The Titan no longer responds. This small tourist submarine, on board of which five people are going, has disappeared in the Atlantic Ocean, off North America. The plane was heading to the site of the wreckage of the Titanic., as part of a trip organized by OceanGate Expeditions. The US and Canadian coast guards have launched a search to find the ship, whose hours are numbered.
On Sunday, at around 3:00 p.m. Paris time, 1:45 hours after beginning its descent into the deep waters of the Atlantic, the Titan did not respond to the Polar Prince, the Canadian research vessel that was escorting the submarine.
The ship’s operator, OceanGate Expeditions, immediately reported the Titan missing to the US Coast Guard.
• No signs of life since Sunday, “complicated” investigation
At a news conference, Rear Admiral John Mauger of the US Coast Guard said his teams are “working very hard” to find the submarine. But the region where the Titan is missing, “about 1,450 kilometers east of Cape Cod, at a depth of about 4,000 meters,” is “remote” and conducting research there is “complicated.”
Especially since the missing device is a submarine. “We have to be sure that we are looking on the surface and in the water,” explained John Mauger. A US military aircraft was deployed over the search area. The Canadians have also sent a device and are sounding the Atlantic with sonar buoys.
• Two possible theories to explain the disappearance of the ship
With AFP, Alistair Greig, professor of marine engineering at University College London, evoked two possible theories from images of the device published by the press. He calculates that if it had had an electrical or communications problem, it could have been brought to the surface, floating “waiting to be found.”
Another scenario is that the hull has been compromised”, and there has been a leak. “So the prognosis is not good,” she added.
Especially since “very few boats can reach” the depth at which it could have sunk, according to him.
• Between 70 and 96 hours of autonomy
John Mauger indicated that the ship has oxygen reserves that allow it to be “autonomous” between 70 and 96 hours.
If we find the Titan In the water, “we will have to do a kind of rescue,” the rear admiral explained, specifying that the US and Canadian armed forces, the coast guards of the two countries and the company are cooperating to implement such an operation.
But time is running out. According to first estimates, passengers on the submarine should run out of air at the earliest on Wednesday at 11:00 a.m. (Paris time) and at the latest on Thursday in the early afternoon.
• Five passengers on board, including a British billionaire
A dive to view the wreckage of the Titanic lasts about eight hours, the time it takes to descend to almost 4,000 meters deep and then surface. In total, each participant must pay 250,000 dollars (about 230,000 euros) to take part in the expedition, which lasts just over a week.
Among the passengers would be wealthy British businessman Hamish Harding, chief executive of private jet sales firm Action Aviation.
“The submarine has successfully launched and Hamish is currently submerging,” the company tweeted on Sunday, adding that the mission began “this morning at 4am.”
“The submarine’s crew is made up of some legendary explorers, some of whom have completed more than 30 dives on the RMS Titanic since the 1980s,” Hamish Harding said on his Instagram account on Saturday, announcing his participation in the journey.
Le contre-amiral Mauger n’a pas voulu donner d’informations sur les personnes se trouvant à bord “par respect pour les familles”, they are content to say that selon l’opérateur, il s’agissait d’un pilote et de quatre others.
Source: BFM TV
