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The Titan submersible is a one-of-a-kind vessel with some non-traditional parts.
OceanGate operates a few submersibles, including the Cyclops 1 (pictured). David L. Ryan / The Boston Globe.
Government agencies from multiple countries are frantically searching for a lost submersible that was taking people down to see the wreck site of the infamous Titanic.
What we already knew about the missing sub
The missing sub Titan took off Sunday morning only to lose contact with its surface ship, which launches and recovers the vessel, an hour and 45 minutes later. The sub was last known to be about 900 miles east of Cape Cod and about 435 miles south of St. John’s, Newfoundland.
Five people are reported to be on the “van-sized” submersible, which is owned and operated by OceanGate Expeditions. The sub is believed to be equipped with up to 96 hours of oxygen, which began being used around 6 a.m. Sunday.
An Instagram post from one of the people believed to be on the submersible said that the team was battling bad weather, and that they identified a “weather window” Sunday during which they would attempt to dive. He said the weather was so bad that his mission might be the only one to take off this year to see the Titanic wreck.
OceanGate has taken at least two dozen people down to see the Titanic and completed over 50 test dives, but has had to cancel many dives in the past, as well as entire missions.
Both air and water search teams are using sonar and other technology to try to find the vessel.
1. The sub is equipped with some non-traditional parts
A December 2022 CBS special about OceanGate’s Titanic expedition highlighted that the submersible Titan is the only one of its kind.
Not only is it the only five-person sub that can reach depths of 13,000 feet, but reporter David Pogue described many of the sub’s parts as seeming “improvised” or “MacGyvered.”
For instance, Pogue noted that the sub is controlled by a gaming controller, that it uses construction pipes as ballasts, and that OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush bought some of its light fixtures from Camping World.
It’s revealed later in the report that the sub navigates to the Titanic wreck based on text messages from the surface ship.
“This is not your grandfather’s submersible,” Rush says at one point.
But in the special, Rush emphasized that the parts of the vessel that are essential for safety are designed by experts.
“There’s certain things that you want to be buttoned down. So the pressure vessel is not MacGyvered at all, because that’s where we work with Boeing and NASA and [the] University of Washington,” he said. “Everything else can fail. Your thrusters can go, your lights can go. You’re still going to be safe.”
OceanGate also highlights on its website that the Titan is equipped with a “real-time hull monitoring health system” that constantly analyzes the effects of changing pressure on the sub and evaluates the sub’s structural integrity.
2. The dives and sub have encountered issues before
According to previous reporting on OceanGate, this is not the first time the company has encountered issues while trying to ferry people down to the Titanic wreck.
The Titan was originally scheduled to take people down for the first time in 2018, but the vessel was damaged by lightning during testing and had to be repaired, tech news website GeekWire reported.
Then, in 2020, the Titan had to be “rebuilt” after its hull showed signs of “cyclic fatigue” during testing, GeekWire reported.
Finally, in 2021, OceanGate completed a successful mission to the Titanic in Titan, The New York Times reported. But issues with the dives didn’t stop there.
In the CBS special, the first dive that’s supposed to include Pogue is canceled due to high waves. Then, the team tries to take him to see the continental shelf 80 miles from the wreck, but the floats on the platform that take the Titan down come off early, and they have to cancel the dive again. It’s not until the third try that Pogue finally gets to see the Titanic.
The Associated Press also reported that in 2022, the Titan had battery issues and later sustained so much external damage that OceanGate had to cancel its second mission to the Titanic. Even so, the company was able to complete successful missions to the Titanic in the Titan after the canceled mission.
3. The Titan has very little room to move around in
In a 2022 Facebook video where OceanGate employees give a tour of Titan, you can see just how tight a fit it is inside the sub. There is not even enough room to stand.
In the CBS special, Pogue shows that the Titan is equipped with a makeshift portable toilet that can hold a limited amount of waste.
The special also shows that the Titan doesn’t have a door. One end of the vessel is repeatedly taken off and bolted on again when passengers go in and out.
This means that if the Titan were to be found, the vessel would need to be unbolted or broken open somehow before the passengers could be rescued.
4. Four people have been identified as currently being on the Titan
The family of 58-year-old Hamish Harding, the chairman of aircraft firm Action Aviation, has confirmed that he is one of the five people currently on the Titan, BBC News reported.
Harding is known for being an adventurer who holds three Guinness World Records. The Independent described him as a British billionaire businessman.
In a Saturday Instagram post, Harding wrote about being part of Sunday’s mission and indicated that Paul-Henri Nargeolet, a French expert on the Titanic who has been working with OceanGate, would be part of the mission. An agent for Nargeolet confirmed to The New York Times that he is on the sub.
The New York Times also reported that Shahzada Dawood, a wealthy British businessman, and his son, Suleman, are on the Titan.
5. Customers pay $250,000 to go see the Titanic through OceanGate
In the CBS special, Pogue said that the going rate for a seat on the Titan was $250,000. The money is used to fund OceanGate’s missions to the Titanic and the scientific research and documentation of the wreck that’s conducted while there.
The customers, who are dubbed “mission specialists” by OceanGate, act as citizen scientists while visiting the wreck by recording and collecting data, according to OceanGate. They are also accompanied by actual scientists and researchers.
In the CBS Special, Rush said that they take people from all walks of life down to see the Titanic.
“We have clients that are Titanic enthusiasts, which we refer to as ‘Titaniacs,’” he said. “We’ve had people who have mortgaged their home to come and do the trip, and we have people who don’t think twice about a trip of this cost. We had one gentleman who had won the lottery.”
Renata Rojas, a bank executive and OceanGate customer interviewed for the special, explained how passionate some people are about seeing the Titanic.
“Dreams don’t have a price,” she said. “Some people want a Ferrari. Some people buy a house. I wanted to go to [see the] Titanic.”
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