At the bottom: what threatens underwater internet cables
Virtually all communications on the planet are provided through cables that are stretched between states and continents. At the beginning of 2017 in the world there were 428 cables running under water, with a total length of 1.1 million kilometers.
They all have different bandwidth. The record holder for this indicator is the Marea cable between Virginia and Bilbao (160 Tbit / s). According to various sources, submarine cables transmit about 95 - 99 % of all data.
But at the same time they are regularly damaged. They encountered this in the 19th century, when they laid telegraph cables. The first cable, laid in Munich along the Isar, had insufficient waterproofing, so it quickly went down.
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In 1858, the first telegraph cable was laid across the Atlantic Ocean. It went down in less than a month due to the fact that the operators applied too much voltage to it in order to increase the speed of data transfer.
The current cables are more reliable, but they also require repair. In our material we will tell what threatens them most often.
/ Flickr / COMSEVENTHFLT / CC
65–75% of underwater cable breakages occur due to transport and fishing vessels — they drop anchors that fall into the cable. On January 30, 2008, the cable SEA-ME-WE 4, which stretches from France along Africa to Southeast Asia, failed . A breakdown on a site in the Mediterranean led to a reduction in traffic by 70% in Egypt and 60% in India. The incident also affected Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Maldives, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. It was possible to restore communication by other cables after a day.
Interestingly, in December of the same year, the cable SEA-ME-WE 4, along with SEA-ME-WE 3 and FLAG Telecom, failed again. Until the breakage from the countries of Asia and the Middle East was eliminated, the rest of the world was 75% less traffic than usual.
In 2012, the ship anchored in the wrong place, waiting for permission to enter the Kenyan port of Mombasa. As a result, the fiber optic cable was cut , and residents of six African countries faced communication problems. The Internet has become 20% slower, and it cost the ÂŁ 300 million Kenyan economy.
And in 2016, one ship damaged three cables at once connecting the island of Jersey in the English Channel with London.
The captains of the ships are aware of areas where the anchor cannot be dropped due to the possibility of damaging the submarine cable. The more surprising are such errors in the above cases.
Various natural phenomena - causes 10% of underwater cable breakages. In 2006, due to an earthquake in the Taiwan region, 8 cables failed at once. This led to a significant reduction in traffic in the Asian region and disruption of the work of Internet services.
Chunghwa Telecom, the largest telecom operator in Taiwan, said that for some time there was no connection with Hong Kong and Southeast Asia, and the PRC received 74% less traffic. Hong Kong's largest operator PCCW announced a 50% reduction in traffic. Two Chinese operators: China Telecom and China Unicom reported a 90% decrease in traffic in the US and Europe, which is why Yahoo, MSN and Hotmail did not work.
At the end of August 2017, two typhoons passed in Asia: Hato and Pakhar. Because of them , four cables were damaged, which connect Hong Kong with Japan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and the USA. Operators temporarily redistributed traffic over other cables.
People - another reason for frequent breakdowns. For example, in 2013, Egyptian authorities detained three people who cut the cable SEA-ME-WE 4 at a site in the Mediterranean near Alexandria.
According to the head of Egypt Telecom, as a result of the incident, the speed of the Internet in the country fell by 60%. At other times, traffic would simply go through other cables, but it was at this point that the alternative EIG and IMEWE were under maintenance .
Moreover, the human factor does not bypass ordinary underground cables. In 2011, a 75-year-old Georgian woman was looking for copper near the village of Ksani and accidentally cut a fiber-optic cable. As a result, most of Georgia and neighboring Armenia were left without internet for several hours.
Often among the main hazards for submarine cables are fish. On the Internet, there is even a video in which the shark is trying to cut the cable.
But in reality the danger is exaggerated. According to ICPC (International Cable Protection Committee) statistics , fish are “responsible” for less than 1% damage. The study also shows that for the period from 1901 to 2007, it was possible to negate cable damage caused by fish. From 1901 to 1957, 28 such damages were recorded. From 1959 to 2006 there were already 11 cases, and since 2007 they have not been observed at all.
