As far as I can tell with the limited amount of information there is out there, the only thing Shaw really did wrong was have their primary and backup generators too close to their transformers, thus allowing the sprinkler system to bring down everything. My guess is that they took a look at the cost of moving some of this equipment around versus the chances of an event like yesterday happening and decided the risk was not worth the cost. this type of thing happens daily all over the world. Unfortunately, they got burned.
As others have already stated though, a lot of blame needs to go to the customers that chose to co-locate their servers at Shaw (or IBM). That building is in a horrible location for a major data centre and the fact that it is also a business/retail space makes it even worse. Again, my guess is that AHS saved a few bucks by hosting with Shaw and it back fired. It sucks, but it happens. Anyone recall Instagram being down last week?
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