Apache not honoring timeouts?

[Krishna PMV <krishna.pmv@xxxxxxxxx>]

hey,
I'm seeing a peculiar problem with apache-2.2.3 where most of the httpd 
processes seem to be freezed and not doing anything. As you can see from
 /server-status (attached), all of these processes have very high SS 
(Seconds since beginning of most recent request) and when I do an strace
 on one of those, they seem to be waiting on an external network call 
forever: http://pastie.org/4202656

To give you some background on the application, it is webmail using 
roundcube(php) and is doing these calls when users insert images/media 
from external sources  in compose window (either via html editor or via 
the image/media insert buttons we provide). So, those are not really 
important for us and we don't want apache to wait for those responses 
forever. I see that the Timeout configured in our configs is 30 sec but 
as per doc[1], it seems it is the amount of time the server will wait 
for
certain events before failing a request but in this case, apache is 
forking a child and it is waiting for an external call to complete. I 
see a difference between this and when apache is serving a request and 
wondering if the same Timeout applies?
And on php front, the timeouts are : max_execution_time = 30 and default_socket_timeout = 60
Can you please let me know how I can cut those processes and let them not wait forever? 

Thanks!

[1] http://httpd.apache.org/docs/2.0/mod/core.html#timeout

httpd -V
Server version: Apache/2.2.3
Server built:   May  4 2011 06:51:15
Server's Module Magic Number: 20051115:3
Server loaded:  APR 1.2.7, APR-Util 1.2.7
Compiled using: APR 1.2.7, APR-Util 1.2.7

Architecture:   64-bit
Server MPM:     Prefork
  threaded:     no
    forked:     yes (variable process count)
Server compiled with....
 -D APACHE_MPM_DIR="server/mpm/

prefork"
 -D APR_HAS_SENDFILE
 -D APR_HAS_MMAP
 -D APR_HAVE_IPV6 (IPv4-mapped addresses enabled)
 -D APR_USE_SYSVSEM_SERIALIZE
 -D APR_USE_PTHREAD_SERIALIZE
 -D SINGLE_LISTEN_UNSERIALIZED_ACCEPT
 -D APR_HAS_OTHER_CHILD
 -D AP_HAVE_RELIABLE_PIPED_LOGS
 -D DYNAMIC_MODULE_LIMIT=128
 -D HTTPD_ROOT="/etc/httpd"
 -D SUEXEC_BIN="/usr/sbin/suexec"
 -D DEFAULT_PIDLOG="run/httpd.pid"
 -D DEFAULT_SCOREBOARD="logs/apache_runtime_status"
 -D DEFAULT_LOCKFILE="logs/accept.lock"
 -D DEFAULT_ERRORLOG="logs/error_log"
 -D AP_TYPES_CONFIG_FILE="conf/mime.types"
 -D SERVER_CONFIG_FILE="conf/httpd.conf"


uname -a
Linux webmail2.mailhostbox.aus-tx.colo 2.6.18-238.19.1.el5 #1 SMP Fri Jul 15 07:31:24 EDT 2011 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

cat /etc/redhat-release
CentOS release 5.6 (Final)

Attachment: httpd_status.png
Description: PNG image

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