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Scenario #22
Cluster Management
K8s v1.21, self-managed

Stale Finalizers Preventing Namespace Deletion

A namespace remained in “Terminating” state indefinitely.

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What Happened

The namespace contained resources with finalizers pointing to a deleted controller. Kubernetes waited forever for the finalizer to complete cleanup.

Diagnosis Steps
  • 1Ran kubectl get ns <name> -o json – saw dangling finalizers.
  • 2Checked for the corresponding CRD/controller – it was uninstalled.
Root Cause

Finalizers without owning controller cause resource lifecycle deadlocks.

Fix/Workaround
• Manually removed finalizers using a patched JSON:
bash
CopyEdit
kubectl patch ns <name> -p '{"spec":{"finalizers":[]}}' --type=merge
Lessons Learned

Always delete CRs before removing the CRD or controller.

How to Avoid
  • 1Implement controller cleanup logic.
  • 2Audit finalizers periodically.
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