Deep-sea robot pictured in Titan sub implosion recovery effort

Voice recordings and other data will be reviewed as part of a US Coast Guard-appointed expert board’s probe into the catastrophic implosion of the Titan submersible last week.

American and Canadian marine authorities have announced investigations into the circumstances that led to the vessel’s malfunction after its chambers were found in a sea of debris 1,600ft from the wreck of the Titanic.

US Coast Guard Captain Jason Neubauer, who is chairing the investigation, said during a press conference on Sunday that he has summoned a Marine Board of Investigation, the highest level of investigation conducted by the Coast Guard. The board’s role is to determine the cause of the tragedy in order to pursue civil or criminal sanctions as necessary.

Voice recordings between the Titan and its mothership Polar Prince will be reviewed by investigators. The mothership’s crew is also being interviewed by different agencies.

Investigators with the Coast Guard have mapped the accident site and salvage operations are expected to continue, Cpt Jason Neubauer said. Once the investigation is wrapped — a timeline has not been laid out — a report with evidence, conclusions and recommendations will be released.

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.

Investigators looking into the implosion of the Titan submersible are “taking all precautions” in case they find bodies on the sea floor, it has emerged.

Captain Jason Neubauer, who is chairing the US Coast Guard investigation into the implosion of the vessel, made the comments as the search and rescue aspects of the response came to an end.

British adventurer Hamish Harding and father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood were killed on board the submersible, alongside the American chief executive of the company responsible for the vessel, Stockton Rush, and French national Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

Salvage operations are continuing and investigators have mapped the accident site, Cpt Neubauer told a press conference in Boston.

He also said the convening of a Marine Board of Investigation is the highest level of investigation conducted by the US Coast Guard. It is unclear how long it will take.

Christine Dawood was on board a support vessel Sunday when she got word that communications were lost with the submersible carrying her husband and son, to view the Titanic wreckage.

She didn’t initially understand what it meant that the Titan submersible had lost contact with the ship an hour and 45 minutes into its voyage, Ms Dawood told the BBC Monday.

It would be four more days before she would learn the fate of her husband Shahzada Dawood and son Suleman Dawood, when authorities announced Thursday the vessel carrying five people had imploded and there were no survivors.“We all thought they are just going to come up,” she said.

“That shock was delayed about 10 hours or so. There was a time … where they were supposed to be up on the surface. When that time passed, that is when the … worry and not so good feelings started.”

Christine Dawood says she and her 17-year-old daughter, Alina, were on the Polar Prince when tragedy struck.

The Independent’s Graeme Massie reports:

When millionaire Steve Fossett’s plane went missing over the Nevada range in 2007, the swashbuckling adventurer had already been the subject of two prior emergency rescue operations thousands of miles apart.

And that prompted a prickly question: After a sweeping search for the wealthy risktaker ended, who should foot the bill?

In recent days, the massive hunt for a submersible vehicle lost during a north Atlantic descent to explore the wreckage of the Titanic has refocused attention on that conundrum. And with rescuers and the public fixated first on saving and then on mourning those aboard, it has again made for uneasy conversation.

“Five people have just lost their lives and to start talking about insurance, all the rescue efforts and the cost can seem pretty heartless — but the thing is, at the end of the day, there are costs,” said Arun Upneja, dean of Boston University’s School of Hospitality Administration and a researcher on tourism.

Popular YouTuber MrBeast has claimed that he turned down a trip on the Titanic submarine that imploded earlier this week.

Police in Canada announced on Saturday that they are considering a criminal investigation over the deaths of five men in the Oceangate submersible implosion.

Superintendent Kent Osmond of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) in Newfoundland and Labrador said law enforcement were in the early stages of the probe.

“Following the US Coast Guard’s announcement earlier this week that debris from the submersible was located and all five on board were presumed dead, we will now look at the circumstances that led to those deaths,” Mr Osmond said, at a press conference.

The Princeton graduate and Titan submarine entrepreneur insisted Atlantic dives were not dangerous and once said: “At some point, safety just is pure waste. If you just want to be safe, don’t get out of bed.”

The Independent’s Joe Sommerlad reports: