Samoa & Tonga: Internet at the Edge of the World

Samoa and Tonga are two Polynesian nations in the southern Pacific Ocean. The nearest continent — Australia — is over 3,000km of open water away. Europe is more than 17,000km distant. It is no surprise that internet here is expensive and slow. But our measurements reveal something more striking: latency to Tonga fluctuates between 297ms and 995ms within a single traceroute — tripling in a matter of seconds.

This is not measurement error. This is the real state of internet infrastructure at the edge of the world.

Hop	Location	Network	RTT
1–7	Tbilisi, GE	JSC Global Erty	25ms
9	Belgrade, RS	Cogent (AS174)	37ms
11	Marseille, FR	Cogent (AS174)	63ms
12	Singapore, SG	Cogent (AS174)	209ms
13	Perth, AU	Cogent (AS174)	263ms
14–15	Sydney, AU	Cogent (AS174)	298ms
16–21	Apia, WS	Vodafone Samoa (AS17993)	297–995ms

Notice hops 16–21: all in Apia, Samoa. All on the same network. RTT jumps from 297ms to 728ms to 764ms to 346ms to 730ms to 995ms. The packet is physically in Samoa — but the network is struggling.

Cogent's Route: Belgrade to Sydney

The path from Tbilisi to Samoa uses Cogent Communications (AS174) — one of the world's largest Tier-1 carriers, and notably different from the NTT routes we see for other Asian destinations. Instead of going west through Paris and across the Atlantic, Cogent goes through Belgrade, Milan, and Marseille — then makes a single massive jump to Singapore (209ms), continues to Perth, and reaches Sydney.

This is a genuinely efficient route: Marseille to Singapore in one hop covering roughly 10,500km, then Perth to Sydney following Australia's western and eastern coasts. No US detour. No Atlantic crossing.

The problem starts when the packet leaves Sydney.

Vodafone Samoa: The Last Mile That Isn't

Vodafone Samoa (AS17993) is the primary internet carrier for both Samoa and Tonga. The network serves two island nations across a vast stretch of ocean — and the RTT instability in our traceroute reflects the challenges of that geography.

The fluctuating RTT values in Apia — 297ms, 728ms, 764ms, 346ms, 730ms, 995ms — indicate severe congestion or an unstable connection on the segment between Sydney and Samoa. This is consistent with what we know about the Southern Cross Cable, which carries most Pacific island traffic: during peak hours or when one of its segments experiences issues, latency can spike dramatically.

Tonga: When the Volcano Cut the Cable

Tonga's internet vulnerability became global news in January 2022 when the Hunga Tonga-Hunga Ha'apai volcanic eruption severed the island's only submarine cable connection. For weeks, Tonga's 100,000 residents were cut off from the global internet entirely — dependent on satellite for emergency communications.

The Tonga cable runs from Fiji to Nuku'alofa, Tonga's capital. The eruption — one of the largest in recorded history — generated shockwaves that damaged the cable at multiple points simultaneously. Repair ships took weeks to reach the damage sites, assess the breaks, and begin repairs.

During this period, the only international connectivity available to Tonga was via Kacific-1, a geostationary satellite with latency of 600ms or more. For a country that already had some of the world's highest internet prices relative to income, the outage was catastrophic.

Samoa vs Tonga: Same Network, Different Story

Samoa and Tonga share Vodafone Samoa as their carrier — but their connectivity situations differ significantly.

Samoa is connected via the Tui cable (Samoa–American Samoa–Hawaii) and the Southern Cross cable system. Multiple cable paths provide some redundancy. Our measured RTT of 387ms from Tbilisi is high but stable.

Tonga has a single cable to Fiji. When it fails — as it did in 2022 — there is no backup. Our measurement of 995ms reflects a combination of the base distance plus severe congestion on this final link, possibly compounded by traffic being rerouted after the cable was repaired but not yet fully restored to capacity.

The Price of Isolation

Internet access in Samoa and Tonga carries some of the highest costs in the Pacific relative to local incomes:

• Monthly fixed broadband can cost the equivalent of several days' wages for an average worker
• Mobile data is the primary form of internet access for most residents
• Video streaming and cloud services are often impractical at these latencies and prices

This is the economic reality of being 3,000km from the nearest major cable hub, connected by infrastructure that was built for a fraction of current demand.

Monitoring Status

• Samoa RTT: 387ms (stable) | Carrier: Cogent → Vodafone Samoa
• Tonga RTT: 995ms (highly variable, 297–995ms range) | Same carrier, less redundancy
• Path: Tbilisi → Belgrade → Marseille → Singapore → Perth → Sydney → Apia
• Key risk: Tonga has single-cable dependency — the 2022 volcanic eruption cut it completely