Every second counts. Hope is not lost, but those who know about submarines are in the worst. “The situation is desperate, if they are still alive”says the ship’s commander, Aurelio Fernández Dapena, head of the Navy’s Submarine Flotilla in “The AR program”, in Mediaset.
The hypothesis that the five crew members of the bathyscaphe that made a visit to the Titanic are still submerged is strong. The hours of oxygen are numbered. They have air until early Thursday morning. “There are five people in a claustrophobic tube“This is how the commander defines it.
The cabin is 7 meters long by two and a half wide. “It is a distressing tube of small dimensions.” Designed to not have to spend more than 5 or 6 hours in it. “It gives you two hours to go down, two to go up, the half hour that you are down and the collection process. They do not usually have very long activities,” explains Dapena.
The five passengers have been here for almost four days. “They have had to breathe slowly, not move much and hold their oxygen as much as possible,” recounts the Spanish sailor. Few are used to these extreme situations. The military experts train for it, but luxury tourists or scientists, like those who went on the submarine, probably not. Besides Nerves and stress make you breathe faster and consume more oxygen. “It’s totally claustrophobic in the usual way. You can look out a window in the bow but with that desperate situation it’s very complex.”
“There is less and less time. It is very difficult” (Aurelio Fernández Dapena, ship commander and head of the Navy Flotilla)
Total darkness and the tightness hypothesis
The submersible could have caught on some part of the Titanic, or suffered a failure in its propulsion system or in the crimping, which allows depth to be changed during descent and ascent. Another hypothesis is that “there may have been a sealing problem of the vehicle”, explains the commander.
At these depths, 3,700 meters, the submarine has to withstand pressures of up to 40 kilos per square centimeter. A circumstance that could have damaged the materials with which it is made and caused water leaks, which could have been fatal for the submersible.
There may have been a sealing problem. The submarine at that depth supports a pressure of 40 kilos per cm2
Complete darkness is another problem rescuers and potential rescuers face. “At 80 meters the light does not penetrate and at 1600 the darkness is total,” the commander recounted. The cold is not so much of a problem. It is estimated that “The temperature of the water due to the underwater currents can be 10 or 12 degrees Celsius”, Dapena maintains.
Where do sonar noises come from?
The hypothesis that they have been able to rise to the surface loses strength. The area has been combed with reconnaissance planes. “After the searches carried out, there have been no contacts with what is presumed that the bathyscaphe is sunk,” says Dapena, for whom the possibility that they may have emerged “is already out of consideration.”
The priority is to locate the missing submarine in order to begin rescue efforts. “It is very complicated with those dimensions in the ocean without light and with those means”, recognizes the commander F.Dapena.
If they find it, the second part would come: get it out of the water. “In the area there are rescue ships with unmanned vehicles with robotic arms that can take it to the surface.” The operation would take a minimum of five hours. Once up, the bathyscaphe would be placed on a ship’s deck and opened with all five of its crew alive. It is everyone’s wish. The minutes count.
