Cacuaco, Angola

Cacuaco, Angola: Submarine Cable Landing Point

Cacuaco is a city and municipality within Luanda Province on the Atlantic coast of Angola, functioning as a suburb of the national capital, Luanda. As a coastal location, Cacuaco hosts submarine cable infrastructure that connects Angola to the broader network of West African nations. One submarine cable lands at Cacuaco, placing it among the seven submarine cable landing points distributed across Angola.

The single cable landing at Cacuaco is the SAT-3/WASC system, a major West African coastal cable that links Angola with Benin, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana, and Nigeria. This connection situates Cacuaco within a regional corridor running along the Gulf of Guinea and the wider West African seaboard, enabling data and communications exchange between Angola and its northern maritime neighbors.

Cables Landing at Cacuaco

SAT-3/WASC is a submarine cable system with a total length of 14,350 km, which reached ready-for-service status in 2002. It connects Angola at Cacuaco to Benin, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana, and Nigeria. The SAT-3/WASC system was the first submarine cable to land in Angola, establishing Cacuaco's place in the international submarine cable network. Its reach across multiple West African countries makes it a geographically extensive regional cable, spanning the coastline from the Gulf of Guinea southward to Angola.

Regional Context

Among Angola's seven submarine cable landing points, Cacuaco hosts one cable, placing it alongside Cabinda, Cacongo, Luanda, N'zeto, and Soyo, each of which also hosts a single cable. Sangano stands apart as the most connected landing point in Angola, with two cables. Cacuaco therefore sits within the larger group of single-cable landing points that collectively form Angola's distributed coastal cable infrastructure.

Network Role

Cacuaco functions as a single-cable terminus on Angola's Atlantic coastline, anchoring the southern end of the SAT-3/WASC system's West African routing. Through this connection, Cacuaco enables direct submarine cable linkages between Angola and six other West African nations — Benin, Cameroon, Côte d'Ivoire, Gabon, Ghana, and Nigeria — supporting regional connectivity along one of Africa's most populated coastal corridors. The SAT-3/WASC cable, having entered service in 2002, represents Angola's earliest engagement with international submarine cable infrastructure.

As a single-cable landing point within a country served by five cables across seven locations, Cacuaco contributes a geographically distinct node to Angola's submarine cable graph. Its position within the densely populated Luanda Province, combined with the regional reach of SAT-3/WASC, gives Cacuaco a defined role in the West African coastal cable network.