Yandex halts Sasovo data centre after incident; reports cite fire after drone attack
In short
Yandex said on 8 October that an incident at its data centre in Sasovo, Ryazan region, had affected part of its infrastructure, that the situation was under control and that no one was injured; Interfax reported the site's operation was fully stopped. The company said its main services were working normally, though some may be unavailable to users. TASS and vc.ru reported a fire at the data centre after a drone attack, while the company statements quoted by other outlets did not name a cause.
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Yandex said on 8 October that an incident at its data centre in Sasovo, Ryazan region, had affected part of its infrastructure. "The situation at the site is now under control, there are no casualties," the press service said, adding that its team was dealing with the aftermath and restoring the affected services. Interfax, citing the company, reported that specialised services were working on site and that the data centre's operation had been fully stopped. [ 1 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 ]
The company said its main services were operating normally, although some of them may be unavailable to users. Kommersant and Vedomosti noted that the company did not specify what had happened or what caused it. [ 1 , 3 , 7 ]
Several outlets reported a fire. Meduza, citing the outlet Astra, which analysed photos and videos from eyewitnesses, reported a fire on the grounds of the Sasta (Саста) machine-tool plant, where the data centre is located. Vedomosti said RIA Novosti later reported a fire at the data centre and that Yandex services could be disrupted. TASS and vc.ru reported that Yandex announced a fire at the data centre after a drone attack; the company statements quoted by Interfax, Kommersant and Meduza do not name a cause. [ 1 , 3 , 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ]
Meduza reported that the Ukrainian monitoring Telegram channels Exilenova+ and Supernova+ claimed the fire began after a Ukrainian attack. According to Meduza, the Russian Defence Ministry listed Ryazan region among the regions where air defences shot down Ukrainian drones overnight into 8 October, while local authorities did not report consequences of the attack. Dozhd (Дождь) noted that several Russian websites became unavailable, including the autoposting platform Postmypost and the Ryazan regional edition of Komsomolskaya Pravda, Meduza reported. [ 5 ]
The Sasovo data centre was launched in 2014 and occupies part of the former premises of the Sasta plant, a maker of pipe-threading machine tools whose products go to Russian machine-building enterprises and for export. Yandex laid several fibre-optic lines between Sasovo and Moscow to connect its servers to a single network, Interfax reported. Meduza noted that in September Russian forces struck several Ukrainian data centres, which the Defence Ministry said processed and transmitted intelligence data for the Ukrainian armed forces. Vedomosti noted that the previous disruption to Yandex services occurred on 30 June. [ 1 , 3 , 5 , 7 ]
Why it matters
The data centre was shut down and Yandex said some of its services may be unavailable to users; Meduza, citing Dozhd (Дождь), reported that several Russian websites went offline. Reports by TASS and vc.ru that the fire followed a drone attack link the outage to the war, which Meduza set against Russian strikes on Ukrainian data centres in September.
Key facts
- Yandex reported an incident at its data centre in Sasovo, Ryazan region, that affected part of its infrastructure. [ 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 ]
- Yandex said the situation at the site was under control and no one was injured. [ 1 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 , 8 ]
- Operation of the data centre was fully stopped, Interfax reported citing the company. [ 1 , 7 ]
- Yandex said its main services were working normally but some may be unavailable to users. [ 1 , 3 , 6 , 7 ]
- TASS and vc.ru reported, citing Yandex, a fire at the data centre after a drone attack. [ 6 , 8 ]
- The data centre was launched in 2014 in part of the former premises of the Sasta (Саста) plant. [ 1 , 3 , 5 ]
Confirmed by several sources
- An incident at Yandex's data centre in Sasovo, Ryazan region, affected part of the company's infrastructure. [ 1 , 2 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 ]
- Yandex said the situation was under control and there were no casualties. [ 1 , 3 , 4 , 5 , 7 , 8 ]
- The data centre's operation was fully stopped. [ 1 , 7 ]
- Yandex said its main services were operating normally. [ 1 , 3 , 7 ]
- A fire was reported at the site. [ 5 , 6 , 7 , 8 ]
- The data centre was launched in 2014 on the former premises of the Sasta plant. [ 1 , 3 , 5 ]
Still unclear
- What caused the incident. Kommersant and Vedomosti said the company did not specify what happened or why; TASS and vc.ru headlines say Yandex reported a fire after a drone attack, but the company statements quoted by Interfax, Kommersant and Meduza do not name a cause.
- Whether the fire was caused by a Ukrainian attack. The claim comes from Ukrainian monitoring Telegram channels Exilenova+ and Supernova+ as reported by Meduza; local authorities did not report consequences of the attack.
- Which services and websites were affected. Yandex said only that some services may be unavailable; the list of offline websites comes from Dozhd as cited by Meduza.
What local media are saying
Timeline, local time
- Interfax reports Yandex's statement on the incident and the full stop of the data centre. [ 1 ]
- Meduza reports Astra's account of a fire at the Sasta plant site and monitoring channels' claims of a Ukrainian attack. [ 5 ]
- vc.ru reports a fire at the data centre after a drone attack. [ 6 ]
- TASS reports Yandex announced a fire at the Sasovo data centre after a drone attack, with no one hurt. [ 8 ]