If it was a 'massive' cable, it aint gonna be a fibre tube. They are relatively small.

In reply to a post by adebov:

(either way; it was unravelling at some rate).

Common sense suggests that this would be being fed into something with little friction - so something going into ducting, rather than ducting going into earth.

But I've never seen it in action, so I have no idea

Looked to be about 1" diameter, maybe 2" (which, compared to the tiny cables which feed individual homes, is 'massive').
Still can't imagine how they've already ran out of capacity on a relatively new cabinet when there hasn't been (and there are no plans for) any building/housing developments for years.
Equally; I can't imagine why they're bothing to install a fibre to a cabinet which has its FTTC enablement dates subject to continual movement (so far it's gone from Dec '10 to Jan '11, to March '11, to June '11, to July '11, to Sept '11 - All bets are off as to when OR finally get round to doing it)!

Seen it in action when it was being installed locally. What you probably seen was the tubing being pushed through existing ducts for which the Fibre will be blown to the new CAB.

In reply to a post by nelix01:

Seen it in action when it was being installed locally. What you probably seen was the tubing being pushed through existing ducts for which the Fibre will be blown to the new CAB.

If that's the case, it's nice to see OR wasting time installing tubing around six months before we're due to go live (which, of course, won't happen for at least 9 months to a year), instead of concentrating on areas due to go live soon.
Maybe we've just discovered why almost all published dates slide (because BT OR are too busy faffing around in areas which aren't due for half a year)!