Google suffered a global outage today while an explosion at a data center in the United States left multiple staff injured.
Three electricians were critically injured after an “electrical incident” at the data center in Council Bluffs, in the US state of Iowa, local police and Google told news site SF Gate.
The accident unfolded at about midday Monday (local time) while the electricians were working on a substation near the data center buildings.
All three suffered significant burns after an electrical explosion, the publication reported.
The incident coincided with a major global outage, with users across the world complaining about the search engine going down.
Many users received an error message when they attempted to search.
People in the US, UK, Australia and Singapore reported issues, according to DownDetector.
It was not immediately clear whether the outage was linked to the explosion.
“We are aware of an electrical incident that took place today at Google’s data center in Council Bluffs, Iowa, injuring three people onsite who are now being treated,” a Google spokesman told SF Gate.
“The health and safety of all workers is our absolute top priority, and we are working closely with partners and local authorities to thoroughly investigate the situation and provide assistance as needed.”
One of the injured electricians was flown to Nebraska Medical Center, while the other two were taken by ambulance, the publication reported.
They were all conscious and breathing at the time.
The affected data centre, which opened in 2009, is one of Google’s largest.
It is one of 14 in the United states, with there 23 around the world.
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