Regional Jet 700 ER/LR (CRJ700)
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Situational Awareness
Inflight Event / Encounter CFTT / CFIT
Flight Crew Became Reoriented; Flight Crew Took Evasive Action
Human Factors
We were setting up for a right base for runway 36L into HSV with the Captain being the pilot flying. It was just after dark; we had called the field in sight and began our descent to traffic pattern altitude; after being cleared for the visual approach. On the right base as we were descending the Captain asked me if I thought we were too low and I went to look at one of the approach charts into HSV. When I looked at the chart in relation to where we were I said that I thought we were fine. As soon as I said this we simultaneously were told by ATC that they were getting a low altitude alert for our flight and a GPWS warning to pull up. The Captain disengaged the autopilot and began to climb and I notified ATC that we were correcting our altitude. After correcting our altitude to a safe altitude we continued the approach to a safe landing.The event occurred because runway 35R was out of service and the ILS was out of service to runway 35L. We decided to set up for a visual and thought we were closer to the airport in relation to terrain than we thought. Therefore we descended to traffic pattern altitude too early.
CRJ-700 First Officer reported receiving a low attitude alert from ATC on a night visual approach to HSV.