BEACH HAVEN - Yet another TransAtlantic fiber optic cable will soon cross Long Beach Island at Beach Haven.     
     Environmental Crossings, Inc., with offices in Michigan, Texas, Canada, and Asia is putting in the pipe conduit across Long Beach Island, which will hold a cable that will stretch from England to Tuckerton.
     Bruce Brasher, owner and executive Vice President of Environmental Crossings, Inc. said from his Houston office Monday that the company is installing underground pipes into the ocean and into the bay. Another company will bring the cable in from a cable laying ship offshore later. 
     He said the fiber optic cable will hold about 146 fibers [or about] 73 or 74 pairs of fiber optics. "My understanding is that each pair of this fiber, one is transmitting and one receiving fiber working on a pulse of light and that each of these pairs are capable of carrying in excess of 25,000 phone calls per second," he said.
     Environmental Crossings has done three directional drills in Beach Haven. One a couple years ago on Leeward Avenue, for a TeleBermuda cable that goes to Toronto.
     This project at Taylor Avenue is subcontracted by Alcatel, a British firm with offices in the United States.
     It is a separate project unrelated to the AT&T TransAtlantic Cable TAT 14 that came through Taylor Avenue earlier this year in a multinational project.
     An approved method today is to land TransAtlantic cables underground by bringing them into land from the end of the pipe offshore.
      Not disrupting  the fishing industry or residents, drilling takes place under the ocean floor after a path. The  entrance and exit point are selected.
     The drill will run under the beach 2,000 to 2,500 ft., depending on the best placement for the cable laying boats that will arrive later. Sometimes the company is required to pull in the cable from cable laying ships offshore. In this particular procedure, the company should be done long before the cable ships arrive.
     Environmental Crossings is a company that specializes in this type of construction. Brasher said, that company officials made an effort five years ago to get involved in communications since they expected a significant increase in this type of construction.
     The company is installing a pipe in the same way on the bayside and into the bay. Later a cable laying vessel subcontracted by Parsons Brinklerhoff, another engineering firm, will lay the cable between LBI and Tuckerton, Brasher said.
     The reason that crews are working both sides of the Long Beach Island, at the same time is to finish as quickly as possible. Since the company officials understand the disruption to residents and the need to leave before the season starts.
     At the time that the company installed the TeleBermuda TransAtlantic conduit across LBI, Environmental Crossings rented several homes on Leeward.
     The bayside will be complete in the next couple days, he said Monday.
     The ocean side is the side in question. "Because of the soft formation we encountered out there, we're having a hard time being able to steer our directional assembly. We're trying to speed up the process. It's kind of early to call," he said.
     "About 900 ft. out past the beach and into the ocean, there is still some type of sand formation at the depth of 45 to 50 ft. or deeper where they are working," Brasher said.