Welcome to the 47th edition of Submarine Telecoms Forum, our Defense & Nontraditional Cable Systems issue.
I have a piece of The Wall held in plastic atop the bookshelf next to my desk. It sits above my terra cotta Jaguar (a model), and both remind me daily of the benefactor, the co-founder of this rag we fondly called SubTel Forum. I also have a small clockwork tin toy that reminds me of my schoolboy visit to Moscow and Leningrad during the Brezhnev years – a very different world from the one today.
In their simplicity these objects symbolize different ingredients of a personal and business life in an
industry that helped transform and shape the world’s past.
It seems fitting to me that in this week when we celebrate both the end of the “War to end all Wars” and the felling of the Berlin Wall, that we can also celebrate in a much less nobler fashion the 8th anniversary of SubTel Forum.
When Ted and I established our little magazine, we did so with two key principles from the outset. We promised then, and annually I reaffirm to you, our readers:
1. That we will provide a wide range of ideas and issues;
2. That we will seek to incite, entertain and provoke in a positive manner.
SubTel Forum is an imperfect medium, and we have surely made our share of mistakes; but we continue to hope that in the long run we have helped our industry in some small way. Though our faces may change, our goals remain. Happy Anniversary (whichever one you choose to celebrate).
A synopsis of current news items from NewsNow, the weekly news feed available on the Submarine Telecoms Forum website.
November 11th, 2009
x Khulna to Chennai Selected for Second Bangladesh Cable Route
x AAG Goes Live – A New Traffic Route Direct To USA
November 10th, 2009
x AccessKenya Group breaks Year End Customer Numbers Target Two Months Early; Customer acquisition numbers reinforce the enormous growth potential for high quality data services
x TM Joins Global Crossing Partner Program To Extend Its Reach In Europe And The Americas
x Globacom Awarded Cote d’Ivoire License
x Hibernia Atlantic Extends Its Global Financial Network (G FN ) Into Two Equinix Data Centers
November 9th, 2009
x Deal Signed for Iraq Cable Landing
November 6th, 2009
x AAG Goes Live on 10 November
x Gateway Communications Awarded NFP Licence in Kenya
November 5th, 2009
x Delivery of Presentation on Ocean Observations and Response to Cyclone Gonu (Gulf of Oman and Arabian Sea)
x LION Operational in Madagascar
November 4th, 2009
x Project Kelvin To Go Live In March
November 3rd, 2009
x SubOptic 2010 – Early Bird Registration has now opened
x Interoute boosts capacity of the European internet by 9.5 Terabits
x E-Marine Confirms its Regional Leadership By Securing another Submarine Cable Maintenance Linking the UAE with East Africa
November 2nd, 2009
x Pacnet’s EAC Pacific to Further Enhance Connectivity between Asia and North America
x Unity Trans-Pacific Cable Lands in Japan
x Landlocked African Nations Looking to EASSy For Connectivity
x Nexans wins a 6 million Euros ice-resistant cable contract from Sevmash to equip an oil production platform in the Barents Sea
October 30th, 2009
x Cuban Government Denies Contact With US Firms About Submarine Cable Development
x NTT Communications Corporation Completes Acquisition of Pacific Crossing Limited
October 29th, 2009
x Submarine Cables Criticized in Rwanda
x $215 Million Central Africa Backbone Program Will Bring Low Cost, High Speed Internet to the Region
October 28th, 2009
x EAC Releases Statement on East African Regional Fiber Backbone
October 27th, 2009
x MTN Nigeria Joins WACS
x SCT launches public consultation for dark fiber auction
x Columbus III Consortium and Xtera Communications Sign Contract to Upgrade Transatlantic Submarine Cable Network Using Xtera’s NXT System
October 26th, 2009
x Verizon Moves Toward Single, Higher Capacity, More Intelligent Global Network
x SEACOM And Partners Bring Broadband To Johannesburg
x TELKOM Will Immediately Build Optical Fibre Backbone in Eastern Territory of Indonesia
October 23rd, 2009
x Hibernia Atlantic`s CEO Receives a Golden Bridges Award for Promoting Partnerships between North America and Ireland
x Regional Communications Infrastructure Project (R CIP) Malawi
October 22nd, 2009
x Verizon Business Circles Globe With Optical Mesh Network; Begins Extension to Middle East
x Venezuela-Cuba Submarine Cable to Start Laying
October 21st, 2009
x FCC Approves Streamlined Submarine Cable Landing License Applications
x Pacnet Announces Largest Ever Capacity Upgrade
October 20th, 2009
x I PC Selects Hibernia Atlantic’s Global Financial Network (G FN ) To Provide Next Generation Data Network Solutions
x OMM provide GAS with ROV services for Saipem Baraka project
x SubOptic 2010 Abstract Submissions Closed
x Internet Costs Remain High Despite SEACOM
x GLO Self Care Service Now in Local Languages
x Delivery of Presentation on Ocean Observations and Response to Cyclone Gonu (Gulf of Oman and Arabian Sea)
x Interoute expands its presence in Russia in response to a surge in enterprise demand
October 19th, 2009
x Pacnet Lightning Blazes Trail with Fastest Link to Asia’s Leading Stock Exchanges
x Tanzania Telecommunication Company to Lower Rates Thanks to SEACOM
October 16th, 2009
x Tata Communications extends connectivity into Australia via PPC1 Cable System
x MTN Rwanda Set to Connect to TEAMS
x BTC moves to enhance BOTSGATE internet backbone
October 15th, 2009
x Level 3 and Internet2 Deliver Trans-Atlantic and U.S. Network Link to Large Hadron Collider
x EASSy is On Track
October 14th, 2009
x WFN Strategies to Support First Fiber Optic Cable to Cuba
October 13th, 2009
x Internap Adds Hibernia Atlantic To Carrier Diversity Model
x Local Telecommunications Company Receives Authorization To Build The First Fiber Optic Cable From The Us To Cuba
x Rwanda Looking to Partner with SEACOM
October 12th, 2009
x Main One Lays Fiber on the Shores of Lagos and Accra
x FCC Approves Unity Cable License
x Competition To Improve Broadband Pricing in Africa?
October 9th, 2009
x Botswana Telecommunication Corporation to Invest US$75 Million in WACS
October 8th, 2009
x Hibernia Atlantic Selects Sunesys To Extend Its Global Financial Network (G FN ) Into 1400 Federal In New Jersey
x Pipe International And Tyco Telecommunications Complete P PC -1 Undersea Cable System
October 7th, 2009
x ASH Cable Undamaged After Tsunami
x Rwandatel SA Launches Super Fast Internet
Speeds with SEACOM’s Submarine Fibre Optic Cable
x Bahamas Telecommunications Company Signs Agreement with Haitian Company
October 6th, 2009
x Cables Damaged by Typhoon Marakot Nearly Repaired
x UCU joins SEACOM in October
x Millennium Telecom to Launch Undersea Cable
x $215 Million Central Africa Backbone Program Will Bring Low Cost, High Speed Internet to the Region
October 5th, 2009
x SEACOM Broadband Experience exhibition
October 2nd, 2009
x PLDT Authority Extended on Asia-America Gateway (AAG)
x TEAMS Fibreoptic Cable Ready for Commercial Service
x Tyco Telecommunications Successfully Completes Field Demonstration Of 40 Gigabits Per Second Capabilities On Live Undersea Cable System
x Australia Japan Cable completes refinancing
October 1st, 2009
x TEAMs Accused of Fixing Connectivity Prices
x Second Cable Planned for American Samoa
x Kordia Board Supports Trans-Tasman Cable
September 30th, 2009
x Taiwan-Taipei Submarine Cable to be Installed by Chunghwa, China Telecom
x Reliance Globalcom and Futron Incorporated Deliver High-Performance, Cost-Effective
Networking Services to Public Agencies under GSA Federal Supply Schedule 70 Contract
x Ghana Praises Glo-1 Submarine Cable
x Altech Profits Surge Thanks to Submarine Cables
September 29th, 2009
x Lighthouse R & D Enterprises Inc. Is On Schedule To Have Their Newest Deepwater Seabed Observatory Operational In November 2009
x FiReGlobal : West Coast Opening Speaker John Delaney to Receive $126 Million for New UW Seafloor Observatory
x Pacnet to Boost Cross-Straits Connectivity for the Financial Industry
September 28th, 2009
x Alcatel-Lucent Bell Labs announces new optical transmission record and breaks 100 Petabit per second kilometer barrier
x WFN Strategies, LLC Receives 2009 Best of Sterling Award
x Tata Communications Transformation Services (TCTS) Starts Management of SEACOM Cable System Linking the World and Eastern & Southern Africa
September 21st, 2009
x Pacnet VC Plus Delivers High Definition Desktop Conferencing over the Internet
September 20th, 2009
x Altech and SEACOM announce strategic bandwidth alliance
September 18th, 2009
x Global Crossing Prices Private Offering of $750 Million of Its 12% Senior Secured Notes Due 2015
x Ban Joo & Company Entering Submarine Cable Business
x SubTel Forum Names Asia Pacific Sales Rep
September 17th, 2009
x WFN Strategies Announces New Offices in Perth, Australia
x WFN Strategies to Support ARINC with Telecommunication Services
x Main One Cable, on course for June 2010 Launch
September 16th
x ZTT passed UJ authentication firstly in China
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ISSN 1948-3031
Submarine Telecoms Forum is published bimonthly by WFN Strategies. The publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, in whole or in part, without the permission of the publishers.
