Titanic tourist sub goes missing

[WLJ]

Not much in the way of details yet nor word on how many are on board.
Reportedly these trips can cost upwards of 200,000 pounds ($256,000).
Don't take much for things to go south real quick at 12,500ft

A submersible used to take people to view the wreck of the Titanic has gone missing in the Atlantic Ocean, sparking a search and rescue mission.

The Boston Coastguard told the BBC on Monday that an operation to find it was under way.

It is not clear how many people, if any, were on board at the time it went missing.

Small submersibles occasionally take paying tourists and experts to view the wreck of the Titanic.

Titanic tourist sub goes missing sparking search
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65953872

TITANIC PANIC Titanic tourist sub goes MISSING sparking frantic search as vessel used for £200k trips to view wreck vanishes
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/22741214/titanic-tourist-boat-missing-atlantic/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=sunyoutubestories

[RocketMan]

I don't know if there is currently a way to recover a minisub from that depth.  I tend to doubt it, but hope I am wrong.  The company likely advertises the tours as, "You pays you money and takes you chances."
If it's a loss of propulsive and/or control power then it will be a long, tedious death for the passengers and crew.  If the sub imploded, it was all over in a small fraction of a second.

[WLJ]

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-65953872

[WLJ]

The company has not yet commented on the missing sub, which uses Elon Musk's Starlink for its communications so far out at sea.

Among those onboard is billionaire Hamish Harding, CEO of Acton Aviation in Dubai. His step-son confirmed he was on the submarine on Monday morning, a day after he excitedly posted to social media about being there.

Looks pretty tight in there

Titanic tourist submarine used to take people to see wreck of liner 12,500ft below surface of Atlantic Ocean for $250,000 a ticket goes missing with five people onboard
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12210873/Tourist-sub-taking-groups-Titanic-wreckage-goes-missing.html

[RoadKingLarry]

The odds of recovery, let alone rescue/survival are infinitesimally small.
If it imploded it would be a near instantaneous death in such a small craft.

[MillCreek]

The submarine was built in Everett and my wife and I went to see it a couple of years ago.

https://www.heraldnet.com/news/oceangate-sub-crew-missing-while-exploring-titanic-shipwreck/

https://www.heraldnet.com/business/for-250k-this-everett-company-will-take-you-to-the-titanic/

[gunsmith]

how awful.
Prayers for those folks

[WLJ]

Reportedly ~60 hours of air left.
 This was posted an hour ago.

The crew launched at around 4am yesterday but lost communication with the mothership a short while afterwards. According to OceanGate's website, the sub can last for up to 96 hours underwater with five people consuming oxygen.

Titanic tourist submarine 'may be stuck in ship's wreckage 12,500ft below Atlantic: Cold War sonar plane and second sub deployed in race against time hunt for vessel that has 60 hours of air left and has been missing for more than 24 hours
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12210873/Tourist-sub-taking-groups-Titanic-wreckage-goes-missing.html

[WLJ]

It lost contact 1 hour and 45 mins into yesterday's dive at 4am - it has now been underwater for well over 24 hours 

Trying to find out how long it take to go down. Articles do say the dives can last 10 hours but not sure how much of that is going down then up.

[BobR]

Everything is speculation at this point. Hard fact, they are out of touch and have been. This will either end badly or they will make a movie out of it.

Even if they wanted to use the USN DSRV out of San Diego it would take a while to get it to North Island, onto a transport, fly to Canada, put on a ship and chug out to where they believe the missing sub is. Even with 60 hours of air left it seems kind of bleak.

bob

Added info, USN DSRV is only good for 5000 foot depth (published).

[WLJ]

Everything is speculation at this point. Hard fact, they are out of touch and have been. This will either end badly or they will make a movie out of it.

Even if they wanted to use the USN DSRV out of San Diego it would take a while to get it to North Island, onto a transport, fly to Canada, put on a ship and chug out to where they believe the missing sub is. Even with 60 hours of air left it seems kind of bleak.

bob

Added info, USN DSRV is only good for 5000 foot depth (published).

