US medical experts will analyze “presumed human remains” found within the Titan submersible’s wreckage as mystery still surrounds the vessel’s catastrophic implosion last week in the North Atlantic, reports CNN.
Cause of the incident
“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,” US Coast Guard Capt. Jason Neubauer said in a statement Wednesday, nearly a week after the calamity was confirmed.
The OceanGate Expeditions submersible – which hosted $250,000-a-ticket tourist excursions to the 111-year-old remains of the Titanic – lost contact June 18 with its mother ship, the Polar Prince. The Titan’s failure to resurface sparked a massive, international search – from the ocean’s swelling surface to its cold, blind depths – that captured the world’s attention for days.
The arduous hunt ended when US authorities delivered the most tragic news: The submersible had imploded, and all five men onboard had presumably died.
The US Coast Guard has convened a Marine Board of Investigation – its highest level of inquiry – to examine what caused the tragedy and offer possible recommendations “to the proper authorities to pursue civil or criminal sanctions as necessary,” said Neubauer, who heads the board and leads the team investigating the Titan disaster.
Investigation
Investigators will analyze debris from the vessel’s wreckage, collect evidence, interview witnesses and hold a public hearing for more witness testimony.
Meanwhile, evidence from the Titan wreckage site has arrived in the Canadian coastal city of St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, the US Coast Guard said Wednesday. The Transportation Safety Board of Canada confirmed its arrival and that the US Coast Guard had it.
The evidence – including the presumed human remains – will be taken to a US port for analysis and testing, the Coast Guard said. “The evidence will provide investigators from several international jurisdictions with critical insights into the cause of this tragedy,” Neubauer said Wednesday.
A white panel-like piece – taller than the two men guiding it onto land – and another similarly sized part with cords and wires draped with white tarp were taken off the anchor handling vessel Horizon Arctic on Wednesday at the Canadian Coast Guard pier in St. John’s, photos by The Canadian Press’ Paul Daly show. It was not immediately clear what those pieces were.
The company that owns the remotely operated vehicles that brought Titan’s remains to the surface, Pelagic Research Services, for now has “successfully completed” its offshore work, it told CNN.
The Canadian safety board is conducting its own safety investigation into the operation of the Polar Prince, which the board called a “Canadian-flagged cargo vessel.”
Those investigators have collected all documents and conducted preliminary interviews with those aboard the Polar Prince, the agency said. They have also sent the vessel’s voyage data recorder, which stores audio from the ship’s bridge, to an Ottawa laboratory for analysis.
The Transportation Safety Board of Canada “will continue to cooperate with the United States, United Kingdom, and France, in accordance with international agreements, as they are ‘substantially interested states’ under the International Maritime Organization Casualty Investigation Code,” it said.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police is also investigating and looking into whether “criminal, federal, or provincial laws may possibly have been broken.”
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Source: CNN
