Submarine Cable Repairs Underway in South Africa

A clock in South Africa is counting down the seconds until a pair of broken cables are expected to go back in service. Every few hours, the service provider TENET, which keeps South Africa’s university and research facilities connected to the global Internet, tweets updates.

The eight-year-old West Africa Cable System (WACS) submarine cable, which runs parallel to Africa’s west coast, broke at two points early on 16 January. That same day, an 18-year-old cable called SAT-3 that runs along the same route also broke.