submarine titanic tour tickets

Innovation | June 2019

A Deep Dive Into the Plans to Take Tourists to the ‘Titanic’

For a handsome price, a daredevil inventor will bring you aboard his groundbreaking submarine to put eyes on most famous shipwreck of all

Tony Perrottet

Contributing writer

Editor's Note, June 22, 2023: On the afternoon of June 22, the U.S. Coast Guard announced the identification of debris from the tourist submersible Titan , which went missing on Sunday during a dive to the wreck of the Titanic . "The debris is consistent with a catastrophic implosion of the vessel" that would have killed all five crew members on board, including OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, said Rear Admiral John Mauger during a press conference. Investigations into the cause and timing of the explosion are ongoing. Below, read a 2019 story by magazine correspondent Tony Perrottet, who visited OceanGate headquarters and reported on the company's plans to send tourists to the Titanic .

The world looks very different through the eye of the Cyclops. I learned this one freezing morning this past February, after trudging through two feet of snow to get to the marina in Everett, Washington, a small port 45 minutes north of Seattle. On the dock was a cylindrical white pod about the size of a moving van, a five-person submersible whose protruding, semi-spherical window inspired its name, after the monocular monster of myth. A half-dozen men wearing thickly padded khaki jumpsuits and orange helmets gathered on the snow-covered dock ready to send me under the ice-flecked waves of Puget Sound.

The schedule was as rigorously timed as a rocket launch. “Vessel prep” had been completed at dawn, so after a pre-dive briefing, I climbed a ladder to the top hatch of the sub, took off my boots and clambered into the tube, which was sheathed in perforated stainless steel. Inside, the pilot Kenny Hague was checking instruments, including the modified Sony PlayStation controllers used to steer the sub underwater. There were no seats, but with only three of us on the dive (the other was staff member Joel Perry), I could stretch out like a pasha on a black vinyl mat.

With the submersible still resting on its metal launching platform, one end of the platform slowly rose from the dock and we slid backward into the sea. The milky green waters of Puget Sound rose over the eye of Cyclops 1 ; the support team blurred and vanished, followed by the leaden sky. Even though visibility was only about 15 feet, thanks to storm runoff, a condition my crew mates dubbed “the milkshake,” it was still magical to be breathing underwater, an unnatural human state that has captured our imagination since antiquity, when Greek legends of Poseidon and mermen abounded. I was reminded, inevitably, of Jules Verne’s 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea , and Captain Nemo’s near-mystical reverie on the Nautilus over its mastery of the deep: “The sea is everything....It is an immense desert, where man is never lonely, for he feels life stirring on all sides. The sea is only the embodiment of a supernatural and wonderful existence. It is nothing but love and emotion; it is the ‘Living Infinite.’”

This test “dunk,” in the words of my hosts, from a company called OceanGate, was just a taste of what will happen this summer, when OceanGate will begin taking paying customers to visit the fabled wreckage of the Titanic , which lies some two and a half miles beneath the North Atlantic. The experimental submersible for those trips, named Titan , closely resembles its sibling Cyclops 1 . But Titan is the first deep-sea submersible constructed from a carbon-fiber composite, which allows the vessel to withstand enormous pressure at great depths while being far cheaper to build and operate than more traditional subs of equal abilities. Though the average depth of the world’s oceans is 2.3 miles, or a little more than 12,000 feet, until Titan came along only a handful of active submersibles were capable of reaching that depth, and they were all owned by the governments of the United States, France, China and Japan. Then, last December, OceanGate made history: Titan became the first privately owned sub with a human aboard to dive that deep and beyond, finally reaching 4,000 meters, or about 13,000 feet—a little deeper than where the Titanic lies.

The feat was the culmination of a dream for Stockton Rush, OceanGate’s maverick CEO and co-founder. “Stockton is a real pioneer,” says Scott Parazynski, a 17-year NASA veteran, the first person to have both flown in space (five times) and summited Mount Everest, and a consultant on the Titan expeditions. “It’s not easy to take a white sheet of paper, come up with a new submersible design, fund it, test it and mature it. It was an incredibly audacious thing to do.”

In his zeal for innovation, Rush stands out even in the elite manned submersible community, which attracts wealthy and eccentric individuals willing to risk their fortunes on wildly uncertain endeavors. Rush wants to do for deep ocean exploration what Richard Branson, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are doing for space travel. By taking well-heeled tourists to the deep—at first, each seat cost $105,129, the inflation-adjusted price of a first-class ticket on the Titanic , though the rate has increased to a cool $125,000—Rush hopes to use private enterprise to spur advances in the long-neglected field of underwater exploratory technology, and reveal some of the secrets of the great blue unknown.

Not that he is given to romantic reveries of the sea. “Sometimes Mother Nature works for you,” Rush said, smiling wryly as he settled into a chair in a wood-paneled parlor in downtown Seattle. “And sometimes Mother Nature is a bitch.” The vagaries of the weather are an ongoing theme for Rush, with deluges, lightning storms and other cataclysms wreaking havoc on Titan ’s test schedules. But he was also referring to the difficulties of our meeting, which occurred while Seattle was being pummeled by its snowiest month in half a century, turning roads into rivers of slush and paralyzing transportation. Just reaching a place for us to sit down had the air of an arctic trek in the Edwardian Age, one reason we chose the historic Hotel Sorrento, which was built for the 1909 Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition that put Seattle, then a frontier outpost for gold prospectors and fur-trappers, on the map. Ever since, the city has attracted independent thinkers, inventors and misfits with a spirit symbolized by the iconic Space Needle, built for the 1962 World’s Fair. As we chatted, snow cascaded down outside the hotel window, cocooning us in an eerie silence and creating the sense that we were sitting in a sub on the ocean floor.

Subscribe to Smithsonian magazine now for just $19.99

This article is a selection from the June 2019 issue of Smithsonian magazine

With a shock of silver hair and preppy clothes, Rush might be mistaken for a corporate lawyer on casual Friday rather than an ocean adventurer in the mold of a Jacques Cousteau, who was not just a telegenic explorer but also an inventor (of the aqualung, in his case). A conversation with Rush jumps between engineering (“sacrificial weights,” “tensile forces,” and “fairing,” the external shell added to streamline a sub), business (“marketing granularity”) and boyish enthusiasm (Rush has a fondness for “Star Trek” references).

His childhood dream, growing up in a wealthy San Francisco family, was to be an astronaut. His parents assumed he’d grow out of it. “I didn’t,” he says. When Stockton’s father introduced him to Pete Conrad, the commander of Apollo 12 and the first manned Skylab mission (and a personal friend), the astronaut advised the teenage math whiz to get his pilot’s license. So in 1980, at age 18, Rush became one of the youngest commercial pilots in the world, then signed up to fly chartered planes in and out of Saudi Arabia, all while studying aerospace engineering at Princeton. “It was the coolest college summer job,” he says. For his thesis, he designed a high-speed ultralight aircraft; later, he built his own plane, a Glasair III, from a kit. (“You start on Page 1 of the manual, and by the time you get to Page 680, you have a plane!”)

The astronaut dream was dashed when Rush learned that his eyesight wasn’t good enough for him to become a military pilot, in the 1980s still the astronaut fast track. Instead, he moved to Seattle, to work for McDonnell Douglas as a flight-test engineer on F-15 fighter jets, then went to business school. Building on inherited money, he invested in a string of esoteric tech companies (wireless remote-control devices, sonar systems). Still, he dreamed of going to space, perhaps as a passenger on one of the private rockets being developed in the early 2000s by the likes of Richard Branson. In fact, Rush traveled to the Mojave Desert in 2004 to watch the launch of SpaceShipOne, the first commercial craft sent into space. When Branson stood on its wing and declared that a new era of space tourism had arrived, Rush says, he abruptly lost interest. “I had this epiphany that this was not at all what I wanted to do. I didn’t want to go up into space as a tourist. I wanted to be Captain Kirk on the Enterprise . I wanted to explore .”

As it happened, Rush had been a fanatic scuba diver since he was a teenager, and had ventured to the Red Sea, the Cayman Islands and Tahiti. It dawned on him that Seattle had excellent cold-water diving. “Puget Sound is full of nutrients, so you have sharks and whales and crabs and dolphins and seals and anemones,” he said. “It’s an absolutely incredible place to dive—except that it’s freezing!” He took a cold-water dive class, but was put off by the thick, full-body dry suits and vast amounts of paraphernalia, including multiple air tanks. “I loved what I saw, but I thought, There’s gotta be a better way. And being in a sub, and being nice and cozy, and having a hot chocolate with you, beats the heck out of freezing and going through a two-hour decompression hanging in deep water.”

The obvious next step was to rent a submarine. He was shocked to find that there were fewer than 100 privately owned subs in the world, and only a few were available for charter. He then tried unsuccessfully to buy one. Instead, a London company offered to sell him parts for a mini-sub that could be built using blueprints created by a retired U.S. Navy submarine commander. He completed it in 2006, a 12-foot-long tube in which the pilot lies flat on his stomach and looks out a plexiglass window while manipulating control levers and cruising at a max speed of three knots.

Rush recalls his first dive in road-to-Damascus terms. “While I was building the sub, I was thinking, This is stupid. I should have just bought a robot and explored with that,” he said. “But the moment I went underwater, I was like, Oh—you can’t describe this. When you go in a sub, things sound different, they look different. It’s like you’ve gone to a different planet.” Rush was hooked—and his entrepreneurial instincts were piqued. “I had come across this business anomaly I couldn’t explain: If three-quarters of the planet is water, how come you can’t access it?”

Our ongoing ignorance of the underwater world is something of a historical accident, Rush discovered. After the Moon landing in 1969, there was a tremendous push for ocean exploration in the U.S. “The thought was, that’s the next frontier,” he says. The Navy pumped millions into manned submersibles with names like Alvin , Turtle and Mystic , with research fueled by secret Cold War missions such as the 1974 recovery of a sunken Russian ballistic-missile sub from the Pacific floor. But in the post-Vietnam recession, government funds dried up. In Seattle, military sub researchers went into other areas of defense contracting and maritime side-specialties such as sonar.

Soon after, the private market died too, Rush found, for two reasons that were “understandable but illogical.” First, subs gained a reputation for danger. Working on offshore rigs in harsh locations like the North Sea, saturation divers, who breathe gas mixtures to avoid diving sicknesses, would be taken in subs to work at great depths. It was the world’s most perilous job, with frequent fatalities. (“It wasn’t the sub’s fault,” says Rush.) To save lives, the industries moved toward using underwater robots to perform the same work.

Second, tourist subs, which could once be skippered by anyone with a U.S. Coast Guard captain’s license, were regulated by the Passenger Vessel Safety Act of 1993, which imposed rigorous new manufacturing and inspection requirements and prohibited dives below 150 feet. The law was well-meaning, Rush says, but he believes it needlessly prioritized passenger safety over commercial innovation (a position a less adventurous submariner might find open to debate). “There hasn’t been an injury in the commercial sub industry in over 35 years. It’s obscenely safe, because they have all these regulations. But it also hasn’t innovated or grown—because they have all these regulations.” The U.S. government, meanwhile, has continued to favor space exploration over ocean research: NASA today gets about $10.5 billion annually for exploration, while NOAA’s Office of Ocean Exploration and Research is allotted less than $50 million—a triumph of “emotion over logic,” Rush says. “Half of the United States is underwater, and we haven’t even mapped it!”

Although Rush can sound as if he’s found a semi-religious calling—he is fond of saying things like “I want to change the way humanity regards the deep ocean”—he is also blunt about his interest in responsibly exploiting America’s natural resources, pointing out that the country’s “exclusive economic zone,” which extends as far as 230 miles from every coast, is vast, thanks to U.S. island possessions. There could be massive oil and gas reserves, rare minerals or diamonds—to say nothing of deep-sea corals and other possible sources of rare chemicals that might, for example, lead to medical breakthroughs. “We don’t know what resources are out there.”

Rush’s first dive in his mini-sub had only been to 30 feet, but he had contracted what he calls “the deep disease.” From 2007, he began descending to ever-lower depths, first testing the sub by lowering it on a rope to see if the hull or windows would crack. “I went to 75 feet. I saw cool stuff. I went 100 feet and saw more cool stuff. And I was like, Wow, what’s it gonna be like at the end of this thing?” He began to fantasize about seeing what’s known as the “deep scattering layer” around 1,600 feet, where marine life is so dense that early sonar scans in the 1940s reported it as a false, ever-shifting seafloor. Experts surmise that in the darkness below that there exist more than a million invertebrate species, most still unknown to marine biologists.

Rush commissioned a marketing study and found demand for “participatory” adventure travel to the deep ocean, and the idea was born to take clients on expeditions to pay for developing new sub technology that would have wider commercial applications—scientific exploration, disaster response, resource speculation. Rush and a business partner (who has since left the company) formed OceanGate in 2009.

When the blizzard eased up, I made the slow pilgrimage with Rush in his SUV north to OceanGate’s headquarters, in Everett, creeping along a highway lined with snow-covered pine trees that loomed like icebergs. The waterfront office seemed crisply corporate except for the telltale scale models of the Titanic and Titan sitting on a shelf. But opening the door to the workshop revealed the company’s hands-on side: an Aladdin’s cave for tech geeks, a jumble of white hulls that looked like shark fins, sculptural engineering parts, oxygen tanks and oddities like a mysterious Perspex sphere whose interior resembled a medieval clock.

