A320 captain discovered an under inflated main tire during preflight.

Attributes
ACN	850437
Time
Date	200909
Aircraft 1
Make Model Name	A320
Operating Under FAR Part	Part 121
Flight Phase	Parked
Flight Plan	IFR
Component
Aircraft Component	Main Gear Tire
Person 1
Function	Captain Pilot Flying
Experience	Flight Crew Last 90 Days 200 Flight Crew Total 9000 Flight Crew Type 7000
Events
Anomaly	Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical Deviation - Procedural Maintenance

Narrative:

On my walk around I discovered that my right inboard tire pressure was 98 psi. This was confirmed when maintenance came out and checked it. Had I followed our new SOP; that deletes the need for us to check them; we would have taken off with a dangerous tire condition. I think it's crazy to delete this from our procedures and to eventually not have tire pressure indicators on the tires. You're taking away a link in the safety chain just to save a few bucks on tire pressure indicators.

Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: A320 Captain discovered an under inflated main tire during preflight.

Narrative: On my walk around I discovered that my right inboard tire pressure was 98 psi. This was confirmed when Maintenance came out and checked it. Had I followed our new SOP; that deletes the need for us to check them; we would have taken off with a dangerous tire condition. I think it's crazy to delete this from our procedures and to eventually not have tire pressure indicators on the tires. You're taking away a link in the safety chain just to save a few bucks on tire pressure indicators.

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.