Narrative:

When I came in for my shift severe weather was extending from dfw to lit then north to canada. The supervisor had already left and did not hold over any overtime; in my opinion a huge mistake. The only way around the weather was through my area. When I was taking over the sector it was very busy; but the supervisor told me that the tmu supervisor said it would only be busy for 10-15 minutes. I took the sector; but right away I realized that most of the aircraft had to be rerouted because the routes where not clearing the weather. If the tmu had weather reroutes issued they were completely ineffective. The westbound aircraft were routed into my sector and then north/northwest right back into the severe weather. I don't think the tmu had a plan. I asked my coworker to call and get us some help. The controller who I had just relieved was still in the building and was paged back. He had already been on position for more than two hours prior to coming back. He worked my d-side for over an hour; during that time one aircraft crossed the ZFW boundary with out a hand off. My d-side did the necessary coordination. I don't remember the call sign. The tmu also did not have a plan for the memphis arrivals that were coming in from ZFW and they were east of the weather. There was no way to get through the weather to memphis. The tmu waited until all the aircraft had flown through my sector and I had started descending them. Then; told me to reroute them back to dallas to get on the west side of the weather. After I got all the aircraft rerouted and started handing them off to ZFW; ZFW started handing different memphis arrivals to me. Apparently our tmu does not coordinate with ZFW tmu. This was not a rapidly developing storm that surprised everyone. It was a huge storm that had been moving across the country most of the day. I don't know why our tmu did not have the aircraft on good routes. And I really don't understand how the supervisors could expect the 3 workers to work that much traffic during severe weather with out help. During any shift we would never be allowed or expected to work that much traffic alone with sectors combined. This is just another example of trying to use the most minimum staffing possible. Recommendation; we need 4 people on late night shifts and the tmu needs to be held accountable for their bad decisions just like controllers. A lot of the problems that the FAA is having right now are due to short staffing.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ZME Controller described a very busy/complex traffic period during late night operation that involved significant weather factors; rerouting and staffing concerns; the reporter suggesting an increase of staffing for late shifts.

Narrative: When I came in for my shift severe weather was extending from DFW to LIT then north to Canada. The Supervisor had already left and did not hold over any overtime; in my opinion a huge mistake. The only way around the weather was through my area. When I was taking over the sector it was very busy; but the Supervisor told me that the TMU Supervisor said it would only be busy for 10-15 minutes. I took the sector; but right away I realized that most of the aircraft had to be rerouted because the routes where not clearing the weather. If the TMU had weather reroutes issued they were completely ineffective. The westbound aircraft were routed into my sector and then north/northwest right back into the severe weather. I don't think the TMU had a plan. I asked my coworker to call and get us some help. The Controller who I had just relieved was still in the building and was paged back. He had already been on position for more than two hours prior to coming back. He worked my D-Side for over an hour; during that time one aircraft crossed the ZFW boundary with out a hand off. My D-Side did the necessary coordination. I don't remember the call sign. The TMU also did not have a plan for the Memphis arrivals that were coming in from ZFW and they were east of the weather. There was no way to get through the weather to Memphis. The TMU waited until all the aircraft had flown through my sector and I had started descending them. Then; told me to reroute them back to Dallas to get on the west side of the weather. After I got all the aircraft rerouted and started handing them off to ZFW; ZFW started handing different Memphis arrivals to me. Apparently our TMU does not coordinate with ZFW TMU. This was not a rapidly developing storm that surprised everyone. It was a huge storm that had been moving across the country most of the day. I don't know why our TMU did not have the aircraft on good routes. And I really don't understand how the supervisors could expect the 3 workers to work that much traffic during severe weather with out help. During any shift we would never be allowed or expected to work that much traffic alone with sectors combined. This is just another example of trying to use the most minimum staffing possible. Recommendation; we need 4 people on late night shifts and the TMU needs to be held accountable for their bad decisions just like controllers. A lot of the problems that the FAA is having right now are due to short staffing.

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.