Drone strikes have caused significant physical damage to AWS data centers in the UAE and Bahrain, leading to widespread service disruptions and outages. AWS engineers are working on recovery efforts but have not yet restored full power or services to the affected facilities.
The company is strongly recommending that customers migrate their workloads and data from the impacted Middle East regions to alternate AWS regions. These incidents represent some of the first major technological impacts reported from the broader 2026 Iran conflict.
The main topics covered are the drone attack on AWS infrastructure, the resulting service outages and recovery efforts, and the recommendation for customers to relocate their data and applications.
Drones attack several AWS Middle East region data centers amid Iran war, leading to outages — service health been disrupted after power cut due to fire risk
Data center operator is still waiting for permission to safely restore power.
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Amazon’s data center business in the Middle East has been adversely impacted amid the 2026 Iran Conflict. The AWS Health Dashboard notes there are ongoing issues with multiple services at its data centers in the region. Specifically, the status page reports that service disruptions/impacts are ongoing at AWS Middle East (UAE) Region (ME-CENTRAL-1), and the AWS Middle East (Bahrain) Region (ME-SOUTH-1) data centers.
“In the UAE, two of our facilities were directly struck, while in Bahrain, a drone strike in close proximity to one of our facilities caused physical impacts to our infrastructure,” explains the AWS Health Dashboard. And these incidents have precipitated dozens of ‘disrupted,’ ‘degraded,’ and ‘impacted’ services.
As per the quote above, the UAE data center was impacted most severely by the drones. From broader reporting of the conflict, we assume these drone strikes are part of Iran’s response to U.S. Operation Epic Fury and Israeli Operation Roaring Lion strikes on Iranian targets over the weekend. Both the UAE and Bahrain data centers were hit by drones in the early hours of March 1. Whether Iran purposely targeted AWS facilities, we cannot say for certain.
ME-CENTRAL-1 in the UAE
This morning’s update regarding AWS Middle East (UAE) Region (ME-CENTRAL-1) assures customers that “teams continue to make progress on recovery efforts across multiple workstreams.”
While engineers are working to safely restore the full gamut of AWS services, the firm says that it “strongly recommend[s] that customers with workloads running in the Middle East take action now to migrate those workloads to alternate AWS Regions.” It would be wise to enact disaster recovery plans, recover from remote backups stored in other Regions, and update applications to direct traffic away from the UAE, for now, too.
ME-SOUTH-1 in Bahrain
In Bahrain, the most recent update says that engineers “continue to work toward restoring power in the affected Availability Zone (mes1-az2) in the ME-SOUTH-1 Region.” The facility still has no firm time/date for when it expects to restore power and full connectivity, with significant work still required, says AWS.
As with ME-CENTRAL-1, above, AWS is recommending users migrate or replicate their ME-SOUTH-1 Region data to another AWS Region.
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These are some of the first ‘tech’ impacts we have seen precipitated by the 2026 Iran Conflict. They surely won’t be the last, with shipping, the costs of raw materials, and energy resources already rapidly inflating due to emerging geopolitical risks and pressures.
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Mark Tyson is a news editor at Tom's Hardware. He enjoys covering the full breadth of PC tech; from business and semiconductor design to products approaching the edge of reason.
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Notton I can't imagine this thread going well, but...Reply
AWS works with the DoD through the JWCC/JEDI so Iranian commanders probably see AWS data centers as fair game. -
SmokyBarnable There are no political factors to discuss here. At all. Stick to the technology like good little talent.Reply -
bit_user Historically, how do the hourly rates compare between these datacenters and those located in cheaper parts of the US? The Middle East sounds like an expensive place to put one.Reply
I'm guessing that if you didn't migrate your data already, you won't be seeing good bandwidth from there.The article said:As with ME-CENTRAL-1, above, AWS is recommending users migrate or replicate their ME-SOUTH-1 Region data to another AWS Region. -
alan.campbell99 The first thing that always comes to my mind when the topic of data centres in the Middle East arises is thermal management. I suppose the energy needed for this there has been generally cheaper.Reply -
warezme Reply
There is more than enough to discuss related to the ramifications of failed data center infrastructure due to war but ignoring the cause due to the effect is like ignoring the elephant in the room.SmokyBarnable said:There are no political factors to discuss here. At all. Stick to the technology like good little talent.
Meridiano
