Flying older, worn out jets for a living has gotten me used to seeing the phrase “could not duplicate” on things I write-up as being inoperable, yet are very difficult to test on the ground.
I was flying into Detroit a few years ago in one hell of a snow storm. The cabin is pressurized by the same hot air (which comes off the engines) that also heats our wings and keeps us from turning into a giant flying ice cube. The engines weren’t producing enough air to do both at the same time. So we were either going to depressurize the cabin and potentially suffocate our passengers, or we were going to turn into a flying brick. Coming in on approach, the computer to keep our tail straight malfunctions (so its swinging all over the place), the autopilot turns itself off, my attitude indicator locks itself in 30 degree right bank (so I don’t know if we are turning or not), and I’m trying to keep the wings from icing over while praying we see the runway with enough time to pull up!
Wrote everything up for maintenance to fix. 2 days later it’s back in service with a couple “could not duplicate” pencil whips