Cable & Wireless remove satellite dishes
Two of the biggest telecommunications aerials in the island have been removed from the St Peter Port skyline.
The aluminium dishes, 10ft in diameter, have been prominent on a mast off Monument Gardens, just up the road from Cable & Wireless’s Upland Road base.
They carried the signals for the Telettra PDH microwave radio system between Guernsey and Jersey for 22 years until late 2008, when the service was switched off.
The system had a capacity of 280 Megabits per second – enough for almost 2,000 simultaneous phone calls – and was cutting edge technology at the time of its introduction.
Now all capacity between the two islands is routed via diverse submarine fibre-optic cables with the potential to support many hundreds or thousands times that of the old fishes, as well as high-capacity internet and data services.
The evolution of microwave radio technology has been rapid over the years and it remains an extremely important and reliable means of communication.
Craig Burton, Head of Core Engineering at Cable & Wireless, said:
“These dishes played a major part in the telecommunications links between the islands for years, and they supported our links with the UK. They were an essential part of our technical infrastructure, but now they are totally redundant and it’s time for them to come down.
“I’m sure that everyone in Guernsey has seen them over the years, but I doubt if many people will mourn their passing.”
The tower remains an essential part of the Bailiwick’s telecommunications infrastructure, supporting the lifeline links to the smaller islands and being shared by all the island’s mobile operators.
Cable & Wireless is also planning a network upgrade which will more than double the capacity on the resilient microwave ring, serving Alderney and Sark.
This is driven by the demand for additional bandwidth to support the growth in broadband and mobile data services and to ensure that these are available across the Bailiwick.
As an internal equipment upgrade it will not require any external work or the installation of any additional antennas.