Narrative:

As we were climbing through FL280 we received a fuel feed 1 fault message. Within 15 seconds we then received a spda fail message. While looking in the QRH the spda fail message told us that we could expect both thrust reversers to be inoperative. What followed is where the QRH grossly failed us. As I began to look at the fuel synoptic page to see what was happening with the fuel system; and noticing that the electric fuel pump a was in operation; the first officer said that the cabin was climbing. I then realized that I too noticed the pressure change. I immediately went to the ecs synoptic page and saw that both engine bleeds were closed! I looked at our altitude and saw that we were now climbing through FL300. I told the first officer that we needed to descend immediately and I called ATC to tell them that we had lost pressurization and that we needed an immediate descent.I then put my O2 mask on and the first officer followed my lead. I then pressed the cabin emergency button and told the flight attendants that we were losing pressurization; we couldn't get it back and hat we were making a emergency descent. I then pulled out the qrc and began to follow the emergency descent checklist. During the checklist ATC gave us a descent to FL240 on our current heading and then FL190 with a turn off course to the right. When the checklist was complete I quickly sent a message to dispatch saying that we had a 'spda fail lost press emergency descent.' at this time the first officer suggested a diversion. ATC was thinking the same thing and we made a turn direct to ZZZ. We then made preparations to land in ZZZ. Dispatch messaged us and also told us to divert to ZZZ; I replied that we were.we continued the descent to 10;000 and lower as ATC cleared our traffic. We then came off O2 and I started the APU. I made an announcement to the passengers describing the situation and of our intentions. We then noticed that we would be landing overweight. We were at 76.6 and needed to get down to 74.9. Given that the aircraft was in a relatively normal state; other than the pressurization and the AC fuel pump being on; that we could take 15-20 minutes to burn off the fuel to make landing weight and to not add another issue to our situation. So we circled the ZZZ airspace at 6;000 at 200 KIAS with flaps 2.I finally had the time to consider using the APU as the bleed source! This is where the QRH failed me a second time - it would have been much more helpful if the qrc told you to go to nap-4 which could have then reminded me that I could use the APU bleed at 15;000 ft and below. I came to this conclusion on my own but we would have been in a much better situation if I had been reminded earlier. There was just too much going on and other linear thoughts taking my attention preventing me to think outside the box.the first time the QRH failed us was with the spda fail procedure. The notation in the procedure is incomplete and; in our situation; completely wrong. The spda that we lost had the bleed valve control on it. Because the bleed valves failed closed we lost pressure at the leak rate. The spda procedure should have a decision tree to determine which systems had failed and what actions should be taken. Had I had time to think outside the box I would have gone to the bleed fail checklist in the QRH which would have had me turn on the APU andused the APU bleed below 15;000 ft.in conclusion; we executed the emergency descent procedure; notified all parties; used the O2 masks as trained; diverted and even kept the cabin altitude from reaching the mask deployment altitude.

Related reports:

Google
 

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: ERJ-175 Captain reported a Secondary Power Distribution (SPDA) Failure which resulted in a loss of pressurization; descent and diversion. The Captain reported the QRH could have been more specific with corrective actions.

Narrative: As we were climbing through FL280 we received a FUEL FEED 1 FAULT message. Within 15 seconds we then received a SPDA FAIL MESSAGE. While looking in the QRH the SPDA FAIL message told us that we could expect both thrust reversers to be inoperative. What followed is where the QRH grossly failed us. As I began to look at the fuel synoptic page to see what was happening with the fuel system; and noticing that the Electric Fuel Pump A was in operation; the FO said that the cabin was climbing. I then realized that I too noticed the pressure change. I immediately went to the ECS synoptic page and saw that BOTH engine bleeds were closed! I looked at our altitude and saw that we were now climbing through FL300. I told the FO that we needed to descend immediately and I called ATC to tell them that we had lost pressurization and that we needed an immediate descent.I then put my O2 mask on and the FO followed my lead. I then pressed the cabin EMER button and told the flight attendants that we were losing pressurization; we couldn't get it back and hat we were making a emergency descent. I then pulled out the QRC and began to follow the EMERGENCY DESCENT checklist. During the checklist ATC gave us a descent to FL240 on our current heading and then FL190 with a turn off course to the right. When the checklist was complete I quickly sent a message to dispatch saying that we had a 'SPDA FAIL lost press EMER descent.' At this time the FO suggested a diversion. ATC was thinking the same thing and we made a turn direct to ZZZ. We then made preparations to land in ZZZ. Dispatch messaged us and also told us to divert to ZZZ; I replied that we were.We continued the descent to 10;000 and lower as ATC cleared our traffic. We then came off O2 and I started the APU. I made an announcement to the passengers describing the situation and of our intentions. We then noticed that we would be landing overweight. We were at 76.6 and needed to get down to 74.9. Given that the aircraft was in a relatively normal state; other than the pressurization and the AC Fuel Pump being on; that we could take 15-20 minutes to burn off the fuel to make landing weight and to not add another issue to our situation. So we circled the ZZZ airspace at 6;000 at 200 KIAS with Flaps 2.I finally had the time to consider using the APU as the bleed source! This is where the QRH failed me a second time - it would have been MUCH more helpful if the QRC told you to go to NAP-4 which could have then reminded me that I could use the APU bleed at 15;000 ft and below. I came to this conclusion on my own but we would have been in a much better situation if I had been reminded earlier. There was just too much going on and other linear thoughts taking my attention preventing me to think outside the box.The first time the QRH failed us was with the SPDA FAIL procedure. The notation in the procedure is incomplete and; in our situation; completely wrong. The SPDA that we lost had the bleed valve control on it. Because the bleed valves failed closed we lost pressure at the leak rate. The SPDA procedure should have a decision tree to determine which systems had failed and what actions should be taken. Had I had time to think outside the box I would have gone to the BLEED FAIL checklist in the QRH which would have had me turn on the APU andused the APU bleed below 15;000 ft.In conclusion; we executed the emergency descent procedure; notified all parties; used the O2 masks as trained; diverted and even kept the cabin altitude from reaching the mask deployment altitude.

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.