Rescuers frantically scour North Atlantic for submersible missing near Titanic wreck
A tragedy may just occur at the site of a historic tragedy as rescuers from both the United States and Canada are racing to find a submersible that went missing near the wreck of the Titanic.
Agence France-Presse reports that the American national guard and a rescue team from OceanGate Expeditions, the company operating the submersible, continue to look for the craft. This is while the US Coast Guard has announced that its search for the vessel had been completed for the day. Canadian aircraft who had been taking part in the search will resume on Tuesday morning.
According to Reuters, the 21-foot craft was taking five passengers - which include British billionaire Hamish Harding and Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his son, Suleman - to the wreck of the Titanic in the North Atlantic. The craft named Titan began its descent on June 18 and lost contact with the surface boat Polar Prince an hour and 45 minutes into its dive.
Reuters quotes U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral John Mauger as saying that conducting the search was “a challenge” owing to the remoteness of the areas.
"We are deploying all available assets to make sure that we can locate the craft and rescue the people on board," he said. "Going into this evening we will continue to fly aircraft and move additional vessels."
Meanwhile, Agence France-Presse quotes Mauger as saying that the Titan probably only has 70 or more hours of remaining oxygen. The Titan can provide its passengers 96 hours of oxygen.
The press service also quotes University College London professor of marine engineering Alistair Greig as saying that there could be two possibilities regarding what happened to the craft. The Titan could either have an electrical or communications problem and would have resurfaced, or its pressure hull was compromised and had a leak. If that was the case, Greig says the “prognosis is not good” as there are not a lot of vessels that can go as deep as the Titan.