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Wayne Nielsen has over 25 years of telecoms experience and developed and managed international projects in the Americas, Far East/Pac Rim, Europe and Middle East. He possesses a postgraduate Masters degree in International Relations, and Bachelor’s Degrees in Economics and Political Science. In 2001, he founded WFN Strategies, which provides project development and engineering of remote communications for telecoms, defense and oil & gas clients. He is also founder and publisher of SubTelForum magazine.
Kevin G. Summers is the Editor of Submarine Telecoms Forum, our resident graphic designer, a creative writing teacher and a professional author of both fiction and non-fiction. He has written stories set in the Star Trek universe, including the critically acclaimed “Isolation Ward 4,” featured in Star Trek: Strange New Worlds IV. He has also published original fiction in Lords of Justice, Tales of Moreauvia, and the forthcoming Shadows of the Emerald City. Learn about his writing at his website: www.kevingsummers.com
Kristian Nielsen has been working for Submarine Telecoms Forum since 2008 as Business Manager, and has recently been promoted to Sales Coordinator. He has supported various international telecoms projects with his accounting expertise, and is the originator of many of SubTel Forum’s products. He has previously lived abroad, is an active leader in his Venturing Crew, an outdoors based, co-ed arm of Boy Scouts, and enjoys computer gaming, scuba diving, skiing, backpacking, and other outdoor activities.
Kaori Shikinaka has previously supported the submarine cable industry as Deputy Manager, Business Development and Sales & Marketing for KDDI Submarine Cable System Inc. in Shijuku-ku, Tokyo, and as Sales & Marketing, Submarine Networks for Fujitsu Limited in Kawasaki, Kanagawa-ken.
Ben Skidmore founded the independent media sales firm Partners Publishers’ Representatives in 2005, and has represented multiple industry publications. He has been involved in the media industry for over 7 years, and has a wide range of experience in online and print media marketing. He has worked with multiple Fortune 1000 companies, helping them market their products and services.
Michael Yee has been in the oil and gas industry for more than 20 years, first as regional editor of Asian Oil & Gas and Asia Pacific Correspondent of Offshore. He is now the Asia Pacific media representative of PennWell Corporation, specializing in media and event sales. He has now also joined SubTel Forum as Asia Pacific Representative. Michael has a Bachelor’s degree in civil engineering and a Master’s degree in English studies.
On Issue #46
Hello Wayne and Kevin. I just read through the September issue of SubTel Forum. Kevin, it was a great move putting the New Yorker article summery in there. It absolutely shouts what the purpose of advertising is all about.
Any how, just wanted to let you know your product continues to look great and I hope you’re enjoying the significant increase in the readership.
Secrecy remains a fact for anyone that has served on a US submarine since World War II. Little of the Cold War as fought underwater has been declassified, and next to nothing past 1950. The bonds of secrecy are tightest in missions that were the most dangerous, and none were more fraught with danger than the efforts of the US submarine force to find and tap Soviet underwater telephone cables.
Of all of the stories that Christopher Drew and I included in Blind Man’s Bluff, the Untold Story of American Submarine Espionage, this was the hardest to uncover, and the most emotional. Over months and years we asked about events that these men had not shared with their wives, children, parents or best friends. They saw that secrecy as both a matter of honor and a burden. They had been gone for so long, and had been through so much. At worst, their absences left them estranged from their families. At best, they lived behind a brick wall they dared not breech.
None of the details of what these men had been through came easily, and nobody simply sat down to tell their story. We traveled the country for several years following rumors-hoping they might lead to facts. We sat down with submariners one after another, most often being treated to a view of their “submarine wall” with plaques, awards, and photographs. The men didn’t give up their secrets, but they shared their pride willingly, happy that someone was there to ask, that someone knew without their telling that they had done more than merely guard the Golden Gate Bridge, even though guard duty was all they could admit to.
Even the smallest clues were enough to justify a plane ticket to yet another place, another
conversation. We were chasing bread crumbs hoping to reconstruct the loaf. In the process, our book changed. We thought we had set out to write an expose. Did these men take such chances that they risked the very war they were sent to prevent? When we started, just about the only public references to Cold War submarines disparagingly referred to games of cat and mouse.
Instead we were learning what we never could have had the Navy simply declassified the
story. We were learning that these men were out there only because they really believed they had no choice. They would give up their families if it meant saving them. They would give up everything, and often everything was the price of that terrible silence they were forced to endure.
This was true of the men sent to follow Soviet subs carrying nuclear missiles in the hopes they would never be allowed to shoot. And it was true of the efforts to tap underwater cables
at a time when logic and technology suggested the goal was unreachable, and when even finding such a cable seemed impossible.
This part of the tale started with one man’s hunch. It was 1970, and Captain James Bradley thought often of the decaying Soviet submarine base at Petropavlovsk, on the Kamchatka Peninsula separated from the mainland by the vast Sea of Okhotsk. He was convinced the Soviets would need a secure way to communicate across that expanse.
Bradley believed the only truly secure communications method would be hard wired, a telephone cable running under water.
Where was it? Okhotsk is 611,000 square miles and a cable wouldn’t be more than six inches wide. How could Bradley get permission to enter Soviet waters based on a bit of logic and an itch? Okhostsk was relatively desolate, fit inside the Soviet Union as neatly as the Chesapeake Bay fits into the Eastern seaboard of the United States. If a submarine was caught in these waters, it could provoke the very confrontation that both sides were desperate to avoid. If, however, US submariners actually found a cable on the sea floor, and managed tap it, that cable could supply the most critical information of the Cold War.
The answer to how Bradley received clearance to send a US sub on such a dangerous mission with nothing to go but a gut feeling was as astonishing as the mission itself. As a child, Bradley was subjected to what had become an all too frequent family trip on Mississippi River Boat rides -- his mother used them as a way to escape summer heat. Bored, he had watched the shore go by endlessly, and read the signs on the beach for lack of anything better to do.
Those signs marked mileage and location mostly, but a few warned: “Cable Crossing, Do Not Anchor.” If those signs existed in the Southern United States, why not along a lonely Soviet Beach somewhere. Bradley was able to get Cabinet level permission to send a submarine to a Soviet Sea looking for signs on the beach.
And what submarine would the Navy send – the only boat that Admiral Hyman Rickover would hand over to be refit for this and several other seemingly outlandish missions – the USS Halibut. She could have been dubbed a special clunker, as she was one of the oldest and loudest boats in the nuclear fleet. She had been designed with an extra
for Halibut to sink.
Seemingly in line with her role as test submarine, Halibut had also been given an appendage on her back that seemed anything but hydrodynamic. It was a tube able to carry a few men, a deep submergence rescue vehicle, the public was told, a small submarine meant to ferry men to the surface if the larger sub were disabled. This was not long after the USS Thresher went down past crush depth during a test dive and all hands were lost.
hanger to Regulus nuclear missiles, the kind that required a sub to surface quickly, shoot and dive. The hanger made her loud, which meant she was easier to detect. It also left submariners convinced that her strange hump was going to make it easier
It was only as Chris and I kept digging that we realized that the clippings touting the new DSRV were just an elaborate cover story. The vehicle would never rescue anybody. It was welded to Halibut’s back, a disguised decompression chamber for divers.
Any time we asked questions about Halibut or even contacted a member of the crew, we quickly got the attention of the Naval Investigative Service. The more we heard that investigators followed in our wake, trying to find out what we were asking, the more certain we felt we were on the right track.
As all of this went on, I became very close to our submariners. Some never offered more than dinner with the family. One man taught me to shoot--handgun, rifle, whatever he had around. We learned that Halibut did find that cable, and that her divers did ride in the disguised decompression chamber to walk the Sea of Okhotsk 400 feet down to place a tap.
So successful was that mission that Halibut would go back, this time with a tap that could be placed and left to run for a year. Soon another Rickover reject, the USS Seawolf was pressed into service to go to the cable, and was almost lost under the Sea of Okhotsk. The missions to that Sea lasted until Ronald Pelton sold details of the mission to the Soviet Union. The Soviets almost found Seawolf, who had barely escaped that year. Instead they did find the tap – opened it up, and if there was any doubt as to who had placed it there, read on one piece the words “property of the United States.”
That didn’t stop a modern submarine, the USS Parche, from being sent to the much busier Barents Sea in missions that brought home information so stunning that she won a string of Presidential Unit Citations. Ronald Reagan was so impressed that he compared one of her captains to John Wayne. The men felt pretty good about that. Reagan had known John Wayne personally.
