[walrus01]

Network engineer here: clink bridged all of the management controllers on their infinera dwdm shelves together into one multi state sized L2 broadcast domain. Best guess is because it made them easier to SNMP poll and to run other management tools to admin them.

Within the circle of people who really know what went on, we've been laughing at them for months.

[ay]

The oddest part was that FFC recommendations didn’t include “limit the size of your broadcast domain”.

Large flat L2 are a classic time bomb, with their builders proudly exclaiming “look ma, no hands!” until they painfully get reminded of their mistake :)

[empath75]

I worked for a regional isp where almost the entire metro network was a single layer 2 network up to the point of presences. We regularly (as in at least once a week) had spanning tree loops and broadcast storms that took down the entire city.

[LIV2]

Is there a source or is that a guess at what happened? That sounds immensely incompetent to the point that I find it hard to believe

[walrus01]

In this particular case, some insider info and I am also in possession of the RFO CenturyLink sent out for a number of downed 10GbE transport circuits. From they way they described it a broadcast storm between infinera node controllers propagated uncontrollably across their entire infinera chassis fleet in the western US.

[jlawson]

I know some of these words.