diff --git a/backend/src/db.rs b/backend/src/db.rs
index dab6466..01ce814 100644
--- a/backend/src/db.rs
+++ b/backend/src/db.rs
@@ -106,10 +106,27 @@ pub async fn create_pool(database_url: &str) -> Result<PgPool> {
         }
     };
 
+    // Migrations run on their OWN connection, deliberately NOT from the pool.
+    //
+    // `after_connect` above puts `lock_timeout = 5s` on every pooled connection, and the migrator
+    // would inherit it. Migrations that take ACCESS EXCLUSIVE (026's index swap, 027's ADD COLUMN)
+    // then turn a short WAIT into a hard FAILURE: anything holding ACCESS SHARE on `upload` or
+    // `"user"` for more than five seconds — the hourly `pg_dump` the runbook installs in §10.2, or
+    // an operator's open `psql` transaction — aborts the migration, `create_pool` returns an
+    // error, `main` exits 1, and `restart: unless-stopped` crash-loops the app behind a live Caddy.
+    // The rollback is clean and a later retry succeeds, which is exactly what makes it a confusing
+    // intermittent outage rather than an obvious one.
+    //
+    // `statement_timeout` is left off here too: a migration on a real table can legitimately run
+    // longer than the 15s a request is allowed.
+    let mut migrator_conn = <sqlx::PgConnection as sqlx::Connection>::connect(database_url)
+        .await
+        .context("failed to open a connection for migrations")?;
     sqlx::migrate!()
-        .run(&pool)
+        .run(&mut migrator_conn)
         .await
         .context("failed to run database migrations")?;
+    let _ = sqlx::Connection::close(migrator_conn).await;
 
     tracing::info!(max_connections, "database connected and migrations applied");
     Ok(pool)