A search is underway for a missing submersible that carries people to view the wreckage of the Titanic. Canadian officials say the five-person submersible was reported overdue Sunday night about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. John's, Newfoundland and that the search is being led by the U.S. Coast Guard. The owner of the ship that launched the submersible confirmed that it was operated by OceanGate Expeditions, which has been operating annual voyages since 2021 to the wreckage of the iconic ocean liner. In a statement, the company said it is working to bring the crew back safely.
What I dont get is that one of the passengers was a billionaire. He could have built himself the fanciest and safest vessel for a few Million Dollars with a whole naval operation attached. Of course thats a lot more than 250K but still nothing for a billionaire.
These people are so out of touch and cheap its insane.
Why do that when you can cut costs, and how would it be possible for them not to ensure their safety? I don’t think they cut costs like the clients, I don’t think they would put lites at risk just for the sake of some extra dollars to the pocket of the CEO. /s
It goes to prove that billionaires are just as gullible as the rest of the people, all they had was just money and assets, it doesn’t grant them wisdom or intelligence.
Gabe Newell, yes the owner of Valve/Steam, has an ocean research organization that owns a submarine designed to dive down to 10km, to some of the deepest parts of the ocean.
To be fair, even if no vehicle that could rescue it from the bottom is available, that doesn’t mean that there is no use in a rescue mission if they don’t know where the sub is. For instance, it could have surfaced but had it’s communications lost, in which case they’d still need rescue, because based on a CBS video of the sub in question shared elsewhere on the thread, the thing doesn’t actually have a hatch and just has the front taken off and then bolted back on afterwards to let people in and out, and obviously is going to be airtight given it’s a sub and all.
This may be true, but how much time does it take to surface to avoid decompression sickness if they are found? This, of course, assumes that the surface in the same vehicle.
The inhabitants of the submarine aren’t under pressure directly like scuba divers are, they’re at atmospheric pressure while inside which is why the pressure hull needs to be so strong to resist the hundreds of PSI outside - it’s the pressure difference that crushes things in this case. If they are rescued there’ll be no requirement to decompress slowly as their bodies were never under compression and at risk of the bends (when nitrogen bubbles form in your blood with often lethal results) to begin with.
The inhabitants of the Kursk during that submarine disaster were subjected to high pressure in their last hours but that was because the water slowly flooding their compartment compressed the air like a piston, this isn’t a concern for this submarine as it goes far deeper than the Kursk and the slightest fracture to the hull would kill them instantly in a violent implosion.
Someone else in the other thread about this said they have magnetically attached ballasts that can be jettisoned so the sub floats if power is lost.
It’s also designed to go down to the floor where the Titanic is. Was it also passing over deeper water? I’dve assumed they’d release it from a boat above the titantic fairly directly.
…officials are working to get a remotely operated vehicle that can reach a depth of 6,000 meters (about 20,000 feet) to the site as soon as possible.
The 5-person submersible, named Titan, is capable of diving 4,000 meters or 13,120 ft. “with a comfortable safety margin,” OceanGate said in its filing with the court.
Built with shit from Home Depot, controlled with a literal Logitech game controller, construction pipes as ballast… holy fuck, why would anybody agree to go 3.7km below the ocean in that deathtrap?
I mean, anything will crack under pressure. The biggest issue I see is uneven compression of the two materials coupled with different fatigue behaviors. I’d feel a lot safer if the whole submarine was titanium, honestly. Barring that, a couple inches of solid steel would be just as comforting.
Everything cracks under pressure, I’m not exactly sure what the above commenter is getting at. If the sub was steel the walls would be thinner. With titanium the walls are thicker. Without knowing the dimensions of the material we can’t know whether it was built to high enough standards.
Also, I’ve seen so many Scientific deepwater vehicles that are thethered to the ship in some form. Why isn’t this thing hooked up to a cran yhat can get it back up if someone fails? I’d think passenger vessels should pass more rigurous safety standards than that.
Are they liable btw or is the “international waters” situation doing them any favor?
I seem to recall a point in that CBS video where they had to sign a waiver stating among other things that they acknowledged it was an experimental vessel that is not certified by or approved any regulatory agency, so, yeah. I don’t know that I’d count on there being rigorous safely standards in that case
An easily disproved one too, as the sister ships weren’t actually identical. Also the recent scan on the ship revealed the hull number 401 on one of the propellers putting another nail in the coffin of the idea the ship is actually the Olympic.
