6/18/2006

Cicadas causing Internet headache
Yomiuri News, June 17, 2006—While Internet firms often grapple with man-made worms, Japanese telecommunications companies have been working on ways to counter a natural Internet pest of their own–cicadas. Across western Japan, kumazemi cicadas have been disrupting Internet service by piercing fiber-optic cables during the summer months to lay their eggs….

Screaming cicada “locusts” are the most remarkable part of the Japanese summer. The sound is deafening EVEN in the concrete jungle of Tokyo—it is astounding that these bugs could thrive in the totally paved and nearly parkless Tokyo environment, but they do.

 Perhaps laying their eggs in the fibre-optic lines festooned on the concrete utility poles is the only way the cicada can survive in treeless urban Japan. From what I read in this Japan blog,”magnoysamsara” the crows of Tokyo are also tearing optical-fibre wires for their nests too.

 Also check out this news report from the Register in the UK: Spiders attack Manchester phone network“… a BT engineer his girlfriend was having problems with her phone because.. spiders had eaten through the line…”