Commercial Fixed Wing
Air Traffic Control Developmental
Confusion; Communication Breakdown
ATC Issue All Types; Conflict Airborne Conflict; Deviation - Track / Heading All Types; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy
Air Traffic Control Issued Advisory / Alert; Air Traffic Control Issued New Clearance; Flight Crew Returned To Clearance
Procedure; Human Factors
We were operating on Runway 33 this day. Tower requested a left turn departure for Air Carrier X because a flight of two military jets were ready for departure right behind them. I told Tower to turn Air Carrier X left on a 210 heading. Tower held on to Air Carrier X for a couple minutes on departure climb while the flight of two military jets departed behind them on runway heading. Shortly thereafter; Air Carrier X came over to Departure climbing out of 034 above the MVA for that area I told them to proceed direct HANAA. [I] then told the following military jet flight to turn left direct LAGGS. I performed coordination for the handoff of the military jet flights to Boston Center then switched them. My trainer alerted me that Air Carrier X appeared to be off course. I immediately told Air Carrier X to turn left direct HANAA. This appeared to do nothing; so my trainer keyed up and said turn left heading 220 and called traffic because Air Carrier X was now a direct conflict with the pair of military jets at their 12 to 1 o'clock around 3 to 4 miles and decreasing rapidly within a few hundred feet of each other. Air Carrier X was issued a safety alert and reported the traffic in sight and was told to maintain visual separation. I'm not sure if the pilots of Air Carrier X saw both military jets or just one. The second military jet did not have it's transponder on so it was hard to tell how much of a factor there was between Air Carrier X and the second military jet. It is my understanding that Air Carrier X was in direct conflict because when I told them to proceed direct HANAA; they accidentally put in HANNA. I've been told that this happened before. I believe that a name change should be initiated for this fix or a removal altogether to avoid future mistakes.
During the preflight I entered the flight plan after receiving the clearance. I entered HANNA into the flight plan instead of entering HANAA. After completing the flight plan the Captain and I reviewed it and the spelling error of HANAA was missed. On takeoff we were cleared runway heading. Moments later ATC came back with a heading of 210 on takeoff. After climbing out and cleaning up we were assigned a climb to 10;000 and direct to HANAA. The incorrect spelling of HANNA was where the aircraft turned toward (should have been HANAA). Not long after the Controller asked if we were direct HANAA. At this time we discovered the incorrect spelling and entered the correct HANAA. During this time ATC gave us an initial vector and called traffic out. We both saw the traffic and continued a left turn direct to HANAA.
A loss of separation event occurred when pronunciation of navigational fix HANAA was apparently incorrectly entered in the FMS as HANNA by the flight crew and an unexpected turn was initiated.