They’re playing a really long game if so. Submarines like this weren’t even conceived of yet when the Titanic went down, it’d take tremendous foresight to have set this up.
Very wealthy people wasting a huge amount of society’s resources to have mild fun doing something very risky then having to get rescued on the back of society at a high cost. I say let’s enjoy watching them die.
this is a very weird first comment to make and the subsequent comments neither look productive nor particularly on topic. let’s save the thirsting for rich people blood for a topic where it’s more warranted folks, please and thanks.
Regardless of one’s opinion the super rich, the thing also has crew that are just there because they’re paid to operate the thing, I doubt they make enough to buy tickets for this kind of thing themselves.
It’s controlled with a knockoff Xbox controller. I’ll bet the “black box” is a cassette recorder bought from Goodwill for $3 and then spray painted black
That is the worst part to me. This kid’s main interests were Rubik’s cubes and volleyball. At least all these old guys had an interest in the Titanic and knew what they were getting into.
I find it strangely hard to care about the fate of a handful of multimillionaire tourists when hundreds of refugees died last week due to the indifference of the Greek authorities - and the media barely noticed.
We should all just be glad that James Cameron wasn’t on board. Imagine never getting another one of his movies because he Heart
-of-the-Ocean’ed himself.
I am, however, enjoying the gradual turn from the search and rescue efforts to assigning blame and pointing out all the noted issues with the vessel that went missing - and the pushback from people saying it was completely safe.
Even if I had a stupid amount of money, there’s no way in hell I would pay someone to stuff me inside what seems to be an over-sized propane tank, then send me to depths where the water pressure is so extreme it will literally crush you.
You definitely wouldn’t.
But what about if you made it to the surface in an emergency? I’d probably want to open it at that point.
Someone mentioned how the sub reminds them of Apollo 1 and I tend to agree. So many poor choices were made!
At the meeting Lochridge discovered why he had been denied access to the viewport information from the Engineering department—the viewport at the forward of the submersible was only built to a certified pressure of 1,300 meters, although OceanGate intended to take passengers down to depths of 4,000 meters. Lochridge learned that the viewport manufacturer would only certify to a depth of 1,300 meters due to experimental design of the viewport supplied by OceanGate, which was out of the Pressure Vessels for Human Occupancy (“PVHO”) standards. OceanGate refused to pay for the manufacturer to build a viewport that would meet the required depth of 4,000 meters.
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What I dont get is that one of the passengers was a billionaire. He could have built himself the fanciest and safest vessel for a few Million Dollars with a whole naval operation attached. Of course thats a lot more than 250K but still nothing for a billionaire. These people are so out of touch and cheap its insane.
Why do that when you can cut costs, and how would it be possible for them not to ensure their safety? I don’t think they cut costs like the clients, I don’t think they would put lites at risk just for the sake of some extra dollars to the pocket of the CEO. /s
It goes to prove that billionaires are just as gullible as the rest of the people, all they had was just money and assets, it doesn’t grant them wisdom or intelligence.
That much money must give you incredible hubris: up until this point you’ve never had a problem that money couldn’t fix (or ease) for you.
Unfortunately, you can’t bribe physics.
I’ve never thought about it this way before. You’ve given me empathy for billionaires; thanks, I hate it!
Goes to further prove that it doesn’t take brains to become a billionaire, I guess
Who even has the vessels that can go deep enough to rescue them? This is the stuff of nightmares
Gabe Newell, yes the owner of Valve/Steam, has an ocean research organization that owns a submarine designed to dive down to 10km, to some of the deepest parts of the ocean.
To be fair, even if no vehicle that could rescue it from the bottom is available, that doesn’t mean that there is no use in a rescue mission if they don’t know where the sub is. For instance, it could have surfaced but had it’s communications lost, in which case they’d still need rescue, because based on a CBS video of the sub in question shared elsewhere on the thread, the thing doesn’t actually have a hatch and just has the front taken off and then bolted back on afterwards to let people in and out, and obviously is going to be airtight given it’s a sub and all.
It has 96 hours of life support, I have faith.
This may be true, but how much time does it take to surface to avoid decompression sickness if they are found? This, of course, assumes that the surface in the same vehicle.