There was OceanGate’s first commercial sub, Antipodes , which was painted bright yellow and whose array of dials and meters had a steampunk air. “I wish it were a different color—I can’t stand that song,” Rush said of “Yellow Submarine.” In 2010, he used the five-person Antipodes , which could descend to 1,000 feet, to carry his first paying clients to Catalina Island, off the coast of California; later, he undertook expeditions to explore corals, lionfish populations and an abandoned oil rig in the Gulf of Mexico. To refine the tourist experience, he decided to recruit expert guides. “People would ask me about a fish, and I wouldn’t know anything about it,” he recalls. So he brought along marine biologists. “The difference was night and day. Their excitement permeated the sub.”

“Deep disease” now pushed Rush into a new phase: engineering. He abandoned the traditional spherical submersible shape. “It’s the best geometry for pressure, but not for occupation, which is why you don’t have spherical military subs,” he says. Instead, he developed Cyclops 1 , a cylinder that fits five people and is strong enough to descend to 1,600 feet. The steel hull was acquired in 2013 from a company in the Azores, who had been using it for 12 years. Its interior was entirely revamped by the OceanGate engineering team and the Applied Physics Laboratory at the University of Washington, who helped integrate new underwater sensors and install the Sony PlayStation controllers, which gave the sub a uniquely intuitive piloting system.

The idea of trips to the Titanic first arose as a marketing ploy. Shipwrecks, Rush realized, were a way to grab public attention. In 2016, OceanGate mounted an expedition with paying passengers in Cyclop s 1 to the wreck of the Andrea Doria , an Italian passenger liner that sank off the coast of Nantucket in 1956, killing 46 people. Media interest spiked. “But there’s only one wreck that everyone knows,” Rush says. “If you ask people to name something underwater, it’s going to be sharks, whales, Titanic .”

The wreck had been visited by tourists before. More than a decade after the ship was located in 1985, by Robert Ballard, Russia contracted two Mir subs to a company called Deep Ocean Expeditions. (It was also a Mir sub that allowed James Cameron to film the haunting opening scenes of Titanic .) A string of salvage missions funded by private investors has also gathered roughly 5,500 Titanic relics, including plates, unopened Champagne bottles and the window frame of the Verandah Café. Some 250 items are on exhibition in the Luxor Hotel & Casino in Las Vegas, along with a piece of the hull recovered from the debris field. (In 2012, the wreck came under the protection of Unesco, which has tried to safeguard the site from looting and further damage.)

Even so, fewer than 200 people have been to the Titanic , and Rush believes there are still original discoveries to be made. The most exciting possibilities lie in exploring the so-called “debris field,” the scattering of the passengers’ personal effects between the two halves of the ship, which broke apart on the surface as it began to sink. OceanGate’s expeditions are also scheduled to conduct sonar, laser scanning and photogrammetric image capture of the entire vessel, in partnership with a company called Virtual Wonders, with an eye toward creating 3-D and virtual reality films, TV shows, video games and exhibition-based immersive experiences.

There was only one catch to Rush’s plan: He still had to prove that Titan could safely get down to the site.

Ever since 1930, when the American inventor and naturalist William Beebe sank to 800 feet in his “bathysphere,” every deep-sea sub has been made of metal, usually steel or titanium. Rush began to experiment with carbon fiber, a lightweight, extremely strong material long used in the aerospace industry. “We thought, Hey, we can use this stuff to make a really cool sub!”

If it worked, it would be a game changer. The weight of steel and titanium subs makes them expensive to transport on land and requires large ships, outfitted with cranes, to launch at sea. Because of their heft, traditional subs tend to require bulky, syntactic foam flotation blocks to maintain neutral buoyancy, which is crucial for maneuverability. Titan , by contrast, is much cheaper to transport and launch, and without the foam is nimbler in the water. Titan uses the same sleek frame design, control panels, thrusters and life support systems as Cyclops 1 , carrying 96 hours of oxygen, but it has a smaller and stronger acrylic window and no top hatch. (Passengers enter through the “eye” itself, as the whole front end of the sub swings open.) Latched onto its 35-foot-long launch platform, it’s transported easily to any location. Most important, Rush believed the carbon fiber body was strong enough to resist crushing pressure down to 13,000 feet.

To test the new sub, Rush chose Great Abaco Island, in the Bahamas. Abaco’s unique advantage is that it sits on the edge of the continental shelf. To reach 13,000-foot-deep waters from Seattle, “I’d have to go 300 miles offshore,” Rush explains. From Abaco, Titan only needs to be towed 12 miles to have 15,000 feet of water to explore. Delays occurred from the start. In April 2018, Titan was in the shipyard just in time for a massive lightning storm that damaged the electrical system, forcing the computers to be replaced. When tests began again in May, an unusual burst of stormy weather postponed the schedule further.

Rush planned to pilot the sub himself, which critics said was an unnecessary risk: Under pressure, the experimental carbon fiber hull might, in the jargon of the sub world, “collapse catastrophically.” So OceanGate developed a new acoustic monitoring system, which can detect “crackling,” or, as Rush puts it, “the sound of micro-buckling way before it fails.” Still, Rush decided to test the hull by lowering the sub to 13,000 feet unmanned. It held.

Last December, the team finally began manned tests, with Rush first dropping 650 feet to the so-called “thermocline,” where tropical water temperature begins to drop precipitously. After successful descents to 3,200, 6,500 and 9,800 feet, Titan was finally ready to plunge to the Titanic’s depth.

The dive was going according to plan until about 10,000 feet, when the descent unexpectedly halted, possibly, Rush says, because the density of the salt water added extra buoyancy to the carbon fiber hull. He now used thrusters to drive Titan deeper, which interfered with the communications system, and he lost contact with the support crew. He recalls the next hour in hallucinogenic terms. “It was like being on the Starship Enterprise ,” he says. “There were these particles going by, like stars. Every so often a jellyfish would go whipping by. It was the childhood dream.”

He had been so focused on the task that the achievement of reaching 13,000 feet only hit him when he regained contact with his crew during the ascent. He had chosen to pilot Titan alone in case anything went unexpectedly wrong, he said. But he also wanted to be only the second person to travel solo to at least that depth, the other being James Cameron, who in 2012 took an Australian-built sub into the Mariana Trench, reaching Challenger Deep, the ocean’s deepest point, touching down at close to 36,000 feet. “That’s a nice club to be a part of,” Rush says. Two weeks later, that club welcomed a new member, when a Texas businessman named Victor Vescovo reached 27,000 feet in his own experimental submersible, whose spherical titanium hull is encased in syntactic foam.

On June 27, OceanGate is scheduled to leave for the first of six trips to the Titanic site.* This summer’s 54 pioneer clients range in age from 28 to 72, and mostly come from the U.S. and Britain, with a few from Australia, Canada and Germany. These 21st-century Astors and Rockefellers are extremophiles, the types of travelers who in the 19th century might have signed up for Amazon explorations and African safaris. Many have traveled to the Antarctic and the North Pole; some have participated in mock dogfights in MIG planes over Russia.

There will be three dives per expedition, and on each descent, three clients will be accompanied by a pilot (drawn from a roster of three, including Rush) and a scientist or a historian specializing in the wreck’s lore. Each dive will involve about 90 minutes of descent, three hours exploring the wreck, and a 90-minute ascent to the surface.

And the future? When the Titanic’s public appeal fades, Rush envisions expeditions to the World War II wrecks in the Coral Sea, to underwater volcanic vents filled with marine life, to deep-sea canyons that no human has ever seen. As for me, the modest dunk in Cyclops 1 gave me an inkling of “deep disease.” As the sub surfaced, every sight and sound seemed strange and unfamiliar. The waterline receded over the sub’s eye to reveal the snow-covered dock and a layer of floating ice; I felt a slight popping in my ears as the hatch opened.

I thought back to a conversation in which Rush painted a portrait of our long-term future that felt, at the time, like science fiction. “We’re going to colonize the ocean long before we colonize space,” he said. In the event that terra firma becomes uninhabitable, undersea settlements could prove more viable “life boats” than interstellar space. “Why leave?” Rush asked. “The ocean is a very protected environment. It’s safe from ozone radiation, nuclear war, hurricanes. The temperatures and currents are very stable.” The idea was undoubtedly far-fetched, and the technology a long way off, but I had to admit that the experience of breathing and moving so freely underwater had captured my imagination. “Every time I go deeper, the experience gets cooler and cooler,” Rush said. “At the very bottom of the ocean, there must be a bunch of octopuses playing chess, wondering why it’s taken us so long to get there.”

* Editor's Note, June 27, 2019: In June 2019, OceanGate postponed its planned Titanic expeditions after failing to secure proper permitting for its contracted research support vessel. The Titanic expeditions are currently being rescheduled for summer 2020.

Get the latest stories in your inbox every weekday.

Tony Perrottet | READ MORE

Tony Perrottet is a contributing writer for Smithsonian magazine, a regular contributor to the New York Times and WSJ Magazine , and the author of six books including ¡Cuba Libre!: Che, Fidel and the Improbable Revolution that Changed World History , The Naked Olympics: The True Story of the Ancient Games and Napoleon's Privates: 2500 Years of History Unzipped . Follow him on Instagram @TonyPerrottet .

What is submersible tourism? The Titanic expedition, explained.

How common are deep-sea expeditions like the Titan’s? Where else do submersibles go?

Seeing the wreck of the Titanic firsthand is a journey.

One must board a submersible vessel about the size of a minivan built to withstand the pressure of descending nearly two and a half miles into the depths of the Atlantic Ocean . It takes about two hours to reach the sunken ship and another two to get back to the surface, plus time for exploration.

And even with a price tag of a quarter of a million dollars, there has been no shortage of people with interest for such an adventure. Philippe Brown, founder of the luxury travel company Brown and Hudso , said there’s a long wait list for the OceanGate Expeditions submersible experience at the center of the world’s attention. The vessel, called the Titan, vanished Sunday in the North Atlantic with five onboard , triggering a wide-reaching search mission that ended Thursday, when the Coast Guard said a remotely operated vehicle discovered debris from the vessel on the ocean floor. Pieces of the submersible indicated it had imploded in a “catastrophic event," Coast Guard officials said. A spokesperson for OceanGate said the pilot and passengers “have sadly been lost."

For the world’s richest and most intrepid travelers, a submersible trip is not so far-fetched, says Roman Chiporukha, co-founder of Roman & Erica, a travel company for ultrawealthy clients with annual membership dues starting at $100,000.

“These are the people who’ve scaled the seven peaks, they’ve crossed the Atlantic on their own boat,” Chiporukha said. The typical vacation of the ultrawealthy, like a beach getaway on the Italian Riviera or St. Barts, “really doesn’t do it for them,” he added.

That description fits tycoon Hamish Harding , who was among the five people on Titan. An avid adventurer who’s thoroughly explored the South Pole and the Mariana Trench, Harding was also on the fifth spaceflight of Blue Origin , the private space company founded by Jeff Bezos, who owns The Washington Post.

View this post on Instagram A post shared by Capt. Hamish Harding (@actionaviationchairman)

Harding and the Titan journey represent the extreme end of the submersible tourism industry, which has been growing in popularity since the 1980s. Ofer Ketter , a longtime submersibles pilot and co-founder of SubMerge , a firm that provides consulting and operations of private submersibles, says such deep-sea journeys are rare in comparison to those in more tropical locations. For example, the luxury tour operator Kensington Tours offers a $700,000, 10-day yacht trip that includes a 600-plus-foot dive in a submersible in the Bahamas to explore the Exumas ocean floor.

Here’s what else to know about the industry.

Deep water, high pressure: Why the Titanic sub search is so complex

Missing Titanic submersible

The latest: After an extensive search, the Coast Guard found debris fields that have been indentified as the Titan submersible. OceanGate, the tour company, has said all 5 passengers are believed dead.

The Titan: The voyage to see the Titanic wreckage is eight days long, costs $250,000 and is open to passengers age 17 and older. The Titan is 22 feet long, weighs 23,000 pounds and “has about as much room as a minivan,” according to CBS correspondent David Pogue. Here’s what we know about the missing submersible .

The search: The daunting mission covers the ocean’s surface and the vast depths beneath. The search poses unique challenges that are further complicated by the depths involved. This map shows the scale of the search near the Titanic wreckage .

The passengers: Hamish Harding , an aviation businessman, aircraft pilot and seasoned adventurer, posted on Instagram that he was joining the expedition and said retired French navy commander Paul-Henri Nargeolet was also onboard. British Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood, 48, and his son, Suleman, 19, were also on the expedition, their family confirmed. The CEO of OceanGate , the submersible expedition company, was also on the vessel. Here’s what we know about the five missing passengers.

Here’s How You Can Visit the Wreck of the Titanic—for $125,000

A series of expeditions will take tourists down to the ill-fated ship in 2021

Courtesy of NOAA/Institute for Exploration/University of Rhode Island (NOAA/IFE/URI)

You’re probably familiar with the RMS Titanic: in 1912, the world’s largest ocean liner of the day embarked on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York, during which she struck an iceberg, sank, and ultimately took more than 1,500 lives. The Titanic’s final resting place remained a mystery until 1985, when American marine geologist Robert Ballard and French oceanographer Jean-Louis Michel discovered the wreck in the crushing depths of the frigid North Atlantic, nearly 2.5 miles beneath the surface of the sea. 

Rather unsurprisingly, visiting the Titanic has become a bucket-list trip for maritime historians, oceanographers, and, well, anyone who has deep enough pockets to go. However, expeditions are rare: only one team has visited the site in-person in the last 15 years. But all that’s about to change.

