Researched
Transatlantic telegraph cable
After a failed 1858 try, the steamship Great Eastern laid a lasting Atlantic cable in 1866: news crossed the ocean in minutes.
Open in the interactive tree →Cyrus Field's first Atlantic cable (1858) carried messages for only a few weeks before failing. In 1866 the giant steamship Great Eastern laid a better cable, helped by William Thomson's (Lord Kelvin's) sensitive mirror galvanometer, and it worked permanently. News and prices between Europe and America now took minutes instead of about ten days by ship, and undersea cables remain the path of most international data.
Prerequisites
- Steamship1807
- Electric Telegraph1844
Unlocks
- Optical Fiber1970Fibre cables such as TAT-8 succeeded the copper transatlantic cables
- Fibre Submarine Cables1988