LAST UPDATE | 21 Jun 2023
THE CO-FOUNDER and chairman of Horizon Maritime Services, said that OceanGate runs an “extremely safe operation”.
OceanGate’s submersible vessel Titan went missing during a dive to the Titanic shipwreck on Sunday.
Sean Leet, whose company owns the Polar Prince vessel which was used to launch the Titan, told a press conference: “OceanGate runs an extremely safe operation.
“Our full focus right now is getting that submersible located and getting those people brought back safely.”
He added: “We’re in constant contact with the crew of the Polar Prince.
“Our emergency procedures kicked in immediately.
“Our emergency room is staffed 24/7 with a group of extremely capable people and there’s live communication with the vessel at all times.
“We’ve got 17 people onboard the ship.”
Leet also said some of the equipment at the site of the search for the missing Titan vessel is “certainly capable of reaching those depths”.
He was asked at a press conference in Newfoundland today if anything is capable of lifting Titan up from the depths of the sea where it is presumed to be and bringing it back to the surface.
He said: “There’s a lot of variability around the question you’re asking there but the equipment that is on site and coming to site is the most capable in the world, and some of that equipment is certainly capable of reaching those depths.”
The US Coast Guard has said its effort are “solely” and “100%” focused on a “search and rescue operation”.
Speaking to reporters today, Captain Jamie Frederick said “we have to remain optimistic” in the search for the missing tourist submarine.
All communication was lost with the van-sized craft, named the Titan.
It was carrying five people to the famous wreck of the Titanic and lost communication during its descent on Sunday.
A Canadian plane detected the noises earlier but the US Coast Guard had said it is unclear what the noises are or where they came from.
“We don’t know what they are, to be frank with you,” said Captain Jamie Frederick regarding the sounds that had raised hopes the five people onboard are still alive.
“The good news is, we are searching in the area where the noises where detected and we will continue to do so.
“We have to remain optimistic and hopeful when you’re in a search and rescue case,” he told reporters in Boston.”
Frederick added that it is so far “inconclusive” whether the noises came from the missing submarine.
Explaining more about the reported noises, Carl Hartsfield, from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, said: “The ocean is a very complex place and it’s very difficult to discern what the sources of those noises are at times.
“But I can tell you that this team has multiple sensors that are in the area, they’re sending data back expeditiously to the best people in the world to analyse that data and they’re feeding the results of the analysis back to the unified team and they’re making decisions.
“There have been multiple reports of noises and every one of those noises is being analysed, tracked, looked for patterns and reported upon.”
Hartsfield added that the noises have been described as “banging noises”.
Meanwhile, Frederick said the oxygen levels on board “is just one piece of data and there are a lot of pieces of data that we have to consider”.
It was estimated earlier today that there could be as little as 20 hours of oxygen left inside the Titan.
US and Canadian coast guard ships and planes are scouring 20,000 square kilometres (7,600 square miles) of ocean – around the size of Leinster – for the vessel, which was attempting to dive some 640 km (400 miles) off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
Rescue aid has been pouring in from around the world, with a specialised winch system for lifting heavy objects from extreme depths, other equipment and personnel due to join the rescue effort last night, according to the US Navy.
The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MoD) said the UK-based Nato Submarine Rescue System (NSRS) team is available to offer expertise and guidance to the search operation.
But reports indicate the the depths involved in the search “greatly exceed” that which the NSRS can safely operate.
An MoD spokesperson said: “As the host nation for NATO’s multinational submarine rescue capability, we continue to monitor the incident in the North Atlantic and will guide and assist in any response activity as appropriate.”
Retired UK navy rear admiral Chris Parry said that without an “emitting signal” from the deep-sea vessel near the wreck site of the Titanic it will be “impossible” to find it in the timescale.
On board are British billionaire Hamish Harding, Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood, his 19-year-old son Suleman, OceanGate Expeditions CEO Stockton Rush and French submarine operator Paul-Henri Nargeolet, nicknamed “Mr Titanic” for his frequent dives at the site.
Harding, 58, is no stranger to daredevil activities and has three Guinness world records to his name.
A year ago, he became a space tourist through Amazon founder Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin company.
Chris Brown, an explorer and friend of Harding, told BBC Breakfast that making “banging sounds” is “just the sort of thing I would have expected Hamish to come up with”.
Shahzada and Suleman Dawood hail from one of Pakistan’s richest families, which runs Karachi-headquartered conglomerate Engro, with investments in energy, agriculture, petrochemicals and telecommunication
Efforts to find the sub ramped up as a 2018 lawsuit came to light that alleged that OceanGate Expeditions’ former director of marine operations was fired after he raised safety concerns about Titan.
David Lochridge, OceanGate’s former director of marine operations, claimed in the August 2018 court document he was wrongfully fired after flagging worries about the company’s alleged “refusal to conduct critical, non-destructive testing of the experimental design”.
After “issues of quality control” with Titan were raised, the filings say OceanGate founder Rush asked Lochridge to conduct a “quality inspection” report on the vessel.
During this process, Lochridge “identified numerous issues that posed serious safety concerns” but he was allegedly “met with hostility and denial of access” to necessary documents before later being fired.
The document claims he became concerned about a “lack of non-destructive testing performed on the hull of the Titan”, and that he “stressed the potential danger to passengers of the Titan as the submersible reached extreme depths”.
In a November 2022 episode of his Unsung Science podcast, CBS journalist David Pogue interviewed Rush ahead of going on a Titan expedition to the wreckage.
In the podcast, Rush told him: “You know, at some point, safety is just pure waste.
“I mean, if you just want to be safe, don’t get out of bed, don’t get in your car, don’t do anything.
“At some point, you’re going to take some risk, and it really is a risk-reward question.
“I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules.”
Pogue also said he had signed a waiver before going on the dive which allegedly said: “The experimental submersible vessel has not been approved or certified by any regulatory body” and that the trip could result in death.
OceanGate has been approached for comment.
Mike Reiss, an American television writer who visited the Titanic wreck on the same sub last year, told the BBC the experience was disorientating.
The pressure at that depth as measured in atmospheres is 400 times what it is at sea level.
“The compass immediately stopped working and was just spinning around and so we had to flail around blindly at the bottom of the ocean, knowing the Titanic was somewhere there,” Reiss said.
He said everyone was aware of the dangers.
“You sign a waiver before you get on and it mentions death three different times on page one.”
Harding and Nargeolet are both members of The Explorers Club, a group which supports scientific expeditions.
The Explorers’ Club, of which Harding is a founding member, shared an upbeat message this morning.
President Richard Garriot de Cayeux said in a statement: “There is cause for hope, that based on data from the field, we understand that likely signs of life have been detected at the site.
“They precisely understand the experienced personnel and tech we can help deploy … We believe they are doing everything possible with all the resources they have.”
Garriot de Cayeux said they are ready to provide the UK-based Magellan’s remotely operated vehicle (ROV) that is certified to travel as deep as 6,000 metres.
Elsewhere, Alistair Greig, professor of marine engineering at University College London, has suggested two possible scenarios based on images of the Titan.
He said if it had an electrical or communications problem, it could have surfaced and remained floating, “waiting to be found” — bearing in mind the vessel can reportedly be unlocked from the outside only.
“Another scenario is the pressure hull was compromised – a leak,” he said in a statement.
“Then the prognosis is not good.”
Additional reporting by PA
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