Narrative:

Training a d-side developmental. Weather was building over rdu and a line of weather was west of gso extending north. Majority of the aircraft in our sector were deviating around the weather. All the clt departures and northbound traffic were not able to stay on their routes. Require numerous point outs and coordination. The edst (enroute decision support tool) was over a page and the amount of coordination and work load was barely manageable with all 3 of us.we then received a phone call from ZJX ridgeway saying that ZTL had been shut off on the mgm playbook over gso and wanted to know what to do with the planes; could we take them; and what route to give them due to weather. We had weather over 70% of our sector so we told them we would have to call back. We did call back and told them to put them off sdz to keep traffic running while our supervisor went to find out with tmu what was going on. No communication was passed from tmu to flm or controllers on what playbooks were in effect; leading to us not know how much traffic was coming; what destinations were being routed into our airspace; or for how long.now all of J75 are deviating south requiring us to take point outs and all the northbound are being routed into our sector. The weather over gso and rdu had caused all the traffic to funnel through 36; 07; 32; 16. There are planes everywhere unable to meet crossing restrictions; unable to climb departures; have clt arrivals at 380. We are taking point puts on dc metros that are being handoff to sector 16 not 20. The conflict alert is going off because no one is near their routes. We are begging planes to turn otherwise we will lose separation. It is completely unsafe.not once were we able to call weather due to unsafe situation of workload and too many aircraft. Traffic needs to be slowed. Plans to be communicated. Playbooks cannot run planes directly at the weather.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZDC Controller reported during a period of weather deviations lack of Traffic Management flow initiatives caused an unsafe workload.

Narrative: Training a D-side developmental. Weather was building over RDU and a line of weather was west of GSO extending north. Majority of the aircraft in our sector were deviating around the weather. All the CLT departures and northbound traffic were not able to stay on their routes. Require numerous point outs and coordination. The EDST (Enroute Decision Support Tool) was over a page and the amount of coordination and work load was barely manageable with all 3 of us.We then received a phone call from ZJX Ridgeway saying that ZTL had been shut off on the MGM playbook over GSO and wanted to know what to do with the planes; could we take them; and what route to give them due to weather. We had weather over 70% of our sector so we told them we would have to call back. We did call back and told them to put them off SDZ to keep traffic running while our supervisor went to find out with TMU what was going on. No communication was passed from TMU to FLM or controllers on what playbooks were in effect; leading to us not know how much traffic was coming; what destinations were being routed into our airspace; or for how long.Now all of J75 are deviating south requiring us to take point outs and all the northbound are being routed into our sector. The weather over GSO and RDU had caused all the traffic to funnel through 36; 07; 32; 16. There are planes everywhere unable to meet crossing restrictions; unable to climb departures; have CLT arrivals at 380. We are taking point puts on DC metros that are being handoff to sector 16 not 20. The conflict alert is going off because no one is near their routes. We are begging planes to turn otherwise we will lose separation. It is completely unsafe.Not once were we able to call weather due to unsafe situation of workload and too many aircraft. Traffic needs to be slowed. Plans to be communicated. Playbooks cannot run planes directly at the weather.

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.