Engineers overcome stormy weather to fix JT cable in English Channel

Friday 22 January 2016

JT’s continued investment in a resilient telecommunications network connecting the Channel Islands to the UK and France ensured that when one of its undersea cables was cut in a rare marine incident last week, services continued as normal for local customers.

During the recent stormy weather, a ship dropped its anchor in the English Channel, inadvertently severing one of the network cables which carries voice and data services between the Channel Islands and the rest of the world.

JT’s sophisticated monitoring systems detected the fault immediately and all communications traffic was automatically re-routed to other cables in the network without any disruption to service.

The operation to repair the cable began immediately, and was completed within seven days.

Despite the continued poor weather, a specialist ship needed to visit the site of the cable-break, and used specialist equipment to locate and repair the damage. Around 800-metres of cable was cut out using remote controlled underwater equipment, lifted on board the ship, re-jointed and subsequently lowered back down onto the sea-bed. In the process the ship also recovered the anchor of the ship causing the damage.

JT’s Chief Operations and Technology Officer, Dave Newbold said: “Incidents like this are thankfully very rare indeed, but when they do happen, they underline exactly why we invest millions of pounds to install, and then maintain, a network of high-speed, high-capacity communications cables, in addition to the essential monitoring and management systems which keep the network running smoothly.

“Given the recent stormy weather, getting a cable fixed beneath the English Channel in just a few days was a physically tough, and technically challenging task, and I’d like to thank our partners BT and Zayo, as well as my team at JT, for their skill and resilience in getting it done.

“We expect our telecoms systems just to work when we want them to, and it is JT’s responsibility to make sure that happens – whilst we never want incidents of this type to take place, when they do, they also shine a light on the work which goes on behind the scenes, and the investment which has been made, to make sure the islands stay connected.”