Narrative:

During our approach into cho; we got a terrain alert. We approached the cho airport and were set up for a visual approach backed up with the ILS to runway 3. ATC gave us vectors toward the airport and then a vector on the downwind. At about a midfield vectored downwind at 3;000 feet; we called the airport in sight. Knowing that there was terrain in the area; we then agreed that we would stay on that vector at 3;000 feet and would not descend till we were on our base turn over the city and that we would descend to 2;600 feet over sipme the final approach fix on the ILS. We briefed the highest obstacles in that area which was 1;795 feet and 1;785 feet. While on the downwind; flying on the same heading as we were last vectored and level at 3;000 feet; we got a 'terrain pull up warning'. We immediately did our egpws escape maneuver. Once clear of any conflict and talking to ATC we continued the approach as normal and the rest of the flight continued without incident. We detected the situation through the aircraft egwps warning.not exactly sure what set off the egpws system. My guess is that the aircraft was pointed right at the top of the highest point and maybe that triggered the system. Checking the approach plate and sectional charts; I'm not sure why the system would go off in level flight at 3;000 feet. Looking in the aom 2 egpws system; I'm not sure how we could have received that message while above all terrain with a vertical speed of 0ft/min. There was no initial 'terrain' warning only a 'terrain pull up' which seems weird also. Performed the egpws escape maneuver.next time; avoid this situation. When flying in there at night I am going to request a full ILS approach. Even though it was a perfectly clear night; doing the whole approach would have help us avoid the situation.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Air carrier pilot reported an EGPWS 'Terrain pull up' warning while on approach to CHO.

Narrative: During our approach into CHO; we got a terrain alert. We approached the CHO airport and were set up for a visual approach backed up with the ILS to RWY 3. ATC gave us vectors toward the airport and then a vector on the downwind. At about a midfield vectored downwind at 3;000 feet; we called the airport in sight. Knowing that there was terrain in the area; we then agreed that we would stay on that vector at 3;000 feet and would not descend till we were on our base turn over the city and that we would descend to 2;600 feet over SIPME the final approach fix on the ILS. We briefed the highest obstacles in that area which was 1;795 feet and 1;785 feet. While on the downwind; flying on the same heading as we were last vectored and level at 3;000 feet; we got a 'terrain pull up warning'. We immediately did our EGPWS escape maneuver. Once clear of any conflict and talking to ATC we continued the approach as normal and the rest of the flight continued without incident. We detected the situation through the aircraft EGWPS warning.Not exactly sure what set off the EGPWS system. My guess is that the aircraft was pointed right at the top of the highest point and maybe that triggered the system. Checking the approach plate and sectional charts; I'm not sure why the system would go off in level flight at 3;000 feet. Looking in the AOM 2 EGPWS system; I'm not sure how we could have received that message while above all terrain with a vertical speed of 0ft/min. There was no initial 'terrain' warning only a 'terrain pull up' which seems weird also. Performed the EGPWS escape maneuver.Next time; avoid this situation. When flying in there at night I am going to request a full ILS approach. Even though it was a perfectly clear night; doing the whole approach would have help us avoid the situation.

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.