The expert diver who was supposed to join the deep-sea expedition to the RMS Titanic wreck site that went missing on Sunday said he keeps receiving "out of office" emails from U.S. government officials. He thinks they could help get key recovery equipment to the rescue site.
Search teams are racing against time to find an advanced submersible vessel named Titan, which was carrying five people near the wreckage of the Titanic at a depth of about 12,500 feet. The identities of three of the passengers aboard the submarine have been confirmed: Stockton Rush, CEO of OceanGate; French submersible pilot Paul-Henry Nargeolet; and billionaire British explorer Hamish Harding.
The identities of the other two passengers were confirmed by their families as: Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood; and his son Sulaiman Dawood.
Talking to NewsNation on Monday, expert diver David Concannon said he has done five expeditions and multiple dives to the Titanic wreckage during his career. He was supposed to be on the mission that is now lost, coordinated by OceanGate—a private company that organizes deep-sea expeditions. The crew of the sub lost contact with the research vessel Polar Prince an hour and 45 minutes into the dive.
Concannon said he didn't make it on the mission because two other people went on in his place—but he's now taking part in the rescue efforts to find the submersible vessel.
"I know three people in the sub, and I'm working, as well as OceanGate and others [...] to bring them home," Concannon said. He added that they've been working "non-stop" to rescue the missing people in the tourist submarine.
As of Monday afternoon, the submarine crew members had "96 hours of oxygen from about the time [...] they went down at approximately 9 o'clock local time yesterday morning," Concannon said.
"We're working as hard as we possibly can to get assets on site that can find and recover the submersible and bring these people home safely. That's all we care about, that's all we've been working on since we lost communication with them," Concannon said. He added that it's the private sector that has the right assets, but that the rescuers have been in touch with the federal government and the governments of other countries.
Concannon said that essential recovery equipment is waiting on the island of Guernsey, a self-governing British Crown dependency. U.S. government officials who need to sign off on the plane taking off with the equipment are not responding to Concannon's requests. He has received "out of office" emails in return.
"This equipment has been on the Tarmac for hours," Concannon said. "When I communicate with the U.S. government, I get 'out of office' replies, not from everyone, but from key people that have a sign-off on this. That's unacceptable," he added.
"We need to move. We do not have minutes or hours. We need to move now," Concannon said.
"If we move fast, we can get to the site in 40 hours from where the ship is now," according to Concannon. He added: "If we get the assets flown from Guernsey Channel Islands overnight, we can have them mobilized on the ship in a day and we can get there inside the window."
The U.S. government has not commented on the accusation.
In a statement, OceanGate wrote: "We are exploring and mobilizing all options to bring the crew back safely. Our entire focus is on the crew members in the submersible and their families."
The vessel went missing after taking off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, on Sunday morning. The descent from the surface to the wreckage of the Titanic, which lies around 370 miles south-southeast off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada, takes approximately eight hours.
The vessel can carry a maximum of five people: a pilot, a content expert, and three paying passengers. Tickets for an expedition to the Titanic wreckage cost about $250,000.
