Titanic submarine latest: OceanGate still advertising Titan trips after human remains recovered from wreckage

Two memorials were held last week at Titanic museums across the US, in honour of the five people who died earlier this month on a submarine expedition to the famous ship wreck.

The services were held at Titanic museums in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, and Branson, Missouri.

Both museums are owned by John Josyln, part of a team that explored the Titanic wreckage in a famous 1987 televised expedition.

Medical professionals will formally analyse presumed human remains recovered from the wreckage of the Titan submersible.

The US Coast Guard (USCG) said it received debris and evidence from the sea floor at the site of the deep-sea vessel’s fatal implosion, which killed five people.

British adventurer Hamish Harding and father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood were killed on board the vessel near the wreckage of the Titanic, alongside OceanGate Expeditions’ chief executive, Stockton Rush, and French national Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

A 20-year-old man who had a lucky escape from the doomed Titanic sub disaster has revealed how he turned down his father’s offer of a “bucket list” trip because he feared the vessel wasn’t safe.

Sean Bloom, 20, told People that he and his financier father Jay Bloom almost signed up to join OceanGate Expeditions’ tourist trip to visit the Titanic wreckage.

But, Mr Bloom said that he ultimately refused to go because he wasn’t convinced the Titan submersible would be able to withstand the pressure around 13,000 feet deep in the Atlantic Ocean.

“The whole reason my dad didn’t go was because I told him, ‘Dude, this submarine cannot survive going that deep in the ocean,’” Sean told People.

A job advert posted by the company that operated the doomed Titanic submersible that imploded last week in the Atlantic Ocean has sparked backlash on social media.

TikTok users have hit out at the since-deleted job posting by embattled OceanGate Expeditions, following the tragedy that killed all five of its passengers. According to the advertising featured on the company’s website and on Indeed, OceanGate was accepting applicants for a sub pilot position.

The company noted that it had an “urgent opening” and was looking for committed individuals with a “combination of strong mechanical and interpersonal skills,” and experience working with submersibles and boats as well as operating complex systems to support dive operations, Insider reported. Among other requirements, applicants were asked to be comfortable in a confined space and be able to fit through a 28-inch diameter ring.

OceanGate not only hosted tours to the wreck of the Titanic, but also to the Azores Archipelago in Portugal and to the Bahamas. One pilot, one “content expert” and three mission specialists — or fee-paying passengers without any previous experience needed — participated in every dive, according to the company’s website.

The post was removed sometime on 23 June, a day after the US Coast Guard confirmed that the vessel’s chambers were found 1,600ft from the wreck of the Titanic on the ocean floor, but not without being noticed by furious sleuths that criticised the timing.

The teenager who died on the Titan submersible took a Rubik’s cube with him because he wanted to break a world record, his mother has said.

Christine Dawood told the BBC her son Suleman, 19, was “so excited” to try and solve the puzzle 3,700 metres below the ocean surface.

Meanwhile, his father Shahzada, a businessman, was “so excited he was like a child” at the prospect of seeing the Titanic wreckage.

He had applied to Guinness World Records and his father, who also died, had brought a camera with him to capture the moment.

Ms Dawood said her son loved the famous square puzzle so much that he carried it with him everywhere and dazzled onlookers by solving it in 12 just seconds.

The 1997 blockbusterTitanic will return to Netflix in July – just weeks after a doomed expedition to the ocean liner’s resting place on the oceanfloor.

The Independent’s report:

The trend of the world’s wealthiest paying above the odds for high-risk adventures is nothing new.

Gabriella Le Breton investigates the elite’s age-old obsession with discovering the furthest – and most dangerous – corners of the globe.

Large pieces of debris from Titan were transported to St John’s harbour on Wednesday by the Horizon Arctic ship, where they were seen being unloaded by a crane. The Coast Guard announced just hours later that medical professionals will formally analyse presumed human remains found on the debris.

Speaking after the evidence was recovered, the Marine Board of Investigation’s (MBI) chairman, Captain Jason Neubauer, said: “I am grateful for the coordinated international and inter-agency support to recover and preserve this vital evidence at extreme offshore distances and depths.

“The evidence will provide investigators from several international jurisdictions with critical insights into the cause of this tragedy.

“There is still a substantial amount of work to be done to understand the factors that led to the catastrophic loss of the Titan and help ensure a similar tragedy does not occur again.”

Emails obtained by Insider show an exchange between Mr Rush and Karl Stanley, the owner of another dive expedition company.

Mr Stanley shared concerns about a large cracking sound during a two-hour dive aboard the Titan in the Bahamas.

“I don’t think if you push forward with dives to the Titantic this season it will be succumbing to financial pressures, I think it will be succumbing to pressures of your own creation in some part dictated by ego to do what people said couldn’t be done,” Mr Stanley warned.