Chris and I didn’t start digging into any of this until the Cold War was over. We learned that this peak into the Soviet mind helped to show our side that the Soviets were just as afraid and horrified at the thought of nuclear war as we were. The intelligence also showed that some of our exercises and rhetoric calling the Soviet Union the Evil Empire was leaving Russians with the impression that we might be willing to wage a first nuclear strike. It was the sense on both sides that we were getting too close to something too horrible to contemplate that helped hasten the end of the Cold War.
As we looked at what we had, Chris and I wondered, should we print this story? Were
we doing any harm by exposing a tale we believed to be over? We decided to take a risk ourselves. We would show our chapters to high ranking men in the Navy or administration. Forgive me for being vague, I have to be. We wouldn’t offer veto powers, but we would accept their advice.
We were told that if we stayed with what we had, we wouldn’t do any harm. This part of the story was indeed over. In fact, these officers mused, we might be doing some good. It was time that these men who asked nothing, could at least show their families who they were, and why they were gone for so long. It was time to let a few more walls crumble.
Sherry Sontag is an investigative journalist who, before turning to Blind Man’s Bluff, was a staff writer for the National Law Journal. While there, she wrote about the Soviet Union, international affairs, and domestic scandals in securities and banking. Prior to that, Sontag wrote for the New York Times. A lifelong resident of New York, she has degrees from Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism and Barnard College.
fOR CaBlE dETECTION, TRaCkINg aNd INSpECTION
MR. HUgH THOMSON
MR. JEffREy HOEl
Image courtesy of Bluefin Robotics Corporation
The views expressed here are solely the authors’ and do not necessarily reflect the policy of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), the U.S. Navy, or its components.
The Naval Seafloor Cable Protection Office (NSCPO), under the command and authority of the Naval Facilities Engineering Command, is the official point of contact for all U.S. Navy (and other Department of Defense) ocean cables. Its mission includes protection of the Navy’s interests with respect to ocean cables by representing these interests to other government agencies and industry. By providing a single point of contact and management of a comprehensive database of cable systems, the NSCPO is uniquely positioned to answer queries from commercial and DoD cable installation planners, surveyors and installation contractors in order to minimize possible damage to Navy cable systems.
The NSCPO also has a goal of reducing the labor intensive work and affiliated costs associated with the inspection and maintenance of seafloor cables and cable systems. To achieve this goal, NSCPO is applying state of the art technology in developing an AUV with the capability to detect, classify, localize, track and inspect (DCLT&I) seafloor cables. Autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) represent a new alternative to using divers and ROVs for cable tracking and inspection.
Navy Cables:
Ocean cables are often exposed to both man-made and naturally occurring conditions that can result in damage or failure. Some of these conditions can cause a slow degradation of the cable that, if allowed to continue, would eventually result in a cable failure and
system outage. Long-term cable survivability has always been a concern since many of the Navy’s cable systems remain in operation well beyond normal commercial economic life. Navy cable systems are just as likely to degrade from hazardous environmental conditions as they are from external damage. In fact, the Navy is still operating seafloor cable systems that were installed in the 1950s and 60s. This extended working life makes routine underwater cable inspection a critical part of the Navy’s preventative maintenance program. These inspections provide valuable information regarding the health and status of the cable systems. This data can be used to provide advanced warning of potentially hazardous conditions and is used in planning cable maintenance and repair operations or to program a system replacement.
Current inspection methods of near-shore cables in shallow water are conducted using divers from the Naval Underwater Construction Teams (UCTs). For the inspections beyond divers capabilities, the Navy uses Remotely Operated Vehicles (ROV’s) outfitted with passive or active cable tracking systems. However, inspections with ROVs are often very expensive due to the high lease costs of
support vessels and ROVs. In this article, we describe some of the Navy’s developmental efforts in designing an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle (AUVs) (also termed Unmanned Underwater Vehicle) to support these inspections.
AUV development:
AUV technology has been continuously evolving to support commercial, academic and the Navy’s growing need for extended operations requiring endurance, increased payload capacity, and greater operating depth. These new systems are also designed with modularity in mind. There are many commercially available vehicles that can be easily reconfigured for a wide variety of customer configured payloads. The NSCPO wanted to take advantage of the state of the art technology in commercial, academic and military applications.
AUVs are rapidly becoming a primary tool in support of mine detection and neutralization and are presently used by the Navy to support a multitude of underwater search and survey missions. In order to leverage the ongoing Office of Naval Research (ONR) sponsored mine
2. Prototype system featuring BOSS integrated along with a magnetic sensor and EOI onboard a Bluefin12 AUV.
countermeasures program, the NSCPO has tasked the Naval Surface Warfare Center - Panama City Division (NSWC-PCD) to initiate an investigation to assess the feasibility, within the current state of technology, that an Autonomous Underwater Vehicle can meet the requirements for seafloor cable DCLT&I.
NSWC-PCD has been conducting experiments using several commercial AUVs equipped with advanced sensor packages developed for sea-mine hunting. In initial feasibility tests, two prototype systems developed specifically to reacquire and identify mines, especially those that are buried, have demonstrated promising sensor capabilities for cable DCLT&I. One system features a highperformance magnetic sensor known as the Laser Scalar Gradiometer (LSG) integrated along with a commercial sidescan sonar and an Underwater EO Imager (EOI) onboard a REMUS 600 AUV, figure 1.
The second system features the Bottom Object Scanning Sonar (BOSS), integrated with a moderate-performance magnetic sensor and an EOI, figure 2. Processors and ATR are currently embedded for the LSG and BOSS to provide autonomous capabilities for sea mine DCL.
The LSG has demonstrated promising results for the detection and localization of powered cables (with salt-water return); including those that are buried, figure 3. The LSG has also shown a short-range capability to detect unpowered cables which have a small magnetic signature associated with ferrous strength members. Based on laboratory measurements, along with supporting analysis, this capability shows promise detecting armored cables which have a relatively large magnetic signature in comparison. BOSS has also demonstrated promising results to image cables acoustically, including those that are buried, figure 3.
Additionally, NSWC-PCD has been developing autonomous target recognition (ATR) algorithms to autonomously DCLT&I seafloor cables with the magnetic, acoustic and optical imaging sensors. In support of NAVFAC’s goals and objectives NSWC-PCD and the Naval Undersea Warfare Center - Newport (NUWC-NWPT) are working jointly to demonstrate capabilities to track cables autonomously by fusing the emerging magnetic ATR with vehicle autonomy capabilities developed by NUWC-NWPT. We are planning a first demonstration of cable DCLT&I in FY 2010 using the LSG to track buried, powered cables.
In a parallel effort, NSCPO is exploring technologies outside of the mine-hunting community and has tasked the Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center (NFESC) to identify and coordinate
Figure 3. Sample data collected over a buried cable powered with 1 ampere dc and with a salt-water return: (a) LSG time series from differenced magnetometers as the REMUS 600 BMI System passes over the cable (upper image) and (b) BOSS image as the Bluefin12 BMI System passes along side the cable (bottom image).
contractors, academia and government organizations that have the capability to refine or develop commercial technology that would support cable location, identification and tracking. NFESC is the Navy’s shore and ocean facility technical center and has extensive experience in the inspection, maintenance and repair of the near-shore sections of several Navy and Air Force ocean cable systems. These systems include Space and Naval Warfare System Command system’s, Naval Air Systems Command - Underwater Tactical
Figure
Figure 4. SEEBYTE’s modified REMUS 100 configured with a multisensor suite including a side scan and Heriot Watt University’s wideband section system ready for testing.
“narrow” or “wide” cable models to identify cable-like objects in each video frame, compares this to previous frames, and makes estimates of where the cable may be in future video frames, figure 5. UBI is presently integrating the cable tracking system into their developmental AUV (under development by a consortium of Spanish universities that includes UBI). The integration includes development of control software which forms the interface between the cable tracking system and the AUV control system.
Training Ranges, Navy range owners and NAVFAC (miscellaneous power cables). NFESC is in a good position to identify emerging technology that might be adapted to meet these requirements.
Initially, this project started with a literature search to identify promising candidates and technologies related to tracking a “proud” seafloor cable with an AUV. This literature search was followed up with a Sources Sought advertisement in the Commerce Business Daily (CBD). From these efforts, two promising candidates were identified:
a. SEEBYTE LTD: SEEBYTE, a UK firm with significant DoD experience, had developed and demonstrated the tracking of an underwater pipeline with an AUV. The primary issue with
regard to the cable tracking application was the systems ability to find and track a cable which is much smaller in size than a pipeline. Under contract to the Navy, SEEBYTE has conducted cable detection tests of wide-band sonar (developed by Heriot Watt University) and a commercially available sidescan system. These systems have recently been integrated onto SEEBYTE’s REMUS 100 AUV, figure 4, vehicle for further tests and evaluations planned for early 2010.
b. University of the Balearic Islands (UBI). UBI, located in Spain, had developed a video-based system for tracking cables and pipelines from an autonomously operated ROV operating in a test tank. This system uses a combination of
Figure 5, UBI Parameters for their cable model and its application of the thin cable model on a cable inspection video
Conclusion:
The long-term goal of this project is to demonstrate that AUVs can autonomously detect, classify, localize, track and inspect (DCLT&I) cables on or buried under the seafloor. This will support the Naval Seafloor Cable Protection Office goals of increasing diver safety while reducing the labor intensive work and affiliated costs to inspect undersea cables currently maintained by the Navy. By leveraging mine-hunting applications and adaptations of commercial and academic
systems, it appears that DCLT&I with an AUV is feasible. AUVs have the potential to provide another platform option for cable inspections. This capability can significantly reduce cable inspection costs by eliminating the high costs associated with leasing an ROV and support vessel. In addition, an AUV platform may provide for quicker response to fleet needs since field support requirements for a small AUV are minimal, and may be supported using the Underwater Construction Teams.
