The U.S. Coast Guard announced at a press conference yesterday afternoon that two debris fields had been found near the wreck of the Titanic that were identified as coming from the missing submersible Titan. Rear Admiral John Mauger said the debris was found by an ROV, or remotely operated vehicle, “approximately 1,600 feet from the bow of the Titanic on the sea floor.” He also said during the press conference that sonar buoys didn’t hear “any signs of catastrophic failure,” but that may be because the submersible imploded just hours after it launched on Sunday.
Officials involved in the search mission say the U.S. Navy heard what they suspect was the implosion of the Titan on Sunday with a top-secret military acoustic detection system designed to spot enemy submarines. The “acoustic anomaly” wasn’t deemed to be definitive, so the search and rescue mission continued while using the Navy report to focus the search area.
Killed in the implosion were Stockton Rush, the CEO and founder of OceanGate, the company leading the trip, British billionaire Hamish Harding, Pakistani billionaire Shahzada Dawood and his son Sulaiman, and French diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet, considered by many to have been the world’s top Titanic expert.