Operations Center

Jake and Quaritch using the Ops Halo Station

The Operations Center, or OPS Center, is a facility in the Hell's Gate (RDA ESC 01) complex on Pandora. It occupies the largest building in the main Hell's Gate administration complex. It is the nexus for communications and operational control on Pandora.

It has offices, a communication center, meeting rooms, and living quarters used by the RDA executive staff. It is located near the Armor Bay and SecOps barracks. Fortified tunnels connect the center to the communications array, with three large antennae and a space resonator for communications outside the local system, and five smaller antennae for accessing Pandoranet communications and geolocation satellites.

Control room floor plan

At the heart of the OPS Center is the control room, where a continuously updated Halo Station display gives a summary of conditions over the entire Hell's Gate facility and much of Pandora, including Hometree, the center of the Omatikaya clan of the indigenous population, the Na'vi. Supervisors monitor all mining, refining, transport, and security conditions on Pandora, as well as conduct flight tracking from the control room.

Parker practicing putting in the ops center

Ample reinforced windows give the control room a spectacular panoramic view from the plateau where the base is situated. Outside the complex, the local rivers are used for both cooling and disposal of waste, to the distant hills beyond. There is an office formally used by Commander Falco and then by Parker Selfridge inside the control room; it is currently decorated with various Na'vi artifacts and a large RDA logo.

Fortified tunnels connect the center to the communications array, with three large antennae and a space resonator for communications outside the local system, and five smaller antennae for accessing Pandoranet communications and geolocation satellites. At the heart of the ops center is the control room, where a continuously updated holotable display gives a summary of conditions over the entire Hell’s Gate facility and all RDA operations on Pandora, while supervisors monitor all mining, refining, transport and security conditions on workstations.

In the interest of maintaining high levels of operating efficiency, efforts were made during the construction of the Hell’s Gate complex to maintain a congenial working environment for senior RDA staff.

Unfortunately, manpower depletion caused by Pandoran megafauna meant that some compromises had to be made. For example, the executive habitation unit, equipped with comfort features comparable to those found at RDA’s Lunar isotopic helium extraction facility, was deferred until the third resource transport arrived. “B” and “C” level executives were quartered with SecOps and construction staff, while special apartments were constructed in the ops center for “A” level staff.

These quarters remain to this day, although individual apartments have been enlarged by merging what were originally separate units. (A senior level annex has been constructed between the ops center and the executive habitation unit, popularly known as “the condo” and used only by “B” and “C” level executives.)

“A” level executives have generally taken their quartering in the ops center in stride; being close to the heart of the Hell’s Gate operation has come to be considered an asset, given the numerous challenges inherent to the frontier-like conditions on Pandora.

Sources

• Avatar (film)
• Pandorapedia - OPS Center article