In PHP, if you try to instantiate a new SoapClient, and the WSDL is not accessible (server down or whatever), a PHP fatal error is thrown:
Fatal error: SOAP-ERROR: Parsing WSDL: Couldn't load from 'http://example.com/servlet/app/SomeService?wsdl' : failed to load external entity "http://example.com/servlet/app/SomeService?wsdl"
Fatal errors in PHP, as far as I know, are not recoverable.
Is there any way to fallback from this? Can this fatal error somehow be avoided?
Edit: I should say that I am running on PHP 5.2, if it makes any difference.