Undersea cable cuts: voice, data services restored by 90%- NCC

David Afolayan
According to the NCC, all operators who were impacted by the cuts have taken recovery capacity from submarine cables which were not impacted by the cuts…
All you need to know about Google's 144 terabit-per-seconds capacity subsea cable, Equiano

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has announced that the voice and data services affected by the cable cuts have now been restored to approximately 90% of their peak utilization capacities. This is according to a statement issued today by the agency’s Director of Public Affairs, Dr Reuben Muoka.

According to the statement, all operators who were impacted by the cuts have taken recovery capacity from submarine broadband fibres which were not impacted by the cuts, and have thus recovered approximately 90% of their peak utilisation capacities.

The NCC also assured users that Mobile Network Operators have assured the Commission that data and voice services would operate optimally pending full repairs of the undersea cables as they have managed to activate alternative connectivities to bring back the situation to normalcy.

This follows a notice by the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) last Thursday that the operators of damaged international undersea cables that have caused Internet service disruption in Nigeria and other countries, have begun repair works and are gradually restoring services. The NCC assured that operators will work round the clock to ensure that services are restored to the affected countries within the shortest possible time. 

Meanwhile, reports earlier today indicated that fixing the damaged undersea fibres and restoring full service would take at least 5 weeks.

Damaged SAT-3, ACE subsea cables undergoing repairs after rockfall incident
Damaged SAT-3, ACE subsea cables undergoing repairs after rockfall incident

Read here: NIMC denies data breach as Ghana’s NCA says repairs could take 5 weeks

Ghana’s National Communication Authority arrived at this conclusion after a meeting with four subsea cable landing service providers and telcos. The landing service providers include the Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), Equinix’s MainOne, South Atlantic 3, and the West Africa Cable System.

At the meeting, the landing service providers revealed the approximate location of the damage and noted that they had made arrangements to send repair vessels to the location.

Undersea cable cuts: A backstory

Recall that four undersea telecommunications cables went offline around the same time on Thursday, 14 March 2024 — the West Africa Cable System (WACS), Africa Coast to Europe (ACE), MainOne, and SAT–3. Bloomberg reports gathered that the damage affected major undersea cables near Abidjan in Côte d’Ivoire.

These outages caused major Internet disruptions across the continent, including Nigeria and South Africa.

In Nigeria for instance, bank customers and telecom subscribers have been bearing the brunt of the internet service disruption as many could not transact business on their accounts. Telecom data services have become very poor, frustrating many subscribers.

According to reports from local media, the undersea damage has also caused a massive internet problem in South Africa.  

A map of installed and soon-to-be installed subsea cables in Nigeria
A map of installed and soon-to-be installed subsea cables in Nigeria…

South African publication, My Broadband reported that WIOCC group business development head Darren Bedford confirmed that multiple undersea cables operating along Africa’s West coast are experiencing outages.

Similar: NIN-SIM linkage: NIMC, NCC collaborate to smoothen process for Nigerians

Bedford said their capacity on the Equiano broadband fibre had not been impacted. WIOCC also has capacity on the East cost EASSy cable. Due to this redundant capacity, Bedford said the outage will not impact their customers. 

Vodacom, one of South Africa’s telecom operators, has also confirmed the resulting internet outages. 

The U.S. Geological Survey did not detect any earthquakes in the vicinity of the cable cuts last week. However, this does not rule out other possible activity on the seabed. Due to the depth, MainOne has all but ruled out sabotage.


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