Narrative:

From cruise at FL200 we were told to descend to 11;000 ft. During the descent; ATC told us to stop at 15;000 ft. ATC then told another aircraft to stop climb at 14;000 ft. As we leveled off at 15;000 ft ATC asked another aircraft to look for traffic at 15;000; a crj 200. Then ATC asked us to look for traffic; a C17; at our eleven o'clock. We had no problems seeing the C17 and told ATC we had traffic in sight. Then ATC told us to maintain visual with the C17 and descend to 11;000 ft. After dialing in 11;000 ft the first officer and I decided the aircraft was too close and decided to maintain 15;000 until passing the traffic. I then told ATC that we would be maintaining 15;000. During our discussion of how close the C17 was the C17 must have been given a clearance to climb. The next thing we know TCAS is telling us to 'climb' which the first officer did promptly. Out of our window I see the C17 coming right towards us; in a climb as well. As the airplane is still telling us to 'climb'; ATC asks us what we are doing. I tell him we are following a RA. Then; I finally see the C17 starting to nose down and when ATC asked the C17 what he is doing he says he is following his RA.the bottom line was ATC asked us to maintain visual with a plane and descend. At the same time he tells the other plane to maintain visual and climb. Neither plane should have been told to change altitude until the planes had passed.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A CRJ and a C17 responded to mutual TCAS RA's after being cleared to descend and climb relative to one another while maintaining visual contact.

Narrative: From cruise at FL200 we were told to descend to 11;000 FT. During the descent; ATC told us to stop at 15;000 FT. ATC then told another aircraft to stop climb at 14;000 FT. As we leveled off at 15;000 FT ATC asked another aircraft to look for traffic at 15;000; a CRJ 200. Then ATC asked us to look for traffic; a C17; at our eleven o'clock. We had no problems seeing the C17 and told ATC we had traffic in sight. Then ATC told us to maintain visual with the C17 and descend to 11;000 FT. After dialing in 11;000 FT the First Officer and I decided the aircraft was too close and decided to maintain 15;000 until passing the traffic. I then told ATC that we would be maintaining 15;000. During our discussion of how close the C17 was the C17 must have been given a clearance to climb. The next thing we know TCAS is telling us to 'CLIMB' which the First Officer did promptly. Out of our window I see the C17 coming right towards us; in a climb as well. As the airplane is still telling us to 'Climb'; ATC asks us what we are doing. I tell him we are following a RA. Then; I finally see the C17 starting to nose down and when ATC asked the C17 what he is doing he says he is following his RA.The bottom line was ATC asked us to maintain visual with a plane and descend. At the same time he tells the other plane to maintain visual and climb. Neither plane should have been told to change altitude until the planes had passed.

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.