Google Outage Blamed on ‘Software Update’, but No One is Buying It

Google Outage Blamed on ‘Software Update’, but No One is Buying It

What happens when Google suffers an outage and goes down? Mass panic, mostly.

That was the case on Tuesday (still Monday for a lot of the world), when Google users were reporting in troves that the beloved search site was on the blink. According to DownDetector, people started reporting a problem with Google from around 9:12 pm EDT, which is 11:12 am AEST.

There were more than 40,000 incidents of people reporting issues, not just with Search but with other Google apps such as Maps.

Users were presented with an error message upon attempting to Google something, the notification read: “The server encountered an error and could not complete your request”.

Around 40 minutes later, things were back to normal. Things seem to be running smoothly now, with reports of a Google outage flatlining.

Google is, officially, blaming the sudden outages on a “software update”.

Though Google has since resolved the outage issues, reports that emerged late last night suggest the disruptions may in fact be tied to an “electrical incident” at a Council Bluffs, Iowa data centre that left at least three electricians critically injured.

“We’re aware of a software update issue that occurred late this afternoon Pacific Time and briefly affected availability of Google search and Maps,” Google said in a statement about the outage to The Guardian. “We apologise for the inconvenience. We worked to quickly address the issue and our services are now back online.”

As noted by my colleague, this is where things get a little hazy. Right around the same time users started experiencing disruptions Google was reportedly dealing with a major electrical fire in its Council Bluffs data centre that sent at least three electricians to the hospital with critical injuries. The engineers, according to SF Gate, were reportedly working on a substation close to the data centres when an explosion occurred. One of the electricians was reportedly airlifted to a local hospital while the other two were rushed in by ambulances to treat their wounds. Though it’s unclear as of writing what, if any impact this explosion had on Google’s larger outage, it’s worth noting the Council Bluffs data centre is one of the largest of the company’s 14 data centres spread across the U.S..

“We are aware of an electrical incident that took place today at Google’s data centre in Council Bluffs, Iowa, injuring three people onsite who are now being treated,” Google said in a statement to SF Gate. “The health and safety of all workers is our absolute top priority, and we are working closely with partners and local authorities to thoroughly investigate the situation and provide assistance as needed.”

Whatever happened, the issue well and truly highlighted the problem with Google’s stranglehold in the search space.

This article has been updated since it was first published.


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