RMAN: target database incarnation is not current in recovery catalog

A surprising database backup failure report was delivered to my mailbox, upon checking with the log revealed the below pasted RMAN- errors. This left me wondering as to how come the rman backup would fail for no reason with an error like this, there is something fishy about the situation.

RMAN> 

RMAN-00571: ====================================================

RMAN-00569: ========== ERROR MESSAGE STACK FOLLOWS ============= 

RMAN-00571: ====================================================

RMAN-06004: ORACLE error from recovery catalog database:

RMAN-20011: target database incarnation is not current in recovery catalog

Here are the steps below that were performed to fix the issue of incarnation.

UNIX:~/dba/log > rman target / catalog rman_user/rman_pass@rcat.acme.com

Recovery Manager: Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production on Mon Jan 26 06:45:20 2009

Copyright (c) 1982, 2005, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

connected to target database: PROD (DBID=2706003900)

connected to recovery catalog database

RMAN>  list incarnation of database;

RMAN> exit

as you can see above, no incarnations listed.

UNIX:~/dba/log >  . oraenv

ORACLE_SID = [oracle] ? PROD

UNIX:~/dba/log > rman target / nocatalog

Recovery Manager: Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production on Mon Jan 26 06:46:58 2009

Copyright (c) 1982, 2005, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

connected to target database: PROD (DBID=2706003900)

using target database control file instead of recovery catalog

RMAN> list incarnation of database;

List of Database Incarnations

DB Key Inc Key DB Name DB ID      STATUS  Reset SCN Reset Time

------ ------- ------- ---------- ------- --------- ----------

  1      1      PROD   2706003900 CURRENT    1      07-FEB-07

RMAN> exit

The database PROD with the DBID (2706003900) and DBINC_KEY (875312) has to 

be reset in the recovery catalog and re-registered for its backups to 

resume.

UNIX:~/dba/log > rman target / catalog rman_user/rman_pass@rcat.acme.com

Recovery Manager: Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production on Mon Jan 26 07:00:56 2009

Copyright (c) 1982, 2005, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

connected to target database: PROD (DBID=2706003900)

connected to recovery catalog database

RMAN> RESET DATABASE TO INCARNATION 875312;

database reset to incarnation 875312

RMAN> register database;

starting full resync of recovery catalog

full resync complete

RMAN-00571: ===========================================================

RMAN-00569: =============== ERROR MESSAGE STACK FOLLOWS ===============

RMAN-00571: ===========================================================

RMAN-03009: failure of register command on default channel at 05/26/2009 07:40:05

RMAN-20002: target database already registered in recovery catalog

RMAN>

RMAN> list incarnation of database; 

List of Database Incarnations 

DB Key Inc Key DB Name DB ID      STATUS    Reset SCN  Reset Time

------ ------- ------- ---------- ------- ------------ ----------

875311 875312  PROD    2706003900 CURRENT            1  07-FEB-07

875311 9179422 PROD2   2706003900 ORPHAN 6203845546338 24-MAY-09 

RMAN> exit 

Recovery Manager complete.