July 2026 Outage - Additional Information & Recommended Action
Created | Jun 10, 2026 |
|---|---|
Type | User Action |
Owner | @George Matthews |
Summary | Cloud Outage Recommended User Actions (6-10th July 2026) |
Status | Active |
User Action Required | Yes |
Last Updated | Jun 10, 2026 |
Archive Date | Jul 13, 2026 |
This notification contains additional user information about the planned outage work for essential maintenance on the STFC Cloud from 6th - 10th July (inclusive). The outage will start at 08:00 on Monday, 6th July and end at 17:00 on Friday, 10th July.
Whilst the STFC Cloud is not being completely shut down before this work commences, this maintenance window will cause widespread disruption and outages as we complete key network infrastructure replacements, security updates and upgrades for multiple devices. This will affect all STFC cloud services, cloud storage and virtual machines. Even if a service or virtual machine comes back online, they may go offline again later as work progresses during the week.
As per our TOS (Terms Of Service) we remind users: backups are their responsibility and STFC Cloud does not guarantee data or VM safety generally.
Network File Systems and Storage via STFC Cloud
Due to the nature of the maintenance work, users using network file systems (Cinder / Volumes, Manila / Shares, S3 / Buckets) are at a higher risk of data corruption due to network connectivity losses midway through a read or write. These users are strongly advised to shutdown or put their resources into a safe state for their workload and/or mounts by Sunday 5th July.
List of services affected during the week:
All Openstack services (https://openstack.stfc.ac.uk)
Harbor (https://harbor.stfc.ac.uk)
DockerHub (https://dockerhub.stfc.ac.uk)
Azimuth (https://portal.apps.cape.stfc.ac.uk)
Storage availability through OpenStack
Any virtual machines shutdown while completing maintenance work will not be re-started. Users are responsible for starting their virtual machines at the end of the outage window.
If you are unsure, the safest state is to shutdown your virtual machines by Sunday 5th July.
If you have any questions, please submit a ticket to cloud-support@stfc.ac.uk or the support portal https://stfc.atlassian.net/servicedesk/customer/portal/6.
We would like to thank you for your understanding and apologise for the widespread disruption while this work is performed.
Best regards,
STFC Cloud Operations Group