Modern cables because of their design sharks simply can not bite. In addition, in many areas the cables are buried in the ground and do not “disturb” the sea inhabitants.
/ Cable Innovator / Minsvyaz / PD
Repair of submarine cables produced with the help of specially equipped ships, which are less than 10 in the world. One of these ships is the ship Le Pierre de Fermat , which is 100 meters long and has a crew of 80 people.
The hardest part of the cable repair process is to find the damaged area. To do this, use a 9-ton robot Hector, equipped with cameras and "claws". With it, the necessary part of the cable climbs to the board for repair. Repair often involves installing a new cable section instead of a damaged one.
Chief engineer of the crew, Willy Poulain, says that the repair process has not changed in recent years, and this is not expected in the near future. How is the repair, you can watch in this video .
A conventional fiber-optic cable for a depth of more than 2,000 meters consists of an internal optical core encased in steel sheath with high tensile strength, as well as a copper conductor. Polyethylene is used for insulation. The diameter of such a cable is 17-21 mm.
At depths of less than 2,000 meters, protection from environmental effects of steel and polypropylene is added. If necessary, several layers of such “armor” can be used. The tensile strength of the most "protected" cable reaches 70 tons.
Breakage also occurs due to the fact that the cable is twisted to a radius less than the recommended one during operation. Therefore, to break enough anchors and fishing equipment.
In most regions, the failure of one cable will not significantly affect the quality of the connection - traffic will simply be redistributed through other channels. But there are still such regions that are connected to the “mainland” by a single wire. One of them is the Northern Mariana Islands in the western part of the Pacific Ocean. When this cable went down due to a typhoon in 2015, 54 thousand people temporarily remained without the Internet and telephone.
With all the shortcomings, there are no real alternatives to cables. Satellite communications can not provide the necessary bandwidth. And alternative technologies, such as laser-radio and quantum Internet, are still far from being implemented “among the masses”.
PS Other materials from our blog:
They all have different bandwidth. The record holder for this indicator is the Marea cable between Virginia and Bilbao (160 Tbit / s). According to various sources, submarine cables transmit about 95 - 99 % of all data.
But at the same time they are regularly damaged. They encountered this in the 19th century, when they laid telegraph cables. The first cable, laid in Munich along the Isar, had insufficient waterproofing, so it quickly went down.
')
In 1858, the first telegraph cable was laid across the Atlantic Ocean. It went down in less than a month due to the fact that the operators applied too much voltage to it in order to increase the speed of data transfer.
The current cables are more reliable, but they also require repair. In our material we will tell what threatens them most often.
/ Flickr / COMSEVENTHFLT / CC
Anchors
65–75% of underwater cable breakages occur due to transport and fishing vessels — they drop anchors that fall into the cable. On January 30, 2008, the cable SEA-ME-WE 4, which stretches from France along Africa to Southeast Asia, failed . A breakdown on a site in the Mediterranean led to a reduction in traffic by 70% in Egypt and 60% in India. The incident also affected Afghanistan, Bahrain, Kuwait, Maldives, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. It was possible to restore communication by other cables after a day.
Interestingly, in December of the same year, the cable SEA-ME-WE 4, along with SEA-ME-WE 3 and FLAG Telecom, failed again. Until the breakage from the countries of Asia and the Middle East was eliminated, the rest of the world was 75% less traffic than usual.
In 2012, the ship anchored in the wrong place, waiting for permission to enter the Kenyan port of Mombasa. As a result, the fiber optic cable was cut , and residents of six African countries faced communication problems. The Internet has become 20% slower, and it cost the ÂŁ 300 million Kenyan economy.
And in 2016, one ship damaged three cables at once connecting the island of Jersey in the English Channel with London.
The captains of the ships are aware of areas where the anchor cannot be dropped due to the possibility of damaging the submarine cable. The more surprising are such errors in the above cases.
