In late May, France’s Bureau of Investigation and Analysis on industrial risks (BEA-RI) issued its technical report on the March 10, 2021 fire at the OVH data centre in Strasbourg. Although all staff were fortunately unharmed and evacuated safely, the fire destroyed SBG2, a five-storey data centre occupying 500m2, and damaged servers in adjacent buildings.
The BEA-RI’s findings concur with those of the Bas-Rhin fire service in March 2022, that multiple factors had contributed to the rapid and destructive spread of the fire.
Previously, the Bas-Rhin fire service’s report highlighted issues such as the lack of an automatic fire extinguisher system in the building, and delay in electrical cutoff which made it more challenging for firefighters to tackle the flames burning in the power room. Toxic fumes from lead batteries also exacerbated the destructiveness of the fire.
France’s BEA-RI’s report also suggested that a water leak on an inverter could have been a possible cause of the fire, which started almost at the same time, in rooms F and G of SBG2. However, the report also noted that the cause of the fire has not been conclusively determined.
Customers Filing Lawsuit for Severe Disruptions
The destruction of the data centre took many key services offline and caused significant disruption to several companies and French websites, especially as OVH is Europe’s largest cloud hosting provider, and is the third-largest across the globe.
In September 2021, Parisian law firm Ziegler & Associates began adding clients who had lost data due to the fire, to their firm’s roster. Over 140 customers filed a class-action lawsuit, intending to seek damages for their losses. In sum, OVHcloud is being pursued for more than €10 million in compensation from the law firm’s clients. Ziegler & Associates is also preparing formal notices to OVHcloud asking OVH for damages that companies are entitled to claim, and expects that it will finish sending out letters on behalf of all its clients by the end of June 2022.
When approached by ComputerWeekly for comments on the lawsuits, a spokesperson from OVHcloud responded in a statement that:
“From the very first hours, OVHcloud has made it a priority to support its affected customers. Commercial gestures and dedicated support have been granted for all the services concerned. This explains the low number of customers who have chosen the legal route. We remain determined to support and find solutions for each individual case which would be brought to our attention.”
Concern over Data Centre Fire Risk
A report by Uptime Institute released in April 2021 highlighted that while incidence of fires at data centres has been low, data centre operators must remain vigilant.
Uptime Institute advised that firms should update very early smoke detection apparatus (VESDA) systems and maintain appropriate fire safety mechanisms, to ensure proper fire suppression in the facility should a fire break out.
