Delete a public ElasticIP

Question

I have the following issue:

• a while ago I tried to create a private vpc with a gateway to a public IP;
• exercise closed, deleted everything - except the public IP. I simply forgot about it. I only remembered about it when the bill came and on details I had EC2-other;
• browsed a little bit the cost explorer and it was confirmed;
• I went to EC2 dashboard, listed the network interfaces (had only one) pointing to my public IP. Tried to "detach" and I got the message "You are not allowed to manage 'ela-attach' attachments.";
• Went to Elastic IPs dashboard and saw only my IP address. Selected and then clicked "Disassociate" and I've got the error: "You do not have permission to access the specified resource.";

I am the owner the account, there are no users. Not sure if it matters, but on the owner of the "Elastic IP" there is my user id (numeric) which is visible on "my account" page.

So, what am I doing wrong? What am I missing?

Answer 1

One possibility of not allowing deletion would be related linking with NAT Gateway. The elastic ips are public ones and attached to a specific region. The reason the system does not allow you to delete the ip would be because it might be associated to some service in a same region but the association might not appear on the EC2 dashboard. Checking NAT gateway configuration would be possible link to the elastic IP.