Narrative:

I had just been relieved from the r-side position a few minutes before the incident having moved to the a-side position. The r-side that had relieved me noticed an air carrier flight; eastbound at FL380 that had been in our airspace for at least 20 minutes and showed that he was on the wrong beacon code; indicating a beacon code in the data block. The r-side pointed this out; and we briefly discussed whether or not I could have missed the fact that he needed a beacon code change on contact. However; we subsequently noticed a message waiting indication; and when we pressed the message acknowledgment button there were beacon code changes indicated for three separate aircraft; including the one in question; and two other aircraft that were being handed off from ZDV. As this was an anomaly; beacon code changes only occur between facilities; I printed a strip and took it to the omic; explaining the situation and assuming it was an automation discrepancy. After his initial investigation; the omic informed us that another area had the same thing happen on several aircraft they were working; and that they believed it to be due to an eram issue with ZLC; who was running eram. All the aircraft in question had flown through ZLC airspace previously. Recommendation; if this is an eram bug; then it needs to be corrected as soon as possible. Since ZLC is continuously running eram; should this same thing occur with moderate or greater traffic; it would cause a great distraction and disruption to controllers working aircraft that had their beacon codes changed in the computer.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZMP Controller described an apparent interface problem with ZLC that was operating on ERAM resulting in confused beacon code assignments.

Narrative: I had just been relieved from the R-Side position a few minutes before the incident having moved to the A-Side position. The R-Side that had relieved me noticed an Air Carrier flight; eastbound at FL380 that had been in our airspace for at least 20 minutes and showed that he was on the wrong beacon code; indicating a beacon code in the data block. The R-Side pointed this out; and we briefly discussed whether or not I could have missed the fact that he needed a beacon code change on contact. However; we subsequently noticed a Message Waiting indication; and when we pressed the Message Acknowledgment button there were beacon code changes indicated for three separate aircraft; including the one in question; and two other aircraft that were being handed off from ZDV. As this was an anomaly; beacon code changes only occur between facilities; I printed a strip and took it to the OMIC; explaining the situation and assuming it was an automation discrepancy. After his initial investigation; the OMIC informed us that another area had the same thing happen on several aircraft they were working; and that they believed it to be due to an ERAM issue with ZLC; who was running ERAM. All the aircraft in question had flown through ZLC airspace previously. Recommendation; if this is an ERAM bug; then it needs to be corrected ASAP. Since ZLC is continuously running ERAM; should this same thing occur with moderate or greater traffic; it would cause a great distraction and disruption to controllers working aircraft that had their beacon codes changed in the computer.

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.