A status update on the OVH tracker for a different datacenter (LIM-1 / Limburg) says "We are going to intervene in the rack to replace a large number of power supply cables that could have an insulation defect." [0][1] The same type of issue is "planned" in BHS [3] and GRA [2].
Eerie timing: do they possibly suspect some bad cables?
>Eerie timing: do they possibly suspect some bad cables?
Why not? Cables with ratings lower than the load they are carrying is a prime cause for electrical fires. If the load is too high for long enough, the shielding melts away, and if it is close enough for other material to catch fire then that's the ball game. It's a common cause for home electrical fires. Some lamp with poor wiring catches the drapes on fire, etc. Wouldn't think a data center would have flammable curtains though.
This definitely could be probable cause. When I was a teen I witnessed such fire once. Basically a friend had a heater but couldn't find any mains cable and eventually decided to disconnect mains cable from the radio and use that. After few minutes the isolation from the mains cable melted away and the cable turned glowing red and it started burning the table it was on. Fortunately we were not asleep and got it under control quickly. Lesson learned.
We have several bare-metal servers on GRA/Gravelines & RBX/Roubaix, 3 weeks ago we had a 3h downtime on RBX because they were replacing power cords without previous notification.
Maybe they were aware this could happen, and were in the process to fix it
Eerie timing: do they possibly suspect some bad cables?
[0]: http://travaux.ovh.net/?do=details&id=49016
[1]: http://travaux.ovh.net/?do=details&id=49017
[3]: http://travaux.ovh.net/?do=details&id=49462
[2]: http://travaux.ovh.net/?do=details&id=49465