diff --git a/asterixdb/asterix-cloud/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/cloud/lazy/ParallelCacher.java b/asterixdb/asterix-cloud/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/cloud/lazy/ParallelCacher.java
index 24f5694..d0ec32f 100644
--- a/asterixdb/asterix-cloud/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/cloud/lazy/ParallelCacher.java
+++ b/asterixdb/asterix-cloud/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/cloud/lazy/ParallelCacher.java
@@ -261,6 +261,7 @@
             IoUtil.create(fileReference);
             try (RandomAccessFile raf = new RandomAccessFile(fileReference.getAbsolutePath(), "rw")) {
                 raf.setLength(((UncachedFileReference) fileReference).getSize());
+                raf.getChannel().force(true);
             } catch (IOException e) {
                 throw HyracksDataException.create(e);
             }
diff --git a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/config/StorageProperties.java b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/config/StorageProperties.java
index 5fbc7c6..c9090c6 100644
--- a/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/config/StorageProperties.java
+++ b/asterixdb/asterix-common/src/main/java/org/apache/asterix/common/config/StorageProperties.java
@@ -60,9 +60,9 @@
         STORAGE_DISK_FORCE_BYTES(LONG_BYTE_UNIT, StorageUtil.getLongSizeInBytes(16, MEGABYTE)),
         STORAGE_IO_SCHEDULER(STRING, "greedy"),
         STORAGE_WRITE_RATE_LIMIT(LONG_BYTE_UNIT, 0L),
-        STORAGE_MAX_CONCURRENT_FLUSHES_PER_PARTITION(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 2),
+        STORAGE_MAX_CONCURRENT_FLUSHES_PER_PARTITION(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 1),
         STORAGE_MAX_SCHEDULED_MERGES_PER_PARTITION(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 8),
-        STORAGE_MAX_CONCURRENT_MERGES_PER_PARTITION(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 2),
+        STORAGE_MAX_CONCURRENT_MERGES_PER_PARTITION(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 1),
         STORAGE_GLOBAL_CLEANUP(BOOLEAN, true),
         STORAGE_GLOBAL_CLEANUP_TIMEOUT(POSITIVE_INTEGER, (int) TimeUnit.MINUTES.toSeconds(10)),
         STORAGE_COLUMN_MAX_TUPLE_COUNT(NONNEGATIVE_INTEGER, 15000),