OceanGate Expeditions , a company that provides well-heeled clients with once-in-a-lifetime underwater experiences, has announced a series of six trips to the Titanic via submersible in 2021. Each has space for nine paying tourists, whose $125,000 tickets will help offset the cost of the expeditions (and put a pretty penny in the pocket of OceanGate owner Stockton Rush).

OceanGate’s expeditions will each run for 10 days out of St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada. Nine tourists, who are actually dubbed “mission specialists” on this expedition, will join the expedition crew on each sailing, and they’ll be expected to participate in the research efforts—this isn’t just a sightseeing affair. OceanGate’s goal is to extensively document the Titanic wreck before it disintegrates entirely due to a deep-sea bacteria that eats iron, which researchers are concerned might happen within the next few decades. As this is a scientific project, mission specialists will have to meet certain physical criteria to ensure their compatibility with the expedition, not to mention training, which includes a test dive.

On each expedition, each mission specialist will be able to partake in a single six- to eight-hour dive to the Titanic via the private Titan submarine, which includes the 90-minute descent and 90-minute ascent. The sub seats five—a pilot, a scientist or researcher, and three mission specialists—and it does have a small, semi-private bathroom for emergencies, in case you were wondering.

Now, it should be known that this isn’t OceanGate’s first attempt to visit the iconic wreck: two previous expeditions had to be scrubbed. (In 2018, the sub was hit by lightning, and its electrical systems were fried, and in 2019, there were issues with sourcing a ship for the expedition.) But hey, perhaps the third time's the charm!

Several international treaties protect the Titanic—the wreck sits in international waters—but their primary goal is to prevent looters and illegal salvage operations from damaging and disrespecting the wreck. However, in terms of tourism, it’s actually perfectly legal to visit the wreck, so long as the expedition doesn’t intrude upon it (i.e., land on the deck or enter the hull.)

“A review of the International Agreement on Titanic, as well as the 2001 UNESCO Convention on Underwater Cultural Heritage, would reveal that non-intrusive visits do not even require a permit or authorization,” said Ole Varmer, a retired legal advisor to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), who was instrumental in negotiating the legal protection of the wreck. “The scope of the prohibition against commercial exploitation of underwater cultural heritage is to prevent unauthorized salvage and looting; it does not include non-intrusive visits regardless of whether they are for-profit or not.”

In terms of OceanGate Expeditions, the company is working with NOAA, the federal agency in charge of implementing the International Agreement on Titanic for U.S.-based Titanic activities, to ensure it follows all protocols set down by that agreement.

There are two major factors to consider regarding ethically visiting the Titanic. First, it’s a memorial site to the lives lost during the disaster, so the wreck should be treated with respect. But that, of course, is true of all memorial sites around the world.

“Speaking as one who visited Titanic’s wreck twice during RMS Titanic, Inc.'s 1993 and 1996 Research and Recovery expeditions, I see nothing unethical about visiting the wreck, nor about helping to defray the significant expense of bringing a visitor to the wreck,” explained Charles Haas, president of the Titanic International Society. “People around the world learn by seeing and visiting. They pay for access to museums, cathedrals, monuments, exhibitions, and, yes, final resting places.”

But second, it’s a fragile piece of cultural heritage. It should be protected—the expedition organizer must take appropriate steps to ensure that it won’t disturb the wreck.

“In the past, submersibles visiting the site by RMS Titanic, Inc. [the only company legally allowed to salvage the wreck], and others have rested on the deck of the hull portions,” says Varmer. “That practice has likely caused some harm and exacerbated the deterioration of the site.  Hopefully, that will no longer be practiced or permitted.”

Per OceanGate’s description of its expeditions, the company’s submersible won’t disturb the wreck, so if you have $125,000 lying around, fee; free to spring for the bucket-list trip of 2021!

The 11 Best Travel Money Belts of 2024

Zicasso Travel Agents Offer Custom Vacations for Adventurous Travelers

The 14 Best Backpack Brands of 2024

Best Tour Companies for Singles

The 8 Best Luggage Sets of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

Complete Guide to the Great Barrier Reef

The 6 Best Small Coolers of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

Where to Go in 2023: The Most Exciting Destinations to Explore This Year

Where to Go in 2021: 10 Future Trips You Can Start Planning Now

These Artist Collaborations Are Redefining Travel Gear

13 New Ocean Cruise Ships in 2018

Top 10 Historical Sites in Canada

The 10 Best Travel Alarm Clocks of 2024

The 7 Best Ski & Snowboard Boot Bags of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

The 9 Best Carry-on Luggage for Men of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

The Best Mini Backpacks of 2024, Tested and Reviewed

Fri 10 May 2024

2024 newspaper of the year

@ Contact us

Your newsletters

How much is the Titanic sub tour? Inside the exclusive OceanGate expedition and why it costs so much

Government agencies, us and canadian navies and commercial deep-sea firms have joined efforts to find the vessel belonging to tour firm oceangate.

A search is under way after a submersible that takes tourists to view the wreck of the Titanic went missing in the Atlantic Ocean .

Government agencies, US and Canadian navies and commercial deep-sea firms have joined efforts to find the vessel belonging to tour firm OceanGate.

The luxury tour company that promises unforgettable expeditions to see the wreckage of the Titanic has confirmed one of its submersibles has gone missing.

“We are exploring and mobilising all options to bring the crew back safely,” OceanGate said in a statement.

Who are Ocean Gate and how much does it cost?

OceanGate is a Washington-based company that has been offering trips to the wreck for several years , with six guests per voyage paying $250,000 (£195,000) for the privilege. This includes a guided tour around the famous ship 13,000ft beneath the sea, as well as luxury hospitality aboard an expedition vessel.

“You will arrive at depth, and after some navigating across the seafloor and debris field, finally see what you’ve been waiting for: the RMS Titanic ,” says the company in its brochure.

The wreck of the Titanic lies about 400 miles off the coast of Newfoundland. Without any cell towers in the middle of the ocean, we are relying on @Starlink to provide the communications we require throughout this year’s 2023 Titanic Expedition. More: https://t.co/F7OtKI0En7 pic.twitter.com/wr7HeKlGjj — OceanGate Expeditions (@OceanGateExped) June 14, 2023

“The content expert on board will point out key features, be they of the wreck itself or the life that calls this corner of the ocean home. Enjoy hours of exploring the wreck and debris field before making the two-hour ascent to the surface.”

The eight-day 2023 expedition was listed as “underway” on a cached page of the OceanGate website, with the original no longer online. The company did not answer calls to its office.

It is extremely exclusive, with the company saying it offers “a select number of individuals to explore the vessel that was once the height of opulence, but whose journey would end tragically”. It says it is a “once in a lifetime opportunity” to travel in the world’s only carbon-fibre submersible capable of diving five people.

OceanGate founder, businessman Stockton Rush, founded the company in 2009 promising to make the depths of the oceans accessible.

The former aerospace engineer told CBS News last year that the Titanic trips represent “a new type of travel”, blending adventure, luxury and history.

What happened to the Titanic tourist sub after it goes missing in Atlantic Ocean

The famous wreck holds a powerful allure that draws passionate guests, he said.

“We have clients that are Titanic enthusiasts, which we refer to as Titaniacs,” Mr Rush added. “We’ve had people who have mortgaged their home to come and do the trip. And we have people who don’t think twice about a trip of this cost. We had one gentleman who had won the lottery.”

The expeditions also double as research opportunities for scientists, allowing them to study rare species in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean.

Visitors are warned that the experience can be unpredictable, with weather conditions interfering with previous expeditions.

OceanGate is one of several companies offering trips to the Titanic , located around 370 miles off the Canadian coast, with demand said to be intense. Scientists had previously warned that the number of visits from filmmakers and explorers was damaging the wreck.

Tourist visits to the Titanic have been controversial, with some relatives of victims of the 1912 disaster saying they are disrespectful to the dead.

What happened?

The sub normally communicates with its pilot ship the Polar Prince every 15 minutes but contact was lost about an hour and 45 minutes into the dive, the US Coast Guard said.

“We are deeply thankful for the extensive assistance we have received from several government agencies and deep sea companies in our efforts to re-establish contact with the submersible,” OceanGate said in a statement.

“We are working toward the safe return of the crew members.”

Rear Adm John Mauger of the US Coast Guard told a press conference they are doing “everything” they can to find the submersible.

“Right now, our focus is getting on as much capability into the area as we can,” he said on Monday, adding: “We anticipate that there’s somewhere between 70 to the full 96 hours at this point.

“It is a remote area and a challenge, but we are deploying all available assets.”

The US Coast Guard said the Canadian research vessel Polar Prince and 106 Rescue wing will continue to conduct surface searches while the US Coast Guard sent two C-130 flights to search for the missing submersible.

Who was on board the sub?

Five people were onboard the vessel, including one pilot and two “mission specialists”.

Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood have been named as two of the other people on the submersible in a family statement.

“We are very grateful for the concern being shown by our colleagues and friends and would like to request everyone to pray for their safety,” the statement said.

Among the crew is British businessman and explorer Hamish Harding , chairman of private plane firm Action Aviation.

In a subsequently deleted Facebook post, Mr Harding’s stepson wrote that he had “gone missing on a submarine” and asked for “thoughts and prayers”.

The last pictures from before the dive were shared on Action Aviation’s Instagram account, depicting the submersible setting off into the depths.

https://www.instagram.com/p/Cto-21dMXpx/?hl=en

Mark Butler, managing director of Action Aviation, said: “There is still plenty of time to facilitate a rescue mission, there is equipment on board for survival in this event. We’re all hoping and praying he comes back safe and sound.”

Mr Harding holds three Guinness World Records, including the longest duration at full ocean depth by a crewed vessel when in March 2021, he and ocean explorer Victor Vescovo dived to the lowest depth of the Mariana Trench. In June 2022, he went into space on Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket.

His cousin, Kathleen Cosnett, told The Daily Telegraph she saw Mr Harding as “daring” and “inquisitive”, and that she was “devastated” to learn he was missing.

On social media at the weekend, he said he was “proud to finally announce” he would be aboard the mission to the wreck of the Titanic , the luxury ocean liner which hit an iceberg and sank in 1912, killing more than 1,500 people.

The Explorer’s Club, of which Mr Harding is a founding member of, shared the news of his disappearance on Instagram with club president Richard Garriot saying: “When I saw Hamish last week… his excitement about this expedition was palpable,” he said.

“I know he was looking forward to conducting research at the site. We all join in the fervent hope that the submersible is located as quickly as possible and the crew is safe.”

Where is the wreckage of the Titanic?

The shipwreck of the Titanic is 3,800 metres down on the bed of the Atlantic Ocean, roughly 600km (370 miles) off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.

The passenger liner hit an iceberg on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York in 1912, with more than 1,500 of the 2,200 passengers and crew onboard dying.

The wreckage was discovered in 1985.

Most Read By Subscribers

Inside the missing submarine that explores the Titanic — each ticket worth $250K

I t’s a race against time to locate the tourist submarine that went missing on Monday as it explored the remnants of the doomed Titanic in the Atlantic Ocean.

Naval experts say the wreckage is in such a position that it will be a “difficult” recovery mission.

Operated by OceanGate Expeditions, the submarine, known as the Titan submersive, holds only up to five people.

“It’s very worrying. It could have become entangled in the wreckage of Titanic, we don’t know yet. The wreck site is a long way from anywhere,” Former Rear Admiral Chris Parry said during an appearance on Sky News.

“The only hope one has is that the mothership will have a standby craft that can investigate immediately what is going on.”

“Our entire focus is on the crew members in the submersible and their families,” the company said in a statement. “We are deeply thankful for the extensive assistance we have received from several government agencies and deep sea companies in our efforts to reestablish contact with the submersible.”

3 tugs seem headed to site of Titanic wreck, where a small submersible that takes paying tourists to view wreck has gone missing

AIS shows 3 tugs left 🇨🇦port St Johns, listing destination as Titanic wreck site & SAR.

3 vessels are Polar Prince, Kopit Hobson 1752, Horizon Arctic pic.twitter.com/TSO45EplMZ

Since 2019, the company has offered tourists the chance to explore the Titanic’s wreckage more than 2 miles below the ocean’s surface off the coast of Canada — at $250,000 per ticket.

The Titan usually operates with one chief pilot, three crew members, and then the tourists who pay for the daredevil adventure.

Among those taking part in the expedition that went missing Monday morning is British billionaire Hamish Harding, CEO of Action Aviation in Dubai.

On Saturday, Harding posted on Facebook announcing his plans to partake in the expedition.

“I am proud to finally announce that I joined OceanGate Expeditions for their RMS TITANIC Mission as a mission specialist on the sub going down to the Titanic,” he said.

“Due to the worst winter in Newfoundland in 40 years, this mission is likely to be the first and only manned mission to the Titanic in 2023,” Harding added. “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. Until then we have a lot of preparations and briefings to do.”

The company’s website outlines an eight-day itinerary for the trip, setting out from the city of St. John’s in Newfoundland to the site of the Titanic wreck.

In 2019, the Titan submarine set a world record as the first non-military manned in a state-of-the-art five-person submersible to take a dive team of four down 3,760 meters (12,336 feet) under the ocean’s surface.

It took about two hours for the team to make the 2.3-mile descent to the sea floor. The team then spent an hour exploring the bottom before making their ascent.

Dives can last up to 10 hours each, and passengers get a bit more space inside than in typical vessels.

“The interior of Titan is roomy compared with traditional deep diving submersibles,” a caption on its social media says, adding “crew members have ample space to work together to document the Titanic wreck site.”

