Rescuers trying to find a submersible that disappeared on a dive are not only racing as the sub’s oxygen supplies dwindle, but are also battling a harsh environment. “It’s really a bit like being an astronaut going into space,' a Titanic expert says.
The sub’s oxygen supply is the most pressing factor in the search, but it’s hardly the only challenge, said Jamie Pringle, a professor of forensic geosciences at Keele University in the United Kingdom.
Scouring such extreme depths is challenging because the seafloor is more rugged than land, he said. The remains of the Titanic, which sank more than a century ago, settled at a depth of around 12,500 feet. “The bottom of the ocean is not flat — there are lots of hills and canyons,” Pringle said, adding that if the submersible is stranded on the seafloor, it’s going to be “really difficult” to locate it there. Even searching in and around the wreckage of the Titanic is tricky because it’s such an expansive site, he said. Coast Guard officials said Tuesday that the search has been focused on an area of the North Atlantic roughly the size of the state of Connecticut., released last month, revealed that the ship’s two main pieces are about 2,000 feet apart and surrounded by debris. These kinds of rescue efforts are also challenging because very few vessels and instruments are able to work at such extreme ocean depths.At the depth of the Titanic wreck, the pressure would be around 400 times greater than at sea level,Some nuclear-powered military submarines are capable of diving up to 1,600 feet, but most modern subs operate at much shallower depths. "Not too many things can go that deep," said Henry Hargrove, a senior analyst at the RAND Corporation, who served in the U.S. Navy for 11 years.Rescuers have deployed several C-130 aircraft to conduct aerial surveys of the site, and sonar buoys that can pick up signals to a depth of 13,000 feet are also being used to search underwater. Pringle said, however, that sonar systems typically need to sweep at greater depths to detect something as small as a submersible within the huge debris field of the Titanic. “If you’re using a sonar system [at the surface], your footprint is going to be quite big because it’s high above the sea floor,” he said. “The lower down it goes, the smaller the footprint and you have a better chance of finding something.” Pringle said it's difficult to speculate about what went wrong aboard the missing submersible, but added that there could be additional challenges even if it is found soon. It’s unclear, for instance, if a rescue craft capable of reaching such depths of the ocean can be deployed in time — or how the stranded craft could be retrieved. Submersibles like the ones used by OceanGate Expeditions usually don’t have mechanisms on their hulls that another vessel can lock onto for a submarine-to-submarine rescue, Pringle said. For those onboard, there’s likely not much they can do but try to remain calm and conserve oxygen, Hargrove said. “But it’s very challenging for people to stay calm, especially in this kind of situation,” he said. “At that depth there aren’t very many rescue options. When you’re disconnected from the ship above, you’re by yourself.”
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