It is found there are some deep-rooted causes that lead to functional failures of some crucial components on modern equipment, these deep-rooted causes probably can not be eliminated effectively by traditional maintenance works, and then the same failures take place again soon after. By analyzing characteristics of failure control theory and relationships between these various failures, this paper put forward the idea that the failure life process, in a broader sense, could be described in terms of cycle, therefore, this process is called failure life cycle (FLC), the cycle can be divided into five phases including incubation phase, root cause phase, medium characteristics cause phase, potential failure phase, and function failure phase. By applying the idea of process control, a failure life control method based on Markov process is established, to root out the direct causes and root causes of failure life comprehensively in the process of equipment operation, hence the failure could be thoroughly eliminated. Finally an example is introduced to verify rationality and validity of this method.