ZSE controller reported of an aircraft that went to an incorrect fix causing conflict with arrivals....

Attributes
ACN	1355180
Time
Date	201605
Local Time Of Day	0001-0600
Place
Locale Reference	ZSE.ARTCC
State Reference	WA
Environment
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Gulfstream V / G500 / G550
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 91
Flight Phase	Climb
Flight Plan	IFR
Person 1
Function	Enroute
Qualification	Air Traffic Control Fully Certified
Experience	Air Traffic Control Time Certified In Pos 1 (yrs) 1
Events
Anomaly	ATC Issue All Types Deviation - Procedural Clearance Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy Deviation - Track / Heading All Types

Narrative:

Aircraft X was a seattle departure. S46 departure controller issued 'direct arrie' which is on his route; and a very common fix for direct. The pilot (non-native english speaking) read back arrie; and even pronounced 'arrie' when asked; but on further questioning had spelled it 'arrue' which was also on his flight plan. This put him in direct conflict with the marnr and jawbn arrivals. I gave him a heading of 250 while we figured out what was going on. At that time; the departure controller called to tell me it didn't look like aircraft X was going to arrie; and I informed him that I'd already turned him. Both arrie and arrue are on J523. I don't know if aircraft have qwerty keyboards; but for similar fixes to have only one letter different that are adjacent to each other on the keyboard may be a contributing factor. Rename either the arrie or arrue fix to something that is not similar to another fix on the airway.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZSE Controller reported of an aircraft that went to an incorrect fix causing conflict with arrivals. The fix names were almost identical and off by one letter.

Narrative: Aircraft X was a Seattle departure. S46 departure controller issued 'direct ARRIE' which is on his route; and a very common fix for direct. The pilot (non-native English speaking) read back ARRIE; and even pronounced 'ARRIE' when asked; but on further questioning had spelled it 'ARRUE' which was also on his flight plan. This put him in direct conflict with the MARNR and JAWBN arrivals. I gave him a heading of 250 while we figured out what was going on. At that time; the departure controller called to tell me it didn't look like Aircraft X was going to ARRIE; and I informed him that I'd already turned him. Both ARRIE and ARRUE are on J523. I don't know if aircraft have QWERTY keyboards; but for similar fixes to have only one letter different that are adjacent to each other on the keyboard may be a contributing factor. Rename either the ARRIE or ARRUE fix to something that is not similar to another fix on the airway.

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.

ZSE controller reported of an aircraft that went to an incorrect fix causing conflict with arrivals. The fix names were almost identical and off by one letter.