A massive search and rescue operation is under way in the mid Atlantic after a tourist submarine went missing during a dive to Titanic’s wreck on Sunday.
Contact with the small sub was lost about an hour and 45 minutes into its dive, the US Coast Guard said.
Tour firm OceanGate said all options were being explored to rescue the five people onboard.
Tickets cost $250,000 (£195,000) for an eight-day trip including dives to the wreck at a depth of 3,800m (12,500ft).
Government agencies, the US and Canadian navies and commercial deep-sea firms are helping the rescue operation, officials said.
The Titanic’s wreck lies some 435 miles (700km) south of St John’s, Newfoundland, though the rescue mission is being run from Boston, Massachusetts.
The missing craft is believed to be OceanGate’s Titan submersible, a truck-sized sub that holds five people and usually dives with a four-day emergency supply of oxygen.
On Monday afternoon, Rear Adm John Mauger of the US Coast Guard told a news conference: “We anticipate there is somewhere between 70 and the full 96 hours available at this point.”
He also said that two aircrafts, a submarine and sonar buoys were involved in the search for the vessel but noted the area in which the search is taking place was “remote”, making operations difficult.
Rear Adm Mauger said the rescue teams were “taking this personally” and were doing everything they could to bring those on board “home safe”.
Hamish Harding, a 58-year-old British billionaire businessman and explorer, is among those on the missing submarine, his family said. (BBC)
