How to unwind the Internet: laying submarine cables. Submarine cable Sharks are trying to connect to the Internet

Google has recently laid a fiber optic cable along the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, connecting the company's data centers in Oregon, USA, with Japan. This magnificent project would cost $300 million and cover 10,000 km. However, once you dig a little deeper, it becomes clear that this project is only likely to work for one media giant for a special YouTube channel. The entire planet is already heavily intertwined with interconnected cables and there are plenty more of them under water, as one would imagine at first glance. Having become hooked on this topic, I have prepared some obscure material for those who are hooked.

Turns of the intercontinental connection

The practice of laying cables across the ocean dates back to the 19th century. As Wikipedia reports, the first attempts to connect the two continents with a wire connection began in 1847. It was not until the 5th sickle of 1858 that it was possible to successfully connect Great Britain and the United States with a transatlantic telegraph cable; It is believed that the cause was damage to the waterproofing of the cable and subsequent corrosion and breakage. A stable connection between the Old and New light was established around 1866. In 1870, a cable was laid in India, which made it possible to connect London and Bombay directly. These projects received some of the greatest wisdom and entrepreneurs of that time: William Thomson (the late Great Lord Kelvin), Charles Whitstone, the Siemency brothers. Apparently, about 150 years ago, people were actively engaged in building thousands of kilometers of line connections. And what is the progress, it is clear, without hesitation. However, telephone connections to America were established as early as 1956 years ago, and robots were in operation for as many as 10 years. You can read in detail about the laying of the first transatlantic telegraph and telephone cables in Arthur C. Clarke’s book “A Voice Across the Ocean.”

Attach the cable

Of great interest is the central cable connection, which can be used at depths of 5-8 kilometers inclusive.
Varto understands that deep-water cable is guilty of a number of basic characteristics:

• Durability
• But waterproof (raptovo!)
• Vitrimuvati the majestic grip of the water masses above oneself
• Provide sufficient space for installation and operation
• The cable materials must be selected so that mechanical changes (stretching the cable during use/laying, for example) do not change its performance characteristics

The working part of the cable that we can see, for the great benefit, is not affected by anything special from the original optics. The whole point of deep-water cables lies in the protection of the working part and the maximum increase in the term of its operation, as can be seen in the schematic little picture on the right. Let's take a look at the meaning of all structural elements in order.

Polyethylene- External traditional insulating ball for cable. This material is an excellent choice for direct contact with water, subject to the availability of power:
Resistant to water, which does not react with any concentration, with neutral, acidic and basic salts, organic and inorganic acids, or with concentrated sulfuric acid.

The ocean of light contains, in fact, all the elements of the periodic table, and water is a universal source. Vikoristannya of such a wide-ranging chemical. The technicality of the material is polyethylene, logical and justifiable, so first of all, the engineers needed to turn off the reaction of the cable and water, thereby eliminating its disruption from the influx of excess media. Polyethylene was used as an insulating material during the construction of the first intercontinental telephone lines in the mid-20th century.
However, due to its porous structure, polyethylene cannot provide complete waterproofing to the cable, so we go to the end of the ball.

Mylar spittle- synthetic material based on polyethylene terephthalate. There are such authorities:
No smell or taste. Prosorium, chemically inactive, with high barrier powers (including many aggressive media), resistant to rupture (10 times greater than polyethylene), wear, and shock. Mylar (or SRSR Lavsan) is widely used in the industry, packaging, textiles, and space industries. From now on, sew the outline. However, the vicor of this material is surrounded by rich spherical melts due to shrinkage during heat sealing.

Using a ball of mylar spun, you can tighten the cable reinforcement of varying strength, depending on the stated characteristics of the product for this purpose. Basically, the steel braiding is made tighter to give the cable sufficient rigidity and strength, and also to resist aggressive mechanical surges. For data that wanders around the edge, EMI, that comes out of the cables, you can attract sharks that overload the cables. Also, in deep waters, the cable is simply laid on the bottom, without digging a trench, and fishing vessels can get caught with their gear. To protect from such infusions, the cable is reinforced with steel braiding. The steel material that is vicorized in the reinforcement bath is first galvanized. When the cable is strengthened, a number of balls may be added. The main task of the spinner during this operation is the uniformity of the susil during the winding of the steel shot. With a suspended reinforcement, the winding is generated in different directions. If the balance is not adjusted during this operation, the cable may accidentally twist into a spiral, creating loops.