The company also notes that dives can be customized nearly anywhere in the world.

Titan is lighter in weight and more cost-efficient, according to the company, which says it’s designed to take five people to depths of 4,000 meters (13,123 feet).

OceanGate announced on Twitter earlier in June that it was relying on Elon Musk’s Starlink to provide internet and communications connection during the expedition. It is not clear whether communications played any role in the submersible going missing.

The most significant innovation during the construction of the submarine is its real time hull health monitoring system, according to the company.

“This onboard health analysis monitoring system provides early warning detection for the pilot with enough time to arrest the descent and safely return to surface,” the company says, by utilizing co-located acoustic sensors and strain gauges throughout to analyze effects of changing pressure as the vessel goes deeper. “The proprietary Real Time Hull Health Monitoring (RTM) systems provides an unparalleled safety feature that assesses the integrity of the hull throughout every dive.”

OceanGate explains that customers do not require any previous diving experience, but that there are “a few physical requirements like being able to board small boats in active seas.”

Stockton Rush, the CEO and founder of OceanGate said in a 2022 interview with Dan.org that the submarine was built unlike anything else before.

“Essentially, the difference is the carbon fiber and titanium pressure vessel,” Rush said. “People have successfully used carbon fiber for yachts and aircraft but hadn’t yet applied it to crewed submersibles. A lot has changed in the past 50 years. We now know a lot about composites and how to manufacture and test them to make sure they are OK.”

The US Coast Guard confirmed to The Post that the rescue mission remains underway.

On April, 15, 1912, the Titanic sank after hitting an iceberg. At the time, it was known as the biggest steamship in the world, carrying more than 1,400 passengers. The Titanic was en route to New York on its maiden voyage across the Atlantic.

• International

Trump's hush money trial

Israel-Hamas war

June 19, 2023 - Search mission underway for missing Titanic tour submersible

By Elise Hammond , Maureen Chowdhury and Mike Hayes, CNN

Our live coverage of the search for the missing Titanic tour submersible has moved here.

OceanGate says it's taking "every step possible" to bring missing submersible crew back to safety

From CNN’s Jackie Wattles

OceanGate Expeditions says it is taking “every step possible” to return the five crew members onboard the missing submersible to safety and focusing its entire search effort on their wellbeing, according to a statement released by the company Monday night.

OceanGate Expeditions is the group that was conducting the expedition to view the wreckage of the Titanic.

“We are deeply grateful for the urgent and extensive assistance we are receiving from multiple government agencies and deep-sea companies as we seek to reestablish contact with the submersible,” the statement read.

Here's the full statement:

“For some time, we have been unable to establish communications with one of our submersible exploration vehicles which is currently visiting the wreck site of the Titanic. Our entire focus is on the wellbeing of the crew and every step possible is being taken to bring the five crew members back safely. We are deeply grateful for the urgent and extensive assistance we are receiving from multiple government agencies and deep-sea companies as we seek to reestablish contact with the submersible. We pray for the safe return of the crew and passengers, and we will provide updates as they are available.” 

US Coast Guard to continue surface search for missing submersible throughout the evening

From CNN’s Artemis Moshtaghian

The US Coast Guard  tweeted that it will continue to conduct surface searches for the missing submersible throughout the evening.

The Coast Guard tweeted that The Polar Prince, the vessel used to transport the submersible to the site of the Titanic wreckage before the expedition, as well as aerial support from the Air Force’s 106th Rescue Wing will be involved in the surface searches. 

Canadian Coast Guard surface and subsurface search, as conducted by Canadian P8 Poseidon aircraft, will continue in the morning, according to the US Coast Guard.

Titanic's fate has long been a source of fascination. Here are some key facts about the luxury liner

From CNN Staff

The submersible that has gone missing in the North Atlantic was part of an expedition to view the wreckage of the RMS Titanic, perhaps the most famous shipwreck in the world.

More than 100 years after its disastrous maiden voyage, the fate of the luxury liner has long served as a source of fascination , and been the backdrop for countless books, fiction and non-fiction and, of course, the blockbuster movie.

The ship set sail from Southampton, England, to New York on April 10, 1912.

Then, between April 14-15, it hit an iceberg around midnight and sank in less than three hours.

A total of 1,517 people died and 706 survived out of 2,223 passengers and crew, according to the  US Senate report  on the disaster.

Here's more interesting facts on the Titanic:

The ship: The estimated cost of construction was $7.5 million. At the time, the RMS Titanic was the largest passenger ship afloat. The ship’s length was 882 feet, 9 inches, and it weighed 46,328 tons. Its top speed was 23 knots. The wreckage is located about 350 miles off the southeast coast of Newfoundland.

The cause of the crash: The iceberg punctured five of 16 supposedly watertight compartments designed to hold water in case of a breach to the hull. Investigations at the time blamed Capt. Edward Smith for going too fast in dangerous waters, initial ship inspections that had been done too quickly, insufficient room in the lifeboats for all passengers, and a nearby ship’s failure to help. Many maritime safety reforms were implemented as a result of the findings of the investigations.

Smith went down with the ship, and his body was never recovered.

Key dates post-shipwreck:

• September 1, 1985 -  Scientists from Woods Hole Deep Submergence LAB in Massachusetts, led by Dr. Robert Ballard, and IFREMER, the French Institute Francais de Recherche pour l’Exploitation des Mers, led by Jean Jarry, locate the wreckage of Titanic.
• July 13, 1986 -  Ballard and his crew use the manned deep-ocean research submersible Alvin to explore the wreckage. The Alvin is accompanied by a remotely operated vehicle named Jason Jr. to conduct photographic surveys and further inspections.
• May 31, 2009 -  The last known survivor, Millvina Dean, dies at age 97.
• April 8-20, 2012 -  The 100th anniversary of the Titanic’s voyage. The MS Balmoral traces the ship’s route from Southampton to New York and holds a memorial service, above the wreck, on April 15.

Read more here .

Aircraft and sonar deployed in search for missing submersible. Here's what we know

From CNN staff

A search and rescue operation is underway for a missing submersible operated by a company that handles expeditions to the Titanic wreckage off the coast of St John’s, Newfoundland, in Canada.

The vessel has between 70 and 96 hours of life support, officials said Monday afternoon.

Here's what we know so far:

• The timeline: The expedition began with a 400-nautical-mile journey to the wreck site, which is about 900 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The submersible began its descent Sunday morning but lost contact with a crew of Polar Prince , the support ship that transported the vessel to the site, 1 hour and 45 minutes into its descent, officials said. The US Coast Guard was alerted that the submersible was overdue and it launched searches on the surface of the water and launched an aircraft to start conducting aerial and radar searches, Rear Adm. John Mauger said during a news conference Monday.

Here's a map of area:

• What we know about the vessel: The submersible, named “Titan,” is 23,000 pounds and made of carbon fiber and titanium, according to the tour operator, OceanGate Expeditions. The 21-foot vessel has life support for up to 96 hours, according to the OceanGate website . Mauger said officials "anticipate that they're somewhere between 70 to the full 96 hours " of oxygen available on the vessel at this point. The  Titanic wreckage, discovered in 1985 , sits in two parts at the bottom of the ocean nearly 13,000 feet below the surface.
• Who is on board: Five people are in the missing submersible, according to authorities. Businessman  Hamish Harding is one of the passengers, according to a social media post by his company, Action Aviation. Typically a pilot, a “content expert” and three paying passengers are on the expeditions, according to the OceanGate website. The cost of joining the eight-day expedition is "from $250,000," according to the operator. Mauger said the Coast Guard is notifying the families of the people on the submersible.
• Search efforts: The effort is incorporating aircraft, sonar buoys and "sonar on the ship that is out there to listen for any sounds that we can detect in the water column," Mauger said. The Polar Prince is also assisting with the search, a co-owner said. The Canadian Armed Forces and the US Coast Guard have deployed aircraft to the remote area of the North Atlantic.
• What's next: The Coast Guard said its priority is locating the vessel. If crews do find the vessel in the water, then rescue plans will be formed, Mauger said. At that point, the Coast Guard will reach out to the US Navy, the Canadian Armed Forces and private industry partners to assess what "underwater rescue capability might be available," Mauger said.

Businessman Hamish Harding is one of the passengers on the submersible, his company says

From CNN's Paul P. Murphy 

Businessman and adventurer Hamish Harding is one of the passengers on the submersible that went missing during a dive to the wreckage of the Titanic, according to a social media post by his company, Action Aviation. 

OceanGate, the company conducting the expedition, released a statement Monday confirming it lost contact with the submersible but did not specify who was onboard.

Harding, a British national, was one of the first people to travel  the Challenger Deep  in the Pacific Ocean — the deepest known point on Earth.

The United Arab Emirates-based businessman also made headlines in 2019 for being part of a flight crew that broke the world record for the  fastest circumnavigation  of the globe via both poles. More recently, he was a passenger on Blue Origin’s June 2022 space flight .  

Harding  posted  on Facebook on Saturday about his participation in the expedition.

“I am proud to finally announce that I joined OceanGate Expeditions for their RMS TITANIC Mission as a mission specialist on the sub going down to the Titanic,” the post read.

CNN has reached out to Action Aviation for comment but did not immediately receive a response. 

The Explorers Club, a New York-based group of elite explorers and scientists that’s been involved in many of the world’s most prestigious discoveries, confirmed Harding was on the submersible.

President Richard Garriott de Cayeux said he saw Hamish last week and “his excitement about this expedition was palpable,” Cayeux wrote in a statement, “I know he was looking forward to conducting research at the site.”

Harding is one of the founding members of the club.

A spokesperson for the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office told CNN it was aware of reports of a British citizen on the submersible.

“We are in contact with the family of a British man following reports of a missing submarine off the coast of North America,” the spokesperson said.

CNN’s Artemis Moshtaghian contributed reporting to this post.

Canadian Armed Forces mobilize aircraft to assist in search for missing submersible

From CNN’s Paula Newton

The Canadian Armed Forces is deploying an aircraft to assist in the search for the missing submersible near the Titanic wreckage, a spokesperson told CNN.

“A Royal Canadian Air Force CC-130 Hercules is preparing to join the search as well,” Len Hickey, a senior public affairs officer for the Canadian Armed Forces, wrote in a statement to CNN.

The US Coast Guard said earlier that it had also deployed aircraft that is searching the surface of the ocean and underwater.

Submersible has 70 to 96 hours of oxygen available, Coast Guard says

US Coast Guard Rear Admiral John Mauger said that the submersible has 96 hours of emergency oxygen on board, based on information received from the vessel operator.

The Coast Guard "anticipate that they're somewhere between 70 to the full 96 hours" of oxygen available on the vessel at this point, he said during a news conference Monday.

Priority on Monday is to locate missing Titanic submersible, Coast Guard commander says

Right now the Coast Guard said its priority is locating the missing submersible that didn’t emerge on Sunday after an expedition to the Titanic wreckage.

Rear Adm. John Mauger, the commander of the First Coast Guard District that is in charge of operations, said that if crews do find the vessel in the water, then rescue plans will be formed. 

Mauger said the Coast Guard is "reaching out to different partners within the US Navy, within the Canadian Armed Forces and within private industry to understand what underwater rescue capability might be available."

Please enable JavaScript for a better experience.

• Today's news
• Reviews and deals
• Climate change
• 2024 election
• Fall allergies
• Health news
• Mental health
• Sexual health
• Family health
• So mini ways
• Unapologetically
• Buying guides

Entertainment

• How to Watch
• My watchlist
• Stock market
• Biden economy
• Personal finance
• Stocks: most active
• Stocks: gainers
• Stocks: losers
• Trending tickers
• World indices
• US Treasury bonds
• Top mutual funds
• Highest open interest
• Highest implied volatility
• Currency converter
• Basic materials
• Communication services
• Consumer cyclical
• Consumer defensive
• Financial services
• Industrials
• Real estate
• Mutual funds
• Credit cards
• Balance transfer cards
• Cash back cards
• Rewards cards
• Travel cards
• Online checking
• High-yield savings
• Money market
• Home equity loan
• Personal loans
• Student loans
• Options pit
• Fantasy football
• Pro Pick 'Em
• College Pick 'Em
• Fantasy baseball
• Fantasy hockey
• Fantasy basketball
• Download the app
• Daily fantasy
• Scores and schedules
• GameChannel
• World Baseball Classic
• Premier League
• CONCACAF League
• Champions League
• Motorsports
• Horse racing
• Newsletters

New on Yahoo

• Privacy Dashboard

Behind the submarine tourism industry, where people pay $250,000 to visit the Titanic

A british billionaire is among the five who are missing in the vessel operated by tourism company oceangate expeditions..

The U.S. Coast Guard launched a rescue operation on Monday after a submersible tourist vessel went missing while on its way to the wreck of the Titanic in the Atlantic Ocean. The Titan, operated by the luxury travel company OceanGate Expeditions, disappeared 900 miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Mass., just one hour and 45 minutes into the dive.

Coast Guard Rear Adm. John Maugar told reporters that the vessel was designed with a 96-hour sustainment capability in case of an emergency onboard. “We’re using that time and the best use of every moment of that time to locate the vessel,” Maugar said. It is expected the oxygen will last until Thursday midday local time.

OceanGate Expeditions released a statement on Monday saying they were “exploring and mobilizing all options” to bring the crew home safely. “We are working toward the safe return of the crewmembers,” the statement said.

The incident has drawn new awareness to the exclusive submarine tourism industry.

What are the details of the trip?

