Updated: submarine exploring Titanic wreckage disappears in Atlantic Ocean: Coast Guard

[Bigun]

The money wouldn't worry me as much as being 2000 (or however much) feet below the surface...

Somewhere in the 13,000 ft neighborhood IIRC.

[massadvj]

Somewhere in the 13,000 ft neighborhood IIRC.

Yes. And I am reading Twitter posts where people are criticizing the design because the crew access is bolted in. As if an escape hatch would do any good at 12,000 feet.

[DB]

Yes. And I am reading Twitter posts where people are criticizing the design because the crew access is bolted in. As if an escape hatch would do any good at 12,000 feet.

The issue is if you manage to surface you still can't get out and get air.

[Bigun]

Yes. And I am reading Twitter posts where people are criticizing the design because the crew access is bolted in. As if an escape hatch would do any good at 12,000 feet.

Pressure at that depth 6000-6500 PSI so escape hatches are not practical.

[libertybele]

The issue is if you manage to surface you still can't get out and get air.

Exactly -- from my understanding another ship has to navigate bringing them in -- the access is still bolted in .

So how long is it going to take to bring them in and unbolt that hatch??

[DB]

OceanGate - Heaven's Gate...

[massadvj]

Exactly -- from my understanding another ship has to navigate bringing them in -- the access is still bolted in .

So how long is it going to take to bring them in and unbolt that hatch??

Looks like about the same amount of time it would take to get a tire off your car. Minutes.

It seems to me that if the crew was alive they would have released ballast and come to the surface. That suggests hull breach or fire. If so, I hope it was quick.

[mystery-ak]

The Lost Titanic Sub Didn’t Even Have a Basic Safety Beacon
SILENT ALARMS

Untethered by regulations, the vehicle wasn’t even equipped with some of the most essential tools. Its inexplicable design may end in tragedy.
Tony Ho Tran

Deputy Editor, Innovation & Tech
Justin Rohrlich

Reporter
Updated Jun. 20, 2023 5:41PM ET / Published Jun. 20, 2023 3:27PM ET

Search and rescue teams are racing against the clock as they attempt to find a missing submersible and its five-person crew that was slated to explore the wreck of the Titanic nearly 13,000 feet under the North Atlantic on June 18. The U.S. Coast Guard said that the 22-foot-long deep-sea vessel, dubbed the Titan, only has a few days worth of oxygen.

The craft is owned and operated by OceanGate, a private submersible company that offers chartered trips to the wreckage of the Titanic to customers for $250,000 a seat. It set out on its voyage on Sunday morning, but lost contact with its research ship the Polar Prince about 1 hour and 45 minutes into its journey.

Things are looking bleak. Even in the best conditions, voyages on and under the North Atlantic are fraught with the kinds of dangers that the Titanic itself faced including freezing water temperatures, chaotic weather conditions, and surging waves and currents. It’s not helped that the technology that went into building the Titan was experimental, unregulated, risky, and potentially life-threatening. This not only makes diving operations like the one undertaken by the Titan fraught, but it also dangerously complicates search and rescue operations.

“We are doing everything that we can do to make sure that we can locate and rescue those on board,” U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral John Mauger said at a press briefing. He later told Good Morning America that the international team of search and rescue officials have scoured an area “about the size of Connecticut” so far.

Walt ‘Butch’ Hendrick, a former safety coordinator for the U.S. Army’s Green Beret Diver Trainer Program, told The Daily Beast that if the sub is entangled by the Titanic wreckage or something else, a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV) could theoretically cut through four inches of steel to cut it loose—but it needs to be fitted with the right tools to be able to do so.

more
https://www.thedailybeast.com/missing-titanic-sub-plagued-by-a-long-history-of-deadly-safety-issues

[libertybele]

.......... Titan, the lost submersible from the company OceanGate, is a technological maverick based on novel concepts that differ from standard designs. Moreover, unlike most deep-sea craft, Titan has undergone no certification by a reputable marine group that does such licensing work for other craft, including one built by OceanGate that dives to shallower depths.

“It suggests they were cutting corners,” said Bruce H. Robison, a senior marine biologist at the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California, who has explored the ocean’s depths with more than a dozen different kinds of submersibles.

Alfred S. McLaren, a retired Navy submariner and president emeritus of the Explorers Club of New York City, agreed. “I’ve had three people ask me about making a dive on it,” he said in reference to the lost submersible. “And I said, ‘Don’t do it.’ I wouldn’t do it in a million years.”......................



https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/06/20/us/titanic-missing-submarine

[libertybele]

Looks like about the same amount of time it would take to get a tire off your car. Minutes.

It seems to me that if the crew was alive they would have released ballast and come to the surface. That suggests hull breach or fire. If so, I hope it was quick.

??? Does this submersible have ballast that can be released to the surface???

[massadvj]

??? Does this submersible have ballast that can be released to the surface???

It has ballast that can be released in order for the craft to surface, yes. That is why they are speculating that it got stuck on something and can't move. Because the only other alternative is crew is dead or incapacitated.

[Lando Lincoln]

Perhaps someone else has drawn the analogy, but climbers on Everest are sometimes abandoned.

[mountaineer]

Perhaps someone else has drawn the analogy, but climbers on Everest are sometimes abandoned.

