Narrative:

At FL360 approximately 240 miles north of adm VOR; proceeding direct adm. Was about 15-20 knots below redline when aircraft speed rapidly increased above redline while pitching up and autopilot disengaged. It was immediately obvious that we were in a fairly significant updraft. We were proceeding in between two cells that were approximately 10 NM either side of our route. We had previously inquired about the route; the ride; and was told by ATC that ride in that area was mostly smooth. We had also checked react mode and it displayed no shadows. I had 50 or 100 mile scope on the radar (I'm not certain now) and the first officer (first officer) had 25 mile scope. Again; path looked clear. I retarded the throttle to correct the over speed but not too much since we were significantly climbing while taking control of the aircraft (since the autopilot disengaged). Speed rapidly decreased towards 200 knots while I pushed the yoke forward to arrest the climb. I then increased power to compensate. I arrested the climb; topping out at FL372. While I descended back to FL360 and controlled the airspeed; the first officer notified ATC that we had borderline severe turbulence and told them the amount of the deviation. While descending back down; it occurred again; but only to about FL365 from about FL363 (much smaller event due to fact I was all over the controls). ATC asked us if we wanted assistance. I declined as we seemed to be out of the area of the problem. I then ensured nobody in the back was injured (seat belt sign was on) and a flight attendant said nothing was wrong in the back. I told him what happened and ensured all passengers were still calm; he said they were. So we pressed on.I asked the line check pilot who was giving me a line check to look up the definition of severe turbulence for me. We discussed the definition from the fom and determined that our event did meet some of but not all the criteria so we decided to amend our report to ATC. We also contacted dispatch and maintenance and informed them of the event and asked for a maintenance technician to meet us at the aircraft. He did. We swapped to another aircraft due to another issue (popped HSV2 circuit breaker in flight) and he said they would do a data download and check out the aircraft.in the crews (captain; first officer; line check jump seater); this was a completely unpredictable; unforeseeable event. I think it was handled very well and appropriate agencies/duty sections notified. In hindsight; I would not do anything differently than what we did with the information we had. I also don't think there was any way to get additional information. That said; knowing what happened; I would have avoided that area; but to be honest; the line of storms wasn't any better if we had attempted to deviate left or right.undesired state was a 1200 foot altitude deviation due to turbulence. Threats were the weather. No errors occurred that we identified. And much discussion took place after the event.honestly; nothing other than attempt to avoid weather by a greater distance; but as I said above; we gathered as much info as we could from every source we could think of and our route flown seemed to be the safest one to take. Nothing could be done by the company to prevent this.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Regional jet flight crew reported turbulence north of ADM VOR which caused them to gain 1200 feet of altitude and exceed redline airspeed.

Narrative: At FL360 approximately 240 miles north of ADM VOR; proceeding direct ADM. Was about 15-20 knots below redline when aircraft speed rapidly increased above redline while pitching up and autopilot disengaged. It was immediately obvious that we were in a fairly significant updraft. We were proceeding in between two cells that were approximately 10 NM either side of our route. We had previously inquired about the route; the ride; and was told by ATC that ride in that area was mostly smooth. We had also checked REACT mode and it displayed no shadows. I had 50 or 100 mile scope on the radar (I'm not certain now) and the First Officer (FO) had 25 mile scope. Again; path looked clear. I retarded the throttle to correct the over speed but not too much since we were significantly climbing while taking control of the aircraft (since the autopilot disengaged). Speed rapidly decreased towards 200 knots while I pushed the yoke forward to arrest the climb. I then increased power to compensate. I arrested the climb; topping out at FL372. While I descended back to FL360 and controlled the airspeed; the FO notified ATC that we had borderline severe turbulence and told them the amount of the deviation. While descending back down; it occurred again; but only to about FL365 from about FL363 (much smaller event due to fact I was all over the controls). ATC asked us if we wanted assistance. I declined as we seemed to be out of the area of the problem. I then ensured nobody in the back was injured (seat belt sign was on) and a Flight Attendant said nothing was wrong in the back. I told him what happened and ensured all passengers were still calm; he said they were. So we pressed on.I asked the line check pilot who was giving me a line check to look up the definition of severe turbulence for me. We discussed the definition from the FOM and determined that our event did meet some of but not all the criteria so we decided to amend our report to ATC. We also contacted dispatch and maintenance and informed them of the event and asked for a maintenance technician to meet us at the aircraft. He did. We swapped to another aircraft due to another issue (popped HSV2 circuit breaker in flight) and he said they would do a data download and check out the aircraft.In the crews (Captain; FO; Line Check Jump seater); this was a completely unpredictable; unforeseeable event. I think it was handled very well and appropriate agencies/duty sections notified. In hindsight; I would not do anything differently than what we did with the information we had. I also don't think there was any way to get additional information. That said; knowing what happened; I would have avoided that area; but to be honest; the line of storms wasn't any better if we had attempted to deviate left or right.Undesired state was a 1200 foot altitude deviation due to turbulence. Threats were the weather. No errors occurred that we identified. And much discussion took place after the event.Honestly; nothing other than attempt to avoid weather by a greater distance; but as I said above; we gathered as much info as we could from every source we could think of and our route flown seemed to be the safest one to take. Nothing could be done by the company to prevent this.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site 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.