take a break without leaving a red sector for my fellow controller relieving me. The OM tried to cut short my break again and hold me over to which the answer was unable. The night was a disgraceful nightmare of the OM's own making; it wasn't tmu or the supervisor's fault; this was the OM's; and this was a known situation well in advance. Tmu knew a day ahead of time about this and told us it was going to get nasty.the operations manager threw the controllers under the bus and endangered the lives of the flying public in their fear of declaring a staffing tmi. While I don't believe it was intentionally malicious; it was however due to incompetence in my opinion. There is no confidence in her as an OM from the perspectives of us controllers or even her own supervisors who deride her constantly as do we all. The flying public deserves to be safe; the flying public expects to be safe; through her actions; or better yet; lack thereof; she endangered the lives of tens of thousands the flying public. I talked with the controller on another sector; he admitted to not having an idea of what was happening because they were so busy.there is an attempted cover up going on currently; an attempt to down play how dangerous the situation was from the air traffic manager no less. The air traffic manager is attempting to spin the narrative that nothing really happened. For them to try and make that argument as thousands of lives were endangered is ridiculous. The air traffic manager is guilty of gross negligence and needs to be removed. They don't understand their role in helping us keep the public safe. Until there is dramatic change in management at this center; this will continue to happen. NORDO aircraft moving through an incredibly busy and complex environment added to an already overwhelming workload. The NORDO aircraft was a direct cause of too much volume combined with weather in the airspace. We wasted precious time trying to find the aircraft. The center controller was so overwhelmed that they couldn't even talk to the planes they had. This situation has happened in the past for years; and will continue to happen in the future until the OM's and the air traffic manager are removed and replaced with effective outside leadership. The center's management culture is inbred in the sense that nobody has any experience in mid to high level management in any serious capacity or time outside the building. All the OM promotions are from in house and as such you get group think; and the same rehashed terrible ideas and hollow promises on how 'this won't ever happen again' there is an unwillingness to issue tmi's to help with staffing; as they won't admit that they have been lying about how bad the situation is out here; and would have to justify how they're issuing staffing tmi's while at the same time promoting cpc's to the management ranks to help their own staffing. Remove the OM from any kind of operational role; give them a position screwing something else up that at least won't get anyone killed. Have the OM write an apology letter to every flight crew and passenger that was endangered; or consider retirementbring in new management from outside the building and replace some of the oms we have; oms that will actually issue tmi's and won't just try and run out the clock for their high 3 until they retire. Promote the competent oms who actually care and will take positive action in the right direction. We work constant 6 day weeks; our breaks are now being shortened; I'm afraid to declare fatigue; i come to work exhausted and ragged because of the lack of staffing and the way we get hammered with weather and volume. I've thought more and more about resigning and doing something else. Trainees are starting to do the same thing. Nobody at the center other than the above mentioned OM's cares much. We often start shifts with 6 or 7 controllers and that's with overtime. We start shifts unable to open sectors; and or do training for the trainees. None of this will be admitted to by local management or it will be marginalized. This center operates in a perpetually unsafe and hopeless environment.we need more staffing. We need less managers. Stop promoting from the controller ranks. We need controller incentive pay to get people in the building. We need more funding in general. We need tmi's issued in a timely manner; and more importantly; don't flake out on the issuance of them; trust the data and do your job. We need fatigue mitigation; as in limit hours per month able to work like airline pilots get.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A Center Controller reported decisions by their management to cancel flow restrictions during a shift with busy weather deviations created an unsafe workload for the controllers.

Narrative: I came into work and knew right away weather was going to be nasty and the volume was going to spike. After working a sector for about an hour and talking with the controller on another sector; I knew the weather was closing over the airspace. I made Management aware. A supervisor was aware as was TMU (Traffic Management Unit) of the situation developing as they had formulated a plan in the form of a TMI (Traffic Management Initiative) to help us out for the night shift since we were short staffed. Again; this was a known situation and would have been briefed to the Operations Manager taking the night shift. The situation was still under control once the day shift left; and apparently this led the Operations Manager to cancel the pending TMI that was put into place to help us because in the Operations Manager's opinion; everything was working still. This is the result of them being woefully unqualified to be an Operations Manager (OM); and their overall negligence in their position.The TMU and the Operations Manager did their jobs in preparing for this shit show; this isn't on them; this is 100% the OM's fault. The OM deliberately created an unsafe situation for the flying public through their incompetence and dereliction of duty or just general negligence; but more about that later. It's a miracle that there wasn't a loss of life. Later; the situation was rapidly spinning out of control as numerous sectors were going red according to the TSD (Traffic Situational Display); and it wasn't just a little red; it was spiking as the holes in the weather were rapidly closing and in so doing forcing all east bound aircraft south. Three other sectors were all red with some in the low to mid 30's of aircraft despite whatever Management claims to the contrary. If they claim otherwise; they're either lying or being deliberately deceptive; more on that later as well. I then remember getting overwhelmed as I was trying to help out my fellow controllers in the adjacent sectors by rerouting and dumping aircraft to miss red sectors.I was doing this because there was a lack of leadership from the OM. I vividly remember our Supervisor asking for guidance