7 ms·

What happens if the cable stops working? What are the troubleshooting steps?

cperciva 7y ago
Figure out roughly where the problem is (a number of ways of doing this), then send a boat out with a hook to grab the cable off the bottom of the ocean. Pull it up to the surface, fix it, and lower it back down. Incredibly expensive operation, so you want to avoid this if at all possible...
- stingraycharles 7y ago
  What measures are taken to avoid this? I read somewhere that these cable are not actually buried into the ground, but rather lay on top of the ground. That sounds very risky to me?
  - wereHamster 7y ago
    They are buried only when close to shores or in other high risk areas. There is no point in burying a cable if the sea bed is 3 miles under the surface. There is still danger, from animals biting into the cable (sharks are known to do this). But the cables are wrapped in steel cables so not even a shark should be able to cut through.
    - thaumasiotes 7y ago
      > There is no point in burying a cable if the sea bed is 3 miles under the surface. There is a point, it's just not something we're able to do. You can get the cable onto the sea bed by lowering it from the surface. We know how to get to the surface. To bury it, you'd need to run a digging operation at the bottom of the ocean.
      - emiliobumachar 7y ago
        ...which we're able to do, we do somewhat similar digs for offshore oil all the time, but it's not worth the gargantuan expense. The risk of leaving it exposed is worth it.
- hanniabu 7y ago
  When we're saying incredibly expensive, what are we talking here? $10M repair job?
  - tim333 7y ago
    I googled and found this https://ore.catapult.org.uk/app/uploads/2018/02/Export-Cable-Reliability-Step-1-v7-UPDATE-Jul-17.pdf https://ore.catapult.org.uk/app/uploads/2018/02/Export-Cable... Costs between £5.3m and £15.5m Wikipedia has a nice gif of the repair process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable#Cable_repair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable... Funny random thing from that. In 1959 the Americans got annoyed by a Russian trawler breaking their cable and complained they'd broken the Convention for the Protection of Submarine Telegraph Cables of 1884. Who'da thought this was going on in 1884?
    - Symbiote 7y ago
      > Who'da thought this was going on in 1884? It's well-known in Britain, at least. It looks to be part of the science examination taken at age 16 [2]. On your Wikipedia page, the section "British dominance of early cable" [1] describes the early success in this technology. Last time I was at the Science Museum in London, they had an exhibition on transatlantic cables. I think it's part of the permanent exhibition. [0] [3] [0] https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/how-perseverance-laid-first-transatlantic-telegraph-cable https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/how-per... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable#British_dominance_of_early_cable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable... [2] https://www.bbc.com/teach/class-clips-video/the-invention-of-morse-code-and-the-first-transatlantic-cable/z47qxyc https://www.bbc.com/teach/class-clips-video/the-invention-of... (video probably only available in the UK). [3] https://collection.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search/gallery/information-age-gallery%3a-cable/museum/science-museum https://collection.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search/gallery/infor...
      - samstave 7y ago
        You would probably be interested in looking into the USS Jimmy Carter submarine.... The one the NSA uses to pull up and splice spying equipment into undersea cables....

Figure out roughly where the problem is (a number of ways of doing this), then send a boat out with a hook to grab the cable off the bottom of the ocean. Pull it up to the surface, fix it, and lower it back down. Incredibly expensive operation, so you want to avoid this if at all possible...

stingraycharles 7y ago
What measures are taken to avoid this? I read somewhere that these cable are not actually buried into the ground, but rather lay on top of the ground. That sounds very risky to me?
- wereHamster 7y ago
  They are buried only when close to shores or in other high risk areas. There is no point in burying a cable if the sea bed is 3 miles under the surface. There is still danger, from animals biting into the cable (sharks are known to do this). But the cables are wrapped in steel cables so not even a shark should be able to cut through.
  - thaumasiotes 7y ago
    > There is no point in burying a cable if the sea bed is 3 miles under the surface. There is a point, it's just not something we're able to do. You can get the cable onto the sea bed by lowering it from the surface. We know how to get to the surface. To bury it, you'd need to run a digging operation at the bottom of the ocean.
    - emiliobumachar 7y ago
      ...which we're able to do, we do somewhat similar digs for offshore oil all the time, but it's not worth the gargantuan expense. The risk of leaving it exposed is worth it.
hanniabu 7y ago
When we're saying incredibly expensive, what are we talking here? $10M repair job?
- tim333 7y ago
  I googled and found this https://ore.catapult.org.uk/app/uploads/2018/02/Export-Cable-Reliability-Step-1-v7-UPDATE-Jul-17.pdf https://ore.catapult.org.uk/app/uploads/2018/02/Export-Cable... Costs between £5.3m and £15.5m Wikipedia has a nice gif of the repair process https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable#Cable_repair https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable... Funny random thing from that. In 1959 the Americans got annoyed by a Russian trawler breaking their cable and complained they'd broken the Convention for the Protection of Submarine Telegraph Cables of 1884. Who'da thought this was going on in 1884?
  - Symbiote 7y ago
    > Who'da thought this was going on in 1884? It's well-known in Britain, at least. It looks to be part of the science examination taken at age 16 [2]. On your Wikipedia page, the section "British dominance of early cable" [1] describes the early success in this technology. Last time I was at the Science Museum in London, they had an exhibition on transatlantic cables. I think it's part of the permanent exhibition. [0] [3] [0] https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/how-perseverance-laid-first-transatlantic-telegraph-cable https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/how-per... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable#British_dominance_of_early_cable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Submarine_communications_cable... [2] https://www.bbc.com/teach/class-clips-video/the-invention-of-morse-code-and-the-first-transatlantic-cable/z47qxyc https://www.bbc.com/teach/class-clips-video/the-invention-of... (video probably only available in the UK). [3] https://collection.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search/gallery/information-age-gallery%3a-cable/museum/science-museum https://collection.sciencemuseum.org.uk/search/gallery/infor...
    - samstave 7y ago
      You would probably be interested in looking into the USS Jimmy Carter submarine.... The one the NSA uses to pull up and splice spying equipment into undersea cables....