AWS outage sparks call for resilient DC strategies

Author: Joe Peck

This Monday’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) outage demonstrates the importance of investing in resilient data centre strategies, according to maintenance specialists Arfon Engineering.

The worldwide outage saw millions unable to access popular apps and websites – including Alexa, Snapchat, and Reddit – after a Domain Name System (DNS) error took down the major AWS data centre site in Virginia.

With hundreds of platforms down for over eight hours, it was the largest internet disruption since a CrowdStrike update caused a global IT meltdown last year.

The financial impact of the crash is expected to reach into the hundreds of billions, while the potential reputational damage could be even more severe in the long run.

A preventable disaster

Although not caused by a lack of maintenance or physical malfunction of equipment and building services, the consequences of the downtime do reflect an opportunity for operators to adopt predictive maintenance strategies.

Alice Oakes, Service and Support Manager at Arfon, comments, “The chaos brought by Monday’s outage shows the sheer damage that can be caused by something as simple servers going down.

“While it might’ve been unavoidable, this is certainly not the case for downtime caused by equipment failures and reactive maintenance.

“This is where predictive maintenance can make a real difference; it’s more resilient, cost-effective, and environmentally responsible than typical reactive or preventative approaches, presenting operators with the chance to stay ahead of potential issues.”

Predictive maintenance strategies incorporate condition-based monitoring (CBM), which uses real-time data to assess equipment health and forecast potential failures well in advance.

This enables informed and proactive maintenance decisions before the point of downtime, eliminating unnecessary interventions and extending asset life in the process.

CBM also reduces the frequency of unnecessary replacements, contributing to lower carbon emissions and reduced energy consumption in a sector under scrutiny for its environmental impact.

Alice continues, “This incident is a timely reminder that resilience should be built into every layer of data centre infrastructure, especially the physical equipment powering them.

“With billions set to be invested in UK data centres over the coming years, operators have a golden opportunity to future-proof their facilities.

“Predictive maintenance should be cornerstone of both new-build and retrofit facilities to adapt to ensure continuity in a sector where downtime simply isn’t an option.”