Ted Clem is a senior research physicist at the Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City. He has 27 years of diversified experience in the development, testing, and application of magnetic sensors for magnetic anomaly detection and is the laboratory’s coordinator for electromagnetic sensor technology. In addition, Dr. Clem is currently directing a multi-facility project sponsored by the Office of Naval Research to develop and demonstrate autonomous underwater systems that identify buried sea mines through the fusion of acoustic and non-acoustic sensors. He is applying these technologies and expertise for buried mine identification to the problem of undersea cable detection and tracking. His technical expertise and research interests have spanned the areas of magnetic sensor technology, superconductivity, statistical mechanics, electromagnetic theory, signal processing, and advanced underwater system development. He has received an award as one of the Department of the Navy Top Scientists and Engineers of 2007, an award for the best Navy independent research paper in 1989 from the Office of Naval Research, and three awards for special achievement in science and technology from the Naval Surface Warfare Center Panama City Division. He received his M.S. and Ph.D. in Biomathematics
from North Carolina State University in 1982 and 1985 with his doctoral research focused on the application of functional analysis to axiomatic statistical mechanics. He served in the US Air Force from 1969 to 1973.
Hugh Thomson is a senior mechanical engineer and project leader in the Ocean Facilities Department at the Naval Facilities Engineering Service Center in Port Hueneme, California. He has 30 years of experience in research and development of specialized tools and techniques for Navy ocean cable system installation, maintenance, and repair. He recently received the 2008 Engineer of the Year award from the Society of Military Engineers. Mr. Thomson received his Bachelor’s of Science from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and is a registered Professional Engineer in the state of Texas.
Jeffrey Hoel P.E. has worked for NAVFAC as an Assistant Director of the Naval Seafloor Cable Protection Office since December 2008. He is a retired Naval Officer with over 20 years experience in seafloor cable systems and was a former Underwater Construction Team Commanding Officer. During his naval career he served as a Civil Engineer Corps Officer and a Naval Diving Officer. Immediately after his retirement he worked as a senior technical lead at General Dynamics- Advanced Information Systems. Mr. Hoel is a graduate of The Citadel with a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Civil Engineering. He also holds a Master’s of Science degree in Ocean Engineering from Florida Institute of Technology and is a graduate of the U. S. Naval War College and U.S. Marine Corps Command and Staff College. He is a registered Professional Engineer in the state of Virginia.
lEfT HaNd? RIgHT HaNd? OOpS…
By BIll BURNS
Illustration of cable samples with opposite lay. Glass, Elliot cable on left, Newall on right.
Well, it should have been a straightforward, if very big, job – armoring 2500 nautical miles of cable for the first attempt on an Atlantic crossing in 1857.
By then the British cable companies had been insulating copper wire with gutta percha and turning it into armored telegraph cable for six years already. The first submarine telegraph cable, laid by the brothers Jacob and John Watkins Brett between England and France in August 1850, had no armoring. It worked for only a day, then broke from chafing on rocks; another version of the story says that the cable was hooked by a fisherman and destroyed. It quickly became apparent that cables needed to be armored to withstand not only the stresses of being laid and the risks
of being damaged by fishing vessels, but also the predations of aquatic life. So for the next attempt on the Channel crossing, in 1851, the cable was armored with ten galvanized iron wires. All subsequent cables were similarly constructed.
Although the cable industry was brand new in the early 1850s, the methods and machines used to make cable were well established. Wire rope manufacturing had begun in the 1830s in Europe, as something stronger than the traditional hemp and other fiber ropes was needed by the coal mining industry. Most of Europe’s energy was supplied by burning coal, and unlike in the United States where coal lay near the surface, Europe’s coal came from deep mines. This required moving men
and coal through vertical shafts often several thousand feet deep, and safe operation of heavy loads at these depths was not possible with hemp ropes.
The first wire ropes were made with iron wire, using the same manufacturing methods as for hemp rope. By 1834 wire ropes developed by the German engineer Wilhelm Albert were being used in the mines in Germany’s Upper Harz district, and it was estimated that the additional manufacturing cost was more than covered by the much longer life of the wire rope over traditional hemp ropes. Then in 1838 Lewis Gordon, formerly an assistant to Brunel during the construction of the Thames Tunnel, visited the mines at Clausthal in the Harz mountains, and met Wilhelm Albert. In
an early case of industrial espionage, he wrote to his friend R.S. Newall in Britain on June 20th, 1838, urging him to “Invent a machine for making wire ropes”.
Robert Sterling Newall was born in Dundee, Scotland, in 1812 and in 1838 he was proprietor of an engineering works in that city. On receipt of Gordon’s letter, Newall set to designing a wire rope machine, and by August 17th 1840 he had taken out a patent for “certain improvements in wire rope and the machinery for making such rope”, and established R.S. Newall & Company. The firm immediately commenced making wire ropes for “Mining, Railway, Ships’ Rigging, and other purposes”.
An important feature of Newall’s wire rope was a central core of hemp or other flexible material, which ensured that the individual wires and strands were held equidistant from their respective centers to ensure equal stress on each wire.
According to Newall’s later account, after the failure of the unarmored Channel cable in 1850, he realized that his wire rope machinery could easily be adapted to making cable, and in September of that year he submitted a specimen of his cable to the engineer of the Anglo-French Telegraph Company. After a patent dispute with another company was resolved in his favor, Newall ended up armoring
the new Channel cable, which was laid in September 1851 and operated well for many years. This initial success in submarine cable manufacturing led R.S. Newall and Company to expand their operations to include cable laying as well as manufacture, and the firm made and laid many of the subsequent cables.
Meanwhile, in London, George Elliot was also getting into the cable business. Born in 1815 in Gateshead, the son of a coal miner, Elliot became a mining engineer and in 1840 a colliery owner. In this capacity he dealt with the wire rope manufacturer Kuper and Company of Camberwell, London, becoming their sole agent and manager after their bankruptcy in 1849. He moved the works to Morden Wharf, East Greenwich (on the River Thames near London), and by 1854 Elliot had become proprietor of the company (in partnership with Richard Glass). The firm was soon renamed Glass, Elliot and Company, and production was turned over from wire rope to submarine cables.
By the mid 1850s, with the successful laying and operation of many short cables around Britain and elsewhere in the world, the scene was set for the Atlantic cable. The American promoter of the enterprise, Cyrus Field, had to go to England to get his cable made, as the British companies had at that time (and for many years to follow) a monopoly on gutta percha, the only suitable insulation. In 1856, the Atlantic Telegraph Company placed an order for 2500 nautical miles of cable, to be made in time for an attempt on the Atlantic route in the summer of 1857. The size of the job - a cable thirty times longer than the longest cable so far produced - turned out to be its downfall. This volume of armoring work was
Illustration of splicing fixture
too much for one company to turn out in any reasonable time, so the job was split between R.S. Newall, at their factory in Birkenhead on the River Mersey across from Liverpool, and Glass, Elliot in London.
Unfortunately, the specifications for the cable did not include the direction of lay of the armoring, which, of course, could be left hand or right hand. Even more unfortunately, the two companies picked opposite directions, Newall choosing right hand lay, and Glass, Elliott left hand. And during all the testing and monitoring of production in the two locations, about 180 miles apart, no-one from the Atlantic Telegraph company noticed the difference.
No single ship at that time could carry the full length of 2500nm or cable so for the 1857 expedition two ships were used. The first section of cable, made by R.S. Newall, was loaded on the USS Niagara, which commenced laying from Valentia, Ireland, towards Newfoundland. The rest of the cable, the section made by Glass, Elliot, was loaded on HMS Agamemnon, to be spliced on when the Niagara’s cable ran out in mid Atlantic. However, the expedition had to be abandoned when the Niagara’s cable broke during laying and the end was lost a few hundred miles west of Ireland. The remaining cable from both ships was stored away for the winter, and a second attempt was not made until May 1858.
