Starting engine: engine windows failed to start: starting windows containers: An error has occurred. Context deadline exceeded.

[TrachukYulia]

Bug report

Docker Desktop encounters an unexpected error when starting with Windows containers:
"Post 'http://ipc/windowscontainers/stop': context deadline exceeded"

The issue appeared suddenly after Docker was working normally. Restarting Docker,
reinstalling Docker Desktop, and toggling Hyper-V on/off provided only temporary relief
before the error returned.

I tried to restart adapters:
Get-NetAdapter | Where-Object {$_.Name -like "*Docker*" -or $_.Name -like "*vEthernet*"} | Restart-NetAdapter
but then I got:
"Starting engine: engine windows failed to start: starting windows containers: An error has occurred."

System resources (CPU, RAM) are not constrained. The issue appears to be network or
Hyper-V virtual switch related (?)

Platform

Windows

Version information

Client:
 Version:    29.2.0
 Context:    desktop-windows
 Debug Mode: false
 Plugins:
  ai: Docker AI Agent - Ask Gordon (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v1.17.2
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-ai.exe
  buildx: Docker Buildx (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.31.1-desktop.1
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-buildx.exe
  compose: Docker Compose (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v5.0.2
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-compose.exe
  debug: Get a shell into any image or container (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  0.0.47
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-debug.exe
  desktop: Docker Desktop commands (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.2.0
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-desktop.exe
  extension: Manages Docker extensions (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.2.31
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-extension.exe
  init: Creates Docker-related starter files for your project (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v1.4.0
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-init.exe
  mcp: Docker MCP Plugin (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.37.0
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-mcp.exe
  model: Docker Model Runner (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v1.0.8
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-model.exe
  offload: Docker Offload (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.5.41
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-offload.exe
  pass: Docker Pass Secrets Manager Plugin (beta) (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.0.24
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-pass.exe
  sandbox: Docker Sandbox (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v0.10.1
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-sandbox.exe
  sbom: View the packaged-based Software Bill Of Materials (SBOM) for an image (Anchore Inc.)
    Version:  0.6.0
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-sbom.exe
  scout: Docker Scout (Docker Inc.)
    Version:  v1.19.0
    Path:     C:\Program Files\Docker\cli-plugins\docker-scout.exe

Diagnostics ID

No response