If you find this at all interesting, you must read Mother Earth, Mother Board by Neal Stephenson - https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/. It's long but so, so good, both in the content and the writing.
After reading this, I don’t know if I can rightly describe myself as being in infrastructure engineering.
> Ninety-nine percent of the world's digital communications rely on subsea cables.
I'm skeptical of this claim. It seems way too high to me, and the reference is a paper about "Fast and destructive density currents created by ocean-entering volcanic eruptions" which I'm unable to view but seems unrelated.
I saw an episode of "Mighty Ships" just this weekend, which followed such a ship around as they were working on splicing one of these cables.
Very cool stuff.
The Verge also did a big set of stories about this last April, it was an excellent read.
The Piece: https://www.theverge.com/c/24070570/internet-cables-undersea...
The Podcast episode: https://www.theverge.com/24131941/undersea-cables-pc-chips-q...