Avalanche halts block production amid inscription wave launch

Decentralized applications (DApp) platform Avalanche witnessed a significant technical disruption impacting the block production of the proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain. 

Investigating Avalanche primary network block production issue right now. Seems to be related to a new inscription wave launched about an hour ago.

— Kevin Sekniqi (@kevinsekniqi) February 23, 2024

On Feb. 23 at 12:02:27 UTC, the Avalanche’s primary network experienced block production issues, seemingly putting the network to a halt. Kevin Sekniqi, the co-founder of Ava Labs, posted on X (formerly Twitter) that their team is already investigating the issue. According to Sekniqi, the halt in block production may be connected to a “new inscription wave” launched an hour before the issues surfaced. 

The Ava Labs executive believes that the issue might be an “esoteric bug from some edge case” and mentioned that the issue is likely a mempool handling issue with inscriptions. Sekniqi assured the community that this would be “handled quickly.”

This is a developing story, and further information will be added as it becomes available.