How remotely operated vehicles might help find the Titan
Nick Logan | CBC News | Posted: June 21, 2023 1:01 AM | Last Updated: June 21, 2023
Few vessels can dive as deep as the wreck of the Titanic — but the U.S. navy has one
A remote marine rescue is challenging in the best conditions, let alone at the depths OceanGate's Titan submersible was travelling, with five people on board, to view the wreck of the Titanic.
During its dive under the North Atlantic Ocean on Sunday morning, the 6.7 metre-long submersible lost contact with the Polar Prince, the research vessel that ferried the Titan some 640 kilometres from St. John's to the approximate location above the wreck site.
The remains of the Titanic rest on the ocean floor some 3,800 metres down. If the Titan plunged that low, it's far too deep for most underwater vehicles — manned or unmanned — to travel.
"Only a tiny percentage of the world's submarines operate that deeply," David Marquet, a former U.S. navy submarine commander, told CBC News, noting that even the U.S. military doesn't operate manned submarines that deep.
Locating the Titan will require remotely controlled vehicles (ROVs) that give crews on the surface a view of the depths and which can attach cables to lift the vessel to the surface — if it can be found.
WATCH | Titan's oxygen running out:
But the clock is ticking. The vessel's estimated 96-hour supply of oxygen is likely more than halfway depleted already, according to the U.S. coast guard, assuming it's still intact and its passengers are still alive.
More than 48 hours into the ordeal, deep-water equipment — like ROVs — is only now arriving at the remote and vast search area.
Going deep
During a news briefing in Boston, U.S. coast guard Capt. Jamie Frederick said a nearby commercial pipe-laying vessel with ROV capability, the Deep Energy, arrived on Tuesday to support the search.
The ROVs are controlled from the surface via a cable.
But a vessel would need five or six kilometres of cable for an ROV to reach the Titanic or to search for the Titan, says Simon Boxall, an oceanographer and associate professor at the University of South Hampton, in the United Kingdom.
Deep Energy's ROVs can only reach 3,000 metres, according to a news release.
There are "only a handful" of ROVs in the world that can go deep enough, Boxall said.
WATCH | Journalist recounts deep dive aboard Titan:
And, even if they find it, rescuers must "work out a way to actually attach a cable to then bring it back to the surface," he said.
OceanGate adviser David Concannon has suggested the company is working to secure equipment that could reach up to 6,000 metres.
The U.S. navy has an ROV, known as the CURV-21 (Cable-controlled Undersea Recovery Vehicle), which can operate down to 6,000 metres.
The 2,900-kilogram vessel has been used in other deep-water search and recovery operations, but it's unclear if it will help search for the Titan.
The U.S. navy told CBC News it is sending a ship lifter — the Flyaway Deep Ocean Salvage System (FADOSS) — to aid efforts, but didn't say if it's also sending the CURV-21, though it has been used in tandem with the FADOSS in the past.
The FADOSS is built for "the recovery of large, bulky, and heavy sunken objects," according to the navy's website, and can lift about 27,200 kilograms. The Titan weighs about 10,000 kilograms.
A U.S. navy spokesperson told CBC News the FADOSS, along with other U.S. navy equipment and personnel, is expected to arrive in St. John's Tuesday evening.
Three C-17 aircraft belonging to the U.S. air force landed there around 7:30 p.m. NT.
WATCH | The difficult search for the Titan submersible:
The CURV-21 was deployed in early 2022 to salvage a U.S. F-35 fighter jet from the floor of the South China Sea. It rigged cables to the jet so it could be hoisted aboard a commercial salvage vessel 3,780 metres above.
The CURV-III, the CURV-21's direct predecessor, was involved in a successful deep-water rescue of a Canadian commercial submersible that sank off the coast of Ireland in August 1973.
The Pisces III, with two British crew members on board, was laying a transatlantic telephone cable when an accident on the surface caused it to sink to 480 metres.
The BBC reported the two men had an estimated 12 minutes of oxygen left when they were rescued after 76 hours inside the submersible.
WATCH | What the crew is likely facing: