How Undersea Cables Work
Meta has announced Petal, a cable designed to carry a petabit per second between the United States and France from 2029. This film explains how undersea cables work: from the telegraph cable of 1858 to the first fibre-optic cable across the Atlantic in 1988, how glass traps light by total internal reflection, how fast it travels, what a cable is made of, how repeaters powered from shore keep the light strong, how many colours and now several cores share one fibre, and why about 150 to 200 cables are damaged every year. Bend the light, add colours, switch off the amplifiers and drag an anchor.
Light on the ocean floor
A petabit a second, under the Atlantic.
Ninety-eight words
The first message across the Atlantic.
The first glass cable
TAT-8, 1988.
Data as light
A laser at one end, a detector at the other.
A mirror made of glass
How a fibre keeps light inside.
How fast is fast?
Light in glass, across an ocean.
As thick as a garden hose
A few fibres, a lot of protection.
Topping up the light
Amplifiers on the sea floor.
A rainbow in a hair
Each colour carries its own data.
More cores
Petal’s trick.
Anchors and nets
Most damage is an accident.
Six hundred cables
Who builds them, and why there are so many.
Flashes in the dark
The internet’s hidden backbone.
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