First deep-sea transatlantic telephone cable

This is a specimen of the first transatlantic telephone cable, also known as TAT-1, which was laid between Oban, Scotland, and Newfoundland. The project was announced by the Postmaster General on December 1953, and was a joint venture between the General Post Office of the UK, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company, and the Canadian Overseas Telecommunications Corporation.

Between 1955 and 1956, two cables were laid - one for each direction of speech. The deep-sea part of the cable had a lighter, high-tensile steel armouring compared with the shore ends.

TAT-1 remained in use without failure until 1978, being withdrawn from service because of the installation of much higher capacity cables across the Atlantic.

Credit: Donated by Submarine Cables Ltd
Object no: 1960-136