moby: Cannot start some containers after restarting docker daemon

I had 4 containers running and when trying to start another one I hit #6476. So I restarted docker daemon, it failed to stop, but started successfuly…

$ /etc/init.d/docker restart
Stopping docker:                                           [FAILED]
Starting docker:                                           [  OK  ]

After this I found that only 1 of my 4 containers were running. Now when I try to start any of the remaining 3 containers I’m getting the following error:

$ docker start gitorious-memcached
Error: Cannot start container gitorious-memcached: Error getting container 5e30d6df89b1a96aeb749b6007754cbf47aea9f075f1185321ae6d8d8ba6dbab from driver devicemapper: Error mounting '/dev/mapper/docker-253:0-3608-5e30d6df89b1a96aeb749b6007754cbf47aea9f075f1185321ae6d8d8ba6dbab' on '/var/lib/docker/devicemapper/mnt/5e30d6df89b1a96aeb749b6007754cbf47aea9f075f1185321ae6d8d8ba6dbab': device or resource busy
2014/06/25 13:39:02 Error: failed to start one or more containers

I restarted the daemon several more times but it still can’t start these containers.

I’m running Docker 1.0.0 on Centos 6.5.

About this issue

Original URL
State: closed
Created 10 years ago
Comments: 38 (7 by maintainers)

Most upvoted comments

I’m having this issue on Docker version 1.11.1, build 5604cbe

~# docker ps -a
c92c9ffcab9d        *omitted*           *omited*   4 weeks ago         Exited (128) 14 hours ago      dovecot_1

:~# docker start dovecot_1 
Error response from daemon: Container c92c9ffcab9d7f27f7f5b6642c6e087da6d9cffdbe36ef152994084bec218d34 is aleady active
Error: failed to start containers: dovecot_1

~# docker kill dovecot_1
Error response from daemon: Cannot kill container dovecot_1: Container c92c9ffcab9d7f27f7f5b6642c6e087da6d9cffdbe36ef152994084bec218d34 is not running

There seems to have happend a docker deamon crash/restart since all my containers are: Up 14 hours

ghost on Jun 30, 2016

Just had it happen to me, running F21, kernel 3.18.3-201, docker 1.4.1.

$ docker start foo_idcmp_1 Error response from daemon: Cannot start container foo_idcmp_1: Unit docker-4a37975cb9bab1af5e47b3a1fa8c67a1c59d30a6e9eaa3f62aa112cb4f848e83.scope already exists. FATA[0000] Error: failed to start one or more containers

Container was a centos 6 image with Java running in it.

I had previously run:

$ docker exec -it foo_idcmp_1 killall -9 java

Running:

sudo systemctl stop docker-4a37975cb9bab1af5e47b3a1fa8c67a1c59d30a6e9eaa3f62aa112cb4f848e83.scope

Seems to have let me start the container again.

idcmp on Feb 6, 2015

I have got a comparable issue with ubunut 14.04. Only i just restart docker with:

sudo service docker restart

After this my containers are not runner, so i tried to start the containers but i get this error:

rror getting container 056e967e98c051e0d801c84d5c5f1f79b3e61ae8c33f421587b08f61f9e55a86 from driver devicemapper: Error mounting '/dev/mapper/docker-8:1-262146-056e967e98c051e0d801c84d5c5f1f79b3e61ae8c33f421587b08f61f9e55a86' on '/var/lib/docker/devicemapper/mnt/056e967e98c051e0d801c84d5c5f1f79b3e61ae8c33f421587b08f61f9e55a86': device or resource busy

So its look likes it running. Also when i start a new elasticsearch container i see the containers that are stop in the cluster and active. Also i can ping the containers that are not showing up in “docker ps”

Docker info

Containers: 3
Images: 54
Storage Driver: devicemapper
 Pool Name: docker-8:1-262146-pool
 Data file: /var/lib/docker/devicemapper/devicemapper/data
 Metadata file: /var/lib/docker/devicemapper/devicemapper/metadata
 Data Space Used: 1272.9 Mb
 Data Space Total: 102400.0 Mb
 Metadata Space Used: 3.5 Mb
 Metadata Space Total: 2048.0 Mb
Execution Driver: native-0.2
Kernel Version: 3.13.0-30-generic
WARNING: No swap limit support

Docker version

Client version: 1.1.1
Client API version: 1.13
Go version (client): go1.2.1
Git commit (client): bd609d2
Server version: 1.1.1
Server API version: 1.13
Go version (server): go1.2.1
Git commit (server): bd609d2

dverbeek84 on Jul 17, 2014