Massive traffic drop after ~20 min 403 during peak hours

Hi everyone, I really need help or real-world experiences because I’m pretty lost.

My site returned 403 (Forbidden) during peak traffic hours for about 20 minutes. Right after that, I saw a massive hit:

About 90% organic traffic loss

Google seems to have deindexed images and videos (disappeared from Google Images and/or results)

I’m still losing pages in Google (previously indexed pages are dropping out)

New pages aren’t indexing quickly; when they do, it takes a long time

In Google Search Console, I’m seeing “Temporary processing error” related to the sitemap/URL inspection (I’ve read it can be a Google-side issue, but the timing matches everything happening)

The 403 issue is fixed and the site loads fine for users, but after 72 hours it hasn’t recovered, and it still feels like it’s getting worse.

I’d like to hear from anyone who has been through something similar:

Can a short 403 window (only minutes) cause this kind of damage, especially for images/videos?

Does this usually recover on its own?

What’s a realistic recovery timeline (days vs weeks)?

Could the sitemap “Temporary processing error” be related, or is it likely unrelated?

What should I verify first (based on evidence, not guesses) to stop further deindexing and restore indexing?

If you’ve recovered from something like this, please share what happened and what you did. Thanks.

Yes, the temporary processing error could be a result of 403 errors.

First, you should check for 403 error in indexing issues in your GSC. If you have these errors, mark them as resolved.

Even if there are no errors, resubmit your sitemap and manually submit some URLs to index. Google is slow these days and could take some time to resolve the issues.

A 403 for even a short time can definitely cause a dip in rankings especially for images/videos. The sitemap error could also be linked to the deindexing. I'd give it a few weeks to recover but make sure everything’s accessible for Googlebot and try resubmitting your sitemap and key pages in GSC.