Narrative:

Our pre departure clearance was to climb via the SNSET1 RNAV departure cikan transition. The first officer (first officer) did a very thorough clearance and departure briefing. He was to be the pilot flying (PF) for this leg. He said we would set 7;000 feet in the MCP to comply with the 5;000-7;000 feet restriction at arile until we had the aircraft in VNAV. We had LNAV armed prior to takeoff and he got the airplane on autopilot and autothrottle shortly after the aircraft was cleaned up and selected VNAV. After coordination with him; I set 10;000 feet in the MCP which is the maintain altitude for the departure. Everything went as briefed to include checking in with departure. About 2.5 miles prior to arile and around 6;500 feet with a rapid climb; departure control gave us a clearance to 'climb via the SID except maintain 17;000.' I saw the first officer's left hand start to move up toward the MCP. As I was saying; 'don't push that;' he had pushed the altitude intv button. With our rapid climb rate; I took control of the aircraft; and disconnected the autopilot and autothrottle to minimize overshoot of the 7;000-foot restriction. We had a significant overshoot and got up to about 7;400 feet before the climb stopped. Once things settled down; we covered what had gone wrong; basically a breakdown in CRM. The first officer thought the departure control instructions meant to climb unrestricted to 17;000 feet and realized he had deleted the arile restriction in haste. He also said he was having difficulty grasping inflight changes to 'climb via' clearances. While this was a breakdown in crew coordination; the additive condition of a clearance change so near an action point contributed to our error. We debriefed the importance of proper verification before changing any vertical or navigation programming. Today we will review the 'climb via' clearance changes in some depth. They can be confusing and are often less clear than 'descend via' clearances. Often the pilot monitoring can be the tie breaker.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: B737 flight crew on the SNSET 1 RNAV departure; with the First Officer flying; describes missing a crossing restriction after being assigned a new top altitude by ATC and pushing the altitude intervention button on the MCP instead of just setting the new altitude. The Captain takes control to mitigate the overshoot.

Narrative: Our PDC was to climb via the SNSET1 RNAV Departure CIKAN transition. The First Officer (FO) did a very thorough Clearance and Departure briefing. He was to be the Pilot Flying (PF) for this leg. He said we would set 7;000 feet in the MCP to comply with the 5;000-7;000 feet restriction at ARILE until we had the aircraft in VNAV. We had LNAV armed prior to takeoff and he got the airplane on autopilot and autothrottle shortly after the aircraft was cleaned up and selected VNAV. After coordination with him; I set 10;000 feet in the MCP which is the maintain altitude for the departure. Everything went as briefed to include checking in with Departure. About 2.5 miles prior to ARILE and around 6;500 feet with a rapid climb; Departure Control gave us a clearance to 'climb via the SID except maintain 17;000.' I saw the FO's left hand start to move up toward the MCP. As I was saying; 'don't push that;' he had pushed the ALT INTV button. With our rapid climb rate; I took control of the aircraft; and disconnected the autopilot and autothrottle to minimize overshoot of the 7;000-foot restriction. We had a significant overshoot and got up to about 7;400 feet before the climb stopped. Once things settled down; we covered what had gone wrong; basically a breakdown in CRM. The FO thought the Departure Control instructions meant to climb unrestricted to 17;000 feet and realized he had deleted the ARILE restriction in haste. He also said he was having difficulty grasping inflight changes to 'Climb Via' clearances. While this was a breakdown in Crew coordination; the additive condition of a clearance change so near an action point contributed to our error. We debriefed the importance of proper verification before changing any vertical or navigation programming. Today we will review the 'Climb Via' clearance changes in some depth. They can be confusing and are often less clear than 'Descend Via' clearances. Often the pilot monitoring can be the tie breaker.

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.