This time the plan was to again load the cable onto the two ships, but now to sail them both to the middle of the Atlantic, splice the two lengths together, and head in opposite directions towards Ireland and Newfoundland. Fortunately, a trial run was made in the Bay of Biscay, where the error of the lays was finally
discovered. This naturally presented a difficulty when the two halves had to be spliced together on board ship to begin the laying – the crew envisioned the armoring slowly unraveling from the splice all the way to the ends of both cable lengths. The situation was saved by the ever-ingenious cable engineers aboard ship, who devised a complex 300-pound fixture to ensure that the splice would not unwind.
As will be no surprise, recriminations began immediately, and as was the custom at the time, the battle between the two companies was fought in the pages of The Times (of London) newspaper in a series of articles and letters to the editor. Neither firm would admit fault, and the issue was in any event rendered moot when the cable again broke during laying and the first expedition of 1858 had to be abandoned.
The second attempt in August 1858 was at least temporarily successful, additional cable being made by Glass, Elliott, and the story of this great engineering triumph has been told many times.
Cables did, in fact, continue to be made with both lays after this – but never again in the same run.
A more detailed story of the origins of cable armoring may be read at http://atlantic-cable. com/Article/WireRope/wirerope.htm
Bill Burns is publisher and webmaster of the atlantic-cable.com website, which has over 800 pages on the history of cable laying from 1850 till the present day.
wHaT glOBal RECESSION?
SUBOpTIC 2010 aBSTRaCT
SUBMISSIONS REflECT a pOSITIvE INdUSTRy
By COlIN aNdERSON
The Most Interesting & Valuable SubOptic Yet
Despite the turmoil created from the Global Financial crises, things are looking up. If there was a recession in the telecom industry, then it seems that it is over! With just 6 months until the SubOptic 2010 conference & convention takes place in Yokohama Japan, the Call for papers has closed and we have had a wonderful and very positive response, in both quantity & quality
We were delighted to receive 166 abstracts, which is higher than the number received for the previous SubOptic conference in 2007 - and we sincerely thank all of the abstract authors for giving their valuable time and making the effort to contribute.
Especially pleasing were the strong submissions from telecom carriers. In fact, the content of the abstracts prompted the program Committee to create a new session devoted to Operations & Maintenance, which we expect will be of strong interest to carriers.
We were also surprised by how much development has taken place in future transmission technologies such as 40 Gb/s and 100 Gb/s since we issued the Call for Papers just 6 months ago. They have clearly already become ‘hot topics’ in the industry, and will make SubOptic 2010 even more interesting for our carrier audience.
The oral paper presentation session will make up a large part of the program. But there are also MasterClass Tutorials, Workshops, Round Tables, a Poster Session, and Exhibition, and three world-class Keynote Speakers included in the SubOptic 2010 program. We expect the MasterClass Tutorials to be attractive for the carrier community and new entrants to the market. They cover almost the entire ‘lifecycle’ of a system, beginning with a MasterClass on the ‘demand drivers’ which underpin the requirement for new capacity, and then go through the important steps leading to the fruition of a full cable project - whether it be a new system or an an upgrade to an existing system. There is also a MasterClass on the lessons learnt in the important oil/gas market.
The work of the Program Committee and by the Hosts NEC & Fujitsu on the other arrangements for the conference, is now in the final stages - and SubOptic 2010 is on-track for 11 ~ 14 May 2010 in Yokohama. We have every reason to expect that this, the seventh SubOptic conference & convention, will be the most successful yet.
Overview of the Abstracts
In the topic area of Global & Geographical Markets, we received abstracts on topics as diverse as hybrid terrestrial & undersea global mesh optimization, and network fundamentals pivotal to succeeding in new service markets. Others focus on issues such as investment decisions regarding huge-capacity upgrades (10Gb/s & 40Gb/s), and what this means for new cable construction. Finally, some touch upon the sensitive issues recently faced by governments being involved more closely than ever in cable projects, and what this portends for the future.
In the topic
area of Regulatory Finance
Environmental and Legal we received abstracts on topics ranging from the environmental impact of cables, to examining the submarine cable’s ability to address the Digital Divide in places such as Africa. Several abstracts were submitting with the aim of deciphering the complex environment of subsea contracts and permits, including how the perception of both Governments and the public to the importance of submarine cables could be improved. We also received several abstracts relating to finance; how financial risk could be
managed and the impact of the Global Financial crisis on the industry
In the topic area of Project Development & Implementation we received abstracts covering topics from modular cable stations to full turnkey system implementation stories - a very eclectic spectrum of abstracts, with a focus on the life cycle of systems and project management viewed and analysed from various different directions. Other abstracts cover success factors during installation, and touch on environmental matters, which was a recurring theme in several of the abstracts.
The System Design & Architecture topic area received the largest number of Abstracts, with a total of 40 submissions. Future transmission at 40 Gb/s & 100 Gb/s has obviously become a much hotter topic in the past few months, judging by the very strong content we received in this area. There were multiple abstract submissions on 40 Gb/s & 100 Gb/s system simulations and test-beds - and many focusing on submarine line-terminal modulation formats to achieve maximum system capacities for 10 Gb/s, 40 Gb/s and 100 Gb/s transmission, on both new and legacy systems.
Other abstracts covered Optical Add-Drop Multiplex (OADM) networks, O&M/OSS system monitoring and control, un-repeatered transmission architectures & equipment, and equipment alternatives to SDH.
A significant plus, was the submission of a number of papers on Operations & Maintenance matters, and the interest shown in this topic area and across a number of others has triggered the Program Committee to dedicate a specific session at SubOptic 2010 on this topic..
In the topic area of Marine Services & Marine Operations, we received` abstracts with topics ranging from piracy threats to marine operations, and on to physical threats to installed systems from submarine landslides (“turbidite flows”). Several abstracts focus on aspects of cable maintenance, whist others address cable protection. And yet other abstracts cover topics from cable congestion to seafloor observatories.
In the topic area of Equipment & Component Technologies we received over 30 abstracts. Again, there were many good abstracts focusing on 40 Gb/s & 100 Gb/s applications.
There were also abstracts covering important aspects of equipment technologies required for submarine system - from Power Feeding Equipment (PFE) to Network & Element Management (NM & EM); and some abstracts were received covering proposals on how to reduce system cost. Abstracts were also received describing new fibers and repeaters.
In the Special Markets topic area we received abstracts ranging from technical riser design to neutrino observatory systems. Slightly more than half the abstracts were focused on scientific systems with about half of those abstracts related to general scientific observatories, the other half concerning seismic observatories, as well as abstracts regarding special survey requirements for scientific systems. The other half of the abstracts were related to topics for the Oil & Gas market. Many of the Oil & Gas abstracts are concerned with requirements, design issues and benefits of submarine capacity for offshore applications with some papers related to subsea controls as well as engineering for deep water dynamic riser design and placement.
Program Overview
In the two weeks after closing, the 67 voluntary members of the Abstract Review Team have evaluated and scored all of the abstracts for quality, originality, interest, and relevance. On behalf of SubOptic and the Program Committee I want to publicly thank them for their valuable work.
the program format & schedule now that the actual program content is clear.
Oral Paper Sessions
We will have two full oral paper sessions for each of the above topics, and one focussing on Operations & Maintenance, totally 15 oral paper sessions and more than 80 oral papers, including some by invitation.
Poster Session
Of the 166 abstracts, many authors requested to do a Poster, and we now plan to have at least 90 Posters in the Poster segment. This session is open to all, and has no other sessions running in parallel. It will be held next to the conference exhibition area, and the exhibition will also be open at that time. Cocktails will be provided, and this is always an enjoyable and interesting session, which facilitates good networking opportunities.
MasterClass Tutorials
The Program Committee has selected seven MasterClass Tutorial topics, which we hope will provide interesting new insights for the spectrum of conference participants:
In the following weeks the Program Committee has been very busy fine-tuning
• Capacity Upgrade of New & Legacy Cable Networks
• Lessons Learned in Oil & Gas
These MasterClass Tutorials are open to all conference registrants free of any additional cost. Instructors are being solicited in the coming weeks.
WorkShops
We are also finalising two WorkShops on hot topics of interest to many in the industry - one on Permitting Issues, and the other on the System Supply Contract focusing on the results of the work done by the SubOptic Interim Working Group in the past 3 years.
Round Table Session
Work is progressing well for the organisation of the Round Table session in 2010, and we will include more information in the Preliminary Program for SubOptic 2010 which will be published in January 2010.
We are planning to design a Round Table which will identify the challenges that providing the next generation of networks and services will bring over the next 5 years - and which will ask whether our community is really equipped to meet them! We expect to send our audience away with at least a better understanding of the future and at least the questions that need to be asked, if not many of the possible the answers.
Early Bird Registration is Now Open!
With the above program content, the three worldclass Keynote Speakers already announced in August 2009, and the usual enjoyable social and networking events at SubOptic, including the Welcome Cocktails and the Closing Gala Dinner, we are now even more confident that SubOptic 2010 will be a successful, valuable, and enjoyable conference for everyone.
