EXPLAINER: A deep dive into risks for undersea cables, pipes

PARIS (AP) — Deep under water, the pipes and cables that carry the modern world's lifeblood — energy and information — are out of sight and largely out of mind. Until, that is, something goes catastrophically wrong.

The suspected sabotage this week of gas pipelines that tied Russia and Europe together is driving home how vital yet weakly protected undersea infrastructure is vulnerable to attack, with potentially disastrous repercussions for the global economy.

It isn't known who detonated explosions, powerful enough to be detected by earthquake monitors across the Baltic Sea, that European governments suspect were the cause of multiple punctures in the Nord Stream pipelines. The leaks released frothing torrents of methane, a potent greenhouse gas.

The Kremlin has denied involvement, calling suspicions that it sabotaged the pipelines “predictable and stupid."

Analysts found that hard to believe, saying that gas-producer Russia seemingly had most to gain from driving up market prices with such a strike and to punish Europe, by creating fear and uncertainty, in retaliation for its switching to other gas suppliers because of the Kremlin's invasion of Ukraine.

Because underwater sabotage is harder to detect and easier to deny than more readily visible attacks on the ground and in the air, the blasts also seemed to fit Russia's military playbook for “hybrid war.” That's the use of an array of means — military, nonmilitary and subterfuge — to destabilize, divide and pressure adversaries.

A look at undersea infrastructures that military and economic analysts say need stronger protection:

WHAT’S DOWN THERE?

Gas networks form just part of the globe's dense mesh of undersea pipes and cables that power economies, keep houses warm and connect billions of people.

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