EMB ERJ 170/175 ER/LR
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Situational Awareness; Distraction
Deviation - Altitude Undershoot; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Clearance; Inflight Event / Encounter Wake Vortex Encounter
Air Traffic Control Issued New Clearance; Flight Crew Became Reoriented
Procedure; Human Factors; Environment - Non Weather Related
Just after departure during aircraft cleanup; we received a complex clearance with direct-to fix; speed restriction; and altitude assignment. As I was selecting the airspeed; we encountered significant wake turbulence and I guarded the controls; subsequently missing the altitude assignment while we searched for the fix. We eventually leveled at 5000 [feet] per the SID when ATC reissued the FL190 clearance mentioning that he thought he had passed it [to us] earlier. We received vectors for the climb and continued without further incident. I should have prioritized the altitude setting and queried the controller when we reached 5000 feet since I had a feeling that we may have missed it.
We departed DCA and on the climb out were given a clearance with multiple instructions; a speed restriction; a fix to go direct to; and an altitude. At about this same time; we hit some wake turbulence that surprised us. The First Officer (FO); the pilot flying; first guarded the controls while we went through the wake; then adjusted the speed; and then we were looking for the fix in the box that we were told to go direct to; at first I must have passed it in the MCDU. I couldn't find it and had to refer to the SID on my iPad to see which fixes it was between. I then found it in the MCDU and we started going to the fix. By this point I had forgotten that along with those clearances we were also given a climb to FL190; my FO had never heard that part of the instruction in the group of instructions we were given at once. It wasn't until ATC queried us about why we were not climbing to FL190 that I remembered the climb. We were still at 5000 [feet]. We were given vectors for the climb and there was no further incident. I should have made sure the altitude was set before anything else; but had been distracted by the unexpected wake turbulence.
E175 flight crew reported failure to climb to assigned altitude when they were distracted by a wake turbulence encounter departing DCA.