Fibre-optic cables line the coasts of the continents and criss-cross the oceans, carrying signals that are the backbone of communication in the modern world.
Fibre-optic cables line the coasts of the continents and criss-cross the oceans, carrying signals that are the backbone of communication in the modern world. While their main job is telecommunications, researchers have been exploring ways to use this giant network to eavesdrop on everything from storms to earthquakes to whales.
Now, working with two nearly parallel fibre-optic telecommunications cables off the Norwegian arctic archipelago of Svalbard, researchers have been able to estimate the positions and tracks of eight fin whales along a section of the cable — for five hours.
“This work demonstrates how we were able to simultaneously locate and follow these whales over an 1800 km2 area — with relatively low infrastructure investment,” said Martin Landrø, head of NTNU’s Centre for Geophysical Forecasting and one of the members of the team that did the work.
Read more at Norwegian University of Science and Technology
Photo: Fin Whale. Credit: NOAA Fisheries
