The Shibarium network, Shiba Inu’s much-anticipated Ethereum Layer 2 solution, officially launched on August 16, but the debut was fraught with challenges. Chinese blockchain journalist Colin Wu revealed that over 965 ETH, valued at $1.7 million, are stuck on the bridge.
Wu highlighted that this alarming situation was confirmed by Beosin, a platform that provides crypto-related risk alerts:
According to Beosin monitoring, the transaction on Shibarium, Shiba Inu's Layer 2 solution, is in a pending state. Currently, $1.7 million in ETH is locked on the Shibarium cross-chain bridge. Users are advised to temporarily stop using Shibarium. During the Shibarium testnet,…
— Wu Blockchain (@WuBlockchain) August 17, 2023
The launch, which occurred amid the Blockchain Futurist Conference, was met with immediate technical issues, leading to a halt in block production. The Shibarium Remote Control Protocol (RPC) was reported to be down, limiting the ability to execute procedures on the network remotely and potentially disrupting user interaction.
Data from the Shibarium explorer indicated that the network faced an issue with block production for up to 7 hours, leading to a halt in blocks within that timeframe. Block production resumed and halted again, with the last block occurring 14 minutes before the reporting time.
Shibarium developers have not released a statement on the post-launch issues, leading to speculation and complaints from community members. In response to the escalating reports of issues, DaVinci, a community member and discord server admin, advised the community in the official discord channel to test with small amounts. The server has been locked as of press time.
The launch’s tumultuous nature has had a direct impact on Shiba Inu’s market performance, with SHIB price dropping 6.7%, according to CoinGecko. The situation has also led to reactions on social media, ranging from skepticism to outright mockery.
Despite facing obstacles, the Shiba Inu project is still striving to find its place within Ethereum’s expanding Layer 2 ecosystem. Shibarium, the network in question, employs a unique form of the Proof of Stake consensus known as Proof of Participation. To incentivize network validators and governance delegates, 21 million BONE tokens have been set aside as rewards.
The Shibarium mainnet’s buggy deployment follows months of testing, including a beta launch in March that engaged 21M users. The situation remains fluid, and the community awaits further clarity from Shiba Inu’s founder, Shytoshi Kusama, who has yet to issue an official statement addressing the controversy. In the aftermath of the launch, community members were advised to take precautionary measures.