As a result of these visits, the weight of a linear kilometer can reach several tons. “Why isn’t this lightweight aluminum?” - feed a lot of people. The whole problem is that when exposed to aluminum, it has a stable oxide melt, and when exposed to sea water, this metal can enter into an intense chemical reaction due to the presence of ions in the water , as it is disastrous to pour on that part of the cable, for which everything was started - optical fiber. That's why vicorists need steel.

Aluminum water barrier, and the ball of aluminum polyethylene is vicorized like a ball of waterproofing and shielding for the cable. Aluminum polyethylene is a combination of aluminum foil and polyethylene molten material, connected by an adhesive ball. Gluing can be either unilateral or double-sided. At the scale of the entire structure, aluminum polyethylene looks almost incomprehensible. The thickness of the casting can vary from one grower to another, but, for example, in one of the growers on the territory of the Russian Federation, the thickness of the final product becomes 0.15-0.2 mm with one-sided sizing.

Polycarbonate ball The design is being strengthened again. Lightweight, flexible and resistant to pressure and impact, the material is widely used in everyday products, for example, in bicycle and motorcycle shoes, and is also used as a material in the preparation of lenses, compact discs and lighting products. Robiv, the sheet version is considered to be a light-transmitting material. Has a high coefficient of thermal expansion. Stagnation was found in the manufacturing cables.

Copper or aluminum tube enter the cable core warehouse and serve for this screen. Other copper tubes with an optical fiber in the middle are placed directly into this structure. Depending on the design of the cable, the tubes may be spun, and they may be intertwined with each other in different ways. Below are some examples of how to organize the cable core:

The optical fibers laid in the copper tubes are filled with hydrophobic thixotropic gel, and the metal elements of the structure are vicorized to organize the remote electrical supply of intermediate regenerators - devices that are being renovated here. However, the shape of the optical pulse, which spreads along the fiber, causes interference.

The cut looks similar to this:

Virobnitsvo cable

The particularity of the production of optical deepwater cables is those that are most often distributed near the ports of the yakomaga, closer to the seashore. One of the main reasons for such placement is that the linear kilometer of the cable can reach a mass of several tons, and in order to shorten the necessary amount of growth during the installation process, the cable duct cannot be destroyed. The minimum length for such a cable is 4 km, which can be approximately 15 tons. As can be understood from the above, transportation of such deep-water bays is not the simplest logistical task for land transport. Simple for winding cables, wooden drums do not vibrate the previously described mass and for transporting OK on land, for example, it is necessary to deposit the entire dovetail “weight” on the paired loading platforms, so as not to damage the optical fiber in the middle designs.

Cable laying

One would think that with such a tough-looking product, one could drag it onto a ship and throw it into the abyss of the sea. The reality is a little different. Laying a cable route is a challenging and laborious process. The route is, of course, economically viable and safe, while the use of various ways to protect the cable leads to increased efficiency of the project and greater profitability. Whenever a cable is laid between different edges, it is necessary to revoke the permit for the vicinity of coastal waters on the same edge, it is necessary to revoke all necessary permits and licenses for the installation of the cable. treasure troves. Subsequently, geological exploration is carried out, an assessment of seismic activity in the region, volcanism, the severity of underwater sounds and other natural disasters in the region where the work is carried out and further , lay cable. Meteorologists' forecasts also play an important role, so that the terms of operation are correct. During geological exploration, the route takes into account a wide range of parameters: depth, bottom topology, soil thickness, the presence of third-party objects, the type of boulders or sunken ships. Possible recovery from the cob route is also assessed. It is possible to tighten the cable and increase the power and efficiency of the work. Only after all necessary preparations have been completed, the cable can be secured on the ship and installation can begin.

Well, from the gif the installation process becomes extremely clear.

Laying a fiber optic cable on the sea/ocean bottom passes continuously from point A to point B. The cable is laid in coils on a ship and transported to the place of descent to the bottom. For example, these bays look like this:

If you wonder what she has covered up, then show your respect in this photo:

After the ship goes to sea, the technical support to the process is lost. A team of layers, assisted by special machines, unwinds the cable with great fluidity and, saving the necessary tension on the cable, sticks it behind the laid route.

