Narrative:

While cruising at fl 330 we got a level 1 alert on the ead - hydraulic pump left fail. I was the pilot monitoring and the first officer was flying so I took out the QRH and turned to the level 1 alert section to read about our message. I also pulled up the hydraulic synoptic page and noticed that our quantity which had started around 11.3 had risen up to about 14 or so. While watching the synoptic page and discussing the potential problem with the first officer; I noticed that our hydraulic quantity started to drop rapidly; so I turned to the hydraulic tab in the QRH so I could be ready for the next alert. At about the same time we received a level 2 alert on the ead - hydraulic left qty low. First officer continued to fly and I finished the QRH procedure. After reading the QRH procedure I wanted to talk to maintenance control so I used the phone to try and establish communication with dispatch and maintenance control. After a number of attempts we finally were connected to our dispatcher. I told him about our situation and told him we needed to talk to maintenance. He tried to connect us all together but we were disconnected. With maintenance [finally] on the call I told them I didn't want to continue to destination because of this issue and suggested we divert to our alternate. After a few minutes they told me to divert to another airport and I agreed. So we told approach we wanted to change our destination and we wanted to divert. We completed the approach to the ILS and rolled to the end and turned off. I had the first officer call operations and tell them that I wanted to be towed to the gate because of our situation. I taxied the aircraft to about 300 feet from the gate or so and after having ground personnel connect the tug to the aircraft and after communications were established they towed us to the gate without any further incident. Maintenance met us at the gate and after walking outside we saw that our left engine was leaking hydraulic fluid at a pretty rapid rate.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A B717 Captain reported losing the left hydraulic system in flight. After running the QRH and coordinating with Dispatch and Maintenance a decision was made to divert to an airport with a longer runway.

Narrative: While cruising at FL 330 we got a LEVEL 1 ALERT on the EAD - HYD PUMP L FAIL. I was the pilot monitoring and the First Officer was flying so I took out the QRH and turned to the LEVEL 1 ALERT section to read about our message. I also pulled up the HYD Synoptic page and noticed that our quantity which had started around 11.3 had risen up to about 14 or so. While watching the Synoptic Page and discussing the potential problem with the First Officer; I noticed that our hydraulic quantity started to drop rapidly; so I turned to the HYD tab in the QRH so I could be ready for the next alert. At about the same time we received a LEVEL 2 ALERT on the EAD - HYD L QTY LOW. First Officer continued to fly and I finished the QRH procedure. After reading the QRH procedure I wanted to talk to Maintenance Control so I used the phone to try and establish communication with Dispatch and Maintenance Control. After a number of attempts we finally were connected to our Dispatcher. I told him about our situation and told him we needed to talk to Maintenance. He tried to connect us all together but we were disconnected. With Maintenance [finally] on the call I told them I didn't want to continue to destination because of this issue and suggested we divert to our alternate. After a few minutes they told me to divert to another airport and I agreed. So we told Approach we wanted to change our destination and we wanted to divert. We completed the approach to the ILS and rolled to the end and turned off. I had the First Officer call Operations and tell them that I wanted to be towed to the gate because of our situation. I taxied the aircraft to about 300 feet from the gate or so and after having ground personnel connect the tug to the aircraft and after communications were established they towed us to the gate without any further incident. Maintenance met us at the gate and after walking outside we saw that our left engine was leaking hydraulic fluid at a pretty rapid rate.

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.