Do not carry scale-down dwell through unsafe topology

Measure low-load dwell only while the fleet inventory and lifecycle actions are safe to mutate. If reconciliation is incomplete, required workers are not ready, or no removal candidate preserves projected capacity, clear the dwell and require a fresh full interval after those gates recover. Otherwise, missing or stale fleet data can be mistaken for sustained low traffic and trigger removal from a partial view. Candidate identity changes may preserve the timer while safety and eligibility remain true; loss of either must end that interval. This adds a safety gate without changing the configured utilization threshold.

Applies when: an autoscaler evaluates scale-down during deploys, restarts, or incomplete reconciliation. Keywords: autoscaler scale down dwell safety topology reconcile restart eligibility capacity