It looks like this from the side:

In case of any problems, breaks or damage to the transmission cable, special anchors are used to lift it to the surface and repair the problematic section of the line.

And, as a result, we can now comfortably and at high speed see photos and videos of cats from all over the world on the Internet.

In the comments to the statistics about the Google project koristuvach nadav, perhaps, whoever needs it.

The cables presented in this section of our online store “AquaCenter” are intended for stationary and non-stationary installation, both in the middle and outside. Such elements are widely found in open soil and in cable ducts, including in unsafe areas of all types and places that are susceptible to the influx of stray streams.

The KVV and KVVP underwater cables serve as a booster element to various electrical appliances, devices and devices with a rated voltage of up to 660V alternating current (frequency 400Hz) or 1000V constant current.

Cables for underwater installation may suffer from extreme temperatures.

Zvičaine Vikonannia -40 ° to +80 ° C;

Refrigeration resistant "HL" - -60 ° to +80 ° C;

Thermal resistance "105" - 40° to +105°C.

So it turns out that such cables can be installed in any climatic regions, including the distant mountains and tropics. However, the installation of such cables must be carried out at temperatures not lower than 15°C (primarily cold) or 30°C (cold-freezing) below zero. These cables are not subject to direct interference. If operational care is taken at all times, the submarine cable will last at least 20-30 years.

Construction

The cable for underwater laying KVV or KVVP is a rich core (not lower than the fourth class) of straight twisting or strands (pairs/threes/fours) with digital or color-coded cores. On top of the core there is a special winding made of water-insulating stitching, which overcomes moisture in the event of mechanical damage to the outer shell.

The KVV and KVVP submarine cables are usually produced with a sheath and insulation made of polyvinyl chloride (PVC), with middle high-tensile conductors. I'm talking about armored cables (KVVB) - that is, galvanized steel is used or there is strech armor. Such cables can connect an insulating screen between an aluminum flex and a drainage tinned copper conductor.

The AquaCenter online store sells submarine cables in a wide range of choices. You can choose a wholesale plumber for your specific needs from our electronic catalogs, which are available freely on our website!

How many fates does the Internet have?
Well, let’s face it, the fragments of our creations are not on empty ground. On June 1, 1983, the ARPANET network launched modernized network security software that allowed it to interact with other networks, based on different technical standards, with such downtime that was previously unattainable, What allowed us to call them Interconnected Networks? ) or briefly – the Internet.

The ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network) network was created in 1969 in the USA, and the first information about it was supposed to be sent on June 1, 1969. Unfazed by the reach of ARPANET, it suddenly had a serious opponent, the inter-university network NSFNet, which was apparently small due to the large capacity of the building, and in the 1990s, having lost in the competitive struggle, ARPANET abandoned its Sleeping. In all respects, this year’s fate will mark the Internet’s thirtieth birthday.

Who is everything?
It is clear that such a global structure is the result of the research of thousands of engineers, and the basis of packet communication technology was almost the same as that of Paul Baran and Donald Watt Davis.
Paul Baran, who was born in 1926 in the same Polish town of Grodno, moved from his father to the USA with a courtier. In 1960, he was already a member of the “brain center” of the Rand Corporation, and as part of the task (to create a universal way of organizing communication between various scientific centers), he decided to transfer information ations for the analogy with the common buttermilk, which you could get yourself, without water Information about the parameters that allow you to accurately combine new tracks with existing ones. In the process, Paul discovered a more suitable recording method for this purpose, a less analogue recording method - digital, and wrote an article about all his findings, which was published in a secret preprint of the Rand Corporation in 1962.

Along with Baran, Donald Davis, a scientist at the British, at that time also secret National Physical Laboratory, developed a similar theory. We created a small measure for the laboratory based on new principles of communication and the use of the term “package”.

How many fates does the World Wide Web have?
In 1980, the English physicist Tim Bernes-Lee spent his first time working at the Geneva European laboratory CERN as a consultant in software development. Having shown himself to be nasty, he became a full-fledged spivorotenik of the laboratory of wines in 1984, when he began to solve the problem of processing and reporting the results of scientific research in real time.

