Batelco announces damage to international cable systems affect Bahrain and the region

Batelco has invested in 3 international cable systems FLAG, SEA-ME-WE 3 and SEA-ME-WE 4 and a satellite earth station to provide voice, data and internet services to its customers across the Kingdom.

Batelco has also invested in three diverse paths (SFO, FALCON and FOG) to access such international connectivity. Such network resilience and diversity is considered "best practice" in the telecommunications industry globally and has served Bahrain well in the past minimising disruption to telecommunications services over the years.

In the last 48 hours, an unfortunate and unforeseen set of events has caused capacity constraints on all the telecommunications networks across the Middle East and India.

On Thursday, anchors from ships near Alexandria in Egypt, dragged and cut two fiber optic cables (FLAG & SEA-ME-WE 4) connecting the Middle East, via Europe to the rest of the world. Batelco engineers at the 24x7 Network Operations Centre, instantaneously started re-routing internet, voice and data traffic to other cable systems. The remaining traffic routes were congested with the sudden volume of traffic, and as a result customers in Bahrain experienced slower browsing speeds to international websites. Similarly, customers in Egypt, UAE, Qatar, KSA, India and other countries were equally affected. Local browsing in Bahrain was not affected by this incident.

"Despite the loss of 3 major international cables connecting the Middle East to the rest of the world, Batelco's network has been carefully designed to provide significant resilience and diversity. Batelco's traffic is now routed via two other cables (FOG and SFO) from Manama to the rest of the world. Congestion will remain until the fiber cables are retrieved underwater and repaired," stated Batelco Corporate Affairs General Manager Ahmed Al Janahi.

"Batelco's executives and network engineers are monitoring the situation from our Network Control Centre and have activated Business Continuity initiatives to ensure any available network capacity is effectively uitilised and connectivity is fully restored at the earliest. All network engineers and other specialists are on full alert and available to assist, as required. Furthermore, repair work is already underway by the international cable providers but expected to be completed within 3 weeks. The situation is very critical should any of these remaining cables suffer damage or develop any fault," said Mr. Al Janahi.

"Several Gulf countries besides Bahrain are being affected by the major damage to these crucial cables. Batelco's multi-million dollar investments in multiple cable systems with significant diversity, expert network planning and extremely responsive restoration initiatives have protected Bahrain from experiencing a very severe, almost catastrophic disconnection with the rest of the world," he said.

"Almost all voice, data and 50% of internet traffic to international destinations has been restored. All internet traffic across the GCC is now back to normal state. This situation is receiving the highest priority in Batelco," said Mr. Al Janahi.

"We understand that customers are inconvenienced and we apologise. It is extremely rare that simultaneously, diverse international cable systems experience such fiber cuts. Our focus now is in ensuring that capacity is restored at the earliest."

"Once we are out of the critical state, our network engineers together with international experts from other companies will review if additional initiatives are required to be implemented. Currently there are no other major international cable systems serving the core of the Middle East apart from FLAG, SEA-ME-WE 3 and SEA-ME-WE 4 which Batelco has already invested in."

"We will issue further statements with updated information as we receive it," he added.

"We regret any inconvenience to customers due to this international problem and appreciate their cooperation and understanding while the repair work is being completed," he concluded.