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Commentary

SEACOM Cable Experiences Service-Affecting Outage

7/25/2017

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SEACOM is experiencing a service-affecting outage on Segment 15 of the SEACOM Subsea Cable System. The marine fault is located slightly west of Djibouti in the Red Sea and occurred on the 8th April 19:00 GMT.

The impact of the incident is that all linear transmission traffic on the east coast of Africa to and from Europe will be affected. Customers with IP or other managed network services will remain unaffected but could experience higher latencies with possible degradation of service, as traffic will predominantly be routed over SEACOM’s WACs transmission links on the west coast of Africa, as well as on SEACOM’s network to Asia gateways.

Our repair vessel is being mobilized and a tentative repair date will be confirmed soon.

SEACOM continues to monitor the situation closely and will provide necessary updates as warranted.

Figure 2 – SEACOM Cable Map
Picture
Source: SEACOM

Source:
SEACOM Press Release

ANALYSIS: SEACOM’s Africa-Europe connectivity services are vulnerable because the system interconnects with the “TE North” cable system which provides onward connectivity from Egypt to Marseille, France through the Mediterranean Sea.

SEACOM has experienced three previous major outages since the system was installed in 2009. The Company lost 40% of its available capacity in 2011 when the TE North cable experienced a fault in the Mediterranean and SEACOM had to scramble for restoration capacity. In 2013, the TE North cable was again hit 8 kilometers off Alexandria, Egypt in the Mediterranean. In this case, SEACOM’s rival cable, EASSy, was also affected. In 2016, the TE North cable experienced a shunt fault in the Mediterranean. By this time, SEACOM had arranged stand-by restoration capacity on the “WACS” cable system which runs up the west coast of Africa from South Africa to Europe. Consequently, the impact on SEACOM’s service was minimized.

SEACOM has a private maintenance contract with Etisalat of UAE. When the fault off Djibouti occurred on 4/9/2017, Etisalat’s cable repair ship, “Maram” had just returned to her home port of Hamriya, UAE. It would appear from the vessel’s itinerary history, that she had some other commitments before she was able to set sail for the SEACOM fault location (see
Figure 3 below):

Figure 3 – CS “Maram” Movements April 2017
Picture
Only 9 days after the fault was reported did the “Maram” leave Hamriya. She then took three days at Salalah, Oman, presumably loading spare SEACOM cable, before leaving for the Gulf of Aden. The fault appears to have been located in the southern approaches to the Red Sea at 12.37008 N, 43.63094 E (see Figure 4 below):

Figure 4 – Assumed Location of SEACOM fault
Picture
Source: Pioneer Consulting
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    Julian Rawle, Author

    Thought leadership articles and commentary on developments related to the subsea fibre optic cable industry can be found here.

    MarineTraffic AIS Ship Data & Live Map Positions

    INDUSTRY PULSE: Retelit Trades AAE-1 Capacity for Asian Services… SEAIOCMA Extends Cable Maintenance Contract with Global Marine… Djibouti Africa Regional Express (DARE) Submarine Cable System Contract in Force... Tui-Samoa Submarine Cable System Final Splice Completed... Xtera Initiates Legal Action against Nokia and NEC for Alleged Patent Infringement... Basslink Subsea Cable Outage Caused By Exceeding Design Limit: Experts... ANTONIO MEUCCI arrived at port CATANIA... ASEAN EXPLORER departed from port SEMBAWANG... ASEAN RESTORER departed from port SEMBAWANG... BOLD MAVERICK departed from port SINGAPORE... CABLE INNOVATOR departed from port VICTORIA... CABLE RETRIEVER departed from port SUBIC BAY ... DECISIVE arrived at port LAS PALMAS... DEPENDABLE departed from port CAPE TOWN... DURABLE arrived at port JINGJIANG... CS ETISALAT departed from port HAMRIYA... FJORDKABEL arrived at port HARSTAD... FU AN arrived at port MINHANG... FU HAI departed from port KITAKYUSHU... GLOBAL SENTINEL departed from port HONOLULU, HI... ILE DAIX departed from port PALMONES... ILE DE BATZ arrived at port CALAIS... ILE DE BREHAT departed from port RIO DE JANEIRO... ILE DE RE departed from port SUVA... ILE DE SEIN departed from port NORFOLK, VA... IT INTREPID departed from port CAPE CANAVERAL, FL... KDDI OCEAN LINK departed from port YOKOHAMA... KDDI PACIFIC LINK arrived at port MOJI... KIZUNA arrived at port NAHA... LEON THEVENIN departed from port CAPE TOWN... CS LIMIN VENTURE departed from port BATU AMPAR... LODBROG departed from port KEELUNG... MAERSK RESPONDER departed from port PASIR GUDANG... MARAM departed from port FREE PORT... NIWA arrived at port SALALAH... NORDKABEL arrived at port BOKN... PACIFIC GUARDIAN arrived at port WILLEMSTAD... PETER FABER arrived at port MINDELO... PIERRE DE FERMAT arrived at port HOEK VAN HOLLAND... RAYMOND CROZE departed from port CATANIA... CS RECORDER arrived at port BLYTH... RELIANCE arrived at port NOUMEA... RENE DESCARTES departed from port LUANDA... RESOLUTE arrived at port KEELUNG... RESPONDER departed from port AUCKLAND... SEGERO departed from port SHANTOU... SOVEREIGN arrived at port PORTLAND, UK... SUBARU departed from port NAGASAKI... TELIRI departed from port CAPE TOWN... TENEO arrived at port WILLEMSTAD... UMM AL ANBER departed from port HAMRIYA... VEGA departed from port BATANGAS BAY... WAVE SENTINEL arrived at port WILLEMSTAD...
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    Julian Rawle participated in the Submarine Networks World Conference 8-10 September 2015 in Singapore

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01864    USA

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