Missing Titanic submarine: Debris found by a remotely operated vehicle, says US Coast Guard

Missing Titanic submarine: A "debris field" has been found by a remotely operated vehicle in the search for the missing Titanic tourist submersible, the US Coast Guard informed on Thursday. The debris was found by teams searching for the missing submarine and it was being evaluated, the USCG said.

"A debris field was discovered within the search area by an ROV near the Titanic. Experts within the unified command are evaluating the information."

According to BBC, Dive expert David Mearns said the debris includes "a landing frame and a rear cover from the submersible". Mearns is a friend of the passengers aboard the Titan.

OceanGate co-founder Guillermo Söhnlein told BBC News that there may have been an "instantaneous implosion" of the craft. He said he would not be surprised if there was something on the surface. "I know that our protocol for lost comms is for the pilot to surface the sub. From the beginning, I always thought that’s probably what Stockton would have done. In which case it becomes very difficult to find the sub because the surface ship wouldn’t have known it was coming up and wouldn’t have known where to look."

He, however, said his biggest fear through this whole thing watching the operations unfold is that they are floating around on the surface and they are just very difficult to find. He said there was a possibility there had been a catastrophe. "What I do know is regardless of the sub, when you’re operating at depth the pressure is so great on any sub that if there is a failure it would be an instantaneous implosion. If that’s what happened that's what would have happened four days ago."

The search for the expedition submarine near the wreck of the Titanic entered a critical juncture on Thursday when the oxygen, which was enough for 96 hours, was expected to run out for the five people aboard. A remotely operated vehicle deployed from a Canadian vessel to the ocean floor discovered a "debris field" near the Titanic, the US Coast Guard said, adding that experts were "evaluating the information."

Another robot from a French research ship was also sent diving toward the seabed to search for signs of the 22-foot (6.7-meter) Titan submersible. The French ship carrying a deep-sea diving robot reached the search area for a missing submarine, the French marine research institute Ifremer said on Thursday. The research vessel Atalante is first using an echo-sounder to accurately map the seabed in order for the robot's search to be more targeted, Ifremer said. 

The submarine went missing on Sunday, shortly after it began what was to be a two-hour descent but lost contact with its support ship. The submersible set off with 96 hours of air, which means the oxygen would be exhausted by Thursday morning, assuming the Titan is still intact. 

Earlier in the day, Britain embedded a navy submariner with the team searching for the missing tourist submersible. An aircraft was also carrying specialist commercial equipment from the United Kingdom to assist with the search, a spokesperson for UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak said on Thursday.

(With inputs from Reuters)