alt Hacker NewsIt has been conjectured that the easiest way to locate a buried fiber optic cable is to start digging.
(The actual easiest method is to install the conduit or direct burial cable with tracer wire)
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Always bring a length of fiber optic cable when you're in the wilderness. If you get lost or stranded, bury the cable. Within a few hours, a backhoe will stop by to dig it up, and the crew will rescue you.
Local people know where they are because once upon a time a D8 drove through pulling a big orange spool of fiber conduit and passers by chatted about how another fiber was going in. Also around here the contractors seeded the disturbed ground with a wildflower mix (presumably to discourage weeds) so you can also look for straps of wildflowers.
And of course there are marker posts that say "buried fiber optic cable do not dig".
Fiber was all installed long after we knew locating it was important. I suspect it all had a tracer wire installed with it. Of course sometimes the tracer wire can break.
Before fiber a lot of things were put into the ground with no thought how you would find it again.