Priority-based decoding

A tape drive includes a magnetic head having a plurality K of read sensors, each read sensor being configured to read data simultaneously. The tape drive also includes a controller and logic integrated with and/or executable by the controller. The logic is configured to receive encoded data read from a plurality of tracks of a magnetic tape medium simultaneously. The logic is also configured to perform priority-based decoding on the encoded data based on erasure coefficients associated with at least one codeword of the encoded data. Erasure pointers for C2 decoding may be enabled if, and only if, C1 codewords include a large number of byte errors. Each erasure pointer may have an erasure coefficient (wi fig. 6) indicating probability that the C2 decoder should treat the corresponding C1 bytes as erasures.