Comments on: Five cables cut? Just what is going on?

By: …My heart’s in Accra » Towards an Atlas of Globalization

…My heart’s in Accra » Towards an Atlas of Globalization — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 17:09:55 +0000

[...] makes our connected world work so smoothly until something fails. When it does, we reach for maps. Undersea cables snapped, meaning there’s very little connectivity to the Middle East? Better call Telegeography, a [...]

By: Taolf Sujat

Taolf Sujat — Wed, 13 Feb 2008 05:41:34 +0000

I found a really good guide that has a lot of very detailed pictures and quotes. It might help to answer some of your questions:
http://www.ilovebonnie.net/2008/02/12/the-submarine-cables-a-complete-guide-to-the-2008-internet-outage/

By: Cos

Cos — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 18:39:50 +0000

I’m not yet convinced that there’s anything more unusual happening here than the original two big cuts (that had a significant impact) shining a lot more light & attention on the next few “normal” cuts.

By: Hanan Cohen

Hanan Cohen — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 07:04:20 +0000

Suggested reading: Mother Earth Mother Board
By Neal Stephenson on the creation of the FLAG cable

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html

By: Adrian

Adrian — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 06:13:53 +0000

Ryan Singel at Wired’s Threat Level sheds some light:

“‘Cable cuts happen on average once every three days,’ Beckert said. There are 25 large ships that do nothing but fix cable cuts and bends, Beckert adds.

While any severed cable is a “cut” in the parlance of telecom, most often they’re the result of cables rubbing against sea floor rocks, eventually cutting through the copper shielding and exposing the thin fiber optics inside.”

http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2008/02/who-cut-the-cab.html

Of course in terms of one’s ability to be connected to the net, it doesn’t matter whether cables are cut intentionally or through random events.

By: quixote

quixote — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 00:36:56 +0000

bloggers are more important than bankers

Well, I mean, isn’t it obvious? ;-)

By: Alaa

Alaa — Thu, 07 Feb 2008 00:10:25 +0000

5 cables ???!!!

for some weird reason I only lost connectivity for a day yet my bank is still living in the stone age. Egyptian ISPs decided bloggers are more important than bankers maybe?

bandwidth is a bit low though (they have a daily public service message on TV and radio asking people not to use bittorent until the cables are fixed)

By: hash

hash — Wed, 06 Feb 2008 23:45:25 +0000

It does make you stop and think doesn’t it. Also, I have a hard time thinking that this is just a highly abnormal statistical coincidence…