An A319 captain reported abnormal noises and an ECAM message alerting him to a nose gear problem. He...

Narrative:

While climbing out first officer and captain both heard a felt a single jolt that we attributed to the flight attendant stowing a cart. Upon level off; 5 strong; rapid jolts were felt and heard followed shortly by the 'LGCIU2' ECAM fault. Crew surmised the jolts were the nose landing gear striking the closed landing gear doors. Crew contacted dispatch/maintenance and elected to return for maintenance facilitation. Operations requested contact with captain. On a 'human factors' quiz captain was asked how 'surprised' he was by the event. The heavy jolts were unexpected but the fault was not; it was written up previously multiple times; and never adequately addressed. The prima-facie evidence of this being our incident. The crew had actually briefed the irregular page for this fault prior to departing on leg one of the assignment. This fault occurred on leg three but the maintenance history led us to believe we would experience it. Maintenance continues to be concerned with 'clearing the fault' rather than fixing the problem that caused the fault. This continued practice is troubling to line pilots and is counter to the public safety message distributed by the company.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An A319 Captain reported abnormal noises and an ECAM message alerting him to a nose gear problem. He coordinated with dispatch and maintenance and returned to departure airport.

Narrative: While climbing out First Officer and Captain both heard a felt a single jolt that we attributed to the Flight Attendant stowing a cart. Upon level off; 5 strong; rapid jolts were felt and heard followed shortly by the 'LGCIU2' ECAM fault. Crew surmised the jolts were the nose landing gear striking the closed landing gear doors. Crew contacted dispatch/maintenance and elected to return for maintenance facilitation. Operations requested contact with Captain. On a 'human factors' quiz Captain was asked how 'surprised' he was by the event. The heavy jolts were unexpected but the fault was not; it was written up previously multiple times; and never adequately addressed. The prima-facie evidence of this being our incident. The crew had actually briefed the irregular page for this fault prior to departing on leg one of the assignment. This fault occurred on leg three but the maintenance history led us to believe we would experience it. Maintenance continues to be concerned with 'clearing the fault' rather than fixing the problem that caused the fault. This continued practice is troubling to line pilots and is counter to the public safety message distributed by the company.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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	861418
Time
Date	200911
Local Time Of Day	1801-2400
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	A319
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Climb
Component
Aircraft Component	Nose Gear
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Not Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 265 Flight Crew Total 13021 Flight Crew Type 3235
Person 2
Function	Dispatcher
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe

An A319 captain reported abnormal noises and an ECAM message alerting him to a nose gear problem. He coordinated with dispatch and maintenance and returned to departure airport.