US President Donald Trump's Twitter account was briefly deactivated for several minutes on Thursday (2 November) evening by a rogue employee and the internet erupted with confusion, joy and relief.

The account, which has been used by Trump since 2009, has drawn fierce criticism. There were even petitions seeking that it be taken down over the president's controversial tweets, particularly since he took office in January.

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Trump uses the account incessantly to reach people directly and weigh in on current events, attack critics and rivals and often make inflammatory statements.

The president's account went dark for 11 minutes and has since been restored.

Twitter initially said that the account was "inadvertently deactivated due to human error by a Twitter employee." However, the company later said that an investigation revealed that a customer service employee took down the account "on the employee's last day".

"We are conducting a full internal review," the social media giant said noting that they are "taking steps to prevent this from happening again".

A former Twitter employee told BuzzFeed News that "a lot" of employees do have the ability to suspend a user's account. Fewer staffers have the ability to deactivate an account.

"It's one click if you have the rights to access the tool," the ex-employee told BuzzFeed News. "There was discussion that for verified accounts or high profile ones, there'd be special protections (i.e. "2 keys") but it was never implemented."

Trump has yet to comment or tweet about his account's short disappearance.

Naturally, the internet went wild after the deactivation's of Trump's account and responded with a slew of questions, memes, jokes and joy-filled comments. Immediately after his account disappeared, Twitter erupted with different theories as to how and why it was deactivated.

"Is this how we do coups now?" one person questioned. A second said: "Please say that the FBI stormed the WH, deleted his Twitter account & then quietly left the building."

After Twitter disclosed that the deactivation was carried out by an employee on his last day of work, many praised the "legendary" person with some calling for him to be promoted rather than fired.

"Not all heroes wear capes," MSNBC host Joy-Ann Reid tweeted. Another said: "You say 'human error', I say 'due for a promotion.'"

Democratic Representative Ted Lieu tweeted: "Dear Twitter employee who shut down Trump's Twitter: You made America feel better for 11 minutes. DM me & I will buy you a Pizza Hut pizza."

"Just gonna say it, the employee at Twitter who shut off Trump's account for 11 mins could become a candidate for the Nobel Peace Prize," former Republican representative David Jolly wrote.

Other Twitter users said the world was "able to breathe again" during those "beautiful" 11 minutes.

"For 11 minutes, the world felt a sign of relief and an overwhelming wave of peace," one person wrote. "Then Trump's Twitter was reactivated."

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Trump's Twitter account briefly vanished for about 11 minutes and Twitter went wild Isaac Brekken/Getty Images
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