During the expedition, the Titan, which can hold up to five people, including three paying passengers, dives 13,000 feet to reach the wreck of the RMS Titanic which, despite being advertised as “unsinkable,” sank after hitting an iceberg during its maiden voyage in 1912, killing more than 1,500 people. The ship’s wreckage was discovered in 1985 around 350 miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Can.

What is the cost?

A seat on OceanGate’s eight-day voyage to the Titanic costs $250,000.

Are these kinds of trips popular?

Aimed at the superrich, such trips promise to provide wealthy explorers with an unforgettable experience — something that money can buy. “This is your chance to step outside of everyday life and discover something truly extraordinary,” reads an archived version of OceanGate Expeditions’ website , which is no longer available online.

OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush told CBS News last year that the people booking the trips are typically   Titanic enthusiasts or “Titaniacs.”

“We’ve had people who have mortgaged their home to come and do the trip,” Rush said. “And we have people who don't think twice about a trip of this cost. We had one gentleman who had won the lottery."

What are the risks involved?

OceanGate describes its vessels as “experimental,” making clear to potential customers that they have not been “approved or certified by any regulatory body.” Last year, CBS News correspondent David Pogue embarked on one of OceanGate’s expeditions to the Titanic, before which he was required to sign a waiver stating that the trip could “result in physical injury, emotional trauma, or death.”

Pogue reported that during the trip, a vessel became lost for a few hours. “There's no GPS underwater, so the surface ship is supposed to guide the sub to the shipwreck by sending text messages,” Pogue said at the time. “But on this dive, communications somehow broke down.”

Do other companies offer this type of trip?

OceanGate Expeditions is the only travel company that is currently selling expeditions to see the ruins of the Titanic. However, other companies offer much more affordable submarine excursions that venture just below sea level , allowing tourists to visit coral reefs and shallow sea floors.

What other kinds of extravagant excursions are available to the superrich?

In recent years, space tourism has flourished with the backing of billionaires such as Jeff Bezos and Richard Branson. In 2021, both Virgin Galactic, Branson’s company, and Bezos’s Blue Origin took their maiden voyages to Earth’s periphery and beyond, beginning a new era of space travel. Virgin Galactic is set to launch commercial flights by the end of this month, with tickets costing $450,000 per person.

For those who prefer to stay on solid ground, a trip up Mount Everest can cost $40,000 to $160,000.

Recommended Stories

Juan soto’s unapologetic intensity and showmanship are captivating the bronx and rubbing off on teammates: ‘literally every pitch is theater’.

The 2024 Yankees have rediscovered their bravado and hold the second-best record in the AL, thanks in large part to the superstar outfielder.

The FDIC change that leaves wealthy bank depositors with less protection

Affluent Americans may want to double-check how much of their bank deposits are protected by government-backed insurance. The rules governing trust accounts just changed.

Dolphins owner Stephen Ross reportedly declined $10 billion for team, stadium and F1 race

The value of the Dolphins and Formula One racing is enormous.

Timberwolves coach Chris Finch calls Jamal Murray's heat-pack toss on court 'inexcusable and dangerous'

Murray made a bad night on the court worse during a moment of frustration on the bench.

Six quarterback situations to worry about & three that are on the precipice | Zero Blitz

Jason Fitz, Charles Robinson and Frank Schwab talk about which quarterback rooms concern them and which they find interesting heading into the 2024 NFL season.

Former NBA guard Darius Morris dies at 33

Former NBA guard Darius Morris has died at the age of 33. He played for five teams during his four NBA seasons. Morris played college basketball at Michigan.

Golf’s moment of truth is here, and the sport is badly flailing

Nonexistent negotiations and missed opportunities for reconciliation between the PGA Tour and LIV Golf have the sport stuck in place.

2024 Fantasy Football Mock Draft, 1.0

The Yahoo Fantasy football crew got together for their very first mock draft of 2024. Andy Behrens recaps the results.

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan says he’s not voting for Trump : 'Character is too important'

Ryan says he would be writing in a Republican candidate instead of voting for Donald Trump.

Yahoo Fantasy staff's Mock Draft 1.0: Shocking picks are plentiful

Teams have made their big splashes in free agency and made their draft picks, it's time for you to do the same. It's fantasy football mock draft time. Some call this time of year best ball season, others know it's an opportunity to get a leg up on your competition for when you have to draft in August. The staff at Yahoo Fantasy did their first mock draft of the 2024 season to help you with the latter. Matt Harmon and Andy Behrens are here to break it all down by each round and crush some staff members in the process.

Ranking the best situations for the rookie quarterbacks: Start with Michael Penix in Atlanta at No. 1

It’s key to note that we’re not saying the “best team” or “best roster.” Instead, we’re talking about the best confluence of factors that can outline a path for survival and then success.

Post-draft NFL fantasy power rankings: Offenses we love, like and want to stay away from

With free agency and the draft behind us, what 32 teams look like today will likely be what they look like Week 1 and beyond for the 2024 season. Matt Harmon and Scott Pianowski reveal the post-draft fantasy power rankings. The duo break down the rankings in six tiers: Elite offensive ecosystems, teams on the cusp of being complete mixed bag ecosystems, offensive ecosystems with something to prove, offenses that could go either way, and offenses that are best to stay away from in fantasy.

Cardinals lose C Willson Contreras after left arm fractured by J.D. Martinez's swing

The Cardinals' nightmare season continues.

Blockbuster May trade by Padres, MVP Ohtani has arrived, Willie Mays’ 93rd birthday & weekend recap

Jake Mintz & Jordan Shusterman discuss the Padres-Marlins trade that sent Luis Arraez to San Diego, as well as recap all the action from this weekend in baseball and send birthday wishes to hall-of-famer Willie Mays.

These 3 stocks are poised to benefit from the massive energy transition

The energy transition will benefit companies providing electrical needs for surging demand. Analysts point to these three stocks as a Buy.

What's wrong with the Denver Nuggets? | Devine Intervention

Dan Devine and Adam Mares discuss the Denver Nuggets and Minnesota Timberwolves after Monday night’s game 2.

Nintendo finally confirms the Switch 2 is on the way

In the most anticlimactic way possible, Nintendo on Tuesday confirmed years of rumors: The Nintendo Switch 2 console is on the way. "We will make an announcement about the successor to Nintendo Switch within this fiscal year," wrote Shuntaro Furukawa, the president of Nintendo, on X. Rather, Furukawa wanted to warn users not to expect the actual announcement in next month's Nintendo Direct livestream.

Recession-proof stocks are leading the market's latest leg higher

The Utilities and Consumer Staples sectors have popped since mid-April as investors search for value.

2024 NFL Team Fantasy Football Power Rankings, 1.0

With NFL rosters pretty much set before training camp, Scott Pianowski reveals his first set of team fantasy power rankings for the 2024 season.

The best budgeting apps for 2024

Budgeting apps can help you keep track of your finances, stick to a spending plan and reach your money goals. These are the best budget-tracking apps available right now.

Search underway for Titanic tourist submarine with 70-96 hours of oxygen left: Live updates

Editor's note: This page reflects the search for the submersible as of Monday evening. For the latest updates on the race against time to locate and rescue the submersible, please follow our live updates for Tuesday, June 20 .

U.S. and Canadian rescue teams were searching Monday for a submersible carrying five people to the wreckage site of the Titanic after the submarine vanished deep in the Atlantic Ocean with four days' or less worth of survival capability .

The U.S. Coast Guard in Boston is leading the search for the missing watercraft, which the Joint Rescue Coordination Centre in Halifax, Nova Scotia, said was reported overdue Sunday night about 435 miles south of St. John’s, Newfoundland.

Rear Adm. John Mauger, commander of the First Coast Guard District, said two aircraft each from the U.S. and Canada were involved in the search, along with a commercial ship, and that further assets will be added as the pursuit continues into the night.

The operation's location − about 900 miles east of Cape Cod and up to 13,000 feet deep − complicates the task, as does the need to look both on the surface of the water and below, he said.

"It is a challenge to conduct a search in that remote area,'' Mauger said at a news conference, "but we are deploying all available assets to make sure that we can locate the craft and rescue the people on board.''

Contact lost with five crew members

The Coast Guard tweeted that the 21-foot submersible named "Titan,'' which left from St. John's, began its dive Sunday morning. The Polar Prince, the Canadian ship supporting the watercraft, lost contact with it about an hour and 45 minutes later.

OceanGate Expeditions , a Washington-based deep-sea exploration company, confirmed in a statement that it owned the submersible − a vessel in the submarine family but smaller and less self-sufficient than the classic military sub.

The company's expeditions to the Titanic wreck site include archaeologists and marine biologists. OceanGate also brings people who pay to come along, known as “mission specialists.”

They take turns operating sonar equipment and performing other tasks in the five-person submersible. The Coast Guard said Monday there was one pilot and four “mission specialists” aboard.

“We are deeply thankful for the extensive assistance we have received from several government agencies and deep sea companies in our efforts to reestablish contact with the submersible,” OceanGate said. “We are working toward the safe return of the crewmembers.”

Based on the company's information, Mauger said the submersible has a 96-hour emergency sustainment capability, which would include oxygen and fuel. "So we anticipate that there's somewhere between 70 and the full 96 hours available at this point,'' he said.

See the Titanic in whole new way: Full-sized, 3D digital scan shows scale of wreckage site

British tourist on board

OceanGate adviser David Concannon told The Associated Press the company lost contact with the submersible Sunday morning.

Concannon, who said he planned to go on the dive but had to cancel because of a matter regarding another client, said officials are rushing to get to the site a remotely operated vehicle that can reach a depth of 20,000 feet. The Titanic wreckage is believed to lie 12,500 feet deep.

Action Aviation said its company chairman, British businessman Hamish Harding, was one of the travelers on board . The experienced adventurer went into space on Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket last June.

“Every attempt is being made for a rescue mission,'' Mark Butler, the company’s managing director, told the AP. "There is still plenty of time to facilitate a rescue mission. There is equipment on board for survival in this event. We’re all hoping and praying he comes back safe and sound.”

Richard Garriott, president of the Explorers Club − a New York-based group that supports scientific exploration − said he saw Harding a week ago and “his excitement was palpable.''

“I know he was looking forward to conducting research at the site,” Garriott wrote in a letter to members. “We all join in the fervent hope that the submersible is located as quickly as possible and the crew is safe.”

Search to continue overnight

The Coast Guard said late Monday that two searches by C-130 aircraft had been completed and the mission would continue though the night.

"The Polar Prince and @Rescue106 will continue to do surface searches throughout the evening," the First Coast Guard District tweeted .

The Guard said Canadian and US aircraft will resume looking underwater and on the ocean's surface Tuesday.

Titanic facts: When did it sink? How many people died?

On April 14, 1912, the Titanic collided with an iceberg in the North Atlantic on its maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City. On April 15, at about 2:20 a.m., the ship sank.

More than 1,500 people died on the Titanic. Of the roughly 2,200 people aboard the ship, only 706 survived. 

The majority of the people killed were members of the crew and third-class passengers. There were 710 deaths in the third class and 700 deaths among the crew.

How many people died on the Titanic?: Facts about the death toll and the survivors

Tourists added for expeditions

In 2021, OceanGate Expeditions began what it expected to become an annual voyage to the wreckage. The company had said it would include about 40 paying tourists to the team of archaeologists and marine biologists on the trips.

The initial group of tourists spent $100,000 to $150,000 apiece.

Contributing: The Associated Press

Titanic tour company offered up-close experience for $250,000

Modern in-person tourism at the Titanic is still in its infancy. 

The submersible that disappeared Sunday near the Titanic wreckage was on only its third trip since the company OceanGate Expeditions began offering them in 2021. 

OceanGate had been promoting the third dive for months on its website and in Facebook posts, offering the chance to “follow in Jacques Cousteau’s footsteps and become an underwater explorer” — for the price of $250,000. 

“ Become one of the few to see the Titanic with your own eyes,” the tour company said on its website. The ticket comes with a title: “mission specialist.” 

Participants have included a chef, an actor, a videographer and someone who worked in banking, the company said on Facebook. 

One of the customers said on Instagram last year that it was a once-in-a-lifetime experience that lived up to her expectations. 

“My lifelong dream of seeing the Titanic has come true!” Chelsea Kellogg, a chef, wrote. “I am still trying to process the whole experience. I’m still crying. Still overwhelmed by all the emotions.” 

Kellogg, who did not respond to an interview request Monday, said she saw the ship’s bow, crow’s-nest and grand staircase. 

OceanGate seems to be the only company offering dive tours to the Titanic wreckage, underscoring the practical difficulty of reaching the site 12,500 feet down in the cold North Atlantic where the ship sank in 1912. About 1,500 people died. 

The resting place of the Titanic was unknown for decades, eluding several groups of researchers racing to find it, until a team led by the explorer Robert Ballard succeeded in 1985. Visits — some of them by artifact hunters — continued off and on for two decades.

Don Lynch, the Titanic Historical Society’s historian, said there was some tourism in the 1990s and early this century, when there were both artifacts to find and Russian-made submersibles capable of reaching the site’s depth. A Los Angeles artist went down in 2000 and produced watercolors from the experience .

Lynch, who went down in 2001, said that eventually, the visits trickled off as Russian-made submersibles were retired and fewer artifacts remained.

“There was a lot of salvage going on prior to that, and I think it reached the point where they weren’t bringing up anything that was increasing the museum visits,” he said. 

Until now, no submersible at the Titanic site had ever gone missing, he said.

Beginning in 2005, there was a 14-year dry spell with no human visits. Then, in 2019, another group visited the wreckage site and reported its rapid deterioration. The pace of visits has picked up since. 