In 1989, the plan was announced, and in the spring of 1990, CERN scientists commissioned the first “web server” and “web browser”, written by Tim. The credibility of the European project "WWW" - "World Wide Web" was so obvious that already in 1991 the American project "Internet" was formed, and today our skin is on the right of the World These webs are practically daily.

How many people benefit from the servants of Merezha?
First of all, we need to understand that we can’t know exactly who anyone is, since the number is subject to change. And yet, the scams are being carried out steadily, and it’s understandable that such information can be used by the rich, from businessmen to military people, and that’s worth a lot of pennies, and a lot of them. There are clear leaders in the market for these services, including commercial structures Nielsen//NetRatings, NUA, eMarketer, IDC, eTForecast. Look around the Internet and forecasts are also made by UNESCO Observatory of the Information Society, International Telecommunication Union (ITU).

How to ensure connections between continents?
What is the underwater communication cable used for? In 1851 An engineer named Bret laid the first submarine cable across the English Channel, thus connecting England with continental Europe by telegraph connection. It has become possible to start using gutta-percha - a mixture of water that is used to isolate water and carry strings. The first telegram transmitted by submarine cable was the greeting of US President James Buchanan by Queen Victoria of Great Britain in 1856. That old reinforced cable, insulated with gutta-percha (the product of engineer Siemens) connected the shores of Ireland and Newfoundland. It was expensive, it was technically underdeveloped, and only after 1866 the telegraph line began to work steadily, at which the speed of information transmission became only 17 rubles per line. Current submarine cables use fiber optic technologies. The first such cable was laid in 1988.

Fiber optic cable at the outlet. 1 – polyethylene, 2 – Mylar melt, 3 – non-metal cores, 4 – aluminum hydrocarbon ball, 5 – polycarbonate, 6 – copper (or aluminum) tube, 7 – rare paraffin (Vaseline), 8 – wholesale the curls lived.

Today, such cables, laid under the water and the Light Ocean, connect all continents, except Antarctica. After approximately 100 km, an EDFA booster is installed to improve the strength of the optical signal. The Internet contains a list of underwater communication cables.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_international_submarine_communications_cables

Map of submarine communication cables

In everyday life, the underwater cable does not look at all romantic, its kilometer is up to 10 tons, its diameter is 69 mm, and, like any underwater cable, there may be damage - anchors, dredgers, special construction, etc. worked repeatedly for an hour Other light wars, or maybe just purchases by smugglers, who can bring copper into the metal market, which is being quarried in New York.

How should the world be wary of high-volume communication traffic?
The traffic map, in order to capture the information that is transmitted along the Merezha, is carefully avoided with the Earth's accessibility map, which is understandable.

Global traffic map

At the same time, the geography of information transfer, due to the great dissatisfaction of the American intelligence services, has noticeably changed over the past 10 years: whereas previously 70% of world traffic flowed through American communication lines, then those The pepper indicator does not exceed 25%. But this is the nature of Merezha and nothing can be gained from it. At the right time, the Americans were inspired to invest a lot of money in optical fiber, and the results were not disappointing. At the same time, India and China are actively investing heavily in the Internet technologies of the new generation, and it is completely obvious that further changes in traffic are still possible.

Since the number of Internet users across continents is related to the number of people living on them, it is clear that the greatest prospects for growth in this indicator and, obviously, growth in traffic are lost in the Asian region and Africa. This means that they are the most promising and from a commercial point of view of the region, not to be ignored by transnational financial corporations.

Land availability map.

...
At the same time, the Unity subsea cable is being deployed for 10,000 km, which will connect the Pacific coast of the United States with Japan, which is already underway. This cable has 5 fibers, and the cable will have a throughput of 960 Gbit/s. The number of fibers can be increased to 8, so the capacity of the warehouse channel will be 7.68 Tbit/s, which is almost twice as high as today’s data. Why not create a global awareness of underwater communications? Everything comes down to pennies, which are required at once (as Nemertes Research thinks) at least 91 billion pounds sterling. Why do as many as six corporations invest money in the first line of the Unity cable (Google). So maybe you can masquerade on the satellite signal? And again money: the cost of systems based on submarine fiber optic cables is lower (one telephone channel - $ 5-10 per river), lower than satellite communication systems with similar bandwidth (one telephone channel - about $ 50 per river), and , As we already know, space is already cramped.