and leadership from the OM; to which they simply froze and had no answer to anything; she nervously just ran around with deer in the headlights expressions. Our FLM was left without any support from her; and as a consequence; we as the controllers were left vulnerable as well. It was clear that she didn't have any idea on what to do; so we simply ignored her; the big distraction that she was; and just started dumping and rerouting planes. It got to the point to where there was no other sectors to move the planes into either via route or altitude to avoid other sectors which were simultaneously all red. I told the OM we need to hold aircraft and keep them from entering; and she simply ignored me; so I became more forceful at which point she said no don't hold them. It was clear that we were going to be leaderless from the top the rest of the night; the only thing the OM knows what do is to cut our breaks short whenever they come around which is often hours in situations like these.The OM decided that we were in an emergency situation and decided to make a controller work a shift in excess of 10 hours; an emergency situation created by the OM's own doing. But even with the emergency situation; there wasn't a TMI put out; there wasn't any help until later; as the OM is lethargic in their responses due to their overall lack of abilities in their position as an OM. As the night progressed and we became shorter staffed after all the people that were held over went home; with at least one going over 10 hours on the shift; we actually stayed as busy or worse. I finally got to the point of being able to leave for a break; realizing the lack of empathy and concern for the controllers; I decided to buy pizza for the area so at least everyone would have dinner; and on that break they cut that short as well. There was never any acknowledgment for dinner or fatigue of the controllers. I come back from my shortened break again and opened up a sector during a brief lull in the action only to be overwhelmed again with the aircraft all capped at 27;000 feet and below to alleviate pressure from other sectors. I found myself going red with a seemingly endless flow of aircraft; all screaming about light chop or wanting higher to which the answer was a very professional unable. Finally after about 2-2.5 hours on position; I was able to take a break without leaving a red sector for my fellow controller relieving me. The OM tried to cut short my break again and hold me over to which the answer was unable. The night was a disgraceful nightmare of the OM's own making; it wasn't TMU or the Supervisor's fault; this was the OM's; and this was a known situation well in advance. TMU knew a day ahead of time about this and told us it was going to get nasty.The Operations Manager threw the controllers under the bus and endangered the lives of the flying public in their fear of declaring a staffing TMI. While I don't believe it was intentionally malicious; it was however due to incompetence in my opinion. There is no confidence in her as an OM from the perspectives of us controllers or even her own supervisors who deride her constantly as do we all. The flying public deserves to be safe; the flying public expects to be safe; through her actions; or better yet; lack thereof; she endangered the lives of tens of thousands the flying public. I talked with the controller on another sector; he admitted to not having an idea of what was happening because they were so busy.There is an attempted cover up going on currently; an attempt to down play how dangerous the situation was from the Air Traffic Manager no less. The Air Traffic Manager is attempting to spin the narrative that nothing really happened. For them to try and make that argument as thousands of lives were endangered is ridiculous. The Air Traffic Manager is guilty of gross negligence and needs to be removed. They don't understand their role in helping us keep the public safe. Until there is dramatic change in Management at this Center; this will continue to happen. NORDO aircraft moving through an incredibly busy and complex environment added to an already overwhelming workload. The NORDO aircraft was a direct cause of too much volume combined with weather in the airspace. We wasted precious time trying to find the aircraft. The Center Controller was so overwhelmed that they couldn't even talk to the planes they had. This situation has happened in the past for years; and will continue to happen in the future until the OM's and the air traffic manager are removed and replaced with effective outside leadership. The Center's management culture is inbred in the sense that nobody has any experience in mid to high level management in any serious capacity or time outside the building. All the OM promotions are from in house and as such you get group think; and the same rehashed terrible ideas and hollow promises on how 'this won't ever happen again' there is an unwillingness to issue TMI's to help with staffing; as they won't admit that they have been lying about how bad the situation is out here; and would have to justify how they're issuing staffing TMI's while at the same time promoting CPC's to the management ranks to help their own staffing. Remove the OM from any kind of operational role; give them a position screwing something else up that at least won't get anyone killed. Have the OM write an apology letter to every flight crew and passenger that was endangered; or consider retirementBring in new Management from outside the building and replace some of the OMs we have; OMs that will actually issue TMI's and won't just try and run out the clock for their high 3 until they retire. Promote the competent OMs who actually care and will take positive action in the right direction. We work constant 6 day weeks; our breaks are now being shortened; I'm afraid to declare fatigue; i come to work exhausted and ragged because of the lack of staffing and the way we get hammered with weather and volume. I've thought more and more about resigning and doing something else. Trainees are starting to do the same thing. Nobody at the Center other than the above mentioned OM's cares much. We often start shifts with 6 or 7 controllers and that's with overtime. We start shifts unable to open sectors; and or do training for the trainees. None of this will be admitted to by Local Management or it will be marginalized. This Center operates in a perpetually unsafe and hopeless environment.We need more staffing. We need less managers. Stop promoting from the controller ranks. We need controller incentive pay to get people in the building. We need more funding in general. We need TMI's issued in a timely manner; and more importantly; don't flake out on the issuance of them; trust the data and do your job. We need fatigue mitigation; as in limit hours per month able to work like airline pilots get.

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.