Coverage of the .to internet outage

Fri Jan 21 01:04:42 UTC 2022

From: "Jay R. Ashworth" <jra at baylink.com>

This piece:
https://www.npr.org/2022/01/18/1073863310/an-undersea-cable-fault-could-cut-tonga-from-the-rest-of-the-world-for-weeks

drills down to this piece with slightly more detail:
https://www.reuters.com/markets/funds/undersea-cable-fault-could-cut-off-tonga-rest-world-weeks-2022-01-18/

I'm told their national carrier is trying to bring in a ground station as
well, though not whom it will connect to.

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On Wed, 19 Jan 2022 at 15:50, Scott Weeks <surfer at mauigateway.com> wrote:

It's hard to imagine they don't have a lot of Kacific Terminals or other 
satellite connectivity there.

That's what most of the South Pacific uses and all used before the 
cables were laid.  Maybe the journalists

missed that like they miss things when talking about our stuff?

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On 1/20/2022 8:18 AM, Eric Kuhnke wrote:
> If you're a small pacific island nation state with a limited budget, 
> and a working submarine cable, maintaining a SCPC geostationary 
> satellite service that might be $20,000 a month (on 36-60 month term) 
> in transponder kHz may seem like a very large ongoing expense.
>
> Ideally it would be possible to keep a backup circuit operating in a 
> very narrow section of kHz during normal times. Along with the 
> contractual ability to significantly expand it on demand, but more 
> capacity on the same satellite/same polarity without physical 
> reconfiguration of the remote end earth station may not always be 
> possible.
> ---------------------------------------------------

Digicel just got them back online via sat:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/digicel-reconnects-tongan-users-via-satellite-to-rest-of-the-world
Digicel reconnects Tongan users via satellite to rest of the world

"Telco handing out free SIMs to let people reconnect."

"Digicel said on Wednesday night it successfully re-established 
international communication with its Tongan network thanks to a 
satellite link."

"A preliminary technical fault investigation has established that there 
are two separate undersea cable breaks. The first between TCL cable 
landing station Sopu, Tongatapu, and FINTEL cable landing station in 
Suva, Fiji," Digicel said.

"The international cable break is approximately 37km offshore from 
Tonga. The second cable break is on the domestic cable which is near the 
area of the recent volcanic activity."

scott

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