Several East African countries experienced significant internet disruption on Sunday due to damage to undersea cables, according to global web monitor NetBlocks. Tanzania and the French Indian Ocean island of Mayotte were the most severely affected by this unexpected interruption.
NetBlocks attributed the incident to failures in the SEACOM and EASSy subsea cable systems. These submarine communications cables play a crucial role in connecting the region to the global internet network. The faults were identified on cables between Mozambique and South Africa, as stated by Tanzania's Information and Technology Minister, Nape Nnauye.
The impact of the disruption varied across different countries. Mozambique and Malawi experienced a medium impact, while Burundi, Somalia, Rwanda, Uganda, Comoros, and Madagascar had less severe outages. The West African nation of Sierra Leone was also affected by this incident.
Despite the widespread disruption, services had been restored in Kenya, according to NetBlocks. However, many users reported inconsistent connectivity. In response to the situation, Kenya's largest telecoms operator, Safaricom, activated redundancy measures to minimise the interruption. However, it warned its users that they might experience reduced internet speeds.
The world's internet traffic primarily passes through numerous fibre optic cables laid along seafloors. One of the longest of these cables, stretching 15,000 kilometres (9,300 miles), extends from Portugal to South Africa. In 2009, SEACOM launched Africa's first fibre-optic cables connecting the eastern and southern coasts.
This is not the first time the region has experienced such disruptions. Several West and Southern African countries suffered similar outages in mid-March due to damage to the cables. This latest incident underscores the vulnerability of the region's internet infrastructure and the need for robust contingency plans to ensure uninterrupted connectivity.