An emb-145 entered holding autonomously while climbing to the revised cruise altitude after the capt...

Narrative:

During climb through FL200 we noticed the aircraft started to deviate off course to the right. We are unaware of why; but the FMS had entered a hold. The captain had been changing some of the init data because ATC had changed our final cruising altitude. However; we are both unaware of how that could have resulted in a hold being entered; since it is fairly difficult to enter a hold without knowing it. We were approximately 45 degrees off our course when I switched to heading mode and start to turn back toward our course. The captain advised ATC of an issue with our autopilot and we were given a heading of 180. After getting the FMS out of the hold; we asked for direct and were given heading 190; direct when able. No further incidents occurred during the flight.threats were a change in final cruising altitude that resulted in a change in the init data. There were no errors that we were aware of. The undesired aircraft state was the course deviation of 45 degrees. I should have been more carefully monitoring the captain entering data in the FMS; we are unaware if that was actually the cause of the deviation; however the FMS is where something was improperly entered and while I am usually paying close attention; it's always possible to miss something.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An EMB-145 entered holding autonomously while climbing to the revised cruise altitude after the Captain entered INIT Data to reflect the new revised altitude assignment.

Narrative: During climb through FL200 we noticed the aircraft started to deviate off course to the right. We are unaware of why; but the FMS had entered a hold. The Captain had been changing some of the INIT Data because ATC had changed our final cruising altitude. However; we are both unaware of how that could have resulted in a hold being entered; since it is fairly difficult to enter a hold without knowing it. We were approximately 45 degrees off our course when I switched to heading mode and start to turn back toward our course. The Captain advised ATC of an issue with our autopilot and we were given a heading of 180. After getting the FMS out of the hold; we asked for direct and were given heading 190; direct when able. No further incidents occurred during the flight.Threats were a change in final cruising altitude that resulted in a change in the INIT data. There were no errors that we were aware of. The undesired aircraft state was the course deviation of 45 degrees. I should have been more carefully monitoring the captain entering data in the FMS; we are unaware if that was actually the cause of the deviation; however the FMS is where something was improperly entered and while I am usually paying close attention; it's always possible to miss something.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of July 2013 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.

Attributes
ACN	1067852
Time
Date	201302
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.ARTCC
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Night
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	EMB ERJ 145 ER/LR
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Climb
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	FMS/FMC
Person 1
Function	First Officer Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Commercial
Person 2
Function	Pilot Not Flying Captain
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe Deviation - Procedural Clearance Deviation - Track / Heading All Types

An emb-145 entered holding autonomously while climbing to the revised cruise altitude after the captain entered init data to reflect the new revised altitude assignment.