A B737 first officer did not see the nose gear pin installed during preflight. A return to land was ...

Narrative:

We were delayed due to the lack of ground personnel. This led us to feel rushed. I was flying with a captain who was new to the company. He had asked pilots who were dead-heading on our flight to go and do the walk-around (preflight check). I told him since they were not the operating crew members for this flight they shouldn't be the ones to do the walk-around and that I would go instead. Afterwards I came back to a cockpit full of dead-heading crew members trying to do my job and paperwork because the captain had asked them to do so. The captain had also pushed in a popped circuit breaker (display cooling fan) without asking me and without the advisement of maintenance control. Because of these events; I was under much stress and had allowed these things prevent me from performing at my peak. On takeoff; the nose gear would not retract. We declared an emergency; ran our abnormal checklists; and did an air-return. We discovered there was a nose gear pin that had not been removed. I must have missed it during the walk-around. This was a rather unusual day being that the nose gear pin is rarely installed and also for the fact that we didn't have our maintenance present. My lesson learned from this event is that I will not let anyone rush me when we are delayed and most of all; not allow anyone or anything hinder me from accomplishing all necessary tasks that need to get done.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A B737 First Officer did not see the nose gear pin installed during preflight. A return to land was required when the nose gear did not retract. Distractions were caused because the Captain allowed dead heading pilots to perform preflight duties.

Narrative: We were delayed due to the lack of ground personnel. This led us to feel rushed. I was flying with a Captain who was new to the Company. He had asked pilots who were dead-heading on our flight to go and do the walk-around (preflight check). I told him since they were not the operating crew members for this flight they shouldn't be the ones to do the walk-around and that I would go instead. Afterwards I came back to a cockpit full of dead-heading crew members trying to do my job and paperwork because the Captain had asked them to do so. The Captain had also pushed in a popped circuit breaker (display cooling fan) without asking me and without the advisement of maintenance control. Because of these events; I was under much stress and had allowed these things prevent me from performing at my peak. On takeoff; the nose gear would not retract. We declared an emergency; ran our abnormal checklists; and did an air-return. We discovered there was a nose gear pin that had not been removed. I must have missed it during the walk-around. This was a rather unusual day being that the nose gear pin is rarely installed and also for the fact that we didn't have our maintenance present. My lesson learned from this event is that I will not let anyone rush me when we are delayed and most of all; not allow anyone or anything hinder me from accomplishing all necessary tasks that need to get done.

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.

Attributes
ACN	974041
Time
Date	201110
Local Time Of Day	0601-1200
Place
Locale Reference	ZZZ.Airport
State Reference	US
Environment
Flight Conditions	VMC
Light	Daylight
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	B737 Undifferentiated or Other Model
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Takeoff
Route In Use	Visual Approach
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	Gear Pins
Person 1
Function	First Officer
Qualification	Flight Crew Instrument Flight Crew Multiengine Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP) Flight Crew Flight Instructor
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 180 Flight Crew Total 3000 Flight Crew Type 500
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Less Severe Deviation - Procedural Published Material / Policy

A B737 first officer did not see the nose gear pin installed during preflight. A return to land was required when the nose gear did not retract. Distractions were caused because the captain allowed dead heading pilots to perform preflight duties.