Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical; Deviation / Discrepancy - Procedural Published Material / Policy; Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Smoke / Fire / Fumes / Odor
General Release Refused / Aircraft Not Accepted; General Maintenance Action; General Flight Cancelled / Delayed
Company Policy; Aircraft
Upon landing while parking the plane at the gate; we noticed an extreme odor of fuel (kerosene) type inside the cockpit. It was noticed by the Flight Attendant as well. During a walk-around examination; Captain and I established that the fuel leak was possibly coming from an area close to the APU titanium firewall. He proceeded to call Maintenance and Dispatch and was told by Maintenance to MEL the APU and that should take care of the problem. We tried several times to get contract maintenance on site to inspect our problem but our company told us they were working on some other plane and was gonna take an indefinite amount of time (several hours). While waiting for our wheels up time I was told by Captain to call our Chief Pilot. I immediately contacted him on my cell phone and the call took lasted for about 5 minutes. The details of the call was him trying to explain to me the systems of the E-145; which for me coming fresh from training was absurd and a waste of time. Finally; as the last resort; he tried to convince me several times to fly the airplane even though he would not send Maintenance to check it out quoting it was safe to fly. He repeatedly communicated to me and my Captain several times that contract Maintenance was only going to take a look through from the outside of the plane and not open any panels and to get Maintenance there it would take hours. After disagreeing; he agreed to send contract Maintenance and the mechanic showed up in less than 15 minutes. I only saw him 'after the inspection' took place; nobody saw him inspect anything. In fact when questioned by Captain and myself about the fuel leak spot on the ground; he was completely unaware of that and we had to walk him to the site because he had not noticed that before.After discussing the whole situation again with Captain. I decided it was a NO-GO and he called Dispatch to inform the flight was canceled. After waiting for about an hour at the airport; the company got us ground transportation to ZZZ so we could pick up our original leg the next morning. Fast forward one month later I received an email notifying me about upcoming training. When I asked why; she said she did not know and told me to inquire a Supervisor. After doing this. I get the following response email which I'm attaching to this report.Number 1: I'm not a mechanic; I'm a pilot and I'm being paid as a pilot. I cannot make uninformed decisions without proper backup (maintenance).Number 2: Without having a mechanic inspecting the APU inside and out and given the OK by him I would have not changed my decision of not completing the flight.Number 3: We were uncertain about the location of the fuel leak and there was no mechanic available to establish where the leak was coming from.My job is to safely transport passengers everyday and safety is the number one priority on my list. This airplane was UNSAFE to fly without having proper maintenance. Even though Section 121.533 of the FARs (section D) applies to PICs and I was the SIC of this flight. Nevertheless I helped my PIC to reach a safe decision which ended in the cancellation of the flight. Last thing to add: After the flight was canceled; dispatch called Captain to see if we were okay ferrying the airplane back. This brings us to an interesting question. They are willing to risk our lives as crew members but not our passengers?
An ERJ145 First Officer reported they declined to take an aircraft with a fuel leak in spite of pressure from management to fly it.