RMS Titanic Inc., the company that owns the ship’s salvage rights, once tried to stop tourist visits, hoping to use pictures and tourism operations of its own to raise money for salvage operations, but in 1999 a federal appeals court ruled that tourists could visit , The Washington Post reported. 

Lynch said he thinks the site should have been treated as an archaeological site with careful documentation of all artifacts. He said he has no objection, though, to tourist visits, especially if they help to pay for research.

“Go down. Take a look. That’s great. It doesn’t damage the ship,” he said. 

Past participants praise the experience in a video OceanGate posted on YouTube in October. The video does not give their names. 

“This is a remarkable event in my life,” one person in the video says. 

“Not many people have done it, and that’s part of the appeal, too, right?” another says. 

Customers travel to the Titanic area from St. John’s, Newfoundland, aboard a ship — this year, the research vessel Polar Prince. 

On dive days, five people can fit into the submersible, named Titan, and the descent takes a couple of hours , OceanGate’s website says . 

“You may assist the pilot with coms and tracking, take notes for the science team about what you see outside of the viewport, watch a movie or eat lunch,” it says. 

There is a small toilet in Titan’s front dome, the website continues. It “doubles as the best seat in the house. When the toilet is in use, we install a privacy curtain between the dome and the main compartment and turn the music up loud.” 

OceanGate’s website promises “hours of exploring” before a two-hour ascent. 

There is required safety training for everyone on the research vessel, the website says. Beyond that, training depends on how much customers want to do, such as assisting with navigation. 

Stockton Rush, the founder of OceanGate, told the travel website Frommer’s in 2020 that about half of his customer pool were Titanic obsessives, while the other half were big-spending travelers also drawn to space tourism and other big-budget ideas. The original price back then was $125,000, or half this year’s price. 

“You couldn’t write a better story,” Rush told the website. “You have the rich and the poor. You have opulence. You have hubris. You have tragedy. You have death.”

The company initially planned to have six expeditions in 2021, Frommer’s reported, but it ended up running one that year and one last year. 

Before then, getting a close-up view of the Titanic’s wreckage meant visiting one of several museums where there are artifacts — including one at the Luxor hotel in Las Vegas — or perhaps visiting one of the replicas in Pigeon Forge , Tennessee, or Branson , Missouri. 

OceanGate’s website laid out various details of this year’s expedition, including a minimum age of 18. The price included training, gear and meals on the ship but not airfare, hotels before departure or insurance. 

Lynch, the historian, said the tours demonstrate the lasting curiosity about the Titanic.

“The movie really brought it to a younger audience and created a lot of new Titanic enthusiasts,” he said, referring to director James Cameron’s 1997 film. “Every couple decades, something happens that puts it back in the public eye.” 

David Ingram covers tech for NBC News.

Russian Submarine Museum

Most Recent: Reviews ordered by most recent publish date in descending order.

Detailed Reviews: Reviews ordered by recency and descriptiveness of user-identified themes such as waiting time, length of visit, general tips, and location information.

Also popular with travellers

Russian Submarine Museum - All You Need to Know BEFORE You Go (2024)

• (0.33 km) Design Hotel Domino
• (0.82 km) Hostel on Dosflota
• (2.44 km) DoubleTree by Hilton Hotel Moscow - Marina
• (0.76 km) Obshhezhitiye na Skhodnenskoi
• (0.17 km) Hostel Uyut
• (0.15 km) Bora Bora
• (0.16 km) Hatimaki Tushino
• (0.27 km) Myata Lounge
• (0.39 km) Merci Baku
• (1.28 km) Steak'S
• (0.39 km) Economy and Life Museum
• (0.50 km) Museum and Memorial Complex of History of the Russian Navy
• (0.11 km) MosKalyan
• (0.77 km) Tsirk Chudes
• (0.72 km) Baltika

Missing Submersible Vessel Disappears During Dive to the Titanic Wreck Site

Five people were in the submersible, which lost contact with a surface vessel on Sunday morning, the Coast Guard said. A search and rescue mission is underway in the North Atlantic.

• Share full article

Follow our live coverage of the missing submersible.

Jenny Gross ,  Emma Bubola and Jesus Jiménez

The search area is 900 miles off the U.S. coast.

A submersible craft carrying five people in the area of the Titanic wreck in the North Atlantic has been missing since Sunday, setting off a search and rescue operation by the U.S. Coast Guard.

The Coast Guard confirmed Monday that it was searching for the vessel after the Canadian research ship MV Polar Prince lost contact with a submersible during a dive about 900 miles east of Cape Cod, Mass., on Sunday morning.

“It is a remote area and it is a challenge to conduct a search in that remote area, but we are deploying all available assets to make sure that we can locate the craft and rescue the people on board,” said Rear Admiral John Mauger of the U.S. Coast Guard.

The submersible disappeared in a portion of the ocean with a depth of roughly 13,000 feet. Admiral Mauger said the occupants would theoretically have between 70 to 96 hours of air as of late Monday afternoon.

The submersible is operated by OceanGate Expeditions, a company that offers tours of shipwrecks and underwater canyons. “Our entire focus is on the crew members in the submersible and their families,” a statement on its website said. “We are deeply thankful for the extensive assistance we have received from several government agencies and deep sea companies in our efforts to reestablish contact with the submersible.”

Hamish Harding, the chairman of the aviation company Action Aviation, is among those aboard the missing submersible, according to Mark Butler, the company’s managing director.

In an Instagram post, Mr. Harding indicated that another member of the submersible team was Paul Henry Nargeolet, a French expert on the Titanic. On his Facebook page on Saturday, Mr. Harding wrote that a dive had been planned for Sunday: “A weather window has just opened up,” he wrote.

Here’s what to know about the search operation:

Stockton Rush, the chief executive of OceanGate, has compared its project to the booming space tourism industry. Its customers pay $250,000 to travel to the Titanic’s wreckage on the seabed, more than two miles below the ocean’s surface.

Admiral Mauger said aircraft from the United States and Canada were searching for the submersible, and sonar buoys had been deployed to help search under the surface. The Coast Guard was also coordinating with commercial vessels in the area to aid the search operation.

OceanGate chartered a vessel, the MV Polar Prince, to serve as the ship on the surface near the dive site. The company’s website outlines an eight-day itinerary for the trip out of St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada.

The Titanic sank in the early hours of April 15, 1912, on its maiden voyage from England to New York after hitting an iceberg, killing more than 1,500 people. The wreckage was found in 1985, broken into two main sections, about 400 miles off Newfoundland, in eastern Canada. Read The Times’s coverage of the sinking.

John Ismay, a Pentagon reporter, served as a deep-sea diving and salvage officer in the U.S. Navy.

Why are undersea rescues so difficult?

Numerous complications could hinder the effort to rescue the five people aboard the deep-diving submersible Titan, which failed to return from a dive on Sunday to the wreck of the Titanic on the floor of the Atlantic Ocean.

For any search and rescue operation at sea, weather conditions, the lack of light at night, the state of the sea and water temperature can all play roles in whether stricken mariners can be found and rescued. For a rescue beneath the waves, the factors involved in a successful rescue are even more numerous and difficult.

The first and most important problem to solve is simply finding the Titan.

Many underwater vehicles are fitted with an acoustic device, often called a pinger, which emits sounds that can be detected underwater by rescuers. Whether Titan has one is unclear.

The submersible reportedly lost contact with its support ship an hour and 45 minutes into what is normally a two-and-a-half-hour dive to the bottom, where the Titanic lies.

There could be a problem with Titan’s communication equipment, or with the ballast system that controls its descent and ascent by flooding tanks with water to dive and pumping water out with air to come back toward the surface.

An additional possible hazard for the vessel would be becoming fouled — hung up on a piece of wreckage that could keep it from being able to return to the surface.

If the submersible is found on the bottom, the extreme depths involved limit the possible means for rescue.

Human divers wearing specialized equipment and breathing helium-rich air mixtures can safely reach depths of just a few hundred feet below the surface before having to spend long amounts of time decompressing on the way back up. A couple hundred feet deeper, light from the sun can no longer penetrate the water, and dark reigns.

The Titanic lies in about 14,000 feet of water in the North Atlantic, a depth that humans can reach only while inside specialized submersibles that keep their occupants warm, dry and supplied with breathable air.

The only likely rescue would come from an uncrewed vehicle — essentially an underwater drone. The U.S. Navy has one submarine rescue vehicle , although it can reportedly reach depths of just 2,000 feet. For recovering objects off the sea floor in deeper water, the Navy relies on what it calls remote-operated vehicles, such as the one it used to salvage a crashed F-35 Joint Strike Fighter in about 12,400 feet in the South China Sea in early 2022. That vehicle, called CURV-21 , can reach depths of 20,000 feet.

Getting the right kind of equipment — such as a remote vehicle like the CURV-21 — to the site takes time, starting with getting it to a ship capable of delivering it to the site.

The Titanic’s wreck lies approximately 370 miles south of Newfoundland, and the kinds of ships that can carry a vehicle like the Navy’s deepest-diving robot normally move no faster than about 20 miles per hour.

According to OceanGate’s website, the Titan can keep its five occupants alive for approximately 96 hours. In many submersibles, the air inside is recycled — carbon dioxide is removed and oxygen is added — but on a long enough timeline, the vessel will lose the ability to scrub enough carbon dioxide, and the air inside will no longer sustain life.

If the Titan’s batteries run down and are no longer able to run heaters that keep the occupants warm in the freezing deep, the people inside can become hypothermic and the situation eventually becomes unsurvivable. Should the submersible’s pressure hull fail, the end for those inside would be certain and quick.

Advertisement

OceanGate Expeditions was created to explore deep waters.

OceanGate Expeditions, the owner of the missing submersible, is a privately owned company headquartered in Everett, Wash., that, since its founding in 2009, has focused on increasing access to deep-ocean exploration.

The company has made headlines in recent years for organizing expeditions for paying tourists to travel in submersibles to shipwrecks, including the Titanic, and to underwater canyons. According to the company’s website , OceanGate also provides crewed submersibles for commercial projects and scientific research.

“Our team of qualified pilots, expedition leaders, mission professionals and client-service staff ensure accountability throughout the entire mission and expedition process with a focus on safety, proactive communication and client satisfaction,” the website reads .

OceanGate was founded by Stockton Rush, an aerospace engineer and pilot, who currently serves as its chief executive officer.

At just 19 years old, in 1981, Mr. Rush became the youngest jet transport rated pilot in the world, and obtained a degree in aerospace engineering from Princeton University three years later, according to the OceanGate website. He later earned an M.B.A. from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley, in 1989.

OceanGate currently owns and operates three five-person submersibles.

The first submersible acquired by OceanGate, Antipodes, could travel to a depth of 1,000 feet.

In 2012, the company acquired another submersible, and rebuilt it into Cyclops 1, a vessel that could travel to a depth of up to 1,640 feet. It served as a prototype for the newest submersible, the Titan. That vessel, made of carbon fiber and titanium, is engineered to reach depths of more than 13,000 feet, or more than two miles. The Titan, which has been used to explore the Titanic’s wreckage, is now missing .

OceanGate has provided tours of the Titanic since 2021, in which guests have paid up to $250,000 to travel to the wreckage, which lies about 12,500 feet below the ocean’s surface.

Last year, Mr. Rush described the business to CBS News as “very unusual,” providing “a new type of travel.”

The company first planned a voyage to the Titanic in 2018, according to the technology news site GeekWire , but the Titan sustained damage to its electronics from lightning. Then, in 2019, the voyage was postponed again because of a problem with complying with Canadian maritime law limitations on foreign flag vessels, according to GeekWire .

Before the first successful trip to the Titanic in 2021, the Titan was “rebuilt,” according to GeekWire , after tests showed signs of “cyclic fatigue” that reduced the hull’s depth rating to 3,000 meters.

In 2020, OceanGate announced that it was working with NASA ’s Marshall Space Flight Center to assure that the submersible was strong enough to survive in the ocean’s depths.

According to the company’s website, OceanGate has successfully completed more than 14 expeditions and more than 200 dives in the Pacific, Atlantic and the Gulf of Mexico.

OceanGate’s board members include Mr. Rush, along with a physician and astronaut, a software consultant, a retired U.S. Coast Guard, and a C.E.O. of an investment advisory firm.

In addition to OceanGate, Mr. Rush is also a co-founder and member of the board of trustees of OceanGate Foundation , a nonprofit organization founded in 2012 which aims to “fuel underwater discoveries in nautical archaeology, marine sciences and subsea technology” through public outreach and financial support.

The nonprofit’s website features OceanGate’s Titanic expedition, along with other global exploration expeditions.

OceanGate is based on the backside of a marina facility in Everett, Wash., tucked between several boat maintenance companies, where some workers were washing, inspecting and relocating yachts on Monday. No sign or logo marks its location, and the windows at the OceanGate doors were covered on Monday, one with a Titanic expedition logo. The entrance door was locked, and nobody responded to knocking. A nearby marina worker said OceanGate employees packed up and left for the Titanic expedition several weeks ago.

Andrea Kannapell

An Instagram post from Hamish Harding, who was aboard the submersible that went missing on Sunday, indicated that another member of the submersible team was Paul Henry Nargeolet, a French expert on the Titanic.

Emma Bubola ,  Salman Masood and Victoria Kim

Here is who was on the missing submersible.

Five people were on board the Titan submersible when it lost contact with its support ship during a dive to the Titanic wreckage site in the North Atlantic on Sunday. On Thursday, the U.S. Coast Guard and the company that operated the submersible, OceanGate Expeditions, said that all five people on board were believed to be dead.

