All five passengers aboard a submersible visiting the wreck of the TITANIC have died, OceanGates Expeditions reported on Thursday.
“We now estimate that our boss Stockton Rush, Shahzada Dawood and her son Suleman, Hamish Harding and Paul-Henri Nargeolet are sadly dead,” said the tour operator, in remarks reported by BFMTV.
The U.S. Coast Guard said the five passengers died in a catastrophic implosion of the Titan as it descended toward the wreck of TITANIC.
Since Sunday June 18, 2023, this small tourist submarine, which had set out to visit the wrecks of the Titanic, had been missing. The authorities were alerted, and the U.S. and Canadian Coast Guards began an intensive search for the submarine and its passengers.
The OceanGate Expedition submarine is the only submersible capable of carrying out such a mission, i.e. to the 4000m depth where the wreck of the Titanic lies. Less than 7 meters long, the Titan was on excursion from June 12 to 20. A place on board costs $250,000.
British billionaire Hamish Harding, CEO of Action Aviation and a famous adventurer with 3 Guinness records to his name, and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, a French oceanographer and leading specialist in Titanic research, were among the (5) passengers aboard the Titan.