Search and Rescue Team Looking Titanic Wreckage Submarine Reportedly Finds Signs Of Hope
This week's underwater catastrophe involving the five-man crew submerging into the Titanic's wreckage in the vast North Atlantic received a positive update late Tuesday.
On Monday, the shocking news of a 22-foot submarine — steered by a video game controller — suddenly going missing shocked people worldwide.
Facing a short time for the OceanGate Expeditions submarine to last for its five-man crew, the search and rescue team, in collaboration with the U.S. Coast Guard, reportedly detected "banging" noises in the direction of the Titanic wreckage — the first potential sign of hope that the people inside the missing submersible are still alive.
As the Daily Mail reported, email updates sent to the Department of Homeland Security relayed that a Canadian airplane detected sonar activity, assumed to be a call from the stranded submarine crew.
“RCC Halifax launched a P8, Poseidon, which has underwater detection capabilities from the air,” the email read. “The P8 deployed sonobuoys, which reported contact in a position close to the distress position. The P8 heard banging sounds in the area every 30 minutes. Four hours later, additional sonar was deployed, and banging was still heard.”
The U.S. Coast Guard said an underwater vehicle was dispatched to investigate the site of the banging noises, with no sign of the vessel available as of current reporting.
A spare anchor sits in its well on the forepeek of the shipwrecked Titanic.
Not only was the concept of a $250,000 underwater voyage to look at the remains of the Titanic a great waste of money, but the blueprint for the seemingly makeshift submarine also posed real questions regarding whether these guys could actually make it back to the surface before meeting a tragic demise.
According to the New York Post, the expedition vessel carried OceanGate Expeditions’ founder and CEO Stockton Rush, Titanic enthusiast Paul-Henri Nargeolet, British adventurer Hamish Harding, and businessman Shahzada Dawood, along with his 19-year-old son.
As of Tuesday afternoon, the crew faced 40 hours of oxygen left.