Here are the passengers who were aboard the craft.

Stockton Rush

Stockton Rush was the founder and chief executive of OceanGate Expeditions, the company that operated the submersible. He was piloting the vessel.

In an interview that aired on CBS in November, Mr. Rush said he grew up wanting to be an astronaut and, after earning an aerospace engineering degree from Princeton in 1984, a fighter pilot.

“I had this epiphany that I didn’t want — it wasn’t about going to space,” Mr. Rush said. “It was about exploring. It was about finding new life-forms. I wanted to be sort of the Captain Kirk. I didn’t want to be the passenger in the back. And I realized that the ocean is the universe.” He founded OceanGate, a private company that is based in Everett, Wash., near Seattle, in 2009.

Read his obituary here .

Hamish Harding

Hamish Harding , a British businessman and explorer, holds several Guinness World Records, including one for the longest time spent traversing the deepest part of the ocean on a single dive. He wrote on his Facebook page on Saturday that he was proud to announce that he had joined OceanGate’s mission “on the sub going down to the Titanic.”

Mr. Harding, 58, was the chairman of Action Aviation, a sales and air operations company based in Dubai. He had previously flown to space on a mission by Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin rocket company.

Mr. Harding also took part in an effort to reintroduce cheetahs to India, and holds a world record for the fastest circumnavigation of Earth via both the geographic poles by plane.

Paul-Henri Nargeolet

Paul-Henri Nargeolet , a French maritime expert, had been on more than 35 dives to the Titanic wreck site.

Mr. Nargeolet was the director of underwater research for RMS Titanic, Inc. , an American company that owns the salvage rights to the famous wreck and displays many of the artifacts in Titanic exhibitions. The company conducted eight research and recovery expeditions between 1987 and 2010, according to its website.

Shahzada Dawood and Suleman Dawood

The British-Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood , 48, and his son, Suleman, 19, were members of one of Pakistan’s wealthiest families.

Mr. Dawood had a background in textiles and fertilizer manufacturing. His son was a business student at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, a spokesman for the school confirmed in a statement on Thursday.

Mr. Dawood and his son had “embarked on a journey to visit the remnants of the Titanic” when contact with the vessel was lost, the statement said, asking for privacy for the family.

Mr. Dawood was also on the board of trustees for the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence Institute. The organization said on its website that he was a resident of Britain, and a father of two children.

April Rubin

‘Digital twin’ of the Titanic shows the shipwreck in extraordinary detail.

An ambitious digital imaging project has produced what researchers describe as a “digital twin” of the R.M.S. Titanic, showing the wreckage of the doomed ocean liner with a level of detail that has never been captured before.

The project, undertaken by Magellan Ltd., a deepwater seabed mapping company, yielded more than 16 terabytes of data, 715,000 still images and a high-resolution video. The visuals were captured over the course of a six-week expedition in the summer of 2022, nearly 2.4 miles below the surface of the North Atlantic, Atlantic Productions, which is working on a documentary about the project, said in a news release.

The researchers used two submersibles, named Romeo and Juliet, to map “every millimeter” of the wreckage as well as the entire three-mile debris field. Creating the model, which shows the ship lying on the ocean floor and the area around it, took about eight months, said Anthony Geffen, the chief executive and creative director of Atlantic Productions.

Jesus Jiménez

A Coast Guard admiral says rescue crews are ‘making the best use of every moment.’

By air and sea, rescue crews on Monday were racing to find five people in a submersible that went missing on Sunday just hours into a dive about 900 miles east of Cape Cod, Mass., officials said.

At a news conference in Boston on Monday afternoon, Rear Adm. John Mauger of the U.S. Coast Guard said that rescue crews were searching in a “remote area” in water roughly 13,000 feet deep, and that they were up against the clock to find those on board the vessel.

Admiral Mauger said that Coast Guard officials understood from OceanGate Expeditions, the operator of the submersible, which offers tours of shipwrecks and underwater canyons, that the vessel was designed to have 96 hours of “emergency capability.” He did not provide specifics about what that capability meant for those on board, though it was believed to indicate that they would have breathable air for four days.

“We’re using that time, making the best use of every moment of that time,” he said.

The five people on board the submersible were not identified at the news conference “out of respect for the families,” Admiral Mauger said, noting that one person on board was a pilot, or operator, and that the other four were “mission specialists.” He did not share what role the specialists served on the vessel, referring that question to the operator of the submersible.

The United States deployed two C-130 aircraft, with another aircraft expected to join the search later on Monday from the New York National Guard, and Canada has sent a C-130 and a P-8 submarine search aircraft, Admiral Mauger said.

“On the surface we have the commercial operator that’s been on site, and we’re bringing additional surface assets into play,” he said, adding that they will provide some “subsurface” search ability.

Admiral Mauger said that rescue teams had also deployed sonar buoys on the surface of the waters to try to locate the submersible, which had sent out its last reported communication about an hour and 45 minutes into its dive. Exactly when that was on Sunday morning was unclear.

In an interview with Fox News earlier on Monday, Admiral Mauger said that the Coast Guard did not have the right equipment in the search area to do a “comprehensive sonar survey of the bottom.”

“Right now, we’re really just focused on trying to locate the vessel again by saturating the air with aerial assets,” he said.

Christine Chung

To the bottom of the sea and the ends of the earth, high-risk travel is booming.

Plunging to the depths of the ocean in a submersible to explore the remains of the Titanic is just one of many extreme excursions on offer for travelers willing to pay a hefty price tag — and accept a substantial dose of peril.

There’s also swimming with great white sharks in Mexico, sailing by an active volcano in New Zealand and rocketing to space . These types of singular and dangerous adventures are becoming increasingly popular with deep-pocketed leisure travelers in search of novel experiences, several travel experts said.

“There are a lot of incredibly well-traveled folks out there who constantly push the boundaries of their travels to chase thrills and claim bragging rights,” said Peter Anderson, managing director of Knightsbridge Circle , a luxury concierge service with offices in London, New York and Dubai. “They’re so accustomed to what they consider to be typical vacations that they begin to seek out more unique experiences, many of which involve a degree of risk.”

Mr. Anderson said he had recently planned a trip for a client to visit the pyramids in South Sudan, the site of one of the world’s biggest refugee crises, which has a “Do Not Travel” advisory from the U.S. State Department. The planning process, he said, involved consultations with security experts on how to best mitigate potential dangers.

Another client wanted to voyage to the geographic South Pole — the southernmost point on Earth — which required chartering an icebreaker, a large vessel that can pass through ice-covered waters, and two helicopters for sightseeing. The trip, which cost about $100,000 per person, required a week of various health screenings and weather preparedness training.

Physically demanding expeditions to some of the world’s most remote destinations are a growing business for the luxury travel company Abercrombie & Kent , said Geoffrey Kent, its founder. He said the company uses expert guides to eliminate as much risk as possible.

“These are thrilling adventures for top-tier clients who have done pretty much everything,” Mr. Kent said in a statement, adding that the challenges left guests “with a sense of accomplishment.”

Perhaps the priciest ticket, and biggest possible risk, is space travel, which has been dominated by a trio of billionaire-led rocket companies: Blue Origin , owned by Jeff Bezos, whose passengers have included the “Star Trek” television star William Shatner; Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic , where tickets for a suborbital spaceflight start at $450,000; and Elon Musk’s SpaceX , which in 2022 launched an all-civilian spaceflight, with no trained astronauts on board.

A spokesman for the U.S. Coast Guard, speaking to reporters, said that the last reported communication from the submersible was about an hour and 45 minutes into its dive.

The spokesman said that the sea conditions in the search area right now are “fairly normal,” with three to six foot waves, with low visibility and fog.

Mauger said that the United States has deployed two C130 aircraft, with an additional on the way from the New York National Guard, and that the Canadians have sent a C130 and a P8 submarine search aircraft. “On the surface we have the commercial operator that’s been on site, and we’re bringing additional surface assets into play,” he said, adding that they will provide some “subsurface” search ability.

Mauger said that one submersible pilot was on board. “And there were four mission specialists, is the term that the operator uses,” he said. “You’ll have to ask the operator what that means.”

Jesus Jimenez

Mauger said it is believed the vessel was designed to sustain an emergency for 96 hours and estimated that the people inside would theoretically have between 70 to 96 hours of air. “We’re using that time making the best use of every moment of that time,” Mauger said.

Mauger said the location of the search is approximately 900 miles east of Cape Cod, Mass., in a water depth of roughly 13,000 feet. “It is a remote area and is a challenge to conduct a search in that remote area, but we are deploying all available assets to make sure that we can locate the craft and rescue the people on board.”

Mauger said that the search is being conducted both under the water, with sonar buoys and sonar on the expedition ship, and over the water, in case the submersible surfaced and lost communications, with the help of aircraft and surface vessels. He said the Coast Guard was coordinating both with the Canadian authorities and commercial vessels in the area for help.

Mauger said the Coast Guard was notified on Sunday afternoon by the operator of the submersible that it was “overdue” and that it had five people on board.

Rear Admiral John Mauger of the U.S. Coast Guard said at a news conference that “we are doing everything we can do” to find the submersible and rescue the five people inside. United States and Canadian aircraft are being used in the search, he said. Mauger said that the Coast Guard has put sonar buoys in the water to try to locate the submersible.

We’re standing by for Rear Admiral John Mauger of the U.S. Coast Guard to provide updates on the missing submersible at a news conference in Boston.

Ben Shpigel

The Titan is equipped with only a few days’ worth of life support.

The Titan , the vessel that went missing in the area of the Titanic wreck in the North Atlantic on Monday, is classified as a submersible, not a submarine, because it does not function as an autonomous craft, instead relying on a support platform to deploy and return.

According to the website for the tourism company operating the Titan, OceanGate Expeditions of Everett, Wash., the missing vessel is a submersible capable of taking five people — one pilot and four crew members — to depths of 4,000 meters, or more than 13,100 feet — for “site survey and inspection, research and data collection, film and media production, and deep sea testing of hardware and software.”

Made of titanium and carbon fiber, it weighs about 21,000 pounds and is listed as measuring 22 feet by 9.2 feet by 8.3 feet, with 96 hours of “life support” for five people.

The Titan, one of three types of crewed submersibles operated by OceanGate, is equipped with a platform similar to the dry dock of a ship that launches and recovers the vessel, the website said.

“The platform is used to launch and recover manned submersibles by flooding its flotation tanks with water for a controlled descent to a depths of 9.1 meters (30 feet) to avoid any surface turbulence,” according to the website.

“Once submerged, the platform uses a patented motion-dampening flotation system to remain coupled to the surface yet still provide a stable underwater platform from which our manned submersibles lift off of and return to after each dive,” the site continues. “At the conclusion of each dive, the sub lands on the submerged platform and the entire system is brought to the surface in approximately two minutes by filling the ballast tanks with air.”

OceanGate calls the Titan the only crewed submersible in the world that can take five people as deep as 4,000 meters — or more than 13,100 feet — enabling it to reach almost 50 percent of the world’s oceans. Unlike other submersibles, the Titan, the website said, employs a system that can analyze how pressure changes affect the vessel as it dives deeper, providing “early warning detection for the pilot with enough time to arrest the descent and safely return to surface.”

The Titan began deep-sea ventures related to the Titanic in 2021. According to the tech news site GeekWire , the vessel was “rebuilt” after OceanGate determined through testing that the vessel could not withstand the pressure of a 4,000-meter dive.

In a Fox News interview, Rear Admiral John Mauger of the U.S. Coast Guard said that the agency did not have the right equipment in the search area to do a “comprehensive sonar survey of the bottom.” He said,“Right now, we’re really just focused on trying to locate the vessel again by saturating the air with aerial assets, by tasking surface assets in the area, and then using the underwater sonar.”

Mauger said that one of the aircraft being used in the search could detect underwater noises.“But it is a large area of water, and it’s complicated by local weather conditions as well,” he said.

The U.S. Coast Guard said in statement that it was searching for five people after the Canadian research vessel MV Polar Prince lost contact with a submersible during a dive about 900 miles east of Cape Cod, Mass., on Sunday morning. The Coast Guard scheduled a news conference for 4:30 p.m. Eastern time.

Jenny Gross

The Marine Institute at the Memorial University of Newfoundland, which partnered with OceanGate on the trip, said in a statement that it became aware on Monday morning that OceanGate had lost contact with its Titan submersible. One Marine Institute student who was on a summer employment contract with OceanGate was safe, the statement said. “We have no further information on the status of the submersible or personnel,” the statement said.

Emma Bubola

Rory Golden, an Irish diver who has previously visited the Titanic wreckage and is part of the OceanGate expedition, said in a Facebook post on Monday that a “major search and rescue operation” was underway. The focus on board the ship is “our friends,” he wrote. Communications were being limited to preserve bandwidth to coordinate operations, he added. (Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this update misstated Rory Golden’s nationality. He is Irish, not Scottish.)

Hamish Harding, the chairman of a Dubai-based sales and air operations company, Action Aviation, is among those aboard the missing submersible, according to Mark Butler, the company’s managing director. Harding, who holds several Guinness World Records, including for the longest time spent traversing the deepest part of the ocean on a single dive, wrote on his Facebook page on Saturday that a dive had been planned for Sunday: “A weather window has just opened up,” he wrote.

Tourists have been going to the Titanic site for decades, by robot or submersible.

For decades after the Titanic sank, searchers scanned the dark waters of the North Atlantic for the ship’s final resting place.