The inhabitants of the submarine aren’t under pressure directly like scuba divers are, they’re at atmospheric pressure while inside which is why the pressure hull needs to be so strong to resist the hundreds of PSI outside - it’s the pressure difference that crushes things in this case. If they are rescued there’ll be no requirement to decompress slowly as their bodies were never under compression and at risk of the bends (when nitrogen bubbles form in your blood with often lethal results) to begin with.
The inhabitants of the Kursk during that submarine disaster were subjected to high pressure in their last hours but that was because the water slowly flooding their compartment compressed the air like a piston, this isn’t a concern for this submarine as it goes far deeper than the Kursk and the slightest fracture to the hull would kill them instantly in a violent implosion.
I am hopeful, but not necessarily optimistic…if it lost power and descended below crush depth, no amount of life support is bringing them back.
Someone else in the other thread about this said they have magnetically attached ballasts that can be jettisoned so the sub floats if power is lost.
It’s also designed to go down to the floor where the Titanic is. Was it also passing over deeper water? I’dve assumed they’d release it from a boat above the titantic fairly directly.
Well with all that taken into account, the fact that we haven’t seen any evidence of the sub yet is a very bad sign.
But apparently they cannot open the hatch from the inside, so even if they are on the surface, the oxygen will still run out if they’re not found.
Edit: here’s an article about this: https://www.insider.com/people-missing-submersible-deadbolt-screws-airtight-coast-guard-2023-6
I assume there is also no vent or similar to let air in?
but…after looking up on Wikipedia
I think they’re advertising the depth limit of the recovery vehicle, not claiming that the wreck is actually at 20,000 feet.
They probably need quite a bit of margin too if the craft accidentally got lost in a deeper area
It might be best practice to use a vessel rated for considerably deeper than you actually go, in case of some problem in the hull?
And/or it’s just a description of a particular vehicle they’re bringing that was most convenient to get there quickly.
It’s not like they’re going to say, “oh, don’t bring THAT recovery vehicle, it can go TOO deep.”
Maybe they’re concerned that it no-clipped through the sea bottom and wound up deeper than the Titanic’s current location?
CBS dude rode on it and did an interview with the owner.
So many red flags.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29co_Hksk6o&feature=youtu.be
Built with shit from Home Depot, controlled with a literal Logitech game controller, construction pipes as ballast… holy fuck, why would anybody agree to go 3.7km below the ocean in that deathtrap?
Made out of a fiberglass tube (catastrophic failure) and titanium end caps (cracks) instead of steel.
“Steel is real.”
Titanium cracks under pressure, I take it?
Or is the join between the cap and the fiberglass body potentially more of a problem?
I mean, anything will crack under pressure. The biggest issue I see is uneven compression of the two materials coupled with different fatigue behaviors. I’d feel a lot safer if the whole submarine was titanium, honestly. Barring that, a couple inches of solid steel would be just as comforting.
Everything cracks under pressure, I’m not exactly sure what the above commenter is getting at. If the sub was steel the walls would be thinner. With titanium the walls are thicker. Without knowing the dimensions of the material we can’t know whether it was built to high enough standards.
I would be worried about both. Joining two very different materials that need to deal with crazy pressures seems like a really bad idea.
Add temperature changes as you dive.
Good point!
bUt iT wAs dEsIgNeD wItH NASA iNpUt
Imagine paying $250k and the pilot pulls out the player 2 controller
Jesus, is that really what they’re using? 😳
Those Logitech controllers are actually pretty decent. I’ve had one for ages and it’s still going strong.
And it’s easily replaceable in case of failure. Of all the design shortcuts this one isn’t bad.
lmao for real. Couldn’t even fork out for a first party controller.
Hope the pilot tried ⬆️ ⬆️ ⬇️⬇️⬅️➡️⬅️➡️🅱️🅰️ start
Wow, that is super sketchy. Now I am not at all surprised this happened. Hope that company has a shit ton of insurance.
Also, I’ve seen so many Scientific deepwater vehicles that are thethered to the ship in some form. Why isn’t this thing hooked up to a cran yhat can get it back up if someone fails? I’d think passenger vessels should pass more rigurous safety standards than that.
Are they liable btw or is the “international waters” situation doing them any favor?
I seem to recall a point in that CBS video where they had to sign a waiver stating among other things that they acknowledged it was an experimental vessel that is not certified by or approved any regulatory agency, so, yeah. I don’t know that I’d count on there being rigorous safely standards in that case
There was a conspiracy that the original titanic going down was an insurance scam.
