Titanic sub: Five on board died after 'catastrophic implosion' of craft – US coast guard

• Published date: 22 June 2023
• Author: Jack Power, Carl O'Brien, Glen Murphy
• Publication title: Irish Times: Web Edition Articles (Dublin, Ireland)

The US coast guard told the media "the debris is consistent with the catastrophic loss of the pressure chamber"

"Upon this determination, we immediately notified the families." It is not yet clear when the implosion could have happened during the dive, the coast guard said.

The sub lost contact with its surface vessel on Sunday while diving to the wreck of the Titanic.

Summary of Thursday's developments

* Tributes have been paid to the five men who were on-board the sub when it went missing

* OceanGate released a statement on Thursday saying "we now believe that our CEO Stockton Rush, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, Hamish Harding, and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, have sadly been lost"

* The US coast guard said on Thursday the found debris is "consistent with a catastrophic loss of the pressure chamber" in the submersible

* The debris was found close to the wreck of the Titanic at a depth of some 3.8km below the ocean's surface

* A family member of the British billionaire Hamish Harding, who was on-board the submersible when it went missing, has said it took OceanGate, the operator of the sub, "far too long" to report its disappearance

The search for the OceanGate Expeditions tourist submersible is entering its fourth day after the vessel was reported overdue on Sunday evening about 700km south of St John's, Newfoundland.

Officials have still said they are hopeful of a rescue despite growing concerns the oxygen supply on board is becoming dangerously low. Equipment from the United States, Canada, the UK and France has been brought in to help find the vessel.

Experts have said the search remains a technically challenging task because of the potential for bad weather and the difficulty in locating a small vessel in a vast ocean.

So far the search has concentrated around an area where sounds were detected repeating at 30-minute intervals but authorities have said they have been unable to confirm the origin of these sounds.

As of Wednesday night local time remotely operated deep-sea vehicles (ROV), capable of operating down to depths of 6km, were heading to the area to join the search and the US naval service is also sending a heavy-lifting system called Fadoss.

It is understood the vessel had enough oxygen on board for 96 hours, though the true extent of its supply depends on several various including whether the vessel remains powered, the activity of those on board and whether they have remained calm and are able to control their breathing.

Wendy Rush, who is married to Stockton Rush, OceanGate chief executive and pilot aboard the Titan submersible, is also a descendant of a couple who lost their lives aboard the famed ship.

The New York Times reports Ms Rush is the great-great-granddaughter of L'Atalante and Ida Straus, two first-class passengers who were aboard the Titanic when it went down in 1912.

The couple were among the Titanic's wealthiest passengers. Isidor and his brother co-owned a Macy's department store. Survivors reported watching Isidor refuse a seat on a life raft, a scene that was recreated in the film dramatisation of the disaster.

Ms Rush, who married Stockton Rush in 1986, is also the communications director at OceanGate and has visited the Titanic wreck three times.

Recovering the missing Titan submersible and bringing its crew to safety in time using the latest advanced deep-sea rescue equipment would be an extremely difficult task, an expert has said.

Even if Titan is located, a successful rescue would require remote-controlled vehicles (ROVs) capable of allowing operators on the surface a clear view of the submersible's location, any obstacles that may be present and where to attach cables capable of lifting it thousands of metres through the water.

If the Titan and its five-person crew did arrive at the Titanic wreck, they will be located 12,500ft (3,800m) below the surface on the seabed – too deep for most ROVs to reach.

Only a "tiny percentage of the world's submarines operate that deeply", David Marquet, a former US naval service submarine commander, told CBC.

OceanGate chief executive and founder Stockton Rush told a US television network he was aware of the risks involved with diving thousands of metres beneath the ocean surface during an interview in December 2022.

Mr Rush was speaking to CBS Sunday Morning when he said his "biggest fear" was "things that will stop me from being able to get to the surface".

"Overhangs, fish nets, entanglement hazards. And, that's just a technique, piloting technique. It's pretty clear – if it's an overhang, don't go under it. If there is a net, don't go near it. So, you can avoid those if you are just slow and steady."

The chief executive also said "there's a limit" to how safe it could make the operation despite introducing some procedures.

"I mean, if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed. Don't get in your car. Don't do anything. At some point, you're going to take some risk, and it really is a risk-reward question. I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules."

It is estimated that the Titan may likely run out of oxygen at some point on Thursday morning.

The exact time the submersible vessel's oxygen supplies would be used up would depend on several factors, such as whether the small crew were able to control their breathing and remain calm over recent days, despite losing contact.

Deep-sea explorer Dr David Gallo believes it would take a "miracle" to rescue those trapped in Titan, but remains optimistic, PA reports.

"Maybe two days ago my hope was sliding downward rapidly, but then these noises appeared and there seems to be very credible sources there, credible and repeatable.

"We'll see how that pans out but everything is happening very quickly, so we have a race against time," he told Good Morning Britain. "Our hopes are high. We need a miracle at this point, but miracles do happen, so I'm very optimistic," he said.

If the Titan is still intact and can be located on the seabed, bringing it and its crew inside back up to the surface is likely to pose huge logistical challenges.

A French research ship with a robotic diving craft able to descend to the depth of the wreck of the Titanic (something very few vessels can do) is en route to assist the search.

While that submersible would not have the power to tow the Titan back to the surface, the possibility of it being able to hook the sub to a ship on the surface strong enough to lift it up has been raised.

However, it would be a complex operation, even if rescuers knew the location of the Titan, as the window of time where its crew would still have oxygen supplies gets smaller and smaller.

For some context, here's a previous photo of what the inside of the submersible looks like. Described as about the size of a minivan, with little room to stand and no chairs, the crew of five travelling in the craft would have to sit with their back to the cylindrical walls of the vessel

While everyone waits for updates and further information on the search operation, as teams increasingly now race against time running out to rescue the Titan crew alive, the Boston US Coast Guard (where the search operation is being co-ordinated from) is one notable account to follow on Twitter. Here's their latest update from late on Wednesday:

Joint search continues for submersible vessel, Titan.

Underwater sounds have been detected in the search area. These recordings have been shared with the U.S. Navy for analysis to help guide future search efforts.

View full news release below: https://t.co/UXdrMJEIGv#Titanic

" USCGNortheast (@USCGNortheast) June 22, 2023

For younger readers (who may not have seen the 1997 classic film staring Kate Winslet and Leonardo DiCaprio), the Titanic was a British-owned passenger liner, constructed in Belfast, that sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on April 15th, 1912 after striking an iceberg on her maiden voyage from Southampton in England to New York City. More than 1,500 people died among 2,224 passengers on board.

OceanGate Expeditions, the company behind the Titan submersible, has carried out expeditions down to the wreck of the ship in recent years and it was where the recent...