Narrative:

We were ferrying into aspen to pick up passengers. After a 1 hour edct delay; we were 30 minutes out; and worried about departing before sunset when we were assigned a hold with a 40 minute efc time. The holding fix was loyyd; and we were given 'as published right turns 20 mile legs' by ATC. There is no hold displayed on the jepp charts. There is one on the nos charts; and it has left turns. Since there were several aircraft given the same instructions at the same time; one pilot on the frequency informed the others of what the inbound heading was. ATC didn't seem to know any of the details of the hold he was assigning to several aircraft. We were at FL310 when we were assigned the hold; and given progressively lower altitudes while in the hold; ending up at FL210.since it seemed doubtful that we were going to be able to get in and out of aspen before sunset; I contacted the assistant chief pilot (acp) to let them know of our situation. They contacted the customer; and decided for us to proceed to aspen and see if we could depart in time. While this was going on; we had entered the hold and were outbound. The controller asked us if we were still in the hold; we replied in the affirmative. Controller then stated that they showed us quite a distance from the fix. I looked at the hold page on the FMS; and it showed us with 20 minute legs; not 20 mile legs. We were then cleared direct to red table VOR to start our approach into aspen. There were no conflicts noted. In the future; I will not allow operational pressures to interfere and distract me from accomplishing my aircraft duties.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Flight crew reported ATC alerted them to a track deviation during a hold in the ASE area.

Narrative: We were ferrying into Aspen to pick up passengers. After a 1 hour EDCT delay; we were 30 minutes out; and worried about departing before sunset when we were assigned a hold with a 40 minute EFC time. The holding fix was LOYYD; and we were given 'As published right turns 20 mile legs' by ATC. There is no hold displayed on the Jepp Charts. There is one on the NOS charts; and it has left turns. Since there were several aircraft given the same instructions at the same time; one pilot on the frequency informed the others of what the inbound heading was. ATC didn't seem to know any of the details of the hold he was assigning to several aircraft. We were at FL310 when we were assigned the hold; and given progressively lower altitudes while in the hold; ending up at FL210.Since it seemed doubtful that we were going to be able to get in and out of Aspen before sunset; I contacted the Assistant Chief Pilot (ACP) to let them know of our situation. They contacted the customer; and decided for us to proceed to Aspen and see if we could depart in time. While this was going on; we had entered the hold and were outbound. The controller asked us if we were still in the hold; we replied in the affirmative. Controller then stated that they showed us quite a distance from the fix. I looked at the hold page on the FMS; and it showed us with 20 minute legs; not 20 mile legs. We were then cleared direct to Red Table VOR to start our approach into Aspen. There were no conflicts noted. In the future; I will not allow operational pressures to interfere and distract me from accomplishing my aircraft duties.

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.