Our company is engaged in the sale of various brands of submarine cables from warehouses distributed throughout Russia, or for production. The representatives of “Kable.RF” know everything about this product, so they can competently advise you on the choice of submarine cables with technical support, help you arrange timely delivery and select the appropriate type of transport.

Submarine cables should be frozen if it is necessary to stop laying power and distribution lines intended for transmitting constant voltage up to 200 kV and alternating voltage up to 500 kV with a frequency of no more than 50 Hz, along the bottom freshwater and saltwater. In addition, submarine cables are used for connecting to offshore drilling platforms, connecting coastal wind-generating electrical installations, for connecting various water-based equipment, stationary installation of lanyard controls using underwater mechanisms, ensuring life support for geophysical surveying and drilling of drill holes, as well as transmitting analogue digital signals . Submarine cables may be laid at depths greater than 500 m and at water temperatures greater than +70 °C.

The cable for underwater installation is produced with single or multi-tension wire conductors, which are shaped in a round or sector shape. To prepare them, use a mixture of aluminum, copper and tin. For their characteristics, prescribed in GOST 22483, they lived up to 1-5 classes. To protect the flux-conducting veins from flooding, vologgers add special water-blocking threads to them. Cables that are assembled for underwater installation are vibrated in single-core and multi-core versions. An insulating ball made of silane-cross-linked polyethylene, ethylene-propylene gum, polyvinyl chloride plastic compound, as well as cable paper, infiltrated in special warehouses, is applied to the conductors of submarine cables. The cable conductors of underwater rich-conductor cables are twisted into a core and filled with free space with paper or humum bundles, hydrophobic material. The inner sheath of polyvinyl chloride plastic compound, polyethylene, rubber or lead tube can be applied to the cable core. Due to the influx of electromagnetic vibration, the cable for underwater installation may be subject to theft by the screen, which appears to be braided with a copper wire. To protect against possible damage to the design of cables intended for stationary laying along the bottom by water, armor is included, which is made of galvanized steel rods. On top of the screen and armor are applied a dry fiber coating and an outer shell made of polyethylene, polyvinyl chloride plastic compound and gum, ethylene propylene oxide.

High-voltage submarine cables are responsible for a number of dry screens that reduce the level of electromagnetic transients that fail. The screens are made from a high-quality paper, a polymer composition or gum, as well as copper stitching and braiding from copper. A water-blocking ball is placed on top of the screen with a copper thread and a polyethylene outer shell.

main advantages

Make it possible to provide electricity to remote islands that have their own power plants;
. Power supply on oil and gas production platforms is connected to the life line via submarine cables.

You can buy a submarine cable from us at a great price, for which you will need to submit a request for a job description to the company manager.

It is common to think that the world's information network is elusive. And this is partly true. Over the last hundred years, the atmosphere of the planet has transformed from a banal madness of nitrogen and sourness into a thick broth of radioactive waste. But it’s not a good idea to have mercy - without information, first of all, it’s necessary to walk a short distance along the wires, most of which are laid on the ocean day.

Volodymyr Sannikov

Attempts to connect continents with wires began with the failure of the telegraph itself. In 1840, the English professor Whitstone presented to parliament a project for laying a submarine cable from Dover to the French coast, without wasting legislators and, obviously, pennies.

Two years later, the owner of the most advanced version of the telegraph, Samuel Morse, connected the shores of New York Bay with a cable and transmitted the message. He also conveyed that the telegraph recently connected the Old World with the New. Ten years later, the company of the brothers John and Jacob Brett launched a telegraphic communication between England and France, passing through a single-strand copper drilt, covered with gutta-percha and steel braiding, under the waters of the English Channel.

