diff --git a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/Dockerfile b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/Dockerfile
index ecef62d89390..27e7eabec263 100644
--- a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/Dockerfile
+++ b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/Dockerfile
@@ -18,7 +18,7 @@ RUN curl --silent -L https://github.com/mikefarah/yq/releases/download/2.4.0/yq_
 COPY rootfs /
 RUN /postunpack.sh
 ENV BITNAMI_APP_NAME="elasticsearch" \
-    BITNAMI_IMAGE_VERSION="7.4.2-ol-7-r26" \
+    BITNAMI_IMAGE_VERSION="7.4.2-ol-7-r27" \
     LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/opt/bitnami/elasticsearch/jdk/lib:/opt/bitnami/elasticsearch/jdk/lib/server:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH" \
     NAMI_PREFIX="/.nami" \
     PATH="/opt/bitnami/java/bin:/opt/bitnami/elasticsearch/bin:$PATH"
diff --git a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/prebuildfs/usr/local/bin/install_packages b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/prebuildfs/usr/local/bin/install_packages
index 4218ab93690a..370f3516f403 100755
--- a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/prebuildfs/usr/local/bin/install_packages
+++ b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/prebuildfs/usr/local/bin/install_packages
@@ -1,20 +1,29 @@
 #!/bin/sh
-set -e
-set -u
-n=0
+set -eu
+
+if [[ -n "oracle-epel-release-el7" ]]; then
+    if ! yum list installed oracle-epel-release-el7 >/dev/null 2>&1; then
+        yum -y install oracle-epel-release-el7 >/dev/null 2>&1
+        CODE=$?
+        if (( $CODE != 0 )); then
+          echo "EPEL repository installation failed"
+          exit $CODE
+        fi
+    fi
+fi
+
 max=2
-until [ $n -gt $max ]; do
+for ((n = 1 ; n <= max ; n+=1 )); do
     set +e
     yum --enablerepo base,updates,ol7_developer_EPEL,ol7_optional_latest install -y "$@"
     CODE=$?
     set -e
-    if [ $CODE -eq 0 ]; then
+    if (( $CODE == 0 )); then
         break
     fi
-    if [ $n -eq $max ]; then
+    if (( $n == $max )); then
         exit $CODE
     fi
     echo "yum failed, retrying"
-    n=$(($n + 1))
 done
 rm -r /var/cache/yum
diff --git a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/rootfs/postunpack.sh b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/rootfs/postunpack.sh
index 08fffd06601a..7b8b407abc38 100755
--- a/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/rootfs/postunpack.sh
+++ b/bitnami/elasticsearch/7/ol-7/rootfs/postunpack.sh
@@ -9,7 +9,18 @@
 # Load Elasticsearch environment variables
 eval "$(elasticsearch_env)"
 
-for dir in "$ELASTICSEARCH_TMPDIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_DATADIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_LOGDIR" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/plugins" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/modules" "${ELASTICSEARCH_CONFDIR}/scripts"; do
+for dir in "$ELASTICSEARCH_TMPDIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_DATADIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_LOGDIR" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/plugins" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/modules" "${ELASTICSEARCH_CONFDIR}"; do
     ensure_dir_exists "$dir"
+    chmod -R ug+rwX "$dir"
+    # `elasticsearch-plugin install` command complains about being unable to create the a plugin's directory
+    # even when having the proper permissions.
+    # The reason: the code is checking trying to check the permissions by consulting the parent directory owner,
+    # instead of checking if the ES user actually has writing permissions.
+    #
+    # As a workaround, we will ensure the container works (at least) with the non-root user 1001. However,
+    # until we can avoid this hack, we can't guarantee this container to work on K8s distributions
+    # where containers are exectued with non-privileged users with random user IDs.
+    #
+    # Issue reported at: https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/issues/50
+    chown -R 1001:0 "$dir"
 done
-chmod -R g+rwX "$ELASTICSEARCH_CONFDIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_TMPDIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_DATADIR" "$ELASTICSEARCH_LOGDIR" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/plugins" "${ELASTICSEARCH_BASEDIR}/modules"
diff --git a/bitnami/elasticsearch/README.md b/bitnami/elasticsearch/README.md
index 457c84f650af..6c384ba3020d 100644
--- a/bitnami/elasticsearch/README.md
+++ b/bitnami/elasticsearch/README.md
@@ -46,7 +46,7 @@ Non-root container images add an extra layer of security and are generally recom
 Learn more about the Bitnami tagging policy and the difference between rolling tags and immutable tags [in our documentation page](https://docs.bitnami.com/containers/how-to/understand-rolling-tags-containers/).
 
 
-* [`7-ol-7`, `7.4.2-ol-7-r26` (7/ol-7/Dockerfile)](https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/blob/7.4.2-ol-7-r26/7/ol-7/Dockerfile)
+* [`7-ol-7`, `7.4.2-ol-7-r27` (7/ol-7/Dockerfile)](https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/blob/7.4.2-ol-7-r27/7/ol-7/Dockerfile)
 * [`7-debian-9`, `7.4.2-debian-9-r10`, `7`, `7.4.2`, `7.4.2-r10`, `latest` (7/debian-9/Dockerfile)](https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/blob/7.4.2-debian-9-r10/7/debian-9/Dockerfile)
 * [`6-ol-7`, `6.8.5-ol-7-r0` (6/ol-7/Dockerfile)](https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/blob/6.8.5-ol-7-r0/6/ol-7/Dockerfile)
 * [`6-debian-9`, `6.8.5-debian-9-r0`, `6`, `6.8.5`, `6.8.5-r0` (6/debian-9/Dockerfile)](https://github.com/bitnami/bitnami-docker-elasticsearch/blob/6.8.5-debian-9-r0/6/debian-9/Dockerfile)