Date: September 2, 2026 

Amazon Web Services announced Sta’O’Nuk, a brand-new privately owned transpacific undersea cable linking Washington State, USA, and Japan. The system will deliver a total capacity of 420 terabits per second across 20 fiber pairs and is scheduled to go live in 2029.

Sta’O’Nuk marks the first international submarine cable to land in Washington’s Ocean Shores in nearly 30 years. Unlike traditional transpacific cables concentrated in California and Oregon, this new route is designed for geographic diversity, lowering shared failure risks caused by earthquakes, fishing operations and ship anchoring damage.

Named after the “lightning serpent” in the local Quinault Indigenous language, the cable is built to support low-latency AI training and cloud workloads. AWS explained the project will add redundant international data pathways and strengthen the resilience of North America-Pacific digital infrastructure.