The underwater fiber optic cable, laid between the mainland of Norway and the Spitsbergen Archipelago in the Arctic Ocean, is disabled or damaged as a result of a mysterious incident, the American edition of The Drive, referring to Space Norway data.
The publication notes that the cable supports the work of the satellite station on Svalbard, and also provides access to broadband Internet on the Arctic archipelago. The publication notes that the mainland and the archipelago connect two cables, one of which continues to work.
The Drive assures that the cables are located in the Arctic area of the Arctic Navy, through which Russian atomic submarines overlook the Atlantic Ocean. According to the publication, this circumstance can cause suspicions of Russia’s involvement in what happened.
The Drive admits that there is no evidence of the role of Russia in the incident, however, it assures that the country has all means for this. The publication also assumes that the underwater cable could be damaged for another reason, for example, during the dredging work during mineral exploration.
In November, The Drive stated that Russia could be involved in damage to the underwater cables of the Marine Observatory Lofoten-Westerolane off the coast of Northern Norway, capable of tracking the movement of the submarine.
In July 2019, the US Naval Institute said that the atomic deep-water station AC-31 “Hosharic”, at which there was a fire in the same month, intended for deployment in North Atlantic. In particular, we are talking about conducting operations on the conditional line connecting Greenland and the British Islands (Faroerage-Icelandic Label), where the American hydroacoustic anti-submarine SOSUS Surveillance System (Sound Surveillance System) is located.