Narrative:

I was on the d-side. C90 called and brought us out of the hold for ord. We were now direct ord and seven miles in trail at 250 knots. The first aircraft we were about to ship to ord would not accept direct ord. The radar assigned the crj a 330 heading; then a 360 heading to avoid weather that was blocking its route to ord. I tried calling C90 for a hand off and could not get a response. When C90 called me I tried to tell them that crj would not accept direct ord. I was told to 'listen' and to bring all arrivals to the watsn arrival; which required vectoring all arrivals; previously set up for direct ord; to get a 090 heading. This created an extremely unsafe situation; and led to two airspace violations because aircraft were placed in unsafe proximity with each other. Upon seeing that crj and MD80 were to conflict; I asked C90 for any help (i.e. A northeast heading; direct style; or a north heading). I was told that the aircraft had to enter the airspace on the arrival. I took three phone calls from C90; from two different people; and got two different requests on how to bring aircraft to ord. We could have had a very catastrophic situation. C90 called after the incident and asked me why I wasn't going direct ord. I finally; out of frustration; told them I'm doing what I am told; and that I'm being given no options. A better way for bringing arrivals to ord from the southeast needs to be studied. Having us route arrivals; so they have to descend under departures; and be vectored away from the airport in order to turn to the airport seems silly and creates a huge amount of workload for the controller. In addition; it leads to possible events like this.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Separation was lost when C90 refused other than standard arrival routing when aircraft were being released to ORD in spite of weather on that route.

Narrative: I was on the D-Side. C90 called and brought us out of the hold for ORD. We were now direct ORD and seven miles in trail at 250 knots. The first aircraft we were about to ship to ORD would not accept direct ORD. The RADAR assigned the CRJ a 330 heading; then a 360 heading to avoid weather that was blocking its route to ORD. I tried calling C90 for a hand off and could not get a response. When C90 called me I tried to tell them that CRJ would not accept direct ORD. I was told to 'listen' and to bring all arrivals to the WATSN arrival; which required vectoring all arrivals; previously set up for direct ORD; to get a 090 heading. This created an extremely unsafe situation; and led to two airspace violations because aircraft were placed in unsafe proximity with each other. Upon seeing that CRJ and MD80 were to conflict; I asked C90 for any help (i.e. a Northeast heading; direct STYLE; or a north heading). I was told that the aircraft had to enter the airspace on the arrival. I took three phone calls from C90; from two different people; and got two different requests on how to bring aircraft to ORD. We could have had a very catastrophic situation. C90 called after the incident and asked me why I wasn't going direct ORD. I finally; out of frustration; told them I'm doing what I am told; and that I'm being given no options. A better way for bringing arrivals to ORD from the southeast needs to be studied. Having us route arrivals; so they have to descend under departures; and be vectored away from the airport in order to turn to the airport seems silly and creates a huge amount of workload for the Controller. In addition; it leads to possible events like this.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.