Red Sea Cable Cuts 2024: How Houthi Attacks Rerouted the Internet
Red Sea Cable Cuts 2024: How Houthi Attacks Rerouted the Internet
Analysis based on GeoCables monitoring data and public incident reports, March 2026 In February and March 2024, a series of submarine cable cuts in the Red Sea created one of the most significant internet routing disruptions in years. Four major cable systems — SEA-ME-WE 4, IMEWE, EIG (Europe India Gateway), and FALCON GCX — were damaged simultaneously, forcing a massive rerouting of traffic between Europe, the Middle East, and Asia. This is what happened, and what our measurements show.The Cables That Were Cut
The Red Sea is one of the most critical chokepoints for global submarine cable infrastructure. At its narrowest point — the Bab-el-Mandeb Strait between Yemen and Djibouti — dozens of cables carrying traffic between Europe and Asia pass within kilometers of each other. In February 2024, as Houthi attacks on commercial shipping intensified, cables began to fail: SEA-ME-WE 4 (20,000km, Singapore → France): One of the oldest and highest-capacity cables on the Asia-Europe corridor. Its Red Sea segment was cut near Yemen. IMEWE (13,000km, India → Western Europe): The India-Middle East-Western Europe cable, a critical link for South Asian traffic to Europe. EIG (Europe India Gateway) (15,000km): Connecting the UK to India via the Red Sea, carrying significant enterprise and financial traffic. FALCON GCX (Regional Gulf cable): Connecting Gulf states to each other and to the broader international network.The Immediate Impact
Microsoft Azure confirmed disruptions starting February 26, 2024, noting that "network traffic travelling through the Middle East might see elevated latency due to undersea fiber cuts in the Red Sea." Azure services were affected for users in the Middle East, South Asia, and parts of Europe. Pakistan Telecommunication Company (PTCL) reported decreased capacity. Users in UAE reported slower speeds to India. Riyadh showed packet loss on international routes that normally transited through Jeddah cable landing stations. The scale: These four cables collectively carried an estimated 25% of traffic between Europe and Asia. Losing them simultaneously created a capacity crunch that forced carriers to reroute onto surviving cables — primarily SEA-ME-WE 5, AAE-1, and terrestrial alternatives through Central Asia.What Happened to Latency
The automatic rerouting worked — but with consequences. Traffic that normally traveled through the Red Sea was pushed onto longer alternative paths: Alternative Route 1 — SEA-ME-WE 5: The only major surviving cable on the same corridor. Became severely congested. Latency increased 20-40ms for many Asia-Europe routes as the cable absorbed traffic from four damaged competitors. Alternative Route 2 — Cape of Good Hope: Some carriers rerouted traffic south around Africa, adding approximately 60ms to Asia-Europe routes. This was the path used by telegraph cables in the 19th century — now briefly relevant again in 2024. Alternative Route 3 — Terrestrial via Central Asia: Traffic from Central Asia that previously went west through the Middle East was pushed north through Russia and east-west through Central Asian terrestrial networks.What GeoCables Measurements Show
Our RIPE Atlas probes in Minsk, Almaty, and Tbilisi captured the routing shifts. The Almaty probe — geographically closest to the affected region — showed measurable RTT increases to Middle Eastern destinations during the incident window. More significantly, our traceroutes from Tbilisi show that even after the cables were repaired, routing patterns shifted. Traffic that previously entered the Middle East network at Jeddah or Aden began appearing more frequently at alternative entry points — reflecting carriers' decisions to diversify away from Yemen-proximate landing stations. Our current measurements of SEA-ME-WE 5 (the cable that absorbed most of the rerouted traffic) show stable RTT in the 100-140ms range for Singapore-Marseille, suggesting the capacity crunch has resolved as repairs were completed and alternative routes were established.The Repair Timeline
Repairing submarine cables in an active conflict zone presented unprecedented challenges. Cable repair ships — specialized vessels that can cost $30,000+ per day to operate — require permits to enter national waters. Yemen's ongoing conflict made permitting and safe access nearly impossible for months. The International Cable Protection Committee (ICPC) reported that repair logistics were complicated by: - Inability to obtain permits from Yemeni authorities - Security risks for repair vessels operating near active conflict - Depth challenges in some cut locations (cables in deep water take longer to repair) Some cuts remained unrepaired for months, with traffic continuing to use the rerouted paths.Why the Red Sea Is Irreplaceable
The geography of the Red Sea makes it almost impossible to avoid for Asia-Europe cables. The alternatives are all worse: Going around Africa adds 15,000+ km to any Asia-Europe cable, increasing latency by ~75ms and requiring enormously longer (and more expensive) cable systems. Going through Central Asia (terrestrial) works for landlocked countries but adds latency from multiple routing hops and lacks the raw capacity of submarine fiber. Going through the Arctic (Northern Sea Route) has been discussed but remains impractical for commercial cable systems. The result: all major Asia-Europe submarine cables continue to pass through the Red Sea, accepting the geopolitical risk as the cost of optimal routing.Lessons for Internet Resilience
The 2024 Red Sea cuts demonstrated both the resilience and the fragility of global internet infrastructure: Resilience: The internet automatically rerouted. Services stayed online. The redundancy built into the global cable network prevented an outage. Fragility: Four cables on the same geographic corridor failed simultaneously. The concentration of cables through a single chokepoint — especially one in a conflict zone — creates systemic risk that no amount of per-cable redundancy can eliminate. GeoCables continues to monitor all cables passing through the Red Sea corridor. Current status of SEA-ME-WE 5, AAE-1, and FALCON is tracked in our Health Monitor →.Related cables: SEA-ME-WE 5 → · AAE-1 → · 2Africa →