Narrative:

En route to lck (flight planned duration 44 minutes); checked in with washington center; was given clearance to FL270; read it back and climbed to FL270. In time we noticed that all the radio chatter had to do with re-routes due to east coast weather and no one was talking to us. We were not yet cleared to our filed altitude but on such a short flight; this was not uncommon. Thinking we were forgotten; I called center and was told we were on ZZZ clearance delivery frequency. Went back to previous frequency and given frequency for the next controller but was also told that we were 'absent' for one complete sector.at some point enroute; I must have called up the stored frequency page; perhaps to store some frequencies for our arrival at lck. We figured out later that the last frequency on that page was ZZZ clearance delivery which we later had occasion to use and must have been there from a previous flight. So after checking in with washington center; I must have inadvertently hit the select button associated with that frequency. If contact was attempted with us on 121.5; our #2 was on lck AWOS as there is no d-atis at lck. Lck has reduced runway and navigational capability right now and it was imperative to put the approach plan together after info was received. After AWOS was received; #2 was used for in-range call. When we arrived in lck; we found an ACARS message from operations control to contact center. I think that because the flight was so short; no aural or visual alert to this message was given. So two things I learned from this 1) be very careful whenever the stored frequency page is up; it's a very handy page to have in the terminal; but one wrong touch can cause big problems; and 2) always keep one radio on ACARS.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An A310 flight crew lost contact with ATC due to the inadvertent selection of a stored frequency instead of the active one.

Narrative: En route to LCK (flight planned duration 44 minutes); checked in with Washington Center; was given clearance to FL270; read it back and climbed to FL270. In time we noticed that all the radio chatter had to do with re-routes due to East Coast weather and no one was talking to us. We were not yet cleared to our filed altitude but on such a short flight; this was not uncommon. Thinking we were forgotten; I called Center and was told we were on ZZZ Clearance Delivery Frequency. Went back to previous frequency and given frequency for the next controller but was also told that we were 'absent' for one complete sector.At some point enroute; I must have called up the stored frequency page; perhaps to store some frequencies for our arrival at LCK. We figured out later that the last frequency on that page was ZZZ Clearance Delivery which we later had occasion to use and must have been there from a previous flight. So after checking in with Washington Center; I must have inadvertently hit the select button associated with that frequency. If contact was attempted with us on 121.5; our #2 was on LCK AWOS as there is no D-ATIS at LCK. LCK has reduced runway and navigational capability right now and it was imperative to put the approach plan together after info was received. After AWOS was received; #2 was used for in-range call. When we arrived in LCK; we found an ACARS message from Operations Control to contact Center. I think that because the flight was so short; no aural or visual alert to this message was given. So two things I learned from this 1) be very careful whenever the stored frequency page is up; it's a very handy page to have in the terminal; but one wrong touch can cause big problems; and 2) always keep one radio on ACARS.

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.