FSCK Check - File system Corrupted
Problem
System won’t boot due to improper shutdown (or corrupted file system). Generally seems to go straight to a login prompt, or a statement saying you need to hit Control + D and be dropped into a shell which also requires root credentials.
Solution
In order to run the FSCK program without actually logging in as root:
- From the GRUB Boot-loader (the bicycle or Evolution Splash screen) hit the up or down arrow to stop the boot process.
- Then hit the letter ‘
e’ on your Keyboard. You want to be able to edit the boot commands. - Go to the second line in the boot (the one that starts with
Kernel). - Edit this line following the on screen instructions.
- Once you have this line highlighted (hit ‘
e’ again) then append to the end (after the final chracters in the kernel statement, note the space):
init=/sbin/fsck –y - Press enter (to save this modified kernel loading command).
- Run the modified boot command from the editing screen by pressing
b.
By doing this, you are forcing a FSCK on boot ( before the filesystem is mounted); the -y option causes it to answer yes anytime a response normally would be needed. This brings up an improperly shut down system that was acting as if it was read-only and would not boot up into CentOS properly. If the File-System check works and ends in a ‘kernel panic attempted to kill init’ statement, it is likely you only need to hard power cycle the system.
This is one of the only, if not the only time, it is safe to do this. After the hard cycle it should return to a normal operational state without additional user input.