Boston, US – All five people aboard a submersible missing near the wreck of the Titanic died – likely in an instant – after their vessel suffered what the US Coast Guard said on Thursday was a “catastrophic implosion” in the ocean depths.
‘Unforgiving environment’
Authorities said they later learnt the pieces included the sub’s tail cone and front and back ends of its pressure hull.
Mauger said the Coast Guard could not be sure when or why the vessel imploded and declined to be drawn on whether remains of the men would be retrieved.
“This is an incredibly unforgiving environment down there on the seafloor,” he said.
The process of demobilising personnel and vessels from the scene would soon begin, but unmanned robots would continue operations on the seabed for now, Mauger added.
“We’ll collect as much information as we can,” he said.
The US military originally detected the likely implosion of the craft on secret underwater sound monitoring devices shortly after it went missing on Sunday, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday.
“The US Navy conducted an analysis of acoustic data and detected an anomaly consistent with an implosion or explosion in the general vicinity of where the Titan submersible was operating when communications were lost,” an unnamed senior Navy official told the Journal.
The small sub named Titan disappeared on Sunday as it descended to the Titanic, which sits about four kilometres below the ocean’s surface and 650 km off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
OceanGate Expeditions charged $250 000 for a seat on the sub. In a 2018 lawsuit, its former director of marine operations raised concerns about the “experimental and untested design” of Titan.
Harding was a billionaire and keen explorer with three Guinness Records to his name, while the Dawoods belonged to one of Pakistan’s richest families. Nargeolet was nicknamed “Mr Titanic” for his frequent dives at the site.
Harding’s family paid tribute to the aviation tycoon, saying he was a “passionate explorer” as well as a “loving husband and a dedicated father to his two sons”.
“What he achieved in his lifetime was truly remarkable and if we can take any small consolation from this tragedy, it’s that we lost him doing what he loved,” the family said.
The Dawoods’ loved ones also expressed their “profound grief” at their loss.
The British and Pakistani governments expressed their “deepest condolences” to all the men’s families.
Titanic’s lure
The 6.5m-long Titan had been due to resurface seven hours after beginning its descent at 8am on Sunday.
But the craft lost communication with its mothership less than two hours in.
Ships and planes from the US and Canadian coast guards, as well as a robot sent from France, scoured 20,000 square kilometres of surface water – roughly the size of the US state of Massachusetts – for the vessel.
The search homed in on areas where underwater banging noises were detected late on Tuesday and Wednesday. But Mauger said that ultimately the sounds did not appear to have any relation to the site of the debris.
The Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in 1912 during its maiden voyage from England to New York with 2 224 passengers and crew on board. More than 1,500 people died.
It was found in 1985 and remains a lure for nautical experts and underwater tourists.
The pressure at that depth as measured in atmospheres is 400 times what it is at sea level.
Marine scientist and oceanographer David Mearns, who specialises in deep water search and recovery operations, said earlier the debris discovery indicated a rapid breakup of the submersible.
“The only saving grace about that is that it would have been immediate, literally in milliseconds, and the men would have had no idea what was happening,” Mearns, who was friends with two of those onboard, told Sky News.
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Source: AFP
Picture: Twitter/@maminhouston
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