Narrative:

On initial climb out through 700 ft AGL as the captain called for autopilot on; two loud bangs were heard and felt; followed by a continuous vibration that rattled the airplane. The aircraft yawed and rolled slightly as well. A quick initial scan of the instruments revealed a 'vib' message in the left engine N2 section and an itt over redline; approximately 950 degrees; but the engine continued to produce thrust. These indications were followed shortly by an left cowl a/ice caution message. Reducing thrust on the left engine caused the vibrations to cease and the messages to extinguish. We declared an emergency and announced our intentions to return to the field. As we had the field in sight; were within a few miles of the field and weather conditions were deteriorating rapidly as a tropical storm approached; the captain decided to immediately began preparations to return to the field. After running the checklists and notifying the flight attendant; we made a normal landing at the departure airport several minutes after departing; though we were approximately 200 pounds overweight. The emergency personnel that met our airplane determined our left engine was secure; so we continued with a normal taxi to the gate and deplaned normally.we executed a normal takeoff that didn't give us any abnormal indications until we heard and felt the bangs. I don't believe any external factors like a bird strike or windshear caused or contributed to the compressor stall. We declared an emergency with ATC and quickly discussed our options. We determined a return to the departure airport would be our best option. ATC gave us a turn back toward the field and we had the airport in sight. It was clear that the weather was deteriorating; any further delay or vectors would have had us flying for a much longer period of time and we would have had to shoot an instrument approach. In the interest of safety; the captain decided to take the visual approach while we had the airport in sight. This meant we had very little time to run our descent and before landing checklists; which we accomplished successfully. We ran the QRH for N2 core vibration upon landing.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: CRJ200 flight crew experiences compressor stalls; vibration; and high ITT shortly after takeoff. With the thrust reduced the symptoms disappear and the Captain elects to return visually to the departure airport with the engine operating at low thrust.

Narrative: On initial climb out through 700 FT AGL as the Captain called for autopilot on; two loud bangs were heard and felt; followed by a continuous vibration that rattled the airplane. The aircraft yawed and rolled slightly as well. A quick initial scan of the instruments revealed a 'VIB' message in the left engine N2 section and an ITT over redline; approximately 950 degrees; but the engine continued to produce thrust. These indications were followed shortly by an L COWL A/ICE caution message. Reducing thrust on the left engine caused the vibrations to cease and the messages to extinguish. We declared an emergency and announced our intentions to return to the field. As we had the field in sight; were within a few miles of the field and weather conditions were deteriorating rapidly as a Tropical Storm approached; the Captain decided to immediately began preparations to return to the field. After running the checklists and notifying the flight attendant; we made a normal landing at the departure airport several minutes after departing; though we were approximately 200 LBS overweight. The emergency personnel that met our airplane determined our left engine was secure; so we continued with a normal taxi to the gate and deplaned normally.We executed a normal takeoff that didn't give us any abnormal indications until we heard and felt the bangs. I don't believe any external factors like a bird strike or windshear caused or contributed to the compressor stall. We declared an emergency with ATC and quickly discussed our options. We determined a return to the departure airport would be our best option. ATC gave us a turn back toward the field and we had the airport in sight. It was clear that the weather was deteriorating; any further delay or vectors would have had us flying for a much longer period of time and we would have had to shoot an instrument approach. In the interest of safety; the Captain decided to take the visual approach while we had the airport in sight. This meant we had very little time to run our descent and before landing checklists; which we accomplished successfully. We ran the QRH for N2 core vibration upon landing.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of July 2013 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.