DSRV no longer in service, replaced with SRDRS and it's only good to 2,000 ft.
Wouldn't do them any good anyway, no way to link up.
If the sub is in intact something would have to latch on to it and haul it up.
Would inflation bags work?

[dogmush]

I thought that most of these smaller research submersibles were positively buoyant with a metal ballast that could be dropped for an emergency surface. If the sub were intact, and not hooked on the Titanic's wreck, I'd expect it to have bobbed up by now.

If it's hooked on wreckage, or not intact, there's nothing anyone can do in time.

[BobR]

People turning highly specialized and somewhat dangerous endeavors (space flight, deep submergence) turned into tourist trips are bound to have a few hiccups along the way. A few deaths here and there can't be that unexpected. Hell, airplanes still fall out of the sky and ships sink and we have been sailing and flying a lot longer than these other things.

bob

[WLJ]

I thought that most of these smaller research submersibles were positively buoyant with a metal ballast that could be dropped for an emergency surface. If the sub were intact, and not hooked on the Titanic's wreck, I'd expect it to have bobbed up by now.

If it's hooked on wreckage, or not intact, there's nothing anyone can do in time.

Yep, the sub has an emergency drop weight. So it's either it trapped for some reason, maybe on the the Titanic's wreckage, or something catastrophic happened

[Ben]

There are plenty of research ROVs and submersibles on the Eastern seaboard that could make the depth without breaking a sweat, but I'm not sure what kind of manipulator arms they would have for attaching cable, and that's only if the sub is sitting unstuck and unentangled (but then as Dogmush alluded, why did they not then drop ballast?). And if they know where it is. It should have a transponder in addition to their Starlink comms. If that's not pinging, that's bad.

[WLJ]

For all the reasons mentioned above I'm not hopeful. Hope I'm wrong.

[WLJ]

Once they reach the surface, there is no way to get out, as those inside are locked in with 17 bolts from the outside.

Can't get out on their own if on the surface. Have to wait for someone to open the hatch from the outside.

[Boomhauer]

One would think an emergency beacon bouy that could be released to float to the surface and start screaming for help would be part of the submersible’s equipment.

[RoadKingLarry]

One would think an emergency beacon bouy that could be released to float to the surface and start screaming for help would be part of the submersible’s equipment.

Both of the boats I served on had "rescue buoys" they were always welded down.
 

Sea pressure at 4000 M is over 5800 psi

[Boomhauer]

Both of the boats I served on had "rescue buoys" they were always welded down.
 

Sea pressure at 4000 M is over 5800 psi

Well you were doing Blind Man’s Bluff *expletive deleted*it though

[Jim147]

What did Harding have on the Clintons?

[WLJ]

What did Harding have on the Clintons?

The Titanic did not sink itself

[RoadKingLarry]

Well you were doing Blind Man’s Bluff *expletive deleted*it though

I have no recollection of those events.

[WLJ]

More info

The sub is suppose to send a ping to the mother ship every 15 minutes. Last ping was heard when the sub was directly over the Titanic around 10:00 EST yesterday (Sunday).
Air is expected to run out sometime around 07:00 EST Thursday

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12212545/Titanic-tourist-sub-five-aboard-just-wreck-communications-went-dead.html

[WLJ]

It's understood that Titan communicates by sending a ping to the Polar Prince every 15 minutes - the last of which was received while the submersible floated above the Titanic wreckage at about 10am EST yesterday (3pm UK time).

It was at that moment that chaos ensued. A distress call was sent to the US Coast Guard at 9pm, whose Boston branch is leading an operation to carry out what would be the deepest undersea rescue mission ever.

Did they wait 11 hours to send the distress call after receiving the last ping? They say these trips take ~10hrs and lost comms after an hour and 45 minutes. I suppose they could have just assume it was a comms issue and didn't start to fear the worse until the sub didn't surface a couple of hours after it was due.