The last hours for survivors as the oxygen supply dwindles on the lost Titanic World news

The race against time to find a lost submersible on its way to the Titanic wreck site entered a new level of desperation on Wednesday morning as the last hours of possible oxygen were left on the doomed ship. leave the clock.

Rescuers have rushed more ships and boats to the site of the loss, hoping the underwater objects they found for the next day straight can help narrow down their search in a quick, international mission. But the crew only had four days’ supply of oxygen when the ship, called the Titan, set sail at around 6am on Sunday.

Even those who express hope have warned that there are many obstacles: to indicate the position of the ship, to reach it with rescue equipment, to bring it to the surface – assuming it is still intact. And all that has to happen before the passengers’ oxygen supply runs out.

Its total area is twice that of the US state of Connecticut in water as deep as 13,200 feet (4,020 meters). Captain Jamie Frederick of the Coast Guard District 1 said authorities were still holding out hope of saving the five passengers on board.

“This is a search and rescue operation, 100%,” he said Wednesday.

The area of ​​the North Atlantic where the Titan disappeared on Sunday is also prone to fog and stormy conditions, making it a very difficult area to conduct search and rescue work, said Donald Murphy, a marine photographer who works as chief scientist of the Region. Guard’s International Ice Patrol.

Meanwhile, the new open allegations suggest that there were serious warnings about the safety of the ship during the development of the submersible.

Frederick said while the sightings offer an opportunity to narrow down the search, their exact location and source have not been determined.

“We don’t know what they are, to be honest,” he said.

Capt. Carl Hartsfield, retired Navy, now director of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Systems Laboratory, said the objects have been described as “loud noises,” but warned that search crews “have to put the whole picture together in situation and they must eliminate the potential human resources other than Titan.”

The report is interesting to some experts because submariners who cannot communicate with the surface are taught to bang on their submarine to be seen by sonar.

The US Navy said in a statement on Thursday that it is deploying a specialized rescue system capable of transporting “large, large and underwater objects such as aircraft or small ships.”

The Titan weighs 20,000 pounds (9,071 kilograms). The US Navy’s Flyaway Deep Ocean Rescue System is designed to lift up to 60,000 pounds (27,216 kilograms), the Navy said on its website.

Lost on the boat was pilot Stockton Rush, CEO of the company that led the trip. Her passengers were a British adventurer, two members of a Pakistani business family and a Titanic expert. OceanGate Travels oversees the mission.

Authorities reported the 22-foot (6.7-meter) carbon-fiber boat was late Sunday night, set adrift in waters about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. Louis.

Officials said the ship had a 96-hour supply of oxygen. That would give rescuers a deadline of between 6 a.m. (1000 GMT) and 8 a.m. (1200 GMT) Wednesday morning to find and lift the Titan before it the oxygen inside should be exhausted – if the ship has not suffered catastrophic damage before. late.

Frank Owen, a submarine search-and-rescue expert, said the estimated oxygen supply is a “useful goal” for searchers, but depends on “the amount of energy.” Owen said that the diver aboard the Titan would do it. advises travelers to “do anything to lower your productivity levels so you can really pull this off.”

At least 46 people successfully traveled on the OceanGate cruise to the Titanic wreck site in 2021 and 2022, according to letters the company filed with a US District Court in Norfolk, Virginia, that overseeing matters involving the Titanic.

One of the company’s first customers characterized the water bath that it built into the space two years ago as a “kamikaze operation.”

“Imagine a metal tube a few meters long with a metal sheet for the floor. You can’t wait. You can’t kneel. Everyone sits close or on top of each other,” said Arthur Loibl, a retired businessman and adventurer from Germany. “You can’t be claustrophobic.”

During the 2.5-hour descent and ascent, the lights were turned off to conserve energy, he said, with the only illumination coming from a fluorescent glow stick.

The dive was repeatedly delayed to fix a problem with the battery and balance units. In total, the trip takes 10.5 hours.

OceanGate has been criticized for using a simple commercially available video game controller to control the Titan. But the company has said that many parts of the ship are off-site because they have proven to be reliable.

“It’s meant for a 16-year-old to throw around” and it’s “very fair,” Rush told the CBC in an interview last year while demonstrating by throwing the director around the Titans’ small cabin. He said there were two spares on board “just in case.”

The submersible has seven backup systems to return to the surface, including sandbags and lead pipes that descend and an inflatable balloon.

Jeff Karson, a professor of earth and environmental sciences at Syracuse University, said the temperature was above freezing, and the ship was too deep for many people to reach it. The best way to reach the submersible may be to use a robot that operates remotely on an optical fiber, he said.

“I’m sure it’s scary down there,” Karson said. “It’s like being in an ice cave and hypothermia is a real risk.”

Documents show that OceanGate was warned that there could be catastrophic safety problems with the way the test vessel was designed.

David Lochridge, OceanGate’s director of marine operations, said in a 2018 lawsuit that the company’s testing and certification was insufficient and would “put travelers at greater risk in the testing of visitors.”

The company stressed that Lochridge “is not an engineer and was not hired or asked to perform mechanical work on the Titan.” The company also said that the ship under development is a prototype, not the now missing Titan.

The Marine Engineering Association, which describes itself as “a professional group of marine engineers, engineers, policy makers, and educators,” also expressed concern that year in a letter to Rush, OceanGate’s executive director. . The society says it is important that the company submits its design to tests conducted by an expert third party before launch in order to protect passengers. The New York Times first reported on the documents.

Missing on Titan is British adventurer Hamish Harding; Pakistani nationals Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman, whose eponymous firm invests across the country; and French explorer and Titanic expert Paul-Henry Nargeolet.

Retired Navy SEAL Robert Murrett, who is the deputy director of the Institute for Security Policy and Law at Syracuse University, said the loss underscores the dangers associated with deep-sea operations and recreational exploration of the sea and place.

“I think some people believe that because modern technology is better, that you can do something like this and you don’t have an accident, but it’s not worth it,” he said.