Kodiak-Kenai Cable Co. has completed a 600-mile marine telecommunications cable to link Kodiak Island and the Kenai Peninsula with the rest of Alaska via high-speed, broadband fiber optic technology.
The $36 million project, funded by a public-private partnership, was online Dec. 29, said C. Walter Ebell, chief executive officer. Funds came the Alaska Aerospace Development Corp., equity investment and bank loans, he said.
Ebell is also the chief executive officer of Old Harbor Native Corp., which owns the Kodiak Kenai Fiber Link with Ouzinkie Native Corp.
“We are a carrier's carrier,” Ebell said in an interview Jan. 12. “We are leasing capacity on the fiber optic cable system.”
The company is already providing service via contracts with GCI and AT&T Alaska, he said.
“We've been working on this project now for close to five years, to upgrade the service to Kodiak and Kenai so they would have the same type of connectivity as they have in Anchorage,” he said. “The hope is that it will improve medical services, and telecommunications, and lead to business development and diversification in communications.”
KKCC began laying submarine fiber optic cable for the Kodiak Kenai Fiber Link in Seward July 17, 2006. The Maersk Defender, a 350-foot custom-built installation cable ship, buried 600 miles of cable about three and a half a foot deep along the ocean floor.
The fiber optic line will provide service to the Coast Guard base at Kodiak, the Alaska Aerospace Development Corp's launch complex at Narrow Cape, and to some 60,000 residents of Kodiak Island, the Kenai Peninsula and Seward, company officials said.
The underwater system will minimize exposure of the Turnagain Arm communication corridor to earthquakes, landslides or terrorist acts, and connect schools, industry and commerce to the world with real-time broadband Internet, company officials said.
Northern Telecommunications Construction Inc. constructed the six landing facilities.
Margaret Bauman can be reached at margie.bauman@alaskajournal.com.
