Firm: Ship's anchor cut Mideast Internet cable

CNN ^ | February 8, 2008 | Unknown

[decimon]

CNN) -- A telecommunications company on Friday blamed a ship anchor for cutting one of three severed undersea cables that snarled Internet traffic throughout the Middle East last week.

FLAG Telecom's FALCON cable spanning Dubai and Oman was snapped February 1 by an abandoned six-ton ship anchor, the company said, and will be repaired by Sunday.

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Another target of the Internet sabotage speculation is Islamic terrorists. "It was a six-ton anchor that took out that cable in the Persian Gulf. Unless al Qaeda has extremely strong frogmen or submarines, I'm not sure how they did it," laughed Beckert.

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[jiggyboy]

I guess he didn’t get the memo from Egypt a couple of days ago: “ix-nay on the anchor-ay”:

“Egypt’s transport ministry said footage recorded by onshore video cameras of the location of the cables showed no maritime traffic in the area when the cables were damaged.

“The ministry’s maritime transport committee reviewed footage covering the period of 12 hours before and 12 hours after the cables were cut and no ships sailed the area,” a statement said.

“The area is also marked on maps as a no-go zone and it is therefore ruled out that the damage to the cables was caused by ships.”

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1964455/posts

It looks like Job One now is to confuse the issue of which cable any given person is talking about. Job Two is to get things fixed.

[decimon]

Now I heard from some really really reliable sources whose identity I cannot disclose that certain really quiet sneaky submarines were sent by the Great Satan to cut the cables and disrupt internet connections in India and Saudi Arabia in retaliation for the high price of oil ... yeah, that's the ticket!

Big deal. I heard the same story before there were cables. ;-)

[DakoKid]

“cable spanning Dubai and Oman was snapped February 1 by an abandoned six-ton ship anchor.”

You realy have to watch out for those ‘abandoned’ anchors wandering around.

[decimon]

It looks like Job One now is to confuse the issue...

You're doing a good job of that. This article references not maritime traffic but an abandoned anchor.

[jiggyboy]

So we’re back to the bouncing six-ton anchor theory?

[Digital Sniper]

Oh, of course! A boat anchor. Yes.

'Scuse me...I need to put some more of these up on eBay.

[BlueDragon]

If the anchor was abandoned, then it was most likely AFTER snagging a cable. I haven't read up on the details of all the severings, but I do know a little bit about phone cables...how they are run from shore [there are at least a couple of methods], how they are later then plowed or jetted in, etc.

It's dangerous to snag a modern fiber optic cable. There can be some extremely high voltages running alongside, with the "light" fibers, since over long distances, there must be boost stations to periodically re-invigorate the signal. Old copper wire wasn't like that.

Though I suppose in this case, just crossing the Persian Gulf(?), there need not be much voltage? The signal can go quite aways without needing a boost station. The trans-Pacific cables need multible boosting...

[quark]

"Hello Mideast?...come in...come in."

[decimon]

So we’re back to the bouncing six-ton anchor theory?

We? I did not propound any such theory.

[MizSterious]

Fifth Cable Cut, Iran Loses Net Connectivity

[tired1]

last I knew, Corning LEAF cables could go 3000 mi without regeneration. however, i’ve been out of the telecom bleeding edge for about ten years.

[decimon]

Apparently the total is now up to 5...

But that, apparently, has proved to not be so.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Dvorak had an item at Marketwatch that speculated on these incidents....

Using the Internet as a weapon
Commentary: Internet interruption in the Middle East looks fishy

*************************EXCERPT***********************

BERKELEY, Calif. (MarketWatch) --Nobody knows what caused the cut cables in the Mediterranean that interrupted Internet service to parts of the Middle East last week, but there are now conspiracy theories galore written by bloggers and pundits.

Some say it will benefit terrorists and Iran somehow. In fact, the cut cables -- originally blamed on ships dragging anchors -- look more like a ploy by some intelligence agency to disrupt Iranian commerce, specifically an emerging oil bourse that the Iranians have been quietly establishing and hoped to roll out fully in the next 60 days.

There has always been talk about disrupting commerce by screwing up the Internet. We've just seen a proof of concept, whether done on purpose or by accident.

This concept seems a little farfetched until you look at the details which were provided to me by one of my readers, Martin Kuplens-Ewart who has been following the story from the outset. He notes: "there is a substantial event that has effectively been killed by the loss of connectivity: the launch of the Iranian Oil Bourse.

"A marketplace for oil, gas, and various petrochemicals, the Iranian Oil Bourse would trade exclusively in non-dollars and probably substantial negative impact to the U.S. economy and financial system. The bourse was scheduled for launch this week (between Feb. 1 and 11. With complete elimination of Internet connectivity to the country, this launch is now impossible and unlikely to be achievable before month's end (given the estimate 10-14 days for repairs to fiber-optic cables)."

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

see link above.

[MizSterious]

That’s if we can trust some of this news coming out of that area. The bouncing anchor story, for one, sounds a little strange.

[RobRoy]

I still sayit was a weather baloon.

[decimon]

The bouncing anchor story, for one, sounds a little strange.

I haven't seen any story about a bouncing anchor.

[decimon]

Dvorak’s conjecture can make sense if disrupting the Iranian oil bourse for two weeks makes sense. But that would give incentive to the Iranians to create alternate communications and does nothing to explain the other cable disruptions.