Ethereum Layer-2 Network Suffers 3-Hour Service Disruption
Ethereum scaling solution Starknet experienced a major mainnet outage on Tuesday, its second in less than two months, causing delays in block production and stagnating transactions. The disruption lasted two hours and 44 minutes, prompting questions about the network’s stability.
What Caused the Outage?
According to status.starknet.io, the outage originated from Starknet’s sequencer, which acts as a transaction traffic controller. The sequencer failed to recognize the “Cairo0 code”, preventing proper ordering and execution of transactions for nearly three hours.
This issue resulted in slow block creation and left pending transactions unprocessed during the downtime. A network reorganization was required from block 1960612, meaning users will need to resubmit transactions submitted between 2:23 a.m. and 4:36 a.m. UTC.
Why It Matters for Ethereum L2 Ecosystem
Starknet is Ethereum’s seventh-largest Layer-2 network with over $548 million in total value locked (TVL), according to L2Beat. The outage raises concerns about reliability as L2 networks become increasingly critical for Ethereum scalability.
“Repeated outages undermine confidence in Layer-2 solutions, especially for protocols handling significant liquidity,” said a blockchain analyst following the event.
This marks the second major outage since July, when Starknet faced a 13-minute slowdown caused by slow block creation times and gateway issues.
Starknet Restores Operations
In an update posted on X, Starknet confirmed that the network is now “fully operational.”
“Block production is back to normal. Most RPC providers are up, and the remaining ones will upgrade shortly,” the announcement stated. The team also promised to publish a full post-mortem report, including root cause analysis and prevention measures.
Starknet relies on ZK-rollups, specifically STARK proofs, to deliver high-throughput, low-cost transactions on top of the Ethereum mainnet. These technologies are essential for scaling Ethereum, but incidents like this highlight the need for robust infrastructure and redundancy mechanisms.
Disclaimer
This content is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial, investment, or legal advice. Cryptocurrency trading involves risk and may result in financial loss.