Just realized I had subtracted dates wrong so the backup should not have been deleted yet. Sorry. +++++++++ I have one database for which we are taking cold RMAN backups. My recovery windows is set for 49 days. In this database, when I run " delete noprompt expired backup" and "delete force obsolete" it does not delete any backups. I can not run crosscheck since once the backups are completed, we run a OS backup to tape and delete the disk copy. Other databases for which we do backups in archivelog mode work fine. Any ideas as to why these old backups are not getting purged? Jeffrey Beckstrom Database Administrator Greater Cleveland Regional Transit Authority 1240 W. 6th Street Cleveland, Ohio 44113