It is possible that a packet does not have a correct address, or a routing table is not correctly configured and it ends up being routed to a port that is not connected to anything. In this situation, if watchdog timers are enabled, the router will wait for the link to start until the end of the time-out period and then spill the packet. No EEP is appended since no data from the packet will have been transferred. If watchdog timers are not enabled, the packet will be spilt immediately.