Finland's Elisa says Baltic undersea cables were torn apart by external force (updated)

Elisa Oyj

06/01/2025 14:19

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      Two underwater fibre optic cables repaired after outage
    

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      Vessel suspected of dragging its anchor across the cables
    

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      Ship remains under Finnish arrest
    

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      Baltic Sea nations on alert for sabotage
    

  
 (Adds quote, detail, background in paragraphs 1-6, 9-10)
    By Isabelle Yr Carlsson
       COPENHAGEN, Jan 6 (Reuters) - Two undersea
telecommunications cables that were damaged in the Baltic Sea on
Dec. 25 appeared to have been torn apart by a strong external
force, Finland's Elisa  ELISA.HE  said on Monday, adding that
they had now been repaired. 
    Baltic Sea nations are on high alert after a string of power
cable, telecom link and gas pipeline outages since Russia
invaded Ukraine in 2022. The NATO military alliance has said it
will boost its presence in the region.
    Finnish police seized the Eagle S tanker carrying Russian
oil on Dec. 26 and said they suspected that the vessel had
damaged the Finnish-Estonian Estlink 2 power line and four
telecoms cables on Christmas Day by dragging its anchor across
the seabed.
    Sweden's navy on Friday sent a vessel equipped for
underwater work to aid Finland's seabed investigation.
    "The current suspicion is that the external force has been
caused by an anchor," Jaakko Wallenius, Chief Security Officer
at Elisa, which owns two of the four fibre optic lines, told
Reuters on Monday.
    The cables, running between Finland and Estonia, are
steel-reinforced with a diameter of just over two centimetres,
with several layers of insulation protecting the fibres within.
    The Eagle S vessel, which is registered in the Cook Islands,
was brought to a bay near Finland's port of Porvoo where police
are currently collecting evidence and questioning the crew,
eight of whom were named as suspects in the investigation.
    A Finnish lawyer representing the company that owns the
Eagle S has said Finland hijacked the vessel at sea and should
release it, a request denied by a court on Friday.
    Repairing the Estlink 2 power cable that was broken along
with the telecoms cables is expected to take some seven months,
operators Fingrid of Finland and Elering of Estonia have said.
    Moscow has said Finland's seizure of the ship is not a
matter for Russia.

 (Reporting by Isabelle Yr Carlsson, writing by Louise Breusch
Rasmussen, editing by Terje Solsvik, Kirsten Donovan)
 ((Louisebreusch.rasmussen@tr.com; +45 21 27 97 79;))