Hawaiki Cable manufacturing nearing completion

The first cable load for the Hawaiki Cable – the subsea cable that will link Australia and New Zealand to the continental US, Hawaii and America Samoa – will commence next month.

Hawaiki Submarine Cable and TE SubCom announced that construction of the cable remains on schedule, with more than 13,000km of the 14,000km transpacific cable now manufactured. The initial cable load will include 7,000km of this cable.

Installation permits for Australia, New Zealand and Oregon in the US have also been procured, and horizontal directional drilling for the cable landing of Pacific City in Oregon have commenced.

In Sydney, more than half of the conduits for the land duct route have meanwhile been installed, and drilling operations will start early next month.

Once complete in mid-2018, Hawaiki is expected to be the highest cross-sectional capacity link between the US and Australia and New Zealand. The carrier-neutral cable system will have options to expand to several South Pacific islands, including Tonga, Fiji and New Caledonia.

“We’re very close to completing the manufacturing stage of Hawaiki and are preparing to launch installation in just a matter of months,” Hawaiki CEO Remi Galasso said.

“Once live, this cable system will help eliminate the distance between all Pacific communities and provide an economic boost to a region consistently starved for broadband access.”