Google today unveiled Firmina, an open subsea cable that will run from the East Coast of the US to Las Toninas, Argentina. Once complete, Firmina will be the longest cable in the world, capable of running entirely from a single power source at one end if, for some reason, its other sources are temporarily unavailable.
"While shorter cable systems can enjoy the higher availability of power feeding from a single end, recent longer cables with large fiber pair count have made this harder and harder," Google says. "Firmina breaks this barrier—the cable will be the longest ever to feature single-end power feeding capability. Achieving this record-breaking, highly resilient design is accomplished by supplying the cable with a voltage 20% higher than with previous systems."
As we've all learned during the global pandemic, internet reliability is really important for work, entertainment, and connecting with friends and family. Firmina aims to provide that reliability to users across South America. Boasting 12 fiber pairs, the cable will carry traffic quickly and securely between countries, giving users fast, low-latency access to Google products like Search, Gmail, YouTube, and cloud services.
Data, according to the company, travels through submarine cables' optical fibers as pulses of light, amplified every 100 km (about 60 miles) with a high-voltage electrical current supplied at landing stations in each country—including, in this case, additional stops in Praia Grande, Brazil, and Punta del Este, Uruguay.
The new cable, named after Brazilian author Maria Firmina dos Reis, joins Google's quartet of private networks—Grace Hopper, Curie, Dunant, and Equiano—in tethering continents along the ocean floor.
Firmina published poetry, essays, stories, and puzzles, as well as composing abolitionist songs, but it was her 1859 abolitionist novel Úrsula, released under the name Uma Maranhense ("a Maranhão woman"), that earned her the title of Brazil's first novelist. "We sought to honor a luminary who worked to advance human understanding and social justice," Google said. "With this cable, we're thrilled to draw attention to [Firmina's] pioneering work and spirit."
With this latest addition, Google now has investments in 16 subsea and consortium cables, including Echo, JGA, INDIGO, and Havfrue. The company continues to build a "robust global network and infrastructure," including data centers and cloud regions around the world.