An easily disproved one too, as the sister ships weren’t actually identical. Also the recent scan on the ship revealed the hull number 401 on one of the propellers putting another nail in the coffin of the idea the ship is actually the Olympic.
Oh i hate that stupid theory. That’s like top tier “looking for a conspiracy because we’ve got nothing better to do”
They’re playing a really long game if so. Submarines like this weren’t even conceived of yet when the Titanic went down, it’d take tremendous foresight to have set this up.
It’s not a great theory. I’m pretty sure it would have made more money transporting passengers hundreds of times over
There’s also a conspiracy that my farts smell like rancid carrots because the government puts carrots up my butt while I’m sleeping
Absolutely ridiculous. It’s huge international mega-corporations doing that.
Why aren’t more people talking about big carrot? Wake up sheeple
Very wealthy people wasting a huge amount of society’s resources to have mild fun doing something very risky then having to get rescued on the back of society at a high cost. I say let’s enjoy watching them die.
They’re dead.
this is a very weird first comment to make and the subsequent comments neither look productive nor particularly on topic. let’s save the thirsting for rich people blood for a topic where it’s more warranted folks, please and thanks.
But rich blood being spilled is the topic. They took a huge risk only to get more resources deployed to find them.
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The best new eco funeral option is human composting, let’s hope they had advance directives to support that industry as well!
“Ask a Mortician” did a video on what happened to the bodies from the Titanic. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHwXhUFQPCk
She also did a video on human composting. https://youtu.be/_LJSEZ_pl3Y
Regardless of one’s opinion the super rich, the thing also has crew that are just there because they’re paid to operate the thing, I doubt they make enough to buy tickets for this kind of thing themselves.
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At least it evens the score a bit. Yes we should enjoy when rich people meet grisly fates, they’ve literally doomed the rest of us.
[x] Doubt
I hope there’s some kind of black box… what would be worse than it happenning again one day because we don’t know what happenned.
It’s controlled with a knockoff Xbox controller. I’ll bet the “black box” is a cassette recorder bought from Goodwill for $3 and then spray painted black
BBC said that this sub (Titan) was damaged last year, and this was its first dive since being “repaired.”
I’m betting it didn’t have a black box, and we’ll never know if the “repair” was the cause.
Why do you put a 19yo in an untested death trap like this…
That is the worst part to me. This kid’s main interests were Rubik’s cubes and volleyball. At least all these old guys had an interest in the Titanic and knew what they were getting into.
I feel bad for the kid.
I feel bad for the families of folks
According to the article there is a metal eating bacteria that’s eating the titanic? And it the wreckage might be gone in a few decades?
That’s incredible
Now they probably have a new submersible to munch on…
Predinner snack!
I find it strangely hard to care about the fate of a handful of multimillionaire tourists when hundreds of refugees died last week due to the indifference of the Greek authorities - and the media barely noticed.
We should all just be glad that James Cameron wasn’t on board. Imagine never getting another one of his movies because he Heart -of-the-Ocean’ed himself.
Exactly- this is only news because their rich.
I am, however, enjoying the gradual turn from the search and rescue efforts to assigning blame and pointing out all the noted issues with the vessel that went missing - and the pushback from people saying it was completely safe.
History repeats itself.
This shits going to keep happening as companies continue to rush commercialization of “Extreme” Travel.
I’m ok with sending a bunch of billionaires to the bottom of the ocean.
Even if I had a stupid amount of money, there’s no way in hell I would pay someone to stuff me inside what seems to be an over-sized propane tank, then send me to depths where the water pressure is so extreme it will literally crush you.
Just…no.
I particularly like the part where this specific submersible can’t ever be opened from the inside, because it gets bolted shut from outside.
You wouldn’t want to open it down there, but also I don’t know why anyone would want to be down there in the first place.
You definitely wouldn’t. But what about if you made it to the surface in an emergency? I’d probably want to open it at that point. Someone mentioned how the sub reminds them of Apollo 1 and I tend to agree. So many poor choices were made!
That’s sort of… poetic in a messed up way.
Only if the sub remains undiscovered for ~70 years.
Why did they name it Titan??
Here’s a thread giving info on all the shoddiness of that sub
https://newrepublic.com/post/173802/missing-titanic-sub-faced-lawsuit-depths-safely-travel-oceangate
This adds to the picture of utter recklessness.
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So they wanted to die. Got it.
What the actual fuck. They built a literal deathtrap
They said it was unsinkable!