Natural disasters
Various natural phenomena - causes 10% of underwater cable breakages. In 2006, due to an earthquake in the Taiwan region, 8 cables failed at once. This led to a significant reduction in traffic in the Asian region and disruption of the work of Internet services.
Chunghwa Telecom, the largest telecom operator in Taiwan, said that for some time there was no connection with Hong Kong and Southeast Asia, and the PRC received 74% less traffic. Hong Kong's largest operator PCCW announced a 50% reduction in traffic. Two Chinese operators: China Telecom and China Unicom reported a 90% decrease in traffic in the US and Europe, which is why Yahoo, MSN and Hotmail did not work.
At the end of August 2017, two typhoons passed in Asia: Hato and Pakhar. Because of them , four cables were damaged, which connect Hong Kong with Japan, the Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and the USA. Operators temporarily redistributed traffic over other cables.
People
People - another reason for frequent breakdowns. For example, in 2013, Egyptian authorities detained three people who cut the cable SEA-ME-WE 4 at a site in the Mediterranean near Alexandria.
According to the head of Egypt Telecom, as a result of the incident, the speed of the Internet in the country fell by 60%. At other times, traffic would simply go through other cables, but it was at this point that the alternative EIG and IMEWE were under maintenance .
Moreover, the human factor does not bypass ordinary underground cables. In 2011, a 75-year-old Georgian woman was looking for copper near the village of Ksani and accidentally cut a fiber-optic cable. As a result, most of Georgia and neighboring Armenia were left without internet for several hours.
Sharks are not so scary
Often among the main hazards for submarine cables are fish. On the Internet, there is even a video in which the shark is trying to cut the cable.
But in reality the danger is exaggerated. According to ICPC (International Cable Protection Committee) statistics , fish are “responsible” for less than 1% damage. The study also shows that for the period from 1901 to 2007, it was possible to negate cable damage caused by fish. From 1901 to 1957, 28 such damages were recorded. From 1959 to 2006 there were already 11 cases, and since 2007 they have not been observed at all.
Modern cables because of their design sharks simply can not bite. In addition, in many areas the cables are buried in the ground and do not “disturb” the sea inhabitants.
/ Cable Innovator / Minsvyaz / PD
How to repair cables
Repair of submarine cables produced with the help of specially equipped ships, which are less than 10 in the world. One of these ships is the ship Le Pierre de Fermat , which is 100 meters long and has a crew of 80 people.
The hardest part of the cable repair process is to find the damaged area. To do this, use a 9-ton robot Hector, equipped with cameras and "claws". With it, the necessary part of the cable climbs to the board for repair. Repair often involves installing a new cable section instead of a damaged one.
Chief engineer of the crew, Willy Poulain, says that the repair process has not changed in recent years, and this is not expected in the near future. How is the repair, you can watch in this video .
How to strengthen the cables
A conventional fiber-optic cable for a depth of more than 2,000 meters consists of an internal optical core encased in steel sheath with high tensile strength, as well as a copper conductor. Polyethylene is used for insulation. The diameter of such a cable is 17-21 mm.
At depths of less than 2,000 meters, protection from environmental effects of steel and polypropylene is added. If necessary, several layers of such “armor” can be used. The tensile strength of the most "protected" cable reaches 70 tons.
Breakage also occurs due to the fact that the cable is twisted to a radius less than the recommended one during operation. Therefore, to break enough anchors and fishing equipment.
In most regions, the failure of one cable will not significantly affect the quality of the connection - traffic will simply be redistributed through other channels. But there are still such regions that are connected to the “mainland” by a single wire. One of them is the Northern Mariana Islands in the western part of the Pacific Ocean. When this cable went down due to a typhoon in 2015, 54 thousand people temporarily remained without the Internet and telephone.
With all the shortcomings, there are no real alternatives to cables. Satellite communications can not provide the necessary bandwidth. And alternative technologies, such as laser-radio and quantum Internet, are still far from being implemented “among the masses”.
PS Other materials from our blog:
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/339616/
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