A SysOps Administrator is troubleshooting Amazon EC2 connectivity issues to the internet. The EC2 instance is in a private subnet. Below is the route table that is applied to the subnet of the EC2…

Question

Options

• AThe NAT gateway no longer exists
• BThere is no route to the internet gateway
• CThe routes are no longer propagating
• DThere is no route rule with a destination for the internet.

• A
  96% (27)
• B
  4% (1)

Explanation

Option A is correct because in AWS route tables, a Blackhole status means the target resource no longer exists - the NAT gateway (nat-xxxxxxx) has been deleted, so packets destined for the internet (via 0.0.0.0/0) are silently dropped with no path forward.

Why the distractors are wrong:

• B is wrong because a route does exist for internet traffic (0.0.0.0/0); the problem is not a missing route but a dead target. Also, private subnets intentionally route through NAT, not directly to an internet gateway.
• C is wrong because "Propagated: No" is normal for manually created routes - propagation applies to BGP routes from VPN/Direct Connect, and both routes show the same propagation status, so nothing changed there.
• D is wrong for the same reason as B - a 0.0.0.0/0 destination rule is present in the table.

Memory tip: Think of Blackhole = Black Hole - something got sucked in and disappeared. Whenever you see Status: Blackhole in an AWS route table, the target resource (NAT gateway, VPN gateway, etc.) no longer exists and must be recreated or the route updated.

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