The Undersea Cable Network
summary
About 2 million kilometers of undersea cable already exists, with roughly 15–30 new cables laid each year; most intercontinental traffic (97–98%) rides these fibers while Starlink totals about 420 Tbps (roughly two modern cables). Contemporary examples: the 6,600 km DANTE cable uses 12 fibers for ~250 terabits per second and costs $150–500M with a 15–25 year life. Cables have repeaters every 50–100 km, are buried near shore 1–4 m by plows, and are repaired by ROVs and splicer ships after anchor or seismic damage.
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chapters (17)
- 0:00Undersea cable network intro
- 1:27Why undersea cables matter
- 3:17History of telegraph cables
- 6:05Copper to fiber evolution
- 9:17Fiber optic cable design
- 14:14Types of undersea cables
- 15:36Google's Dante cable
- 16:59Laying undersea cables
- 19:48Cable landing stations
- 20:51Repairing damaged cables
- 24:39Geopolitical cable threats
- 33:02Future of undersea cables
- 37:38Q&A session part one
- 40:27Q&A session part two
- 47:58Q&A session part three
- 51:09Q&A session part four
- 56:03Closing summary
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