David Millar – Thales GeoSolutions (Pacific), Inc., USA
Bill Gilmour – Thales GeoSolutions (Pacific), Inc., USA
Bruce Rein – GCI, USA
Given the
Thales GeoSolutions (Pacific), Inc., has recently launched a web site that is aimed at providing cable awareness information on behalf of cable owners to the fishing industry. Over the past three years, Thales
GeoSolutions has been promoting a conceptual system that would provide fishermen and other interested parties with “basic RPL data” and “cable awareness charts” over the Internet. This concept is now a reality and the site has been live since August 2002. GCI, which owns and operates Alaska United Fiber Optic Cable
System, has recently added CableAwareness.com as part of its cable protection strategy. It is hoped that the site will gain acceptance and ultimately become the source for all cable awareness data and products.
The Traditional Approach to Cable Awareness
The concepts of cable awareness and cable protection are not new. In fact, they have been issues since submarine cables were first installed in the mid-1800s. Despite significant increases in both the number of submarine cable systems and submarine cable owners and the technological advances of “the day”, cable protection is handled very similarly today as it was 25 years ago. Cable owners typically provide and advertise a telephone “Help Line”. They now also provide access to cable information via their own website. There has also been a recent movement to set up local arrangements with local fisheries groups. In all cases, the cable owners and/or maintenance authorities produce cable awareness charts, chartlets and/or electronic charts and distribute these to fishermen directly or via fisheries groups.

While these methods “work”, there is significant room for improvement. There is currently very limited coordination and collaboration between cable owners. There is no single source of information for submarine cables within a given area. As a result, fishermen or fishing organizations must go to several different sources for cable information within a given area. In many cases, there will be several cable awareness charts available for the same area, each focusing on the cables of a particular owner. In addition there is no standardization in the type of cable awareness information provided and no standardization in the way updates are handled. It is obvious that there is a great deal of duplication and redundancy and that it is very confusing to the fishing community.
The CableAwareness.com Approach to Cable Awareness
The ultimate goal of CableAwareness.com is to provide a single source for accurate and up-to-date “cable awareness charts” and “simple” RPL data. It is hoped that this will address many of the deficiencies outlined above. CableAwareness.com provides the infrastructure for cable owners to manage and distribute cable awareness data and products to mariners operating in the vicinity of their submarine cable. Cable RPL data and current notes on any repair or maintenance activity may be uploaded or edited remotely via an Internet browser, allowing site management from any location. Data security is enacted by infrastructure as a virtual private network and by using secure socket layer 3.0 as data encryption protection during transmission. The site allows fishermen, fishing organizations and other interested parties with a mechanism to view, print and download both coordinate listings of the cables and limited extents “chartlets” that show the cable routes over standard nautical charts. There is also a proximity tool, where the user can enter geographic coordinates and the system will provide a listing of the closest cables along with a range and bearing to each of those cables. In addition, there are quick links available that provide emergency contact information for the owner of any submarine cable system.
Benefits to the Cable Owners and Operators
From the owners’ perspective, the system provides a powerful and inexpensive method to provide the same information that has historically been distributed to mariners. There is no loss of control, in the sense that cable owners still upload and edit their own data and each owner has secure access to their data only. This data is immediately superimposed over the appropriate backgrounds and served via the map server. The site also provides a single source, controlled record of the cable positional data throughout the cable owners’ company, disbursed over a wide geographic area. All operations and engineering departments will have instantaneous and user friendly access to the positional data. Traditionally, these data were distributed through a companywide intranet system, but due to data control, compatibility and software licensing issues through different departments, there has been limited access to this data. So, not only can this information be used outside the organization for cable protection purposes, it can also provide great value within an organization. Best of all,

the cable owner does not need to worry about expensive infrastructure investment or server administration and support. Instead, the cable owner can rely on a subscription to a reliable and professional third party service that has considerable experience in dealing with their requirements. By utilizing a web-based system, the cable owner has access to the data for review or update from any worldwide location on a 7/24 basis. This enables prompt and well-informed action in the event of an emergency. The proximity function allows the user to input a geographical location and calculate the bearing and distance to the nearest cable segments. Thus, input of a position received from an emergency call can aid in any decision related to the “cutting away” of fishing gear, if a submarine cable is nearby.
Benefits to the Users and Fishermen
From the user’s perspective, the system provides ‘round the clock access to the latest cable information for
“all” cables within their operating area. The concept of a single site to access this type of information increases the likelihood of routine usage from fishermen. As new cable systems are introduced, and as the value and the capacity of cable systems continue to increase, such an approach to cable protection will be extremely important to both cable owners and fishermen. Ideally the site will reduce or eliminate the current problem where extensive research is required to identify and locate all cables within a particular area. For the fishermen, it would greatly increase the awareness of “all” cables within a region and not just the most advertised or most recently damaged cable. Given the ever-increasing pressures within the fishing community to fish areas outside normal and/or known grounds, the site can provide a quick reference of the cables within an area. The site is very easy to use and users can easily identify the names of cable systems and find out the owners of those cable systems within their area of interest. What’s more, they can quickly get to emergency contact information, RPL data, and the chartlets themselves.
Conclusions
For CableAwareness.com to succeed and ultimately achieve its goal, there must be a change in the mindset of submarine cable owners. Cable owners must become more willing to share basic submarine cable data. These data are already provided to international hydrographic offices, are already published on their charts, and of course, are also already provided to local fishermen and local fishing organizations, in the form of RPL listings and chartlets. CableAwareness.com does not change the type of information that is distributed, it simply provides an infrastructure for consolidating the information and changes the manner in which that information is distributed. Because of this consolidated infrastructure, the administrative and management burden and as a result the costs to individual cable companies will decrease. GCI has recognized the value of
CableAwareness.com and it is hoped that other cable owners and cable protection organizations will ultimately adopt such an approach to cable awareness.