Narrative:

During post-flight inspection in den; my first officer discovered what appeared to be a missing seal on the vertical stabilizer just forward of the rudder. I entered the discrepancy into the aircraft logbook and contacted maintenance control. The responding mechanic said that it could be deferred according to maintenance control.after about a thirty minute delay; he returned to the aircraft with the logbook. I reviewed the entry and it appeared to be properly signed off with a 200 flight cycle limitation on the item. I saw no reason to not accept the aircraft; so we departed on our scheduled flight. The flight was uneventful and we arrived at our destination about 20 minutes late. After deplaning; I spoke with some of our maintenance people and learned that the airplane was in fact; not legal for flight and was grounded. They already knew this before I arrived. I had unknowingly accepted and flown a non-airworthy aircraft. I can only suspect that the aircraft was signed off in order for me to accept the aircraft and complete my flight. The 'complete the flight at all cost' mentality at this company flies in the face of the so-called 'safety first' mantra. I am extremely angry and frustrated to think that a non-airworthy airplane may have been signed off solely for the purpose of me completing my flight and getting the aircraft back to a maintenance base. This is simply not the way I or any other professional aviator conducts our business.

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Original NASA ASRS Text

Title: An EMB-190 may have been dispatched with a deferred maintenance item for a missing vertical stabilizer aerodynamic seal section. Confusion centered over whether 50% of the entire seal could be missing or only 50% of an individual section of the entire seal.

Narrative: During post-flight inspection in DEN; my First Officer discovered what appeared to be a missing seal on the vertical stabilizer just forward of the rudder. I entered the discrepancy into the aircraft logbook and contacted Maintenance Control. The responding Mechanic said that it could be deferred according to Maintenance Control.After about a thirty minute delay; he returned to the aircraft with the logbook. I reviewed the entry and it appeared to be properly signed off with a 200 flight cycle limitation on the item. I saw no reason to not accept the aircraft; so we departed on our scheduled flight. The flight was uneventful and we arrived at our destination about 20 minutes late. After deplaning; I spoke with some of our Maintenance people and learned that the airplane was in fact; not legal for flight and was grounded. They already knew this before I arrived. I had unknowingly accepted and flown a non-airworthy aircraft. I can only suspect that the aircraft was signed off in order for me to accept the aircraft and complete my flight. The 'complete the flight at all cost' mentality at this company flies in the face of the so-called 'safety first' mantra. I am extremely angry and frustrated to think that a non-airworthy airplane may have been signed off solely for the purpose of me completing my flight and getting the aircraft back to a Maintenance base. This is simply not the way I or any other professional aviator conducts our business.

Data retrieved from NASA's ASRS site 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.