Your private messages travel under this beach
In Porthcurno, Cornwall, there’s an old telegraph cable landing station. It’s how Britain talked to the Empire — and it’s now a museum. But the technology here isn’t quite as obsolete as you might think.
Thanks to Steve and all the team at the Porthcurno Telegraph Museum! You can find out more about them here: https://pkporthcurno.com/
Edited by Michelle Martin https://www.youtube.com/@OnTheCrux
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@TomScottGo
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Thanks to all the Telegraph Museum team: pull down the description for more about the museum and Porthcurno!
@nblucas
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Didnt expect to hear a Jersey reference, let alone an event i remember!
@sydhenderson6753
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
This is one of those things that gives me faith in mankind. A little, anyway.
@MichaelEllisOfTenDeg
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Lovely to see my absolute favourite beach featured here <3
@Ryulin18
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
How do you even make 15,000 miles of fibreoptic cable and run it?!
@djjohnnymusic
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
We have similar at Flinders, Victoria, Australia. 😉
@zanelindsay1267
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
A very interesting account, concise and to the point with excellent narration!
@monsieurpoirot7659
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
The manager of the museum has a really distant aura of david bowie to him
@Josh-cm9jw
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
They've set one of these up in Bude, just a bit further up Cornwall
@qxtr5853
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
"There is a beach somewhere near you" is such an islander thing to say.
@jannepeltonen2036
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Why is there a cable going from Britain to Japan? Internet being a relayed packet switched network, it doesn't seem to make any kind of sense. Or apparently it makes business sense, I guess a direct connection between Britain and Japan is worth an undersea cable going all over the place.
@danser_theplayer01
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
World Wide Web nowadays is literally a web of ginormous cables between entire continents.
@Fiery.Dragon
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
100 gigabits per second or 100 gigabytes per second?
@RetroLuxNZ
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the speed of data transmission normally measured in gigabits per second? Tom said "100 gigabytes per second" in the video. They are two very different measures.
@daveabbott
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
It's also one of the best Bass fishing beaches in the country when the tides are right
@ciaramc29
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
It's not magic that makes it happen. Networking is just as impostant as the software, even more so as nothing can happen without the infrastructure to send those 0s and 1s.
@ranscorpio3235
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
i am one of the fools who lives in rural australia the minimum ping ive ever got on a game was 5-600
@pierQRzt180
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
question, couldn't the enemies pick the cable not directly near the beach, but more far away (some kilometers) and then simply cut it? By a submarine or the like?
@80robina
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Do these huts still exist or I imagine there data centers now?
@Kellogs_cereal2
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
imagine the sheer amount of porn that passed under that beach.
@kirk3intokyo
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
I just watched this video in Japan, I wonder if this video was actually flashing underneath this beach…
@fuiehfjfcnsl
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Ein Kommentar
@devon896
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Hey Tom, you should do two videos. One about the old London Bridge now in Lake Havasu and about the old GWR atmospheric railway from Exeter to Newton Abbot.
@AuraMaster7
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
"Somewhere near you, there is a beach"
People in North Dakota: ???
@devonhansen1831
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Satellites ARE NOT FALLING. Seriously people need to stop saying that.
@DesertFernweh
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
I worked for an ISP that owned many of those cables. You would be amazed on how often they get cut or damaged. That is why there are multiple lines and protocols like BGP in place to re-route traffic.
@Anolytic
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
100 GB of data per second seems low for a cable to Japan considering all of the Japanese porn…
@paulkurilecz4209
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
I am both amazed by and enjoy the stories that you tell.
@dannestrom
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
The new landing station is at Skewjack, which is closer to Land's End. When I was young, there used to be a surf village there, called Skewjack Surf Village. Now it looks more like a flight hangar or something.
@HoneyBeaLovely
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
The infrastructure of the internet is so damn cool.
@nickthelick
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
For years I always wondered about these cables.
I wondered if the cables were just kind of suspended there, literally hanging across an underwater mountain range in DEEP water (Of course not! How ludicrous!)😜
@jeric_synergy8581
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Neal Stephenson wrote an EXTENSIVE article about undersea cables for WIRED, and this place figures prominently.
The original telegraph cables and ships were amaaaaazing.
@lemonaidking
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
I'm interested in why Faial was spelled Fayal? I've never seen the name of my parents home island spelled with a "y" ever, until this video.
@sirhenk5910
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
"Just take a moment and remember that somewhere near you there is a beach with… flamethrowers"
@alfulton5946
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Being in the exact middle of Canada I don't think there is a beach that close unless the cables come up through the great lakes then maybe there's a beach within 1000 miles of me
@abhishekthakker
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
woah! didn't knew this… thanks mate
@krackensden
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Huh, What if you cut one of those cables? I am guessing it is a crime but what crime would be charged with?
@SS97archive
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
666k views
@vffa
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Do DECIX.
@anotherfeat1647
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
1:55
is that the same technology they were using to communicate when we landed on the moon, or is that something else
@IvanStamenkovicSeemsIndie
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
Why does youtube keep recommending you even tho I already watched the majority of your videos…not that I mind it 😀
@aabbccddeeffgghhiijjkkllmm4357
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
nice
@phillipwhittan9550
April 20, 2026 at 2:12 pm
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