Good point. The mountain is littered with dead bodies.

[berdie]

A question (maybe a dumb one) but assuming this vessel is intact, would it have to be brought slowly to the surface, much like a scuba driver has to come up slowly?

[bigheadfred]

A question (maybe a dumb one) but assuming this vessel is intact, would it have to be brought slowly to the surface, much like a scuba driver has to come up slowly?

The sub can come up fast. All the pressure is on the hull. The people inside aren't exposed to that pressure like divers are.

[mystery-ak]

 Missing Titanic sub: Dire animation suggests how far it’s sunk
By Ben Cost   
June 21, 2023 3:00pm

Amid desperate efforts to rescue the five passengers trapped aboard the Titan, a video has circulated illustrating just how deep the Titanic-bound submersible could have sunk.

The unsettling animated clip is currently making waves online.

The dizzying 3-D demo, created by Spanish animation company MetaBallStudios, depicts a virtual underwater seascape filled with global landmarks, as if an Atlantis-esque apocalypse had drowned Earth’s treasures.

As the illustrated submersible descends into the digital depths, the video’s perspective passes various global landmarks, including the Statue of Liberty (305 feet tall), the Eiffel Tower (984 feet) and the Burj Khalifa (2,719 feet).

Other measuring sticks include a Typhoon-class submarine’s test depth (1,312 feet) and the bottom of the Southern Ocean (10,728 feet).


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5C7sqVe2Vg&ab_channel=MetaBallStudios



Eventually, the viewer is transported all the way down to the wreckage of the Titanic, some 12,000 feet below sea level at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean — where rescuers suspect that the Titan is trapped after disappearing Sunday.

Aboard the vessel are OceanGate Expeditions founder and CEO Stockton Rush, French Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, British billionaire Hamish Harding and Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son, Suleman.

more
https://nypost.com/2023/06/21/titanic-sub-terrifying-animation-predicts-how-far-its-sunk/

[sneakypete]

Exactly -- from my understanding another ship has to navigate bringing them in -- the access is still bolted in .

So how long is it going to take to bring them in and unbolt that hatch??

@libertybele

Given that ships have  items like high-rpm air-powered drills with cobalt bits,acetylene torches,high-speed metal grinders,and I am sure other similar items I am unaware of,it shouldn't take more than a few minutes to burn,cut,or drill a hole in the submersible,and let air in. 

Letting air IN ASAP once surfaced is a lot more important than getting the occupants out right away,and there will be more than one hole being drilled or cut at the same time.

Essentially,if any are still alive once it pops up above the ocean surface,they are safe.

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

Titanic tour CEO didn’t hire ‘50-year-old white guys’ because they weren’t ‘inspirational’

https://nypost.com/2023/06/21/why-stockton-rush-didnt-hire-50-year-old-white-guys-for-titanic-sub-tours/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=nypost

[libertybele]

.......“There are 10 submarines in the world that can go 12,000 ft and deeper,” Kohnen said. “All of them are certified except the Oceangate submersible.”..........

https://www.cnn.com/americas/live-news/titanic-missing-sub-oceangate-06-21-23

[Weird Tolkienish Figure]

.......“There are 10 submarines in the world that can go 12,000 ft and deeper,” Kohnen said. “All of them are certified except the Oceangate submersible.”..........

https://www.cnn.com/americas/live-news/titanic-missing-sub-oceangate-06-21-23

Yeah... still not even sure I'd go. Certified isn't a guarantee. Especially after this incident.

[libertybele]

Yeah... still not even sure I'd go. Certified isn't a guarantee. Especially after this incident.

I agree.  They couldn't pay me $250,000!

[Polly Ticks]

Yeah... still not even sure I'd go. Certified isn't a guarantee. Especially after this incident.

Yeah, definitely not.  I'm risk-averse and happy that way.

Side note - given the propensity to add "-gate" to the end of everything since Watergate, is this going to be known as OceanGate-gate?

[DCPatriot]

Questions:

1) Didn't Jacque Cousteau always have oxygen being pumped from a ship on the surface?

2) Couldn't a ship on the surface contain 3 miles of cable and tubing?

Might not be as 'sexy' going down independently in your own sub...but geez. 

[Free Vulcan]

Questions:

1) Didn't Jacque Cousteau always have oxygen being pumped from a ship on the surface?

2) Couldn't a ship on the surface contain 3 miles of cable and tubing?

Might not be as 'sexy' going down independently in your own sub...but geez. 

That's what first caught my eye is the complete lack of a surface support team that everyone else doing the same type of endeavor always has. I can't believe these people let themselves get snookered right to their deaths.

[DB]

Questions:

1) Didn't Jacque Cousteau always have oxygen being pumped from a ship on the surface?

2) Couldn't a ship on the surface contain 3 miles of cable and tubing?

Might not be as 'sexy' going down independently in your own sub...but geez. 

Apparently - but not certain - they had a cable going to the surface with a buoy housing a StarLink satellite modem. And that is what they used for communications.

Regarding a hose, it would have to be a hell of hose to withstand nearly 6,000 lbs per square inch of pressure without collapsing. It would also be heavy and increase the chances of getting tangled up in something. The communications cable could be pretty small with small floats keeping it taunt. It could also more easily be jettisoned if entangled in something.