Narrative:

During deicing of our aircraft (both engines running); the captain needed to use the lavatory. He called the flight attendants and advised them to block the aisle with the beverage cart and have the 'a' flight attendant come into the flight deck (following ZZZ procedures.) the 'a' flight attendant was a large male. He sat down in the captain's seat to await his return. When the captain signaled his return; the flight attendant got up to look out the peephole and told me 'ok' it's him. I opened the electric lock to let him in. At that moment I noticed that the aircraft had begun to move. I immediately applied the brakes and set the parking brake. I do not know how far the aircraft moved but it had to be 2 or 3 seconds in time. The aircraft did not come in contact with the deice trucks as they were off to the side deicing the wings. The deice crew then instructed us to shut down our engines and proceeded to deice us. The ZZZZ deice frequency asked what had happened and I told them it was an inadvertent parking brake release. I was then advised they would have to file a report. When we told the flight attendants what had happened; the 'a' flight attendant said as he got up out of the seat; he felt something against his shin. The parking brake in the EMB190 is located right beside the captain's seat and resembles a small car parking brake; it has a button release on the end. When set; it is upright at about 75 degrees. To prevent this in the future; the flight attendant who comes into the flight deck should be briefed on the parking brake and told to be very careful when moving about a small flight deck such as the EMB190's.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: EMB190 First Officer reported inadvertent parking brake release by a Flight Attendant while being deiced. Aircraft rolled ahead but no damage occurred. The Captain was on a lavatory break requiring the Flight Attendant's presence.

Narrative: During deicing of our aircraft (both engines running); the Captain needed to use the lavatory. He called the Flight Attendants and advised them to block the aisle with the beverage cart and have the 'A' Flight Attendant come into the flight deck (following ZZZ procedures.) The 'A' Flight Attendant was a large male. He sat down in the Captain's seat to await his return. When the Captain signaled his return; the Flight Attendant got up to look out the peephole and told me 'OK' it's him. I opened the electric lock to let him in. At that moment I noticed that the aircraft had begun to move. I immediately applied the brakes and set the parking brake. I do not know how far the aircraft moved but it had to be 2 or 3 seconds in time. The aircraft did not come in contact with the deice trucks as they were off to the side deicing the wings. The deice crew then instructed us to shut down our engines and proceeded to deice us. The ZZZZ deice frequency asked what had happened and I told them it was an inadvertent parking brake release. I was then advised they would have to file a report. When we told the Flight Attendants what had happened; the 'A' Flight Attendant said as he got up out of the seat; he felt something against his shin. The parking brake in the EMB190 is located right beside the Captain's seat and resembles a small car parking brake; it has a button release on the end. When set; it is upright at about 75 degrees. To prevent this in the future; the Flight Attendant who comes into the flight deck should be briefed on the parking brake and told to be very careful when moving about a small flight deck such as the EMB190's.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of May 2009 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.