Submarine hunter plane to join the search for the Titanic tourist submarine

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US and Canadian planes and ships were racing Tuesday to locate a submarine missing during a commercial dive to the site of the Titanic, as concerns grew about the five people on board with limited oxygen supplies.

The Boston-based Northeast Service of the US Coast Guard said Monday evening that a Royal Canadian Air Force aircraft capable of detecting underwater objects, the CP-140 Aurora, will join the search Tuesday morning. This was to follow up on the sea surface searches by the C-130 Hercules during the night.

Inside the Titan submarine, which offers tours to the wreck of the Titanic at a cost of $250,000 per person, they include Hamish Harding, a British businessman, along with Shahzada Dawood, a Pakistani businessman, and his son Suleiman.

Abdul Razzaq Daoud, Pakistan’s former Commerce Minister and uncle of Shahzada Daoud, told the Financial Times: “We could never have imagined even in our wildest dreams that something like this could happen… We are praying and praying for their return.”

There has been no official confirmation of the names of the five missing people, but multiple reports have said that Paul-Henri Nargolet, a French explorer, was on board with Stockton Rush, founder of OceanGate, the company that built Titan and organized the voyage.

Canada’s Aurora is designed for anti-submarine warfare, which means it can detect underwater objects from the air.

British businessman Hamish Harding shortly before boarding the submarine Titan on Sunday morning © Dirty Dozen Productions / AFP / Getty Images

Most aircraft and ships initially deployed in the search are limited to surface inspections, in case the submarine returns to the surface far from the ship that launched it. They also have sonar equipment to detect any sounds from the craft.

The Titan launched Sunday morning from Polar Prince, the ship that took it to a dive site 900 nautical miles east of Cape Cod on the US coast.

Polar Prince reported losing contact with Titan 1 hour and 45 minutes into the flight. Titanic had planned to travel to the wreck of the Titanic, which sank in April 1912 taking about 1,500 lives.

John Mauger, commander of the US Coast Guard 1st District, based in Boston, told reporters Monday night that Titan has a “sustainability” capability intended to provide oxygen to those on board for up to 96 hours. That should give the search the possibility of success until Thursday morning local time.

“We’re making the best use of every moment of that time to locate the ship,” Mauger said.

The commander said that the search was complicated by the need to search on the surface, in case the ship could surface but was not connected, and in the “water column”.

The wreck of the Titanic lies at a depth of 3,800 metres, where the water pressure is about 380 times the atmospheric pressure at sea level.

“It’s a remote area, and it’s difficult to conduct a search in that remote area, but we’re deploying all available assets to ensure we can locate the ship and rescue the people on board,” the commander said.

According to the OceanGate website, the submarine weighs 10.4 tons and is made of carbon fiber and titanium.

It claims that the ship is equipped with a real-time health monitoring system to monitor the effect of stress on the hull, giving the crew enough time to return to the surface in case of any problems. She added that the submarine Titan is the only submarine in the world equipped with such a system.

Shahzada and Sulaiman Dawood are from one of the most famous business families in Pakistan, which controls a large fertilizer factory along with textile and energy businesses.

Karachi-based Engro, of which Shahzada is vice president, said on Tuesday that “the available information is limited . . . that we know” about their disappearance and that the company “remained in prayer for their speedy and safe return.”

Nasir Ali Shah Bukhari, a friend of the family, said that Shehzadeh Daoud was “very humble . . . if you met him, you could not imagine his financial worth.” Friends said he had lived in the UK for several years with his wife, Christine, and two children.

“As time passes and our hopes diminish, we pray for an impossible miracle,” said another family friend in Karachi.

Harding is the President of Action Aviation, a Dubai-based business jet brokerage firm. He previously dived to the lowest depths of the Mariana Trench in the Pacific Ocean with ocean explorer Victor Vescovo and traveled into space on a commercial flight operated by Blue Origin, the company founded by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos.

“Harding’s excitement about this expedition was palpable,” said Richard Jarriott de Cayeux, president of the Explorers Club, a group to which Harding belonged. He added, “We all join in the fervent hope that the submarine will fall as soon as possible and that the crew will be safe.”

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