Early-bird Registration, at discounted pricing, is now open. So register now for this ‘must-attend’ event. To get up-to-date details at any time, please visit our web site www.suboptic.org
Colin Anderson has been involved in the international telecommunications networks industry for over 20 years, and has held a range of marketing and engineering roles in the areas of terrestrial optical networks and digital radio networks, before entering the submarine networks industry, where he has played a significant role in the design, bidding, award, and implementation of many international submarine cable projectsamong them SEA-ME-WE 3, Southern Cross, Japan-
US, FNAL, SEA-ME-WE 4, FLAG FEA, AJC, AAG, & Unity. He is a New Zealander, and lived in Tokyo for 13 years before moving to Sydney Australia in 2005. His hobbies include a life-long passion for classical music, the restoration of grand pianos, home & car hi-fi audio systems, electronics, and home renovation.
advertise with the experts
By kEITH SCHOfIEld
The Task
In his presentation at SubOptic 2007, Michael Carter of Alcatel Lucent proposed that there would be significant benefits if, like other comparable industries, the Submarine Cable Community could agree to standardise certain key aspects of the terms of engagement for a submarine cable construction contract.
I, like others, agreed that this would be a worthy collaborative endeavour, and within three months the SubOptic Interim activities working group (http://www.suboptic.org/Workgroups. aspx) was formed to seek a collaborative endeavour from all parts of the industry to see if, before SubOptic 2010, this could be turned into a reality.
Effort and Reward
Terms of reference were quickly agreed and by the end of 2007 the basic framework for a standard submarine cable contract had been discussed with representatives of the group (http://www. suboptic.org/WG1_Members.aspx ), drawn from all quarters of the industry (http://www. suboptic.org/WG1_Companies.aspx ). We would prepare a document that was usable by the whole industry. It would be simplified to the minimum commercial terms necessary to allow those engaged in competitive procurement to identify the key terms that would reflect the industry expectations for the appropriate allocation of commercial risk between potential suppliers and purchasers, whether they be for a consortium or private project. Furthermore, it was agreed that it was not the task of the group to impose one commercial solution on the industry, but that the standardised terms should
allow full room for commercial negotiation and indeed modification of the standard terms to suit individual contractual needs. The areas for discussion would be collected into comments in guidelines, and potential areas of contention would also be addressed in guidelines to accompany the document.
Furthermore, the Interim Activities Working Group would submit the document to review by all the SubOptic Executive Committee, plus a number of others who had requested to participate in a ‘peer review’ process once the preliminary draft had been prepared.
At PTC 2009 the status was reported on, and for the next six months there followed a voluntary but intensive period of drafting to cover both the standardised terms and the guidelines.
In many respects this followed the familiar pattern of negotiation that occurs between supplier and purchaser. However, all sides were mindful of the duty to propose to the industry a document that was broadly-enough conceived to permit parties to take it and negotiate in a competitive tendering environment, simplified to eliminate the duplication that had made previous drafts unwieldy, yet comprehensive enough to define all the key terms that the industry needs to be resolved in a commercial construction contract for a submarine cable system.
In July 2009 the entire IAWG agreed that this stage had been met, and the document was issued for peer review for the following two months, with many comments and suggestions received back from reviewing persons spanning a wide variety of constituencies, notably the carriers.
Where we are now
The SubOptic IAWG now has a complete set of peer review comments assembled, and between now and December will debate and incorporate these as appropriate. The routine comments and clarifications are now being incorporated into the next draft, and at the time of writing the IAWG is planning a face-to-face meeting in London to address areas that may be more taxing to achieve an industry consensus, while fully encouraging competitive tendering and procurement through the provision to the industry of a balanced contract.
Where next
It is planned that by PTC 2010, SubOptic will be able to publish on its website the results of all these endeavours in the form of a draft industrystandard contract containing embedded guidelines, which will be suitable for use by all members of the industry, whether new to it or experienced, whether suppliers, consultants or purchasers. In the same way as the peer reviewers had comments on the first draft, we expect the industry will have its own comments on the document. It is the intention that by SubOptic 2010 these comments will have been processed and the next version will have been issued and be available for issue to all the industry at the event itself.
...And so to the future
The issue of standardisation within a competitive framework has been raised again by the industry since SubOptic 2007, and it is expected that many questions and debates will be raised at SubOptic 2010 – for instance,
why does the carrier community not have a more legally sound ‘standard’ IRU agreement? What opportunities are there to standardise on already pseudo-standardised technical activities within survey, burial and maintenance? How can standardisation occur in a manner that does not prevent commercial advantage of one side over another, but does permit competition? How can standardisation help to prevent ‘re-inventing the wheel’ thereby contributing to cost reduction in the industry?
All these issues and more will be debated in the halls and corridors of SubOptic 2010. I look forward to seeing you there!
The SubOptic Interim Activities Working Group is Chaired by Keith Schofield. For over 28 years, Keith has worked internationally in the submarine communications industry, initially in cable/process development and project management for a supplier, then for 17 years in a carrier, where he worked on both consortium and private contracts as a Director of Commercial Development, engaging in system management, due diligence, engineering and implementation consultancy. During that time Keith has worked on the commercial and engineering aspects of over 20 contracts both in repeatered and unrepeatered cables. He is a regular contributor to SubOptic, having presented papers at every event since 1997. Keith presently works in Pioneer Consulting as Director of Submarine Networks, providing expertise for carriers, suppliers and investors.
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Featuring discussions with industry experts, the SubTel Forum podcast expands the platform for discourse on submarine telecom cable and network operations Episode 4:TGN-IA
Do you have a paper or topic you would like to have presented? Contact Kevin Summers: editor@subtelforum.com | 703.468.0554
aNd pETER
Port Alberni Shore Station
odp889_depl_ as_seen_from_ atlantis2_11aug09
It’s been two long years since the NEPTUNE Canada Cabled Ocean Observatory last appeared in these pages. During that time, with much dedication and perseverance, manufacturing and installation have been completed and NEPTUNE Canada has entered operation. Live data is now being streamed from several dozen underwater instruments, with more planned for next summer and beyond. With the difficult and tiring installation
work completed for the year, now is a good time to reflect on what has been achieved and what still remains to be done.
First, to briefly recap: the NEPTUNE Canada backbone consists of an 800km cable loop landing at Port Alberni, British Columbia. The backbone includes six branching units to which nodes are connected; currently five nodes are installed. Each node provides up to 10kW of
power and 4 Gb/s bandwidth to a series of science platforms located within 10km of the node. A typical science platform supports five to ten instruments; science platforms can be daisy-chained to support additional instruments. Instruments include bottom pressure recorders, current profilers, nitrate, oxygen, and chlorophyll sensors, conductivity, temperature, and depth (CTD) sensors, still and video cameras, hydrophones and more.
NEPTUNE Canada is operated by Ocean Networks Canada http:// www.oceannetworks.ca/, a not-for-profit society created by the University of Victoria. Principal funding for NEPTUNE Canada comes from Canadian federal and provincial funding agencies. The NEPTUNE Canada core infrastructure is designed by AlcatelLucent Submarine Networks and their chief subcontractors L-3 Maripro and Texcel. The science platforms were built by UVic with junction boxes supplied by Oceanworks Inc. of Vancouver.
As previously described in NEPTUNE Canada Update, SubTelForum Issue 36 pp 12-15, the NEPTUNE Canada backbone was installed in 2007 using conventional submarine cable components, slightly modified to handle the higher currents. Terminal equipment was installed at the same time. Refit and upgrades to the former Teleglobe cable station were carried out, providing nearly ideal shore facilities. A backhaul link from the shore station to the UVic campus was activated shortly thereafter.
So, what happened to 2008? Simply put, it takes time to develop, validate and integrate any new system. In particular, aspects of the power delivery subsystem proved more challenging than originally thought. Some of the critical network elements required further design and additional prototypes before specifications were met. Integration tests of the power equipment usually relied on single example of each element, which made some of the more complex network behaviors difficult to anticipate. As a tribute to all involved in the project, requirements were not relaxed or omitted; instead work continued until a successful outcome was achieved.
In contrast with the power subsystem, the communications components were all “off-the-shelf” and it was easy to assemble the entire network in a single lab for configuration and testing. Once this was done, the communications aspects of the network were generally trouble-free. The experience with both power and communications stress the importance of early and repeated integration testing. This is particularly true with components which are not “off-the-shelf.”
Once the node design was complete and ready for manufacture, the project moved quickly and, for the most part, smoothly into the node deployment phase. Nodes were delivered to the Esquimalt Graving Dock for final assembly and loading on board the C/S Lodbrog. With support from R/V Atlantis and the Canadian Science Submersible ROPOS, the five nodes and one empty sea-bed frame were installed during July and August of this year.
Work moved immediately to installation of the science platforms. Science platforms at four of the node sites, along with extension cables connecting the science platforms to the nodes were installed by the Atlantis and ROPOS. Midway through this work, the ROPOS ROV was demobilized from R/V Atlantis and onto R/V Thompson. Finally, a last bit of Post Lay Inspection and Burial (PLIB) work was carried out. The high level marine installation activity highlights the need for closely coordinated scheduling, day-to-day management and the importance of knowledgeable staff both at sea and on land.
