While this error isn't terribly uncommon – the event log spewed something quite interesting that I didn't see much on the blogs about. All of a sudden on my web front ends I was getting this HTTP error 503. So, I quickly jumped over to the application event log and noticed the more detailed error:
"Windows Process Activation Service (WAS) encountered a failure when it started a worker process to serve the application pool"
For others out there that see this error, my problem was the password for my service account had expired (embarrassing mistake J). To fix it I had to:
- Change the service account so that the password never expires.
- Reset the password to exactly as it was before it expired.
- Start the application pool(s) in IIS.
That did the trick!
Phil