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Scenario #6
Cluster Management
K8s v1.22, EKS
Kubelet DiskPressure Loop on Large Image Pulls
Continuous pod evictions caused by DiskPressure due to image bloating.
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What Happened
A new container image with many layers was deployed. Node’s disk filled up, triggering kubelet’s DiskPressure condition. Evicted pods created a loop.
Diagnosis Steps
- 1Checked node conditions: kubectl describe node showed DiskPressure: True.
- 2Monitored image cache with crictl images.
- 3Node /var/lib/containerd usage exceeded threshold.
Root Cause
Excessive layering in container image and high pull churn caused disk exhaustion.
Fix/Workaround
• Rebuilt image using multistage builds and removed unused layers.
• Increased ephemeral disk space temporarily.
Lessons Learned
Container image size directly affects node stability.
How to Avoid
- 1Set resource requests/limits appropriately.
- 2Use image scanning to reject bloated images.