One of the highlights at this year’s annual broadband conference was the presentation given by Seacom’s President Brian Herlihy.<\/p>\n
Herlihy, who missed Thanksgiving in his home country to give his talk at Vodaworld, spoke quite openly about some of the real challenges that Seacom’s cable laying process is facing. <\/p>\n
The cable which will connect Africa to Europe went into its early manufacturing process in November 2007. Today, 6000km of the fibre cable is sitting on a ship somewhere in the Red sea off the coast of Egypt.<\/p>\n
At certain depths the cable has to be buried into the ocean floor using a massive plough. Repeaters are spread across the cable in 100-115km intervals. These are required to keep data moving along the cable at an acceptable throughput. <\/p>\n
The Seacom cable passes through 11 different territorial waters. Every territory requires a unique set of documents and permission from the respective governing states. Every territory possesses unique mandates and requirements, making the cable laying process a complex bureaucratic hurdle race. <\/p>\n
The cable laying process has already been delayed in Egypt, where the permit application process was delayed. Herlihy feels confident that the rest of the cable laying process will not face too many major delays. The use of a local African barge will negate much of the legal red tape involved in crossing territorial waters along the continent. <\/p>\n
“Load 2” is the second ship, and will carry another 6000kms from South Africa up past Kenya. Load 2 is expected to arrive in SA in January. The SA cable will come into Mtinzini in Natal. The cable will come ashore on the beaches of a nature sanctuary and will burrow underground through the dunes and connect up with a Neotel landing station which will port traffic to Johannesburg. <\/p>\n
The drilling for this landing station is set to begin sometime before Christmas. <\/p>\n
Herlihy is adamant that Seacom is going to great lengths to preserve natural ecosystems across the entire length of the cable, including the Mtinzini landing station.<\/p>\n
Also speaking at the conference was Dr Angus Hay, CTO of Neotel. He stated that from their side going live in June is a realistic expectation. <\/p>\n