Regional Jet 200 ER/LR (CRJ200)
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Communication Breakdown; Confusion; Distraction; Situational Awareness; Time Pressure; Workload
Other Unwanted Situation
Flight Crew Became Reoriented; Flight Crew Overcame Equipment Problem
Chart Or Publication; Company Policy; Environment - Non Weather Related; Weather
The airport crew room suffered considerable water damage; to the point that all crews that stored their flight cases in the crew room were unusable. I am a reserve Captain. I was starting my duty on after a major storm. The night before I was issued a trip and was told about the damage to the crew room. I was asked if possible to report early to assess the damage to my crew bag and its contents. If my contents were unusable I was told the company will have a bag ready with all my manuals and charts to [be] necessary for duty along with telling me that they have obtained an exemption where myself and the First Officer can operate out of this issued bag; share its contents. I arrived at crew room; with only 20 minutes to spare to report time; due to traffic in the city area. I looked for my bag and tried to salvage some of my belongings out of the bag and discussed how to handle things with the Company staff on duty. I was handed a crew bag; opened it and scanned to ensure I had the Company manuals and Commercial Chart binders to conduct a flight. I rushed to get to the plane to conduct the preflight and briefings necessary with my crew to begin our duty. It was a little cumbersome because I needed to establish how the pilot flying vs. the pilot not flying duty will have to adjust regarding plate brief etc considering we only had one set of Commercial Charts. Our Commercial Chart plate binders were wet so that added a little stress to the situation considering I assumed we were given a new set to operate for our trip. We moved on and conducted our operation safely taking the extra time where necessary to conduct our operation. On the third day of this trip; we had our GPS malfunction on us descending into our destination; approximately 75 miles out in VFR. We informed ATC requested VOR navigation to the destination VOR. We were given vectors to final approach and landed VFR on Runway 15. At the gate I contacted Maintenance Control and performed a reset procedure and the GPS came back. I discussed with Dispatch and told them that to be cautious I wanted to operate VOR navigation backed with our GPS to our next designation in the event the GPS acted up again. Myself; Dispatch and First Officer were all in agreement to be filled VOR to VOR along with a non RNAV arrival as a safer approach to conduct our flight. Once the filled route was given to me; I reached in the bag and realized that I had NO enroute charts. We operated 6 flights without any enroute charts in our issued flight case. I called Dispatch back; who in turn called an Assistant Chief Pilot. I talked to the Assistant Chief Pilot who had communicated and consulted our Chief Pilot on the matter; and we agreed to obtain printed Government Charts downloaded from the FAA website. We printed the necessary enroute charts to conduct flight below 18;000 FT; along with uploading an electronic copy to my iPad. The Assistant Chief Pilot assured me that this would be in compliance and that they have consulted the FAA on the matter. Dispatch refilled us VOR to VOR navigation bellow 18;000 FT; we all reviewed the facts on hand and decided to operate flight. At our destination we were issued a set of Company Commercial Chart to finish our trip. I think there were a few contributing factors leading to this mishap. The water damage to the crew room and our equipment had created quite havoc. The fact that I couldn't get to the airport 45 minutes early to show time to assess the damage to my bag; sort out what was necessary and fully inventory the bag issued to me; along with assuming the bag had all necessary equipment all led to this mishap. I think we are so used to our bags and its contents that I wrongfully assumed the bag issued to me had all necessary equipment. I accept fault in not inventory the bag issued to me more thoroughly.
A Captain reported for duty following a major storm which flooded the crew room and destroyed flight bags. He was issued a single bag for both pilots which they discovered had no airway charts after the aircraft's GPS malfunctioned.