Narrative:

First officer was pilot flying. Ca was pilot not flying. We approached smo from southeast. We were issued; and flew; direct darts. Before crossing darts; we were turned inside darts by no more than 1 mile and were told to intercept GPS-a approach course. The GPS-a approach had been entered into the FMS well before this point and the autopilot was engaged; and aircraft intercepted course and was established inbound. We were cleared for the approach and handed off to smo tower; who cleared us to land and told us that the preceding aircraft went missed. We descended to 2600 ft to cross bevey; looked at the FMS fpl page; and saw runway 21 as the next point; and therefore dialed in 680 ft in the altitude selector; and first officer began a vs descent. 1 mile after crossing bevey; we had the runway in sight. There was no ceiling or layer we had to descend thru; and we were VMC from about 11 miles out; and had the field in sight from 5 miles out. The next transmission from tower was 'callsign; low altitude alert; altimeter 29.97; you are 0.2 miles from culve; we show you at 750 ft; altitude at culve is 1120.' pm replied 'altimeter 29.97; roger; field in sight'. Tower responded with 'roger.' both pilot flying and pilot not flying looked at the mfd and did not see culve displayed; or listed on the fpl page of the FMS. We stayed at 680 feet (da for the approach); continued and landed runway 21 without incident. Both first officer and captain wrote this report together.when loading the smo GPS-a approach; FMS does not load culve. 2) very high workload during approach to landing phase. 3) crew reliance on using FMS / mfd as primary data source. (Pulling out a stowed efb during approach in low vis conditions is awkward and not conducive to safe operations; pilot not flying is looking for runway and monitoring instruments; pilot flying has hands full.) 4) after initial briefing of the approach plate on the efb by both crewmembers; the FMS was used as primary source; therefore not prompting crew of culve and its crossing altitude during high workload environment. Why is culve not listed in the approach when it is in the FMS database? We are not allowed to build our own approaches; and if we entered culve into the fpl this would be against company policy. Also; with culve being an important stepdown fix there is no reason that it should not be loaded with the rest of the points on the approach.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: Business jet flight crew is issued a low altitude alert by SMO Tower after descending to minimums prior to CULVE during the GPS-A approach to SMO. Crew states that FMS did not load the CULVE fix and company SOP does not allow them to add it to approach.

Narrative: First Officer was pilot flying. CA was pilot not flying. We approached SMO from southeast. We were issued; and flew; direct DARTS. Before crossing DARTS; we were turned inside DARTS by no more than 1 mile and were told to intercept GPS-A approach course. The GPS-A approach had been entered into the FMS well before this point and the autopilot was engaged; and aircraft intercepted course and was established inbound. We were cleared for the approach and handed off to SMO Tower; who cleared us to land and told us that the preceding aircraft went missed. We descended to 2600 FT to cross BEVEY; looked at the FMS FPL page; and saw Runway 21 as the next point; and therefore dialed in 680 FT in the altitude selector; and First Officer began a VS descent. 1 mile after crossing BEVEY; we had the runway in sight. There was no ceiling or layer we had to descend thru; and we were VMC from about 11 miles out; and had the field in sight from 5 miles out. The next transmission from tower was 'Callsign; low altitude alert; altimeter 29.97; you are 0.2 miles from CULVE; we show you at 750 FT; altitude at CULVE is 1120.' PM replied 'altimeter 29.97; roger; field in sight'. Tower responded with 'Roger.' Both pilot flying and pilot not flying looked at the MFD and did not see CULVE displayed; or listed on the FPL page of the FMS. We stayed at 680 feet (DA for the approach); continued and landed Runway 21 without incident. Both First Officer and Captain wrote this report together.When loading the SMO GPS-A approach; FMS does not load CULVE. 2) Very high workload during approach to landing phase. 3) Crew reliance on using FMS / MFD as primary data source. (Pulling out a stowed EFB during approach in low vis conditions is awkward and not conducive to safe operations; pilot not flying is looking for runway and monitoring instruments; pilot flying has hands full.) 4) After initial briefing of the approach plate on the EFB by both crewmembers; the FMS was used as primary source; therefore not prompting crew of CULVE and its crossing altitude during high workload environment. Why is CULVE not listed in the approach when it IS in the FMS database? We are not allowed to build our own approaches; and if we entered CULVE into the FPL this would be against company policy. Also; with CULVE being an important stepdown fix there is no reason that it should not be loaded with the rest of the points on the approach.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site as of April 2012 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.