A-I-S (Australia-Indonesia-Singapore) Cable is a 1,380 channel (23 supergroup) analogue cable system manufactured by STC and was laid in 1986 and taken out of service in 1999. A-I-S Cable is of the same technology as the high capacity section of ANZCAN Cable.

Whilst the cable was fully functional when retired, it had been overtaken by technology and was replaced by the new SEA-ME-WE 3 high capacity fibre optic cable.

British manufacturer, Standard Telephones and Cables (STC) manufactured and supplied the cable and repeaters for the A-I-S project.

The 1,380 circuit cable has an outer conductor diameter of 37.34 mm (1.47 inches). When the cable comes close to shore, soft iron tape is used to prevent electrical interference and the cable is sheathed in one or two layers of armour wire.

There are 275 repeaters in A-I-S Segment "A" (Australia-Indonesia) and 78 repeaters in Segment B (Indonesia - Singapore). A typical analogue cable repeater is 2.7 m long and 230 mm in diameter, can weigh up to 533 kg and contains more than 300 components - all of them thoroughly tested to ensure a reliable 25 year working life. The repeater case must be strong enough to withstand the great pressure of water at the ocean bottom at depths of up to 6 km. The water pressure is more than 80 tonnes per sq. metre.

TERMINAL EQUIPMENT

The Australian terminal station for A-I-S was in the same building at Gnangara that is used for the Perth satellite station. The main function of the equipment at the terminal station was to apply power to the cable and also to connect the complex translation equipment (MUX) that enabled the speech on the 1,380 circuits to be combined into a complex electrical wave, transmitted along the cable and then restored back to 1,380 separate conversations.

The terminal equipment also, however, included apparatus which continually watches over the performance of the complete A-I-S cable system and which could detect faults in the cable or the repeaters. Additional equipment enabled maintenance staff to locate any such fault.

	Technical Details
Laid	1986
Out of Service	1999
Capacity	14MHz Cable System
Transmission Capacity	1380 x 4kHz channels
Total cable length	4667 km
Number of Repeaters	353
System Design Life	25 years Actual Life: 13 years
Maximum Depth	6,392 m
Landing Points	Whitford Beach, Perth WA Ancol, Jakarta, Indonesia Changi, Singapore