According to  http://phys.org/news/2013-01-cuba-fiber-optic-link-venezuela.html a 1,600-kilometer (994-mile) cable between Venezuela and Cuba, estimated to cost $70 million, was actually completed in February 2011 and was due to come into operation in July 2011. It was switched on in January 2013.

In its statement, Etecsa said the cable has been "operational since August 2012," and was initially tested with international telephone traffic.

But it warned that the "conclusion of the testing process ... will not automatically mean an increase in access" for Cubans to the Internet.

"It will be necessary to make investments in the domestic telecommunications infrastructure and increase foreign exchange resources to pay for Internet traffic in order to achieve the gradual growth of a service we provide mostly for free today," Etecsa said.

According to http://cuba.blogspot.com/2013/05/cubas-fibre-optic-link-to-venezuela.html 5/29/2014

The government is creating an additional 118 outlets, which will make 
use of faster bandwidth thanks to undersea fibre optic cables between 
the Caribbean island to Venezuela. Cuba cannot use others due to a US 
embargo. 

Starting from June 4, the extra access will be provided by the state 
telecommunications monopoly ETECSA for a reduced price than is currently 
charged. 

However, there still be no internet provided directly to private homes. 

Cuba has one of the lowest rates of internet usage in Latin America. 
There are only 2.6 million users out of a population of 11.1 million.

Given the various dates above we decided to use the PingER data of measurements to Cuba to see when the minimum Round Trip Time (min-RTT) dramatically reduced from the > 450ms of a typical geostationary link to a shorter min-RTT associated with a terrestrial link (such as provided by the undersea fibre optic cable between Venezuela and Cuba.

The plot below shows the minimum RTTs measured from SLAC to a host in Cuba. It is seen that the change occurred in Jan 2013. (spreadsheet)

More details are shown in the  plot below that shows that the change from Satlink to terrestrial took place in a few steps. First on 14th Jan, one way route was changed to terrestial.

link to spreadsheet : http://www.slac.stanford.edu/xorg/icfa/icfa-net-paper-jan14/slaconly/cuba-minrtt-2013.xlsx

 

This figure shows that even though the minimum RTT has reduced, the jitter and packet Loss are both quite high.

1 rtr-servcore1-serv01-webserv.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.197.130) 0.652 ms
2 rtr-core1-p2p-servcore1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.166) 0.302 ms
3 rtr-border1-p2p-core1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.133) 0.519 ms
4 slac-mr2-p2p-rtr-border1.slac.stanford.edu (192.68.191.245) 0.261 ms
5 sunncr5-ip-a-slacmr2.es.net (134.55.36.21) 1.221 ms
6 sunnsdn2-ip-c-sunncr5.es.net (134.55.37.62) 0.922 ms
7 sunncr1-sunnsdn2.es.net (134.55.209.98) 1.178 ms
8 paixpart1-sunncr1.es.net (134.55.218.133) 1.583 ms
9 *
10 176.52.254.254 (176.52.254.254) 78.132 ms
11 176.52.249.97 (176.52.249.97) 106.149 ms
12 (84.16.8.106) 195.357 ms
13 (84.16.8.106) 190.959 ms
14 200.0.16.105 (200.0.16.105) 419.377 ms
15 *
16 *
17 *

This shows the traceroute when the first change occured. The packet goes from SLAC to a router in Sunnyvale (sunncr1-sunnsdn2.es.net) ; then to Florida (176.52.254.254 found using TULIP) 

cant locate 

  176.52.249.97

  or

  84.16.8.106

both are in Europe according to GeoIPTool but seem to be in Latin America

and then goes through a node (200.0.16.105) on  Satlink.

1  rtr-servcore1-serv01-webserv.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.197.130)  0.395 ms
2 rtr-core1-p2p-servcore1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.166) 0.305 ms
3 rtr-border1-p2p-core1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.133) 139.355 ms
4 slac-mr2-p2p-rtr-border1.slac.stanford.edu (192.68.191.245) 0.266 ms
5 sunncr5-ip-a-slacmr2.es.net (134.55.36.21) 1.217 ms
6 sunnsdn2-ip-c-sunncr5.es.net (134.55.37.62) 11.184 ms
7 sunncr1-sdn-a-sunnsdn2.es.net (134.55.207.37) 0.996 ms
8 paixpart1-sunncr1.es.net (134.55.218.133) 1.531 ms
9 *
  
10 176.52.254.254 (176.52.254.254) 136.111 ms
11 (94.142.117.45) 111.241 ms
12 (84.16.8.106) 195.391 ms
13 200.0.16.105 (200.0.16.105) 201.607 ms
14 200.0.16.201 (200.0.16.201) 199.077 ms
15 200.0.16.201 (200.0.16.201) 199.501 ms
16 *
  
17 *

This is when the route first changed to terrestrial. It goes from Sunnyvale to Florida( 176.52.254.254 ) to Cuba ( 84.16.8.106 Telefonica ).

