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Cables can be buried in trenches in the ocean bottom. There are cable plows for this. [1] They're huge and slow. Undersea power cables are routinely buried, bu
by Animats 2y ago
Cables can be buried in trenches in the ocean bottom. There are cable plows for this. [1] They're huge and slow. Undersea power cables are routinely buried, but comm cables are only buried near shore.
The downside of cable burial is that repair is harder.
[1] https://www.smd.co.uk/category/trenching/ https://www.smd.co.uk/category/trenching/
- alsodumb 2y agoThere isn't a significant upside either. At the end of the day, buring cable throughout it's way is very expensive while damaging it at one spot, even if it's buried, is not that hard or expensive.
- aaron695 2y ago[dead]
- PittleyDunkin 2y agoPresumably this protects against accidental damage only. Protecting a literal globe-wrapping supply line from intentional damage is an insane concept.
- Aloisius 2y agoThe costs to repair submarine fiber is high regardless of whether they're buried or not; they're already dragged up when they're cut by things like anchors. It's more about the cost to bury the cable at a particular depth vs. the risk of it being cut (and expected cost to repair and outage cost). There are guidelines to determine how deep to bury cable based on risk like the Cable Burial Risk Assessment. In shallow waters like the Baltic Sea, communications cables are buried to protect against things like fishing boats snagging them. For example, the C-Lion1 cable that was cut was buried a meter down. In deeper seas where the risk of accidental cuts is near zero, there is little benefit to burying them.