Since the wreck was found, in 1985, it has drawn hundreds of filmmakers, salvagers, explorers and tourists, using robots and submersibles.

First there was the team that took undersea robots to depths of more than 12,000 feet, verifying that the broken hulk it found at the bottom was in fact the Titanic. Then came many others, including James Cameron, the director who reinvigorated interest in the ship with his 1997 film, “ Titanic .”

The ship had long garnered intense interest among researchers and treasure hunters captivated by the tragic history of the wreck: the horror of the accident, the supposed hubris of the ship’s builders, the enormous wealth of many and the poverty of others on the luxury liner juxtaposed with the cold facts of the iceberg and the sea.

But Mr. Cameron’s hit imbued the wreck with a new story of romance and tragedy, renewing interest far beyond those with an interest in famous accidents at sea.

By the early 2000s, scientists were warning that visitors were a threat to the wreck, saying that gaping holes had opened up in the decks, walls had crumpled, and that rusticles — icicle-shaped structures of rust — were spreading all over the ship.

Tourists were paying up to $36,000 per dive by submersible. Salvage crews hunted for artifacts to bring back up, over the objections of preservationists who said the wreck should be honored as the graveyard for more than 1,500 people. Wreckage from a submersible accident was found on one of the Titanic’s decks. Researchers said the site was littered with beer and soda bottles and the remains of salvage efforts, including weights, chains and cargo nets.

Mr. Cameron, who has repeatedly visited the wreck, was among those calling for care around the site. In 2003, he took 3D cameras there for his 2003 documentary, “ Ghosts of the Abyss .”

OceanGate Expeditions, the private company operating the submersible that went missing on Monday, was founded in 2009. By the time it began offering tours to paying customers, researchers said that the Titanic had little scientific value compared to other sites.

But cultural interest in the Titanic remains extraordinarily high: OceanGate charges $250,000 for a submersible tour of the wreck, and the disaster continues to command a fascination online, sometimes at the expense of facts .

A spokeswoman for Canada's Coast Guard said that a military aircraft and a Coast Guard ship had been deployed to help search for the missing submersible. The ship, Kopit Hopson 1752, was off eastern Newfoundland, and headed for the search area.

Dana Rubinstein

John Lockwood, a longtime OceanGate board member, has been in the company’s submersibles, though not the Titan, the one that he said takes people to the Titanic. He said the submersibles have a viewing port and external cameras. “But it’s not like going down in a submarine at a very shallow depth, where there are multiple viewing ports,” he said.

Amanda Holpuch

The tour’s operator charges $250,000 for trips to the sunken wreckage.

OceanGate Expeditions, the operator of the submersible that disappeared during a voyage to the wreckage of the Titanic, has led previous tourist trips to the site at a cost of $250,000 per person.

Stockton Rush, the president of OceanGate, told The New York Times last summer that private exploration was needed to continue feeding public fascination with the wreck site.

“No public entity is going to fund going back to the Titanic,” Mr. Rush said. “There are other sites that are newer and probably of greater scientific value.”

OceanGate takes paying tourists in submersibles to underwater canyons and shipwrecks, including the Titanic. Last year, it shared a one-minute clip of video obtained during one of its trips to the wreck site, which was discovered in 1985, less than 400 miles off Newfoundland.

The dives last about eight hours, including the estimated 2.5 hours each way it takes to descend and ascend. Scientists and historians provide context on the trip and some conduct research at the site, which has become a reef that is home to many organisms. The team also documents the wreckage with high-definition cameras to monitor its decay and capture it in detail.

Mr. Rush said that the high quality of the footage allowed researchers to get an even closer look at the site without having to go underwater. He compared the OceanGate trips to space tourism, saying the commercial voyages were the first step to expanding the use of the submersibles for industrial activities, such as inspecting and maintaining underwater oil rigs.

“For those who think it’s expensive, it’s a fraction of the cost of going to space and it’s very expensive for us to get these ships and go out there,” Mr. Rush said. “And the folks who don’t like anybody making money sort of miss the fact that that’s the only way anything gets done in this world is if there is profit or military need.”

Because of an editing error, an earlier version of this article misstated the day that the expedition’s research vessel lost contact with the submersible. It was Sunday, not Monday.

How we handle corrections

Trevor Munroe, a Canadian Coast Guard spokesman, said his country is involved in the rescue mission, but the U.S. Coast Guard is leading it from Boston. “It’s technically in their waters,” he said.

The news of the missing submersible recalls an OceanGate trip last year that was the subject of a CBS story . During the trip, the CBS correspondent David Pogue reported that “communication somehow broke down”and that the submersible was briefly lost for a couple of hours.

You may remember that the @OceanGateExped sub to the #Titanic got lost for a few hours LAST summer, too, when I was aboard…Here’s the relevant part of that story. https://t.co/7FhcMs0oeH pic.twitter.com/ClaNg5nzj8 — David Pogue (@Pogue) June 19, 2023

The New York Times

Here’s how The New York Times covered the sinking of the Titanic in 1912.

The Titanic was en route to New York on its maiden voyage when it struck an iceberg and sank on April 15, 1912. The sinking was front-page news around the world, including in The New York Times. Here is a portion of The Times’s coverage, as it was written that day. The digital version of the paper from that day can be viewed here .

The admission that the Titanic, the biggest steamship in the world, had been sunk by an iceberg and had gone to the bottom of the Atlantic, probably carrying more than 1,400 of her passengers and crew with her, was made at the White Star Line offices, 9 Broadway, at 8:20 o’clock last night.

Then P.A.S. Franklin, Vice President and General Manager of the International Mercantile Marine, conceded that probably only those passengers who were picked up by the Cunarder Carpathia had been saved. Advices received early this morning tended to increase the number of survivers by 200.

The admission followed a day in which the White Star Line officials had been optimistic in the extreme. At no time was the admission made that every one aboard the huge steamer was not safe. The ship itself, it was confidently asserted, was unsinkable, and inquirers were informed that she would reach port, under her own steam probably, but surely with the help of the Allan liner Virginian, which was reported to be towing her.

As the day passed, however, with no new authentic reports from the Titanic or any of the ships were known to have responded to her wireless call for help, it became apparent that authentic news of the disaster probably could come only from the Titanic’s sister ship, the Olympic.

The wireless range of the Olympic is 500 miles. That of the Carpathia, the Parisian, and the Virginian is much less, and as they neared the position of the Titanic they drew further and further out of shore range. From the Titanic’s position at the time of the disaster it is doubtful if any of the ships except the Olympic could establish communication with shore.

Miawpukek Horizon Maritime Services, of St. John’s, Canada, said it was supporting OceanGate Expeditions, a client. “We are working closely with authorities on the search and rescue effort,” they said in a statement.

Explore Smolensk on a Private Day tour (from Moscow)

• Transfer to and from train station
• Transportation by fast train to Smolensk and back to Moscow
• Transportation in Smolensk by car
• Museum entrance fees
• Should your hotel not be listed, You have to provide us with your hotel location so that we can arrange your pick up. Otherwise, we can not guarantee your timely pickup Pickup from your hotel at 6:15 am
• Not wheelchair accessible
• Infants must sit on laps
• Confirmation will be received at time of booking
• Travelers should have a moderate physical fitness level
• This experience requires good weather. If it’s canceled due to poor weather, you’ll be offered a different date or a full refund
• This is a private tour/activity. Only your group will participate
• All sales are final and incur 100% cancellation penalties.
• You'll get picked up See departure details
• 1 Cathedral of the Assumption (Uspensky Sobor) Stop: 45 minutes See details
• 2 Smolensk Fortress Stop: 60 minutes See details
• You'll return to the starting point

• TravelSomeMore24 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Unique Authentic Russian Experience We had such an incredible experience. It felt like we were transformed into a different time. Our guide was so informative and gracious. We are so grateful for a unique experience and would absolutely recommend it to everyone. Read more Written July 21, 2021
• JulieArquette 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Great day 😘 in Moscow We booked a one day your and were able to change the itinerary as we wanted to visit WW2 memoreal. Our guide was very knowledgeable and passionate and explained us a lot about Moscow life now and back to Soviet times. Loved our day, thank you, Mariya and all Read more Written March 5, 2020
• creitzy 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Guide Have used Anton 2 times now for different friends when they have visited Moscow.he is very knowledgeable, friendly, helpful and speaks very good English.i would recommend the metro tour and WW II museum. Thanks again Read more Written February 11, 2020
• JeffKuptchuck 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles This is definitely a unique experience After looking at all of the big cathedrals in Moscow and being rather overwhelmed this was a much more intimate and personal experience. It was great to be able to be there by ourselves and the monk that showed us around and Anton both were obviously very passionate about the monastery so you were able to understand much better what the various churches and icons meant to them The view from the bell tower was awesome even if the climb up took some faith! Dinner was very good except for my wife who doesn't like fish and that is all they eat at the monastery besides vegetables, but still very unique dinner. Read more Written February 9, 2020
• justinbM9877MC 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Sightseeing in Moscow over New Year’s Anton was great, very friendly, knowledgeable about local history as well as general Russian history, and had good recommendations for day trips that didn’t over-schedule. He was easy to work with and an excellent English-language speaker. Would highly recommend. Read more Written January 26, 2020
• TanechkaVas 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles The whole day tour to Zvenigorod, the country side of Moscow, with Anton. We organized that tour from Australia well ahead of time, planning to visit Zvenigorod with big group of extended family and friends with teens as part of our New Year trip to Moscow. The communication with Anton, our guide, was excellent during the time since booking till the excursion day. The actual day was organized very good, taken into account mixed group of adults, born in USSR and kids, born in Australia. Anton organized our activities to be suitable for all of us. As adults, we were enjoyed country side during winter and Monastery's quietness and ability to jump to the cold "holy" water at one of the oldest Monasteries of Russia - Savva Storoghevskiy Man Monastery. That was the most amazing and nearly magical experience! Kids were enjoyed of snow and treats Anton provide for us, including buisquits and Sbiten'. We also visited very interesting Museum of Russian desserts and learn a lot about ancient russian sweets; have a look on our past in the Museum of USSR and bought some yammie things to enjoy later. In general we all agree that our tour to Zvenigorod with Anton was enjoyable and educational; well organized and unforgettable. We wish we would have more time there! We would recommend such trip to everyone wishing to see Russia's country side. Read more Written January 17, 2020
• GuidesAndGuides 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Loved this experience. Especially the hidden gems! Anton brought us around places which we couldn't have done it alone. I went with the family, my husband and two daughters and they enjoyed every minute. Anton was very attentive to our needs and have good connections with the local communities. We tasted delicious Russian lunch on this tour. We had a fun time painting our Russian dolls (matryoshka) and finished the trip with a great feeling of connection to Russian culture, tasty food, fantastic people and magnificent architecture.   Do not hesitate to book this tour. It is worth your money and time. It was a great day, Thank you Anton! Read more Written January 14, 2020
• 161sinemg 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles It was a very interesting experience This tour was the most exciting activity on our trip to Moscow. I would strongly recommend but climbing stairs was a bit hard. I will not forget all my life. Many thanks to our guide Hektor and Anton Read more Written January 7, 2020
• Mustafa19890 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Tour was amazing We had exceptional experience 45 meters deep underground. You really feel how it was to be in Soviet Union during the Cold War era, what were their fears Read more Written December 27, 2019
• yeatharhiu 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Unique Experience Victor is our English speaking guide. It's a small group tour so you dont have to worry about being left out. He took us down the bunker 43 meter down the surface, explained about the heavy doors and let us open them, kept us informed about its functions and introduced us whatever exhibits were left there. Very patient guide and informative tour. Sign up for it if you are in Moscow. Read more Written December 26, 2019
• NickRobson101 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles WOW. We absolutely recommend this tour! This is a tour for the senses and truly exceeded our expectations. There is an interesting balance of history, access you would not expect around a monastery, the visuals of the architecture and decoration, unique chance to observe the inner workings of the monastery, views from vantage points and the towers. Favourite parts included climbing the bell tower for the bell ringing and an exceptionally good meal. For something interestingly different that will add unique memories and experiences Read more Written December 20, 2019
• Loxiee 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles The Highlight of our trip Elena, was very attentive and knowledgeable. She took us through the city as if she was a long lost friend. She made us not only feel comfortable in any way possible but she made the experience feel like a another day in our hometown. I am so happy to have met her, she was the highlight of our entire trip. Read more Written December 17, 2019
• Deryabayazit 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Amazing and delicious We had great time, Anton showed us around Moscow local food, it was jus awesome. Tasty and a lot of fun!!! Read more Written December 14, 2019
• ShingoKamiki 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Interesting and delicious Had a tour and dinner inside the monastery with Moscow with Locals. It was a very interesting tour, a monk presented us the monastery, the temples, the bell tower with ringing bells. Amazing! And then we had delicious dinner with Russian traditional cuising, Lovely! Arigatou, Anton! Read more Written December 8, 2019
• Hideo_Aoki78 0 contributions 5.0 of 5 bubbles Moscow is marvelous Good job, Anton! We were a group of friends from Japan and Anton did a great job, showing us Moscow. The metro is so interesting and important for local citizens, Red Square is amazing, St. Basil cathedral was iconic both outside and even more interesting inside. It was both interesting and educational seeing central Moscow streets. Anton managed to book us a table for lunch with delicious local food and he helped us with recommendations for dinner (booked is a table as well). Brilliant job, Moscow with locals! Read more Written December 1, 2019

Explore Smolensk on a Private Day tour (from Moscow) provided by Moscow With Locals