2-22-2013

1  rtr-servcore1-serv01-webserv.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.197.130)  0.369 ms
2  rtr-core1-p2p-servcore1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.166)  0.566 ms
3  rtr-border1-p2p-core1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.133)  0.402 ms
4  slac-mr2-p2p-rtr-border1.slac.stanford.edu (192.68.191.245)  0.258 ms
5  sunncr5-ip-a-slacmr2.es.net (134.55.36.21)  1.207 ms
6  sunnsdn2-ip-c-sunncr5.es.net (134.55.37.62)  0.886 ms
7  sunncr1-sdn-a-sunnsdn2.es.net (134.55.207.37)  0.986 ms
8  paixpart1-sunncr1.es.net (134.55.218.133)  1.534 ms
9  ge-1-3-0-132-100M.ar4.PAO2.gblx.net (208.50.13.53)  2.087 ms
 10  so2-0-0-2488M.ar3.MIA1.gblx.net (67.17.109.230)  79.993 ms
 11  NEWCOM-Miami.so-3-2-1.ar2.MIA1.gblx.net (64.209.103.174)  80.942 ms
 12  mia-static-204-14-40-138.newcom-intl.com (204.14.40.138)  80.743 ms
 13  newcom1.newcom-intl.com (204.14.40.1)  82.600 ms
 14  mia-static-204-14-41-196.newcom-intl.com (204.14.41.196)  596.118 ms
 15  200.0.16.102 (200.0.16.102)  596.798 ms
 16  200.0.16.85 (200.0.16.85)  391.862 ms
 17  200.0.16.201 (200.0.16.201)  390.459 ms
 18  *
 19  *
 20  *
 21  *

This is another route that still uses Satlink. It goes to Miami Florida and then moves to SAT.

1  rtr-servcore1-serv01-webserv.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.197.130)  1.035 ms
2 rtr-core1-p2p-servcore1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.166) 0.622 ms
3 rtr-border1-p2p-core1.slac.stanford.edu (134.79.252.133) 0.396 ms
4 slac-mr2-p2p-rtr-border1.slac.stanford.edu (192.68.191.245) 0.310 ms
5 *
  
6 paixpart1-sunncr1.es.net (134.55.218.133) 1.944 ms
7 *
  
8 xe7-1-3-0-grtmiabr7.red.telefonica-wholesale.net (84.16.14.154) 80.455 ms
9 Xe5-0-1-0-grtmiana2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net (94.142.122.249) 85.051 ms
10 GE6-0-0-0-gramiana2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net (94.142.121.133) 113.007 ms
11 176.52.249.29 (176.52.249.29) 113.601 ms
12 So3-0-0-0-graccsim2.red.telefonica-wholesale.net (94.142.123.190) 113.962 ms
13 5.53.0.134 (5.53.0.134) 144.770 ms
14 200.0.16.85 (200.0.16.85) 142.703 ms
15 200.0.16.201 (200.0.16.201) 142.668 ms
16 *
  
17 *

This is the final shift to terrestial link. It goes from SLAC to sunnyvale then to Flordia  (94.142.121.133 found using TULIP)  and from here moves to Latin America (Cuba) on Fibre. This is just a different route. There are two carriers available i.e. Tata and Telefonica. Tata shows better latency than Telefonica. {Renesys}

Looking at www.uclv.edu.cu one can see a large step reduction in RTT around October 1st 2014.

 It appears this host has much lower losses and jitter than the www.egrem.com.cu host seen below for thye same time period

Looking back at the beginning of 2014 it can be seen that until about May 16, 2014 the performance to www.uclv.edu.cu was dreadful even though minimum RTTs were aroung 160ms.

On Dec 22nd, 2014 the route from SLAC to www.uclv.edu.cu goes via ESnet to Sunnyvale back to Palo Alto where it enters the Tata communication network goes to Chicago and thence to Montreal and thence to Cuba.

Overall route map (red is from VTrace, blue from MaxmindRouting Bay AreaAnotated Traceroute 
 

 

 

 

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