Fire and power outage near Moscow telecom hub knock Discord, Steam and Telegram offline across Russia
A power failure near a major telecommunications hub in Moscow triggered widespread internet disruptions across Russia, affecting services including Discord, Steam and Telegram.
Internet users across Russia, primarily in Moscow and St. Petersburg, reported significant outages on Monday. Downdetector recorded issues with internet providers Lovit and Rostelecom, mobile carriers MegaFon and Beeline, as well as Discord, Steam, Telegram and several other platforms.
Domain registrar Reg.ru told state news agency TASS that the nationwide disruption to Runet, the Russian segment of the internet, stemmed from a power failure at a major communications hub.
Fire and blackouts reported
Power also went down in several Moscow districts. Shoppers were evacuated from the Gagarinsky mall in the city's southwest, according to news outlet Msk1. Witnesses told the Telegram channel Ostorozhno, Moskva that a fire had broken out at a facility on Vavilova Street, where a siren sounded and multiple fire crews and ambulances arrived. The Telegram channel 112 reported an explosion at a nearby power substation.
Residents of the Khamovniki, Zamoskvorechye and Danilovsky districts also reported power outages.
Link to the MMTS-9 hub
The Telegram channel ZaTelekom said the outage originated from a power failure at the MMTS-9 telecommunications hub, known as M9, located at 7 Butlerova Street — described as a historic site housing key equipment. The street lies in the same southwestern part of Moscow as the Gagarinsky district.
Russian information security outlet SecurityLab said hosting providers have begun openly acknowledging that their server racks at M9 are isolated, noting the site houses key national network infrastructure, including the core of the MSK-IX internet exchange point. A source cited by business outlet RBC likewise tied the nationwide outage to the incident in the Gagarinsky district, where MMTS-9 is based.
