OceanGate Waited 8 Hours Before Reporting Missing Titanic Tourist Sub to U.S. Coast Guard
June 20 2023, Published 6:15 p.m. ET
The OceanGate Expeditions mothership waited 8 hours before reporting the Titan submersible missing, RadarOnline.com has learned.
The Titan is a 21-foot submersible owned and operated by OceanGate. The submersible was roughly an hour and 45 minutes into its descent to the Titanic wreckage site when it lost connection with the mothership, the Polar Prince.
Among the five missing passengers onboard included OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush and British billionaire Hamish Harding.
HMS Titanic
The Titan set out on its expected 9-hour round-trip expedition from 400 miles off the coast of St John's, Newfoundland, around 8 AM Sunday. The submersible's last contact with the Polar Prince, which provided coordination communication from the surface, was around 9:45 AM.
Despite being unable to reach the Titan from that point forward, OceanGate waited to report the submersible as missing when it failed to return to the surface around 5:40 PM, nearly 8 hours later.
Making matters worse, only the U.S. Coast Guard was initially alerted. The Canadian Coast Guard wasn't notified until much later, around 9 PM.
A frantic search and rescue effort was thrown together by U.S. and Canadian officials, who had to work with minimal resources needed for the deep-sea excursion.
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According to the Daily Mail, a former U.S. Navy commander gave the Titan a "one percent" chance of survival.
"If I was advising the Prime Minister, I'd say their chances are one percent," said Lt. David Marquet, former U.S. Navy nuclear submarine commander.
On Tuesday morning, officials said the submersible had about 48 hours of breathable oxygen left, making the search a dire race against time.
Critics pointed not only to the Polar Prince's delayed response to both U.S. and Canadian Coast Guards but the Titan's so-called rudimentary construction. A viral video of the vessel and Rush showed the inside of the cramped submarine.
More shocking than its lack of amenities was the utilization of a $30 video game controller, which served as the commanding component of the vessel.