Nexans Skaggerak is a specialized vessel built in 1976 by the new company Øgreys Mekaniske Verksted for the underwater installation of power cables and hose lines. In January 2010 the ship was modernized at the Cammell Laird repair docks near Birkenhead, England. The vessel was sawed crosswise, and an additional section of 12.5 meters was welded between the two halves. A new turning platform was also installed on Skagerrak. On the right in the photo is a power cable intended for laying at sea, which comes from the shore along a special conveyor, which includes very sharp bends, and is folded into a special cylindrical container. A current submarine power cable can have a diameter of approximately 100 mm. A meter of such a “thread” can generally stretch a couple of tens of kilograms, so it’s not surprising that to control the laying of a thread, a number of strong roboticists are required. Below in the photo is a turntable mounted on Skagerrak, it has a diameter of 29 meters and a total capacity of 7000 tons, with a volume of 2000 cubic meters.

The person who united the Old and the New World in a mellow way became the American entrepreneur Cyrus Field, who founded the New York-Newfoundland and London Telegraph Company in 1854. Samuel Morse, known to us, became Vice President. The laying of cables began in 1857 as a result of the unification of the US and Great Britain, which was used to serve as cable-laying ships for military ships: the steamship Niagara and the steam-sailing battleship Agamemnon. A 620 km cable was laid at the bottom of the Atlantic, after which it broke.

The next test was carried out across the river - "Niagara" and "Agamemnon", having connected the ends of the cable in the middle of the ocean, the sides broke in different directions. After many losses, the ships turned back to Ireland to replenish supplies. The offensive start - at the same time - brought success, which few people could hope for. Ale... the telegraph was processed for almost a month and lock.

The independent Field returned to its turn in 1865, chartering the largest ship of that time, the Great Eastern, as a cable-laying ship. Three quarters of the line were laid on the bottom, when 2 crescents of the cable broke again and fell to the bottom. Nareshti, in 1866 the telegraph line crossed the Atlantic, and at the beginning of the last century - the boundless Pacific Ocean.

Already until the 30s of the 20th century, the main problem of intercontinental communications was the low intensity of insulation. The main materials for its production were natural polymers, rubber and gutta-percha, the cable was wrapped in steel armor, and on the coastal plots the armor was made of double balls to protect anchors and fishing gear.

The possibility of transmitting data over thousands of kilometers at once is perceived as reliable - for hundreds of years, no one is surprised. There are technological tricks behind the obvious. All-World Merezha - it is not less throughput and length, but also mass and obscurity. To get into the cable, just look at the drum, which stores the burnt cable. The dimensions of this “cat” fully correspond to the scale of the tasks involved. A daily cable drum on a specialized vessel costs thousands of tons and cubic meters, plus special systems for cable laying and unwinding. And there are three such drums on the flagships of the “wire fleet”. The design is responsible for ensuring winding, unwinding and saving the cable without kinks, strong stress and other extremes. With this very knitting, the large diameter of the “spool” - the current underwater darts are not covered for serious weight, so it is not possible to cut the skein too tightly - it breaks.

Today's fiber optic cables are susceptible to damage from corrosive seawater and mechanical damage. A bundle of transmission fibers “floats” in a gel hydrophobic coating in the middle of a copper or aluminum tube, covered with a ball of elastic polycarbonate and an aluminum screen. The offensive ball of torsion is made of steel, covered with a mylar stitch. Call the cable for the polyethylene shirt. Another option is a cable with a profiled load-bearing core. In this scheme, up to eight optical pairs are located in the middle of the skin of six channels extruded from a polyethylene cord, filled with gel. The pairs are protected by a wound mylar stitch, a copper screen and a similar polyethylene braid. A thick steel thread is laid at the center of the cord to give the cable rigidity. The warranty on submarine cables is not less than 25 years.

Stars will rewind the Internet

The first attempt to install an underwater signal transmission cable - also telegraph - was built in Russia in 1812 by P. Schilling to transport sea mines from the shore, protected by an electric fuse.
The first attempt to lay a telegraph cable under water was made in 1839 in India. The Indian Telegraph Company laid a cable at the bottom of the Hooghly River, near Calcutta. It’s a pity that the data from the recovery line did not reach us.
The first transatlantic cable was laid in 1858, having served for almost a month. Cables 1865-66 pp. served without repair for about five years, and a number of sections of the 1873 cable (Ireland - Newfoundland) - about ninety years.
Until 1900, the world had 1,750 underwater telegraph lines with a total length of approximately 300 thousand kilometers. The first telephone line across the Atlantic was laid in 1956.
The discovered underwater power cable lays on the bottom of the Pivnichny Sea between Eemshaven (Netherlands) and Feda (Norway). The length of the NorNed line is 580 km, it is insured for 700 MW. Exploitation began in 2008.
The life of the Unity line, which joined Japan (Chikura place) in 2010 from the outer shores of the United States (Los Angeles) at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean, becomes 10 thousand. km, capacity - 7.68 Tbit/s.

