## The symptom
Running a one-off command on a Fly postgres machine with the Postgres password
supplied as an inline environment variable:
```
fly ssh console -a mydb -C "psql -h the-loopback-address -U postgres -c ..."
```
The `-C` argument mangled the environment variable and the command failed.
## Why
The `-C` flag was passing the command in a way that dropped the environment
variable assignment. This was a bug on Fly's side, not your command syntax.
## The fix
Fly fixed it in an updated hallpass. For existing apps you need to pick it up:
- App machines: `fly deploy` or `fly machine update`
- Postgres clusters: `fly image update` or similar
After that, a one-off command with the password supplied as an inline env var
works as written, which the reporter verified on a fresh app:
```
fly ssh console -a APP -C "psql ..."
```
## The general lesson
If a CLI flag silently eats part of your command (rather than erroring), check
the platform's changelog before reworking your quoting. Silent mangling is
usually a bug on their side, not yours.