A major project to lay a new multi-million pound fibre optic cable underneath the Atlantic from Brean, near Burnham-On-Sea, to Canada has begun.
The high-speed data link between Brean and Halifax in Nova Scotia is being laid on the sea bottom as part of a $300m project.
The 6,021km Hibernian Express network aims to bring super-fast communications to the financial centres of New York and London. Communications between the two cities will take just 59 milliseconds.
The Atlantic phase of the Global Financial Network – which will link up with similar fibre networks planed to connect financial centres like Tokyo, Hong Kong and Singapore – is due to be ready for service by the summer of 2013.
The fibre optic cables between Brean and Halifax in Canada will run for a total of 4,600km.