My external storage failed and 1 file system related was damaged. When booting OS, it stops on fsck with the damaged file system. Thus the OS will never be up and running, no matter how long I wait.

My question is, how to skip the fsck on the damaged file system?

Since OS can not be booted up, I have no chance to change /etc/fstab. I just want to boot up the OS and remove the damaged file system mannualy.

Thanks!

Boot up in single user mode, and remove the offending entry form /etc/fstab. If you are using grub as the bootloader, you can enter grub's interactive mode by pressing a key when the bootloader menu comes up. Select a suitable entry, press 'e' to edit the entry. Select the entry's kernel commandline, and press 'e' to edit again. Append the word 'single' to the commandline (whitespace separated, no quotes), and press the enter key to complete the edit. Press 'b' to boot using the edited commandline, and you will boot to single user mode, where you can edit the fstab file.

You can also use a live CD to boot, and mount the appropriate partition to edit the fstab file.
--- rod.