Lots of Sites down/badly working because

AWS (Amazon Web Services) is down. Just so you know what's going on if something isn't right. AWS provides just image hosting for some, but entire websites for others, so you may see different effects.

I got a bit frustrated because Spoonflower is down (I don't know if their whole site is AWS, but definitely that's where all the design storage is, I've seen the Amazon name on stuff many times.)

So I googled and it seems the problem is at *one* of their facilities on the East Coast and affecting many sites that feed through it. Not that Amazon is admitting it, but this is a quote from a news article:

Network intelligence software provider ThousandEyes notes that all the packet loss for the ongoing issue appears to be happening in the Ashburn, VA area. Amazon has an AWS data center in Ashburn, whose exact location was revealed in a news story last year due to a fire during its construction.

So, I'm thinking, someone goofed when they built the data center, causing a fire which left unnoticed and unrepaired damage that finally went TILT today and died entirely.

Eventually they'll have to fix it, but I bet it's going to be due to one underpaid and unappreciated person with a voltage tester and a roll of electrician's tape exploring the cobwebbed stacks of a warehouse.

What puzzles me is why they don't have a switch (either automatic, or manual) to let traffic be redirected around a faulty facility. They own OOODLES of places, surely this isn't like a garden hose where the flow can only go on one path.