This SOA-C02 practice question tests your understanding of reliability and business continuity. The scenario asks you to isolate a root cause — eliminate options that address a different problem before choosing. After answering, compare your reasoning against the explanation and wrong-answer breakdown below. Once you have made your selection, read the full explanation to reinforce the concept and understand why each distractor is designed to mislead on exam day.
Refer to the exhibit. A SysOps administrator ran the commands shown. What is the state of the EC2 instance?
The instance is running and healthy.
Why wrong: The system status is impaired, so it is not healthy.
The instance is terminated.
Why wrong: The instance state is running, not terminated.
The instance is running but has a system impairment.
System status shows impaired, indicating an underlying system issue.
The instance is stopped.
Why wrong: The instance state is running, not stopped.
Answer choices
Answer the question above first, then reveal the full breakdown to understand why each option is right or wrong.
Correct answer & explanation
The instance is running but has a system impairment.
The `aws ec2 describe-instance-status` command with the `--instance-id` flag returns the instance's system status checks. The output shows `SystemStatus: impaired`, which indicates that the instance is running but has a system impairment (e.g., loss of network connectivity or power). This status is determined by AWS's automated status checks that run every minute, and an impaired status means the underlying host has an issue that affects the instance.
Key principle: Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Answer analysis
For each option: why learners choose it and why it is or isn't the right answer here.
The instance is running and healthy.
Why it's wrong here
The system status is impaired, so it is not healthy.
The instance is terminated.
Why it's wrong here
The instance state is running, not terminated.
The instance is running but has a system impairment.
Why this is correct
System status shows impaired, indicating an underlying system issue.
Related concept
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
The instance is stopped.
Why it's wrong here
The instance state is running, not stopped.
Common exam traps
The trap here is that candidates confuse `SystemStatus: impaired` with instance state (e.g., stopped or terminated), when in fact the instance is still running but the underlying host has a problem that affects its reliability.
Detailed technical explanation
AWS EC2 status checks consist of two types: system status checks (monitoring the physical host) and instance status checks (monitoring the guest OS). A system impairment typically indicates issues like loss of network connectivity, power loss, or hardware failure on the host, which AWS may resolve by automatically recovering the instance (if configured). The `impaired` status triggers CloudWatch alarms and can be used to automate recovery actions via Auto Scaling or Lambda.
Key takeaway
Answer the scenario, not the keyword: identify the specific constraint before choosing the most familiar-sounding option.
Real-world example
A healthcare organisation deploys an application with a public-facing web tier and a private database tier. The database subnet has no public IP and only accepts connections from the web tier's security group. Questions like this test whether you can design cloud network isolation using VNets/VPCs, subnets, and security group rules.
What to study next
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FAQ
Reliability and Business Continuity — This question tests Reliability and Business Continuity — Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer..
The correct answer is: The instance is running but has a system impairment. — The `aws ec2 describe-instance-status` command with the `--instance-id` flag returns the instance's system status checks. The output shows `SystemStatus: impaired`, which indicates that the instance is running but has a system impairment (e.g., loss of network connectivity or power). This status is determined by AWS's automated status checks that run every minute, and an impaired status means the underlying host has an issue that affects the instance.
Identify which exam domain this question belongs to, review the core concept, then practise similar questions from the same domain.
Read the scenario before looking for a memorised answer.
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Last reviewed: Jul 4, 2026
This SOA-C02 practice question is part of Courseiva's free Amazon Web Services certification practice question bank. Courseiva provides original exam-style practice questions with explanations, topic-based practice, mock exams, readiness tracking, and study analytics to help learners prepare for the SOA-C02 exam.
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