Remove zombie databases from RDS

Question

I have a couple of Aurora database clusters that didn't create properly several years ago, and cannot be deleted using the API or console. They are both MySQL 5.6.10a regional clusters (with no instances) but also can't be upgraded.

They're probably not doing any harm but I'd like to get rid of them anyway, especially as I'm getting frequent messages about compulsory upgrades.

One cluster is in us-east-1, stuck with status "Creating".  The other cluster is in ap-southeast-2, and is stuck with status "Incompatible-restore" (whatever we were trying to restore doesn't matter now anyway).

If I attempt to delete them in the console, I get a banner notification "The  cluster is being deleted.", but it never does delete.

If I attempt to delete them using the aws cli tool, I get a response with the cluster details, but again, they are not deleted.

`aws rds delete-db-cluster --profile develop --region us-east-1 --skip-final-snapshot --db-cluster-identifier develop-globaldb-instance-1-cluster`
`aws rds delete-db-cluster --profile develop --region ap-southeast-2 --skip-final-snapshot --db-cluster-identifier snowflake-cluster`

Ideas welcome!

Accepted Answer

Here are some ideas:

1. **Use the AWS CLI to force delete the clusters.** You can use the following command to force delete the clusters:
    
    ```
    aws rds delete-db-cluster --profile develop --region us-east-1 --skip-final-snapshot --db-cluster-identifier develop-globaldb-instance-1-cluster --force
    ```
    
    ```
    aws rds delete-db-cluster --profile develop --region ap-southeast-2 --skip-final-snapshot --db-cluster-identifier snowflake-cluster --force
    ```
    
2. **Use the AWS CloudFormation template to delete the clusters.** You can use the following AWS CloudFormation template to delete the clusters:
    
    ```
    {
      "Resources": {
        "DevelopGlobalDbInstance1Cluster": {
          "Type": "AWS::RDS::DBCluster",
          "Properties": {
            "DBClusterIdentifier": "develop-globaldb-instance-1-cluster",
            "Engine": "MySQL",
            "EngineVersion": "5.6.10a",
            "Region": "us-east-1",
            "DeletionPolicy": "ForceDelete"
          }
        },
        "SnowflakeCluster": {
          "Type": "AWS::RDS::DBCluster",
          "Properties": {
            "DBClusterIdentifier": "snowflake-cluster",
            "Engine": "MySQL",
            "EngineVersion": "5.6.10a",
            "Region": "ap-southeast-2",
            "DeletionPolicy": "ForceDelete"
          }
        }
      }
    }
    ```
    
3. **Use the AWS API to delete the clusters.** You can use the following AWS API call to delete the clusters:
    
    ```
    DELETE /rds/clusters/develop-globaldb-instance-1-cluster
    ```
    
    ```
    DELETE /rds/clusters/snowflake-cluster
    ```
    
    **Note:** If you are using the AWS API to delete the clusters, you will need to make sure that you have the appropriate permissions.
    
4. **Contact AWS Support.** AWS Support can help you troubleshoot and delete your database clusters.

Remove zombie databases from RDS

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