# Alfajores long block times

**URL:** <https://forum.celo.org/t/alfajores-long-block-times/100>\
**Category:** Alfajores Testnet\
**Created:** [September 18, 2019, 5:34pm UTC](https://forum.celo.org/t/alfajores-long-block-times/100 "2019-09-18T17:34:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![jmrossy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ecccb3/32.png) [@jmrossy](https://forum.celo.org/u/jmrossy)\
**Post date:** [September 18, 2019, 5:34pm UTC](https://forum.celo.org/t/alfajores-long-block-times/100/1 "2019-09-18T17:34:48Z")

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Hey all, just an FYI:  
The Alfajores test network is currently experiencing an issue with block its times. Occasionally, some blocks can take a few minutes to be validated. This is due to a small set of validators being down/unavailable. Please be warned this may affect the wallet app’s ability to sync and perform transactions. We have identified a fix and we’re hoping to ship it soon!

Note, a service that powers the activity feed in the wallet app is also down. We’re investigating this as well.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![pkrasam](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.celo.org/pkrasam/32/22_2.png) [@pkrasam](https://forum.celo.org/u/pkrasam)\
**Post date:** [September 21, 2019, 1:07pm UTC](https://forum.celo.org/t/alfajores-long-block-times/100/2 "2019-09-21T13:07:54Z")

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What can we do to help?

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**Author:** ![tim](https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/flex020/user_avatar/forum.celo.org/tim/32/9_2.png) [@tim](https://forum.celo.org/u/tim)\
**Post date:** [September 23, 2019, 7:31pm UTC](https://forum.celo.org/t/alfajores-long-block-times/100/3 "2019-09-23T19:31:13Z")

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@pkrasam – thanks for asking! Just cross-posting from Discord:

For anyone running a validator right now – We figured out that our CLI `unlock` command was only unlocking keys for a week, and after that your validator would be unable to participate in consensus. This (compounded with a couple of other issues we’ve since fixed) meant we have been seeing periodic very slow block times.

We’ve pushed a new version of our CLI (0.0.21) and would love it if you all could update to it, and unlock again. This version now unlocks indefinitely. If you do

```auto
$ npm upgrade -g @celo/celocli

```

Check you’ve got 0.0.21:

```auto
$ npm info @celo/celocli 

```

then

```auto
$ celocli account:unlock --account $CELO_VALIDATOR_GROUP_ADDRESS --password <YOUR_FIRST_PASSWORD>
$ celocli account:unlock --account $CELO_VALIDATOR_ADDRESS --password <YOUR_SECOND_PASSWORD>

```

this should get you validating again.

In the mean time, so you as you don’t need to look at this urgently, we are going to do an on-chain governance proposal to reduce the number of validators to 70 and as soon as we’ve seen a bunch of folks unlock we’ll raise it to 100 again.

Thanks for your help, and apologies for the downtime. We’ve learnt a few things, which is the purpose of the testnet 🙂 Let me know if you’ve got any questions.