They're red. They're bright. They say "REMOVE BEFORE FLIGHT" in bold letters — and yet every single year, pilots take off with them still attached to their aircraft. Pitot tube covers, engine inlet plugs, static port covers, control lock pins. These items have contributed to accidents, incidents, and near-misses across general aviation for decades.
This isn't a story about bad pilots. It's a story about how distraction, habit, and overconfidence can compromise even the most experienced aviators.
What Are Remove Before Flight (RBF) Items?
Remove Before Flight items — commonly called RBF covers or tags — are protective covers and plugs installed on aircraft when they're parked or hangared. Their purpose is to protect sensitive components from debris, insects, moisture, and environmental damage while the aircraft is on the ground.
The most common RBF items in general aviation include:
- Pitot tube cover — Protects the pitot tube, which measures airspeed. A blocked pitot tube gives false airspeed readings in flight — a potentially fatal condition.
- Static port cover — Protects static ports used by the altimeter, vertical speed indicator, and airspeed indicator. Blocked static ports cause instrument errors.
- Engine inlet covers — Prevent birds, insects, and debris from entering the engine intake and air filter.
- Exhaust plugs — Block the exhaust pipe from moisture, insects, and animals nesting inside.
- Control lock/gust lock — A pin or flag device that locks control surfaces (ailerons, elevator, rudder) during storage to prevent wind damage. If left in place, the pilot cannot control the aircraft.
- Fuel cap covers and fuel sumps — Protect fuel openings from contamination.
Why Do Pilots Forget to Remove Them?
This is the uncomfortable question — and it's worth answering honestly. Forgetting RBF items isn't a sign of incompetence. It's a predictable result of how human memory works under routine conditions.
Preflight checklists exist precisely because humans are terrible at remembering routine tasks when they're distracted. And at a busy airport or flight school, distractions are constant — a conversation with another pilot, a phone call, a student's question, an unexpected weather check.
The problem is compounded by what psychologists call "expectation bias." When you've done something a hundred times without incident, your brain starts to assume it's always done correctly. You check the pitot tube area, see nothing obviously wrong, and move on — even if the cover is the same color as the surrounding area or partially hidden by a wingtip.
Contributing factors that increase risk:
- Flying a rented or unfamiliar aircraft (covers may look different)
- Flying early in the morning or after long breaks
- Distraction during preflight (passengers, phone, other pilots)
- Covers that blend in with aircraft color or are installed in low-visibility areas
- Rushing — especially when running late for a departure slot
- Flying from unfamiliar airports where the handling was done by someone else
Real Incidents Caused by Forgotten RBF Items
The NTSB database contains numerous reports involving RBF-related incidents. Some result in aborted takeoffs when pilots notice something is wrong. Others don't end as well.
In one documented case, a student pilot took off with a pitot cover installed. The airspeed indicator showed zero throughout the takeoff roll. The student, unfamiliar with the failure mode, continued the departure and experienced spatial disorientation before the flight instructor intervened. The cover was found still attached after landing.
In another incident, a gust lock installed on the control column was not removed before departure. The pilot discovered the controls were locked during initial climbout — a terrifying moment that ended fortunately only because of the aircraft's altitude at the time.
These incidents share a common thread: the standard preflight checklist was completed, but the RBF items were either skipped, assumed to be removed, or checked without actually physically verifying removal.
The Standard Checklist Is Not Enough — Here's Why
Most preflight checklists include a line item for removing covers and checking RBF items. So why do incidents still happen?
Because reading a checklist item and physically verifying it are two different things. When a pilot reads "remove pitot cover" and mentally confirms it was removed earlier (by themselves or by ground crew), they may mark it complete without physically touching or visually inspecting the tube. This is called a "read-do" versus "challenge-response" checklist failure — one of the most common procedural errors in aviation.
The solution isn't to add more items to the checklist. It's to build a physical system that makes it impossible to miss RBF items — a dedicated kit that stores all covers together, with a visual reminder that something is missing when any item is still out.
How to Build a Foolproof RBF System
Experienced pilots who've studied aviation safety incidents recommend a physical accountability approach:
- Dedicate a single storage location — One bag, one case, one pouch. All RBF items live there and only there when not on the aircraft.
- Count your items — Know exactly how many RBF covers your aircraft has. Write the number inside your case. Before every flight, count them as you remove them. Before engine start, count them again in the bag.
- Use bright, standardized covers — High-visibility red or orange covers that stand out against any aircraft color. Avoid gray or white covers on white aircraft.
- Attach a cockpit reminder — Some pilots hang a small flag or tag from the throttle or yoke that reads "covers removed?" until they physically verify the bag is full.
- Never rush preflight — If you're running late, the answer is to delay departure, not compress preflight. A 3-minute delay on the ground is always better than the alternative.
What the Data Says About General Aviation Preflight Accidents
According to FAA and NTSB data, preflight-related incidents account for a meaningful percentage of general aviation accidents each year. While exact RBF-specific statistics are not isolated in most databases (they're often classified under "preflight/planning" or "pilot error"), aviation safety researchers consistently identify inadequate preflight inspection as a top contributing factor in GA accidents.
The AOPA Air Safety Institute's annual General Aviation Accident Scorecard regularly identifies "inadequate preflight" as one of the leading causes of preventable accidents — sitting alongside weather, fuel management, and spatial disorientation.
The Bottom Line
RBF covers are a small item with an outsized safety impact. The good news is that this is one of the most preventable risks in aviation — not through more training or more checklists, but through better physical systems and habits.
Every pilot who has ever done a preflight has had a moment of doubt — "did I remove that cover?" The goal is to build a system where that question is always answered with certainty, not assumption.
Fly safe. Check your covers. And if you've ever landed wondering if everything was removed — you already understand why this matters.