Oh so true. Lynnrd Skynnrd’s leased ancient Convair 240. At their stop in Greenville, SC the pilots were both aware of the malfunction of auto-lean fuel system on one engine, and so they continued to allow that engine to burn rich (ie. use more fuel than the other one). They could have, and should have stopped somewhere along the way to Baton Rouge, and refueled, to be on the safe side. In addition, relying on their fuel gauge was a huge mistake. This was a tragedy. The pilot/copilot were 34 and 32 y.o. respectively.
When in the Carribean, never flew with any pilot who relied on their fuel gauges— only the ones who checked all tanks with a dipstick, and refueled at frequent intervals. Over water... but really over anywhere- no fuel means a crash.
I was on a United flight recently. Takeoff was delayed over an hour because the fuel gauge wasn’t reading properly and they needed to bring a tech over to do a dipstick check.
The guy next to me was a jet mechanic at that airport, but not authorized for United. He said it’s less than a 5 minute job, but we had to wait.
Not a big deal.