Emb-175 flight crew reported failure of FMS 1 and 2 while on initial approach. The captain alluded t...

Narrative:

I've personally had this event occur to me twice as a first officer; and so I was partly familiar with the occurrence; however; skill levels of me and my captains were high; and in both cases a nonevent. I had a friend recently tell me about this occurrence to him and I've heard others as well at ZZZZ; so I had briefed my first officer of such a possible risk to flight and our escape strategy before departure. We were told to be at 12000 MSL at 50 DME from the VOR inbound; report 50 DME and expect the VOR-a runway 26. As we did; we were cleared to descend to 8000 and report 17 DME. When we did the same; we were told to report 10 DME. Just somewhere between 11 to 9 DME inbound we got a EICAS messages namely 'FMS 1(and 2) fail' along with messages on the scratchpad of both mcdu's namely 'FMC 1(and 2) activity failure' which then deleted our zero fuel weights along with the whole routing and flight plan. At 4 DME; ATC queried our DME and we reported our navigational issues and requested a visual approach as we approached over the field at 8000 feet. We were promptly cleared for a visual; which we flew for a non-eventful landing. I walked the first officer through the turns as the airfield was on my side of the aircraft along with altitudes to fly. While I talked him through the visual approach; I was able to re-enter the zero fuel weight and a GPS approach to back up the visual for him while we were on a wide base leg. The automation was on all the way to 2000 to 1500 AGL at which point we had to disconnect the autopilot and had to do some south turns to lose a bit of altitude as we landed with no event. The cause of these events is still unknown as I've personally experienced them three times now and heard at least 3 other stories from colleagues. Suggestions: have a company mechanic non-revenue to a few ZZZZ turns where they may be able to download the data immediately upon landing in such an incident for duplication and analysis purposes. A crew memo be sent out to crews so we can officially be aware of such events rather than by word of mouth. Along with realistic escape procedures in VMC/IMC. A minimum of 2000lbs fuel be added to all ZZZZ departures for possible un-stabilized approaches/ aborted approaches in anticipation of future events until resolved.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: EMB-175 flight crew reported failure of FMS 1 and 2 while on initial approach. The Captain alluded to previous multiple occurrences at the same airport.

Narrative: I've personally had this event occur to me twice as a First Officer; and so I was partly familiar with the occurrence; however; skill levels of me and my Captains were high; and in both cases a nonevent. I had a friend recently tell me about this occurrence to him and I've heard others as well at ZZZZ; so I had briefed my FIRST Officer of such a possible risk to flight and our escape strategy before departure. We were told to be at 12000 MSL at 50 DME from the VOR inbound; report 50 DME and expect the VOR-A Runway 26. As we did; we were cleared to descend to 8000 and report 17 DME. When we did the same; we were told to report 10 DME. Just somewhere between 11 to 9 DME inbound we got a EICAS messages namely 'FMS 1(and 2) fail' along with messages on the scratchpad of both MCDU's namely 'FMC 1(and 2) activity failure' which then deleted our zero fuel weights along with the whole routing and flight plan. At 4 DME; ATC queried our DME and we reported our navigational issues and requested a visual approach as we approached over the field at 8000 feet. We were promptly cleared for a visual; which we flew for a non-eventful landing. I walked the First Officer through the turns as the airfield was on my side of the aircraft along with altitudes to fly. While I talked him through the visual approach; I was able to re-enter the zero fuel weight and a GPS approach to back up the visual for him while we were on a wide base leg. The automation was on all the way to 2000 to 1500 AGL at which point we had to disconnect the autopilot and had to do some S turns to lose a bit of altitude as we landed with no event. The cause of these events is still unknown as I've personally experienced them three times now and heard at least 3 other stories from colleagues. Suggestions: Have a company mechanic non-revenue to a few ZZZZ turns where they may be able to download the data immediately upon landing in such an incident for duplication and analysis purposes. A crew memo be sent out to crews so we can officially be aware of such events rather than by word of mouth. Along with realistic escape procedures in VMC/IMC. A minimum of 2000lbs fuel be added to all ZZZZ departures for possible un-stabilized approaches/ Aborted approaches in anticipation of future events until resolved.

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.

Attributes
ACN	1513216
Time
Date	201801
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZZ.Airport
State Reference	FO
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	Embraer Undifferentiated or Other Model
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Initial Approach
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	FMS/FMC
Person 1
Function	Pilot Not Flying Captain
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Person 2
Function	First Officer Pilot Flying
Qualification	Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe

Emb-175 flight crew reported failure of FMS 1 and 2 while on initial approach. The captain alluded to previous multiple occurrences at the same airport.