High-voltage mains that connect islands from the Great Land, naphtha platforms and wind power plants are even more often stolen for communications. The conductors are three copper days, the skin of which is shielded with a conductor stitch and a thick ball of insulator made of cross-linked polyethylene. Another screen is laid on top of the insulator, and a waterproof stitch is wound. The skin wire conductor is covered with a sealed lead sheath and anti-corrosion polyethylene braid. Since ethylene propylene gum (EPR) is vicorized in the core of the main insulator, the lead ball is often not vicorized to make the structure lighter. At least one fiber optic pair is connected to the current power cable for data transmission. Conductors and optical fibers are filled with polypropylene or polyethylene, covered with reinforced stitching, polymer braiding, steel armor and another ball of polyethylene yarn with a thickness of at least 4 mm. As a rule, such cables serve every day for dozens of years. The rapid development of offshore wind energy and the oil and gas industry has led to the fact that at this time all the factories on the planet producing submarine power cables are working at the limit. And it only grows on its products.

Italian cable laying machine Gliulio Verne

On the right is technology

Well, the world traffic flow is simply divine - according to data from the Telegeography agency, since 2007, wine has grown by 100% on the river. Underwater power lines are growing at the same time as alternative energy. We have an external cable. We are deprived of the ability to connect our islands and continents.

The creation of a submarine cable system is a complex operation that involves top-class professionals in extreme minds with surgical precision. The optimal route appears in front of us. Using special vessels equipped with long-range sonars, underwater vehicles with remote monitoring and acoustic Doppler profilometers, oceanologists trace the bottom areas, like a thin line of water. The altitude profile of the route, the storage of bottom soil, the seismic activity of the zone, the presence and nature of flows, natural and artificial changes in the laying corridor are carefully recorded and analyzed. After removing the data, a line configuration and a technological laying map are formed. Buoys equipped with GPS transmissions and radio beacons are placed at critical points along the route. After this, cable-laying vessels take over.

Cable Innovator with a water capacity of 10,557 tons is the largest vessel in the world designed for laying optical cables. Produced in 1995 at the Finnish shipyards of Kvaerner Masa, owned by Global Marine Systems. Three 17-meter drums can accommodate 2,333 tons of leather cable. For 60 days, a ship with a crew of dozens of people can operate in full autonomy mode, reeling out the cable line at a speed of up to 6.6 knots (a little more than 12 km/year).

There are no serious connections between cable vessels for laying power and communication lines. The difference is limited to specific equipment. In addition, the “security forces” are expected to work near coastal areas, and the optics are to be deployed thousands of kilometers near the open sea. The world's largest and most productive vessels that specialize in high-voltage mains are the Norwegian laying vessel Skagerrak, which belongs to the Nexans company, and the Giulio Verne of the Italian corporation Prysmian Group. Cable Innovator from the Global Marine Systems fleet with a water capacity of 10,557 tons does not have the same number of “connectors” - it can take on board 8,500 km of optical cable. The largest fleets of cable ships are based in the Pacific Ocean - all of the ships work for the American company SubCom and much of the Japanese competitor NEC. Characteristic features of cable laying machines are a small working draft, which does not exceed 10 m, the lining is equipped with systems of dynamic positioning and hydroacoustic orientation, as well as extremely sensitive crashes, which allow Adjust the fluidity with pharmaceutical precision. The current cable laying plant is equipped with a large cable winch machine, which develops a thrust of up to 50 tons, which lowers the cable into the water at a speed of about 1.5 km/year. In addition, on board there are cranes for tightening and lifting underwater vehicles, devices for cutting and cutting, diving equipment and much more.

