Race against time to rescue five missing in Titanic sub

WASHINGTON/KARACHI: Rescue teams are scrambling to find five people on a tourist submersible that went missing near the wreck of the Titanic in the North Atlantic on Sunday, and is believed to be left with oxygen estimated for 40 hours.

Among the missing tourists are the tour operator´s boss, a French submarine operator known as “Mr Titanic”, a British aviation tycoon, son and grandson of a prominent Pakistan businessman -- Chairman of Dawood Group Hussain Dawood.

The submarine with five people onboard including Hussain Dawood’s son Shahzada Dawood and grandson Suleman, British billionaire Hamish Harding, French navy veteran PH Nargeolet and submarine company OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush went missing since the afternoon of June 18. It is feared that they may have become stuck in the wreckage of the Titanic.

The submarine lost communication with the mothership just one hour and 45 minutes after it began the expedition.

According to OceanGate’s website, the sub can last up to 96 hours underwater with five people consuming oxygen. The rescue process is underway but the submersible is still nowhere to be found. Rear Admiral John W. Mauger said, the US Coast Guard is working “as hard as possible” to find it while “lives are at risk”. C-130s and P-8s are now being used to assist in the search in the remote area of the ocean, 900 miles east of Cape Cod and 370 miles southeast of southernmost Newfoundland.

Rescue teams raced against time Tuesday to find a deep-diving tourist submersible that went missing near the wreck of the Titanic with five people on board and an estimated 40 hours of oxygen left.

All communication was lost with the 21-foot (6.5-meter) Titan craft during a descent Sunday to the Titanic, which sits more than two miles (nearly four kilometres) below the surface of the North Atlantic.

The submersible was carrying three fee-paying passengers -- British billionaire Hamish Harding, and Pakistani tycoon Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman.

The US and Canadian Coast Guards have deployed ships and planes in an intensive search for the vessel, which was attempting to dive near the wreck of the Titanic some 400 miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.

Coast Guard Captain Jamie Frederick told reporters that the rescue efforts over an area of 7,600 square miles, larger than the US state of Connecticut, “have not yielded any results.” “There´s about 40 hours of breathable air left based on that initial report,” he said referring to the sub´s capacity to hold up to 96 hours of oxygen.

A P-3 plane from Canada dropped sonar buoys in the area of the Titanic wreckage to listen for any sound from the small sub. The search, initially restricted to the ocean´s surface, was expanded underwater on Tuesday. France’s oceanographic institute said it was sending a deep-sea underwater robot to aid efforts.

In an Instagram message posted just before the dive, Harding said a mission window had opened after days of bad weather. Among the crew he named was Paul-Henry Nargeolet, a veteran diver and expert on the Titanic wreck. Unconfirmed reports said the fifth person on board was Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate Expeditions which operates the tourist dives.

The Titan lost contact with the surface less than two hours into its descent, according to authorities. “We are exploring and mobilizing all options to bring the crew back safely. Our entire focus is on the crewmembers in the submersible and their families,” OceanGate said in a statement.

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 told the BBC that everyone was aware of the dangers. “You sign a waiver before you get on and it mentions death three different times on page one” OceanGate Expeditions charges $250,000 for a seat on the Titan.

The Titanic hit an iceberg and sank in 1912 during its maiden voyage from England to New York with 2,224 passengers and crew on board. More than 1,500 people died. It was found in 1985 and remains a lure for nautical experts and underwater tourists.

According to an Engro press release of Sunday, June 18, “Shahzada Dawood, Vice Chairman of Engro Corporation Limited, along with his son, Suleman, embarked on a journey to visit the remnants of the Titanic in the Atlantic Ocean. All that we know so far is that contact was lost with their submersible craft. There is limited information available beyond this that we know, and we humbly request avoiding speculation and theorization.”

“A rescue effort is being jointly led by multiple government agencies and deep-sea companies to find and bring home Shahzada, Suleman, and all aboard. Prayers for their safety and privacy for the family are requested during this testing time. We, at Engro, remain in prayer for their swift and safe return and will share any updates we may have as and when they come,” the press release concluded.