[LINK] Internet descending below gutter level...

[Michael Biber]

Hi Richard,
This caused a bit of a double take. I thought that fibre was used in
intrinsically safe environments precisely because of a lack of a fire
ignition risk if the cable breaks. Surely there isn't enough energy from the
photons emanating from a damaged fibre? Do you have a source for your
proposition? (Before I spend hours digging through the web myself)?

I don't know that this is wrong, I'm just surprised that it could be right.
NTT has been pulling fibre though Japanese POO (Partitioned Optical
Operations 8^) ) for over 10 years. When I worked for Fujitsu, circa 1988, I
remember seeing a video of their little robots pulling fibre through Tokyo
sewers. In fact, 5 years before that, Exxon was pulling fibre through their
oil pipelines in the Gulf of Mexico. At Esso, we investigated that for Bass
Strait but decided the re-engineering of the pigs would cost too much. Used
radio instead.

Thanks

Mike Biber

-----Original Message-----
From: owner-link@www.anu.edu.au [mailto:owner-link@www.anu.edu.au]On
Behalf Of richard@auscoms.com.au
Sent: Thursday, 9 November 2000 2:41 PM
To: link@www.anu.edu.au
Subject: Re:[LINK] Internet descending below gutter level...


The sewer is, I suspect, a very inappropriate environment for fibre ... not
because of what the poo might do to the fibres, but because of what the
light
might do to methane should a fibre break.

eg, fibre is still used only with caution in some mining applications
because of
the risk of explosion...

Richard C

original Article:
http://washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A37705-2000Nov7.html