What Caused the Red Sea Submarine Cable Cuts?

kentik.com

32 points·oavioklein··5 comments

We see routine cable cuts every so often between Tokyo and Hong Kong. It's just shipping mishaps (dragged anchors, trawling etc.). One of our vendors didn't have connectivity for months.

The article is pretty detailed actually. Interesting that it was the Houthis after all, albeit incidentally, since it's likely the dragged anchor after being hit my missiles.

In Vietnam it happens quite a lot and the joke is that it is always blamed on sharks...

https://www.reddit.com/r/VietNam/comments/zvo553/sharks_ate_...

https://www.independent.co.uk/tech/sharks-are-eating-the-int...

https://www.computerworld.com/article/2872728/dont-blame-sha...

Would it be feasible to establish some kind of substantial radio connections in that region to offer alternative paths?

Gee, why not Starlink?

Come to think of it there was suspicion Ukraine was responsible for the Nord Stream attacks via underwater drone. At the time they blamed Russia and warned Russia would attack the undersea cables.

https://www.reuters.com/world/moscow-may-sabotage-undersea-c...

But Ukraine had both the incentive and capability in these incidents, perhaps with the added benefit of blaming their enemy for the action while reaping the strategic reward. They certainly owe Starlink a favor.

It's naive to think this was an accident, although technically possible

Radio doesn't have the bandwidth. The AAE-1 cable is 40 Tbps capacity. 1 Gbps is good bandwidth for a radio link, and that is either short-range link like Wifi or 5G. Point-to-point link like to satellite can be faster but is limited in range or having satellite in view. The other problem is that that the cable went up the length of the Red Sea. That is too far for point-to-point link.

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