Missing Titanic submersible live updates: Texts show OceanGate CEO dismissed concerns
Five people, including the company CEO, were aboard the sub when it imploded.
All passengers are believed to be lost after a desperate dayslong search for a submersible carrying five people that vanished while on a tour of the Titanic wreckage off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
The 21-foot deep-sea vessel, operated by OceanGate Expeditions, lost contact about an hour and 45 minutes after submerging on Sunday morning with a 96-hour oxygen supply. That amount of breathable air was forecast to run out on Thursday morning, according to the United States Coast Guard, which was coordinating the multinational search and rescue efforts.
Latest headlines:
- RCMP to investigate the deaths aboard Titan sub
- US taxpayer cost for search and rescue may be $1.5 million, expert says
- OceanGate CEO claimed sub was safer than scuba diving, texts show
- OceanGate co-founder defends development of submersible
- Sub's carbon-fiber composite hull was the 'critical failure,' James Cameron says
- Probe seeks answers on why Titanic sub imploded
- Navy likely detected sound of the implosion on Sunday: Official
- All lives believed to be lost: OceanGate
What to know about the missing sub
A submersible on a tour of the Titanic wreckage was reported overdue by its operator OceanGate Expeditions on Sunday, prompting the United States Coast Guard to launch a search and rescue effort for the 22-foot, 23,000-pound vessel.
Designed with life support to sustain five crew members for 96 hours, the submersible would need to be rescued in three days to save its five passengers, according to the Coast Guard.
Stockton Rush founded Washington-based OceanGate in 2009 to make deep-sea exploration more accessible to scientists and tourists. Fourteen years, more than 200 dives and three submersible designs later, the company now finds itself in a desperate search to recover the submersible carrying five people aboard that’s gone missing off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
OceanGate confirmed Monday it had lost contact with a submersible, saying in a statement: "We are exploring and mobilizing all options to bring the crew back safely. Our entire focus is on the crewmembers in the submersible and their families. We are working toward the safe return of the crewmembers."
Here's what we know about the submersible.
-ABC News' Peter Charalambous and Sam Sweeney
James Cameron calls OceanGate's carbon-fiber hull 'fundamentally flawed'
In reacting to news of the OceanGate submersible implosion, "Titanic" director James Cameron told ABC News that he was "struck by the similarity of the Titanic disaster itself, where the captain was repeatedly warned about ice ahead of his ship and yet he steamed at full speed into an ice field."
Cameron, who has built his own submersible, was critical of OceanGate's use of a carbon-fiber hull, calling it "fundamentally flawed."
OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who was among the five passengers killed on the submersible, had previously said he believed a sub made with carbon fiber would have a better strength-to-buoyancy ratio than titanium.