During the early part of the summer, the installation of the nodes was the primary focus, but this soon moved on to deployment of science platforms and instruments. Another lesson learned is that the time and effort involved with science instruments are significant and should not be underestimated. Ideally, science instruments need the same attention as the major components of the observatory. New instrument designs naturally require prototype testing, but even well-proven instruments may operate differently when connected to the DC/ DC supplies in a cabled observatory rather than batteries or a ship power supply. The more realistic the integration testing, the greater the chances for success.
As we move into the fall and winter months, conditions in the North Pacific make work at sea impossible. Attention is now focused on ensuring the data acquisition and storage systems are ready to support public access to the data, which is expected before the end of the year.
Looking forward, planning for next year’s installation work is already underway. Instruments will be installed at the fifth node site. A handful of instruments have experienced problems (typically ground faults) and need to be recovered for repair. This brings up a final observation, namely the need
to plan for ongoing operations and maintenance.
Operations and maintenance of a cabled observatory includes many activities on many levels: top level activities such as securing funding, managing staff, and long term planning; on-going work such as refurbishing recovered equipment and preparing new instruments; intermittent work such as preparing for cruises and repairing faults; and the day-to-day work of responding to events and managing data.
Now that the observatory infrastructure is in operation, scientists around the world are applying for funding from their national agencies for additional
experiments and suites of instruments. Although the most visible goal of NEPTUNE Canada is to support science, commercial or industrial applications are also envisioned. NC provides an ideal and costeffective platform for long term testing and proving of deep water equipment.
In conclusion, NEPTUNE Canada, the world’s most advanced cabled ocean observatory, is substantially complete, operating well, and open for business. As we look forward to more such systems being deployed, the lessons learned from NEPTUNE Canada provide a valuable resource for the future.
Barkley Head Instrument Frame on Seafloor
Steve Lentz has over fifteen years experience in the construction and operation of optical communications networks including metropolitan area networks, national networks, and international submarine cable networks. He has served as VP Network Engineering and Deployment for 360networks’ submarine division where he developed the network architecture, functional requirements, and performance specifications for international submarine cable networks and supervised testing, commissioning, and verification of compliance with contractual requirements. He was Manager of Transmission Engineering for Time Telekom, Sdn. Bhd. located in Kuala Lumpur Malaysia, and Director of Systems Engineering for Lightwave Spectrum, Inc. He joined WFN Strategies in 2005 as Project Manager, and has supported telecom projects in Oklahoma, Antarctica, West Africa and the Gulf of Mexico.
Peter Phibbs is Associate Director, Engineering and Operations for NEPTUNE Canada. An engineer with construction in the marine environment, Peter has a wide range of experience in managing the implementation of complex deepwater projects. After completing his B.Sc. in Engineering Science from the University of Durham, UK, he practiced engineering as a designer of marine structures in the UK, the Middle East and then in Vancouver, British Columbia. He became a member of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 1978, and a member of the Professional Engineers of British Columbia in 1981. In 1986 he began specializing in underwater construction, managing construction and maintenance projects at variety of sites in North America and around the world.
The Alcatel-Lucent factory in Calais is the oldest submarine cable manufacturing facility in the world. It went into production in 1891 under the ownership of La société Générale des Téléphone and shipped its first cable on 19th April the same year. Calais was chosen because of the then new port facilities that were being built and its close proximity to the mining regions of northern France. This provided the fuel to drive the machinery and the steel wire required to make the cable.
The motivation to build a factory was driven by the desire to break the virtual monopoly of the English over submarine telegraphy and its importance to international commerce. Apart from a small factory in Italy, the only submarine cable factories at that time were in England, and only the English were capable of laying transoceanic cables. In 1891, the only transatlantic telegraph cable landing in France (Brest), had been made and installed by the Telegraph Construction and Maintenance Company for La Sociéte du Câble Translantique Française, in 1869. This company was promoted by Baron d’Erlanger and Julius Reuter, but by 1873 it had been absorbed into the Anglo-America Telegraph Company and had no real French ownership.
Back Reflection by stewart ash
from Marconi radio telegraphy, WW1 and its aftermath followed by wireless telephony in the 1920s made business difficult. In 1938, the company needed finance and succeeded in attracting interest from La Compagnie Genérale d’Electricité which led to a merger and Calais along with a factory in Bezons was incorporated into Les Cables de Lyon. When WW2 broke out, Calais was making cables equipped with microphones for the French navy to detect enemy submarines. By May 1940, the factory tanks had large stocks of this cable. The tanks were blown up to prevent the cable falling into German hands; the rest of the factory was destroyed in successive bombing raids.
The Gates of Calais,France
The factory was rebuilt in 1948, and shortly afterward commenced coaxial cable production. The factory traded as Les Cables des Lyon until 1991 when it became Alcatel Cables. From 1970, Les Cable des Lyon and Alcatel CIT worked through the submarine marketing division of Alcatel, Submarcom. In 1994, Alcatel purchased STC Submarine Systems, then the market leader, from Northern Telecoms and restructured to form Alcatel Submarine Networks. With STC came cable making facilities in Southampton and Portland Oregon to augment Alcatel’s Calais and Port Botany, New South Wales factories. When the industry downturn hit, three of the four cable factories were closed down. Despite her great age the old ‘lady’ survived them all.
Within a year the factory had been taken over by La société Générale des Téléphones, and for the next decade experienced a period of relative prosperity. In 1897, it manufactured 3,400nm of its own transatlantic cable to connect Brest to New York; however, competition
La Vieille Dame de Calais
The Submarine Telecoms Forum
2010 Cable Map will again be produced in conjunction with SubOptic, and will be a poster provided free of charge to our subscriber list, including senior government and international organization officials, telecom company executives and team, support and supply company management, and technical, sales and purchasing staff, field and shipboard personnel, academicians, consultants, financiers, and legal specialists.
2010 SUBMaRINE CaBlE Map
SpONSORSHIp COST: $2,500
The Submarine Telecoms Forum
2010 Cable Map will be printed in full color on high quality art paper, measuring 914 mm x 610 mm, and provide participating advertisers an area of approximately 100 mm x 38 mm to display their corporate logo and contact information. According to a 2009 survey, 64% of respondents use our cable map on a regular basis.
The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) is the Treaty banning all nuclear explosions on Earth. The Treaty was negotiated at the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva and adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. It opened for signature on 24 September 1996. Since then, the Treaty has reached near-universality. 181 countries have signed the Treaty – the last country to do so was St. Vincent and the Grenadines on 2 July 2009. 149 countries have ratified the Treaty –most recently, Liberia on 17 August 2009.
Why is the CTBT so important?
The CTBT is the last barrier on the way to develop nuclear weapons. It prevents the development of new nuclear weapons and the improvement of existing nuclear weapon designs. When the Treaty enters into force it provides a legally binding norm against nuclear testing. The Treaty also helps prevent human suffering and environmental damages caused by nuclear testing.
How many nuclear tests were conducted and by whom?
Between 1945 and 1996 when the CTBT was adopted, over 2000 nuclear tests were conducted by the United States (1000+), the Soviet Union (700+), France (200+), the United Kingdom and China (45 each). Three countries have carried out nuclear explosions after the 1996: India and Pakistan in 1998, and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in 2006 and 2009.
Why has the Treaty not entered into force yet?
The Treaty’s entry into force depends on 44 specific States that must have signed and ratified the Treaty. These States had nuclear facilities at the time the Treaty was negotiated
and adopted. As of August 2009, 35 of these States have ratified the Treaty. Nine States still need to do so: China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and the United States. India, North Korea and Pakistan have not yet signed the Treaty. All 44 States are listed in the Treaty’s Annex 2.
What is the difference between signature and ratification?
The signature to a treaty indicates that the country accepts the treaty. It commits not to take any actions that would undermine the treaty’s purposes. A treaty is signed by a senior representative of a country such as the president or the foreign minister.
The ratification symbolizes the official sanction of a treaty to make it legally binding for the government of a country. This process involves the treaty’s adoption by the legislature of a country such as the parliament. It also includes the submission of the so-called instrument of ratification to the treaty’s depository, which for the CTBT is the UN Secretary-General. Only then is the process of ratification officially concluded. The ratification of a treaty may require the adjustment of a country’s legislation, reflecting its commitments under the treaty.
What is the CTBTO and what does it do?
The abbreviation stands for the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization. The organization promotes the Treaty so that it can enter into force. It also establishes a verification regime to monitor adherence to the Treaty. The organization was founded in 1996 and employs a staff of roughly 260 from the CTBT’s Members States.
What is the CTBT verification regime?
The CTBT verification regime is a unique, comprehensive system, consisting of the International Monitoring System (IMS), International Data Centre (IDC) and on-site inspections (OSI). It constantly monitors the planet for nuclear explosions and shares its findings with Member States (= the 181 States that have signed the Treaty).
How does the CTBT verification regime work?
