How One Clumsy Ship Caused A Major Net Outtage

Ant writes "Here is an interesting world map of various Internet connections, showing how it took just one vessel to inflict the damage that brought down the internet for millions."

Comments

That's no physical location map.

[the_other_chewey]

The image linked from the summary does not depict the physical locations of cables, but is a schematic of existing connections between points on the globe. The lines in that image have not much to do with where the cables actually are. A more realistic representation of (a subset of) the world's submarine cable networks would e.g. be this big PDF or, in a more comprehensive view, that one (sold for a mere $350 :-| ).

Re:That's no physical location map.

[jimmyswimmy]

Interesting drawing. I was amazed to see that Cuba has no subsea internet connection at all. It's kind of interesting to see one of the larger countries in the area completely circumnavigated like that. Out of curiousity I looked to see what connection they use, and it looks like a completely satellite-based service from newcom-intl.com, judging from the traceroute responses and the huge delays which occur at that hop. Neat.

Guess that's one way to avoid having your internet connection destroyed by an anchor...

Re:3rd cable cut

[aminorex]

Two in the Mediterranean, another between Suez and Dubai somewhere, which is not in the Mediterranean at all.
The nation of Iran appears to be entirely disconnected from the Internet by these events: http://www.internettrafficreport.com/asia.htm

See it to believe it

[__aaqvdr516]

The cable that was cut is in a common anchoring point for ships waiting to transit the Suez. The Suez canal is only large enough to allow transit in one direction, which leads to a pileup of sorts at one end to the "lake" in the center. As a point of reference here's a picture of a US carrier entering the Suez canal. https://segue.atlas.uiuc.edu/index.php?action=site&site=rrosenb2

Off into the distance you can see the anchoring area. All the cables except the one that goes around the horn of Africa go through this channel. Maybe now it doesn't look so far fetched?

Re:See it to believe it

[anticypher]

I don't know where you are getting your information from, but hire a proctologist to put it back for you.

There are no fibres running on the bottom of the Suez canal, all the fibres take an overland route. There are three major Egyptian landing areas in the Mediterranean, two west of Al Iskandariyah (Alexandria), and one to the east of Port Said, well away from the entry to the canal. The cable routes overland are now quite redundant, as cable cuts happen so often in Egypt every company now has at least two routes with circuit protection. On the Red Sea side, there are at least two landing points, at Abadiya and one across from there on the eastern side of the sea.

All the cable landing zones are quite well marked on shipping charts (my google skills have failed me, I can't find an online chart site for Egypt, similar to this one for the UK). Ships are not supposed to drop anchor in those zones, no fishing allowed, no recreational boating, etc. At least in Europe, boaters can get a pretty heavy fine for dropping anchor in a restricted area, big enough that any captain who values his vessel/career knows to stay out of the areas. I doubt Egypt has such draconian enforcement, but the charts are clearly marked.

For the two cuts off of Al Iskandariyah, there was a large storm in the eastern Med the day of the cuts, gale force 7 winds with large swells. So the local authority moved the anchorage area to west of Al Iskandariyah, and many ships ended up anchoring in the restricted zone, dragging their anchors as they were pulled along by the strong easterly winds.

Only one cable near Egypt was cut at first, the second major cut was near France, which took out FLAG. There was then a third cut in the Egypt area, of the same FLAG fibre, but by a different ship dragging anchor. So FLAG got hit double hard.

The most recent cut was somewhere down off of Dubai, which took out even more capacity. It's been an interesting week, as European banking traffic to the Emirates now has to flow all the way around the world the wrong way, and many of the intermediate carriers are choking on the traffic.

the AC

Re:Send Them a Bill

[Registered Coward v2]

They should follow the example of the telephone company. Find the owners of the ships and send them a bill for the repair costs. That will get their attention.


Actually, ships are governed by maritime law, which is designed to protect and encourage commerce; I'm not sure if they even would be responsible for damage from an anchor to a cable lying on the seafloor. From my limited recollection, vessel owners liability is generally the value of the vessel (not including the cargo).

Re:Send Them a Bill

[linuxscrub]

I believe that many/all undersea cables are mapped.

Ships/captains plying international waters must have up-to-date info. If they damage a cable that is on the maps, they are responsible.

See the great WIRED article from Neal Stephanson on the laying of FLAG:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html

OK, it's an article from 1996, but it's one of the best WIRED articles (and looong) ever (back before they were owned by Conde Nast)

L. Scrub