TAT-7 was the seventh

transatlantic telephone cable A transatlantic telecommunications cable is a submarine communications cable connecting one side of the Atlantic Ocean to the other. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, each cable was a single wire. After mid-century, coaxial cable came into use ...

, in operation from 1983 to 1994, initially carrying 4,000 3 kHz telephone circuits between

New Jersey New Jersey is a state in the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern regions of the United States. It is bordered on the north and east by the state of New York; on the east, southeast, and south by the Atlantic Ocean; on the west by the Delaware ...

, United States and

Porthcurno Porthcurno ( kw, Porthkornow, Porthcornow, meaning ''"pinnacle cove"'', see below) is a small village covering a small valley and beach on the south coast of Cornwall, England in the United Kingdom. It is the main settlement in a civil and an ec ...

in southwest England. It was owned by

AT&T AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered at Whitacre Tower in Downtown Dallas, Texas. It is the world's largest telecommunications company by revenue and the third largest provider of mobile tel ...

British Telecom BT Group plc (trade name, trading as BT and formerly British Telecom) is a British Multinational corporation, multinational telecommunications holding company headquartered in London, England. It has operations in around 180 countries and is th ...

and

France Telecom Orange S.A. (), formerly France Télécom S.A. (stylized as france telecom) is a French multinational telecommunications corporation. It has 266 million customers worldwide and employs 89,000 people in France, and 59,000 elsewhere. In 2015, ...

. Although

optical fiber An optical fiber, or optical fibre in Commonwealth English, is a flexible, transparent fiber made by drawing glass (silica) or plastic to a diameter slightly thicker than that of a human hair. Optical fibers are used most often as a means to ...

had been invented in 1970, this cable was still using

coaxial cable Coaxial cable, or coax (pronounced ) is a type of electrical cable consisting of an inner conductor surrounded by a concentric conducting shield, with the two separated by a dielectric ( insulating material); many coaxial cables also have a p ...

technology.

References

Infrastructure completed in 1983 Transatlantic communications cables United Kingdom–United States relations AT&T buildings British Telecom buildings and structures Orange S.A. 1994 disestablishments in England 1983 establishments in England 1983 establishments in New Jersey 1994 disestablishments in New Jersey {{Telecomm-stub