Monitoring stations
The 337 IMS facilities are located all over the globe and use four distinct technologies to look for signs of nuclear explosions:
Seismic: to detect shockwaves in the Earth. The seismic network is comprised of 170 stations. 50 primary stations provide data continuously and 120 auxiliary stations provide data on demand. They register thousands of earthquakes and mine explosions every year. Hydroacoustic: to detect acoustic signals in the oceans. Eleven stations are sufficient to monitor the big oceans as sound travels very efficiently in water.
Infrasound: to detect low-frequency sound waves in the air with a network of 60 stations. Radionuclide: to detect radionuclide particles and noble gas. 80 stations provide the “smoking gun” evidence that an explosion was nuclear. Half of these stations are equipped with radionuclide noble gas detection technology. The radionuclide network is complemented by 16 laboratories for detailed analysis.
Data analysis
Two thirds of these facilities are already established and send data to the IDC for analysis. All raw data and the analysis reports are made available to Member States.
On-site inspections
After the Treaty’s entry into force, an OSI can be requested if monitoring data suggest that a nuclear explosion was carried out in violation of the test ban. This involves a team of 40 inspectors who search the area where data suggest that a nuclear explosion may have taken place. In September 2008, the CTBTO tested a complete OSI in a simulation exercise in Kazakhstan.
Did the CTBTO detect the nuclear explosions conducted by the DPRK?
Yes, it did. The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea detonated nuclear devices on two occasions, in October 2006 and in May 2009. On both occasions, the CTBT verification regime was capable of detecting the explosions in a fast and reliable manner.
Can monitoring data be used for other purposes?
CTBT monitoring data and technologies are also used for civilian purposes and scientific research. The CTBTO is providing monitoring data directly from some of its stations to Tsunami warning institutions in Asia and the Pacific since November 2006.
Using CTBT verification data for tsunami early warning
Disaster mitigation is a top priority when looking at potential applications of CTBT verification technologies and data in other fields. Interest in this topic increased, entering a whole new phase on 26 December 2004 when a tsunami caused by an earthquake off the coast of Sumatra, Indonesia, devastated coastal regions all around the Indian Ocean.
For the first time, the CTBTO took concrete steps to allow the use of its verification data
for disaster mitigation. In March 2005, States Signatories tasked the organization with testing the provision of data to selected tsunami warning centres.
The test phase lasted twenty months and proved successful. Because time is of the essence when warning populations in coastal regions of a possible tsunami, the success of the CTBTO’s test was determined by the speed of data arriving at tsunami warning centres. Verification data sent by CTBT monitoring stations took the least time in comparison with data from other monitoring networks.
Patricio Bernard, Assistant Director-General of UNESCO and Executive Secretary of the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission, confirmed the usefulness of CTBT monitoring data. Referring to an experiment that was carried out in 2005, Bernard said it had shown that “IMS waveform data were received with a maximum delay of 30 seconds, while those from other networks were received with an average delay of 100 to 180 seconds”.
Consequently, in November 2006, States
Signatories endorsed a recommendation of the CTBTO’s technical working group to provide real-time and continuous data to relevant tsunami warning organizations. Five tsunami warning centres – one each in Japan, the United States and Australia, and two in Malaysia – now receive data directly from 30 monitoring stations worldwide, representing three of the four CTBT verification technologies – seismic, hydroacoustic and infrasound.
Letter to a friend from Jean Devos
My dear friend
My Dear Friend
“Botany Bay”
Warrior event was still in everyone’s memory. It is for these reasons among others that STC (UK) rejected the Alcatel‘s suggestion to come with a joint bid, to offer a “European” solution.
One of the winning factors has been the Port-Botany cable factory. Such a factory was a strong requirement from OTC (now Telstra) and the Australian Government.
Retired but not tired
Alcatel was the most motivated. Such a factory could expand its influence in the Pacific where the three other players were historically well established in this region, which represents a large part of their market. They saw this factory as a risk for their existing facilities!
I published recently a modest novel, whose title is Botany Bay. It is the place in Australia where
We, my friend, are retired from the mainstream of the submarine cable business, but still playing modest little roles as advisers here and there. And we know that there are many people like us. So, as to keep our capability, we spend much time on the web, looking for information and staying in touch with what is going on around the globe. Amazingly, both of us now in our 70’s, still have a good knowledge of the actual status of projects, technologies, cable owners, operators etc. Very often we have a broader view of the market and the corresponding issues than many of the active players who are somewhat prisoners in their own sphere of influence. We also have the advantage given by a good knowledge of the past. And last but not the least, we are free. We are independent, not obliged to speak the language of our company. We have our own judgment
Alcatel established a submarine cable factory in 1989 as part of its contract for the Tasman 2 link. In this same bay, where two centuries before the French expedition
I have in mind a well known old friend, who was a key industry figure from 1970-1980, and then as a young engineer “during the war”. He was a cable-ship engineer when it was still “the telegraph time.” He is now approaching 90, still very excited about this industry, and very sharp on many aspects of it. He approached me recently in the framework of an investigation he was doing for one of his US customers interested in joining one
“La Pérouse” made of two ships, La Boussole
of the West-Africa cables. As a result, I am now helping these guys to raise money. Doing this, I happen to be directed to someone I knew well within Alcatel. This person is now the telecom adviser of a French investment fund. What a small world!
The collapse of the bubble around the year 2000 forced the industry to be restructured and downsized. As a consequence, many people have been pushed back home, some still quite young. I have clearly in mind some ex-Tyco and some ex-Alcatel guys, but also ex-KDD, ex-BT, and ex-C&W who are nostalgic of the “good old days”. Many of them have not yet reached 60, and whatever they do now, they still feel that the submarine cable community is their family--is their culture.
and l’Astrolabe, landed in 1788 to discover that Captain Cook was already around bearing the British flag. So Botany Bay is now for me the symbol of a dream which becomes a reality!
Tasman 2 has been yet another chapter in this long Anglo-French competition! The award to Alcatel came out as a big surprise to many, including inside Alcatel. Everybody was naturally expecting the British to win that battle, and such an expectation was at that time very logical.
Overall there is a fairly large population of “ex” guys who considers themselves as members of the submarine cable industry. Some are teaching the “submarine segment” in their local university, some are publishing papers in magazine, even writing books. Others are organizing “clubs of ex.” I am personally member of Les amis des cables sous-marins (the Submarine cable friends), an association promoted by an ex-FT and an ex-cable ship captain. A monthly publication gathers articles submitted by the members.
There were so many difficulties and misunderstanding between Australia and France, the main one being the French presence in the Pacific area, the worse being the nuclear bomb experiment in Tahiti! The sad Rainbow
“old guys” still around. They do not sufficiently appreciate the fact that this activity is a religion. Our community is a church, and whether you are a priest, a monk, a mullah, a rabbi, or just a believer, this is forever.
SubOptic ‘87 in Versailles came at the right time. It is where the Australian teams discovered the French model, a close cooperation between Alcatel and FT, exactly what they wanted to establish in their country.
SubOptic 2010 will be a celebration, satisfying a ritual. I am praying our pope and our bishops, not to forget the old believers who have served the church for so long with faith--with all their hearts and souls. Let them be part of the coming solemn congregation. Amen!
Jean Devos
My friend, things are changed since, but one thing stays true: When you offer something, the reader can see between the lines if you are or not genuinely motivated and sincere. Then your offer becomes really attractive and this opens the route to “Botany Bay.”
See you soon.
Jean Devos
Submarcom Consulting
My friend, you and I know that some of the folks in activity do not see with pleasure these
Jean Devos is a senior consultant with Submarcom Consulting. He is also one of the founders and a board member of Axiom, a Paris based company specialized in Submarine systems projects study & management. He spent three years developing Tyco’s international capability, and was the head of ASN (Alcatel Submarine Networks). Jean was born in 1938 and is graduated from the Lille University. He is the founder of SubOptic and carries a vast international experience in our field.
by Kevin G. Summers
SubTel Forum is now on Twitter and Facebook. That’s right, now you can follow us via social networking sites at http://twitter.com/SubTelForum and http://www.facebook.com/ pages/Submarine-TelecomsForum/143392522615?ref=mf.
I was, at first, resistant to taking this plunge, but the thing is, everyone is doing it. Now, I’m not about to follow the herd over a cliff, but the fact is that more and more people are using social networking sites, thanks in large part to submarine cables, and it’s important for SubTel Forum to remain at the forefront of technology.
I consulted with marketing expert Kate Meier of K8 Communications, who had this to say:
“Mounting studies show that we are in the midst of a massive media shift. More and more, consumers are turning to internet-
based media for news, information and even entertainment, and are choosing to spend their time on social networking sites over traditional sources like newspaper, radio and even television. And it’s not just the kids anymore - the fastest growing demographic on facebook currently belongs to baby boomers.
“This new breed of consumers not only want to interact with businesses online, but they expect to. Findings from the Cone Business in Social Media Study revealed recently that 93 percent of social media users believe a company should have a presence in social media, while an overwhelming 85 percent believe the company should not only be present, but also interact with its consumers via social media.”
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