Narrative:

Busy and complex session. Aircraft X a mht arrival was level at 29000 feet from sector 20. Sector 38 has control to turn mht arrivals and descend them to 27000 feet 15 miles from the ign/athens boundary. An isp arrival was also entering the airspace from sector 10 descending to 29000 feet in conflict with aircraft X. Both aircraft must be descended to 24000 feet by sector 38 and handed off to sector 22. Aircraft Y was a dca overflight at 28000 feet southbound toward sector 20. Sector 20 has control to turn aircraft up to 30 degrees south of J68. Roughly 5 miles from the boundary I turned aircraft X direct to fyshr; and a few seconds later descended aircraft X to 27000 feet. This would place aircraft X in front of and below the 29000 foot traffic that also needed to descend; and additionally; would place aircraft X behind aircraft Y.unknown to me sector 20 had simultaneously issued aircraft Y a vector to the right towards aircraft X. Sector 20 did not place the heading into the 4th line of the data block; nor did they update the flight plan to show a shortcut to a subsequent fix. Conflict alert activated roughly 15 seconds later as aircraft Y's turn became apparent. I issued a left turn to aircraft X and since he had already left 29000 feet; issued an expedited descent to 25000 feet as the aircraft was now entering my airspace and I did not want him to shallow his descent to level at 27000 feet. At closest point the aircraft were 5.12 miles lateral and 200ft vertical.the dual control situation in the SOP needs to be fixed. Sector 20 does not need control of aircraft south of J68.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZBW Center Controller turned and descended an aircraft to avoid a conflict with converging traffic. The Controller working the converging traffic turned their traffic also to avoid the confliction which put them into conflict.

Narrative: Busy and complex session. Aircraft X a MHT arrival was level at 29000 feet from sector 20. Sector 38 has control to turn MHT arrivals and descend them to 27000 feet 15 miles from the IGN/ATHENS boundary. An ISP arrival was also entering the airspace from sector 10 descending to 29000 feet in conflict with Aircraft X. Both aircraft must be descended to 24000 feet by sector 38 and handed off to sector 22. Aircraft Y was a DCA overflight at 28000 feet southbound toward sector 20. Sector 20 has control to turn aircraft up to 30 degrees south of J68. Roughly 5 miles from the boundary I turned Aircraft X direct to FYSHR; and a few seconds later descended Aircraft X to 27000 feet. This would place Aircraft X in front of and below the 29000 foot traffic that also needed to descend; and additionally; would place Aircraft X behind Aircraft Y.Unknown to me sector 20 had simultaneously issued Aircraft Y a vector to the right towards Aircraft X. Sector 20 DID NOT place the heading into the 4th line of the data block; nor did they update the flight plan to show a shortcut to a subsequent fix. Conflict alert activated roughly 15 seconds later as Aircraft Y's turn became apparent. I issued a left turn to Aircraft X and since he had already left 29000 feet; issued an expedited descent to 25000 feet as the aircraft was now entering my airspace and I did not want him to shallow his descent to level at 27000 feet. At closest point the aircraft were 5.12 miles Lateral and 200ft vertical.The dual control situation in the SOP needs to be fixed. Sector 20 does not need control of aircraft south of J68.

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.