OceanGate, the company that owns the Titanic tourist submarine that went missing on Sunday, announced on Thursday afternoon that the passengers are now presumed lost:
We now believe that our CEO Stockton Rush, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, Hamish Harding, and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, have sadly been lost.
These men were true explorers who shared a distinct spirit of adventure, and a deep passion for exploring and protecting the world’s oceans. Our hearts are with these five souls and every member of their families during this tragic time. We grieve the loss of life and joy they brought to everyone they knew.
This is an extremely sad time for our dedicated employees who are exhausted and grieving deeply over this loss. The entire OceanGate family is deeply grateful for the countless men and women from multiple organisations of the international community who expedited wide-ranging resources and have worked so very hard on this mission.
We appreciate their commitment to finding these five explorers, and their days and nights of tireless work in support of our crew and their families.
This is a very sad time for the entire explorer community, and for each of the family members of those lost at sea.
We respectfully ask that the privacy of these families be respected during this most painful time.
At a U.S. Coast Guard press conference, Rear Adm. John Mauger announced that debris found earlier today “is consistent with the catastrophic loss of the pressure chamber” that resulted in an implosion of the vessel, likely about an hour and a half into the trip to the bottom of the sea.
He offered his “deepest condolences” to those who have lost loved ones. “I can only imagine what this has been like for them and I hope that this discovery provides some solace during this difficult time.”
Asked about the prospects for recovering the bodies of the lost passengers, Mauger said, “And so this is an incredibly unforgiving environment down there on the sea floor. And the debris is consistent with a catastrophic implosion of the vessel. And so we’ll continue to work and continue to search the area down there, but I don’t have an answer for prospects.”
The debris from the vessel was located approximately 1,600 feet from the hull of the Titanic in an area with a smooth ocean bottom.