Passengers on board a submarine to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean to see the site of the Titanic wreck last year were missing for two and a half hours after their ship lost communication with its mothership.
On Monday, CBS Sunday Morning reporter David Pogue shared his experience after the United States and Canadian Coast Guards launched a search for a missing OceanGate Expeditions vessel.
He said he took the $250,000-a-person trip last year, but his voyage was marred by bad weather and communications problems on the cramped submarine.
It now seems that history has repeated itself, as the company reports that a submersible carrying five passengers disappeared after it embarked on its trip at 4am Sunday morning.
Those passengers, one of whom is British billionaire Hamish Harding, CEO of Action Aviation in Dubai, now have just over 70 hours of oxygen remaining.
CBS Sunday Morning reporter David Pogue shared his experience onboard an OceanGate Expeditions vessel on Monday as United States and Canadian Coast Guard officials desperately search for one of its missing ships
He said his voyage was marred by communication failure on board the cramped submarine
A passenger on board the doomed voyage told how they were lost for two and a half hours
The trip last year had already been delayed by bad weather, Pogue reported
During his voyage last year, Pogue reported that his trip to see the site of the Titanic wreckage off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada was delayed for several days due to inclement weather.
Finally, after six days, he sad, ‘the dive was a go.’
But as they were preparing to make their final descent to the site, the communications system failed.
‘There’s no GPS underwater, so the surface ship is supposed to guide the ship to the shipwreck by sending text messages,’ Pogue said in his November 2022 news story. ‘But on this dive, communication somehow broke down. The sub never found the wreck.’
‘We were lost,’ one of the passengers said in the news package. ‘We were lost for two and a half hours.’
Fortunately, no one was injured during that time, and footage showed the passengers being brought back above sea level.
The company said it would offer passengers onboard that trip a ‘free do-over’ in the summer. It is unclear if any of those explorers were taking their free trip when the submarine disappeared Sunday.
Authorities are now searching for OceanGate’s 22ft carbon fiber and titanium vessel called the Titan after it vanished on Sunday, while taking a trip to view the Titanic wreckage.
It is believed to have departed St Johns in Newfoundland on Saturday, with the submersible launching at around 4am Sunday.
Passengers are seen here onboard one of the company’s maiden voyages last year. Those on board the trip with Pogue were allowed to rebook a trip this summer. It is unclear if any of them were on board when the ship disappeared Sunday morning
OceanGate’s 22ft carbon fiber and titanium vessel called the Titan is pictured here
The Boston Coastguard is now looking for the missing vessel. The wreckage of the iconic ship sits 12,500ft underwater around 370 miles from Newfoundland, Canada
OceanGate has not confirmed how long the sub has been missing, but Rear Admiral John W. Mauger told Fox News that it had 72 hours of oxygen left based on OceanGate’s ads that the sub has a life support of 96 hours.
He added that the Coast Guard does not have any ships or subs available to rescue the Titan from the ocean bed, and that more help is on the way.
‘We don’t have equipment onsite that can do a survey of the bottom… there is a lot of debris [at this wreckage] so locating will be difficult.
‘We don’t have the capabilities at this time. Right now, we’re focused on trying to locate it,’ he said.
Marine Traffic shows the Canadian Coast Guard’s Horizon Arctic and Kopit Hobson 1752 are now making their way to the wreckage.
Its dives can last up to 10 hours each, with participants spending a total of eight days at sea onboard a larger ship.
Among those taking part in the expedition is billionaire Hamish Harding, CEO of Action Aviation in Dubai. He excitedly posted to social media about being there yesterday
Harding excitedly posted to social media about being on the mission
Harding had posted excitedly about the dive. The boat departed St John in Newfoundland on Saturday for a Sunday morning dive
In a statement, OceanGate said: ‘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.
‘We are working toward the safe return of the crewmembers.
The company added that ‘several’ government agencies were involved in addition to the Coast Guard.
Among those taking part in the expedition is billionaire Harding, who excitedly posted to social media about being there. Harding said it a ‘window’ had opened up that would allow the group to dive.
‘A weather window has just opened up and we are going to attempt a dive tomorrow.
‘We started steaming from St. Johns, Newfoundland, Canada yesterday and are planning to start dive operations around 4am tomorrow morning,’ he wrote.
His company, Action Aviation, posted yesterday at 4am confirming that he was ‘diving’. ‘Until then we have a lot of preparations and briefings to do.’
The company’s CEO Stockton Rush previously told CBC that their subs had capacity for five people.
‘Titan is the only five-person sub capable of going to the Titanic depth, which is half the depth of the ocean.’
‘There’s no switches and things to bump into, we have one button to turn it on.
‘Everything else is done with touch screens and computers, and so you really become part of the vehicle and everybody gets to know everyone pretty well.’
The 2023 expeditions are only the third the company has carried out in the Titan.
