Urgent Search For Missing Sub Near Titanic

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Good morning,

Hope everyone had a nice holiday weekend.

Planning a summer trip? Just FYI, Emily in Paris is heading… to Rome.

We can dream.

~ Mosheh, Jill, & Courtney

🗞 MISSING TITANIC SUB HAS TWO DAYS OF OXYGEN LEFT

A submersible vessel that was touring the Titanic wreckage in the depths of the Atlantic Ocean has gone missing. The developing situation is like something straight out of a movie.

WHAT WE KNOW
The Coast Guard says a deep-sea vessel carrying five people disappeared near the Titanic shipwreck in the North Atlantic yesterday, sparking a massive search and rescue operation. The vessel, Titan, belongs to the private company OceanGate, and was carrying tourists to see the Titanic shipwreck.

The U.S. Coast Guard says contact with the vessel was lost one hour and 45 minutes into its descent on Sunday. The prime location of the search is in a remote area about 900 miles east of Cape Cod, Massachusetts. The Titan is about 21 feet long — only slightly bigger than a minivan.

British billionaire and adventurer, Hamish Harding, who was also a passenger on a Blue Origin flight to space last year is said to be one of the passengers onboard. Also reportedly on board is OceanGate founder Stockton Rush. He gave a tour of the vessel to the CBC recently.

RACE AGAINST THE CLOCK
The Titan is advertised to have enough life support to keep five people alive for 96 hours (4 days). That means rescuers have until roughly 2:00pm ET on Thursday until the oxygen supply runs out.

THE EXPEDITION
Oceangate Expeditions began to lead expeditions to the Titanic in 2021. It begins aboard a ship in St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada — from there it is about a 400 mile journey to the site of the Titanic shipwreck, which sits at the bottom of the ocean floor (around 12,500 feet below sea level).

The entire dive in the submersible then takes about 8 hours to the bottom of the ocean and back up.

According to OceanGate’s website: “Once the submersible is launched you will begin to see alien-like lifeforms whizz by the viewport as you sink deeper and deeper into the ocean. The descent takes approximately two hours but it feels like the blink of an eye.” OceanGate charges tourists $250,000 for a spot on an expedition.

CBS News attempted to join OceanGate for a trip down to the Titanic last year. Below are a couple concerning experiences they had with the vessel:

SEARCH AND RESCUE MISSION
Both the U.S. and Canada are currently searching for the submersible using aircrafts that have underwater detection capabilities. The Boston Coast Guard is also helping lead efforts to make contact with the vessel (the Titanic shipwreck lies parallel to Boston, MA).

EERIE HISTORY
In April 1963, a nuclear submarine named the USS Thresher went down not far from this same area — just 300 miles east of Cape Cod. The search and rescue mission eventually determined the sunken ship took the lives of 129 passengers and crew members.

And of course, the Titanic infamously hit an iceberg and sank on April 15, 1912, killing more than 1,500 of the 2,200+ passengers and crew members.

It took more than 70 years for explorers to finally discover the Titanic’s wreckage in 1985. It sits in two separated parts at the bottom of the ocean, nearly 13,000 feet below the surface. What’s left of the wreck is expected to fully erode within decades — one reason why trips to see it are highly sought after.

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🗓 ON THIS DAY: JUNE 20

• This week in 1885: The Statue of Liberty arrived at its permanent home in New York Harbor. A gift of friendship from the people of France to the people of the United States, the 151-foot-tall statue was created to commemorate the centennial of the American Declaration of Independence.

  Fun Fact: The Statue of Liberty was originally copper brown. Weathering led it to become blue/green through the years.

• 1963: The creation of “Red Telephone” is agreed to between the US and Soviet Union in the aftermath of the Cuban Missile Crisis.

• 1975: Steven Spielberg's ‘Jaws’ was released in theaters.

  An interesting backstory about the iconic Jaws music: Dun Dun. Dun Dun. Dun Dun. It was created by legendary composer John Williams.
  

  Spielberg has said in interviews: “I expected to hear something kind of weird and melodic, something tonal, but eerie; something of another world, almost like outer space under the water… And what (Williams) played me instead, with two fingers on the lower keys, was ‘dun dun, dun dun, dun dun.’ And at first, I began to laugh. He had a great sense of humor, and I thought he was putting me on.”
  
  Spielberg was eventually convinced that the simplicity worked. He later said, “I think the score was responsible for half of the success of that movie.”