nginx reload fails with [emerg] host not found in upstream

[groknaut]

12/07 05:31[root at proxy2-prod-ue1 ~]# cat gethostbyname.c
#include <stdio.h>
#include <netdb.h>

int main(int argc, char *argv[])
{   
    if (argc != 2) {
      printf("usage: %s [hostname]\n", argv[0]);
      return 1;
    }

    struct hostent *lh = gethostbyname(argv[1]);

    if (lh) {
      puts(lh->h_name);
      return 0;
    } else {
      herror("gethostbyname");
      return 1;
    }
}
12/07 05:31[root at proxy2-prod-ue1 ~]# gcc -o gethostbyname gethostbyname.c
12/07 05:31[root at proxy2-prod-ue1 ~]# ./gethostbyname webapp02c
webapp02c.prod.romeovoid.com
12/07 05:31[root at proxy2-prod-ue1 ~]# ./gethostbyname
webapp02c.prod.romeovoid.com
webapp02c.prod.romeovoid.com

Posted at Nginx Forum: http://forum.nginx.org/read.php?2,233661,233663#msg-233663