By default Apache only allows upto 150 connections, if the number is over, you will be in the queue. It will look like the server is down.
The limit for server is usually configured in the following files:
/etc/apache2/apache2.conf
/etc/apache2/mods-available/mpm_worker.conf
/etc/apache2/mods-available/mpm_prefork.conf
This is the content to update:
<IfModule mpm_worker_module>
ServerLimit 600
StartServers 10
MinSpareThreads 75
MaxSpareThreads 250
ThreadLimit 64
ThreadsPerChild 32
MaxRequestWorkers 600
MaxConnectionsPerChild 800
</IfModule>