A schematic map of the first transatlantic cable, laid at the bottom in 1858. Due to the imperfect design, poor insulation, and too much voltage for transmission, the bonding line continued to work for almost a month, and the viscosity and, apparently, the fluidity of the bond You spent the whole hour being inferior for any criticism. On June 1, 1858, the final message was transmitted across the Atlantic, after which the continents became separated again. Until 1861, about 20 thousand kilometers of submarine cable were laid in various parts of the world, and the work station had three more than a quarter of them. America and Europe remained connected by telegraph on June 27, 1866, after which the connections never broke for more than a year.

Renting such a marvel of technology costs approximately $100,000 per piece, but the price is outweighed by the proposition. For example, the Tyco Resolute cable laying machine of the SubCom company, cylindrical hangars that can accommodate 2500 km of optical cable, is secured by robots in advance. The same can be said about Skagerrak. Others cannot sit without work: fishing gear, ship anchors, ships and earthquakes that pierce underwater highways, keep a squadron of cable ships in constant combat readiness. Cases of cable rupture through shark bites and theft of tens of kilometers of power lines by pirates have been recorded. The Atlantic Ocean is ending with up to 50 repair operations on the river. Ale tse right technology...

To the bottom

Laying any cable begins out of the blue. This jewelry operation is to be carried out by a team of last-ditch divers. The cable-laying machine comes closer to the shore, stands at a given course and releases the necessary section of “thread” into the water, connected to the tension cable, first leading from the shore through a long pipe screwed into the ground. During this operation, hang the winding cable on the floats to avoid critical kinks and tangles. The process of removing the cable and cable to the connection panel is monitored visually by means of television cameras - repairing this section of the line will be much easier, no matter what else. Checking the integrity of the signal supply cable (or voltage, such as the power supply) is carried out at the time of establishing a steady state. As if everything is normal - the pipe is walled up at the side of the sea, water is pumped out of it, and instead of it, an anti-corrosion mixture of inhibitors, biocides, which kill water bacteria, and a deoxidizing agent is supplied The muslin is rotting. Coastal laying, unimportant of simplicity, - the found stage works. The team of Björn Ladegaard, an engineer at Nexans, needed three years to ensure that the greatest power was reached on the beaches of Mallorca at a distance of almost 500 m!

Everything is simpler in the open sea, but it has its own difficulties. The relief of the seabed is rarely suitable for the so-called free laying, if the thread is lowered directly onto the ground. Thus, the power line between Spain and the Balearics was dug over a distance of 283 km, including over a kilometer in the depths. Another 23 km was lost near the rocks!

In underwater networks, the engineers’ indispensable assistants are deep-water devices with remote control via a hose-cable. The drivers of the Nexans company have three machines in their possession. Small and nimble CapTrack with a complex of sensors, a GPS transmitter, spotlights and television cameras for operational monitoring and precise placement of the “thread” on the bottom. On plots with an extremely foldable topography, an underwater Spider bulldozer is installed with additional equipment in the form of a drill head, water cannons and a pressure pump. The Spider manipulator arm can be equipped with a whole range of motor tools used for construction. Most of the work on the routes is carried out by the Capjet trenching machine with its water-jet plow. The cracked soil is gradually pumped out by a pump from a two-meter trench and fed behind the stern of the Capjet, where the cable is laid.

If the gasket path reveals more serious problems, engineers will need to replace the arched transition systems. The cable in a special sleeve is suspended on anchored sealed steel cylinders on the outside. Due to the presence of “associated” pipelines, the cable is secured with special clips. If you have to “step over” the pipes, concrete areas or dry hoses are put in place, which are laid at the required place by underwater vehicles. In areas with persistent bottom flows, the cable, even if it is a cylindrical body, is subject to the flow of vortex vibrations. Step by step, the invisible eyes of the high-frequency pounding fall on the concrete beams. To combat this disease, the “thread” is wrapped around a plastic spiral-like “feather”. To prevent abrasion of the insulation on hard soil, use soft polyurethane materials or stitch protectors. All operations with the installation, straightening of the cable, installation of new support and control equipment are carried out on the vessel immediately before laying the plot on the bottom. At the end of the route, the cable-laying operator repeats the operation from the mainline to the shore. After this line is tested and put into operation.

Wouldn’t it be simpler to launch a couple of satellites into orbit, you ask? It's not simpler. Speeds are not the same - megabits per second are no longer suitable for the 21st century. The same gigabytes. Underwater treatments are completely on the right.