What happened when the Titanic submarine went missing before?

A rescue operation to recover a submersible vessel carrying five people is underway in the Atlantic Ocean, after a craft went missing on a journey to observe the wreckage of the Titanic.

The missing tourist submarine is thought to contain British billionaire explorer Hamish Harding and renowned French diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

OceanGate Expeditions uses Elon Musk’s Starlink to maintain communications while out in the ocean, the company revealed recently.

The tourist submarine has disappeared before, albeit for a much shorter time period.

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CBS Sunday Morning reporter David Pogue is a former passenger aboard one of the vessels, and he recounted his experiences of being on the craft when it became lost for two-and-a-half hours.

Pogue also said that as there’s no GPS underwater, the craft is guided by text messages from the main ship.

According to Pogue, the crew were forced to steer the craft using a video game controller after losing contact with the main ship after submerging and were left adrift.

"You may remember that the @OceanGateExped sub to the #Titanic got lost for a few hours LAST summer, too, when I was aboard…" he tweeted, posting a clip from the documentary he filmed about the experience.

A visit to RMS Titanicwww.youtube.com

"I couldn't help noticing how many pieces of this sub seemed improvised, with off-the-shelf components," Pogue wrote.

Speaking to Oceangate CEO Stockton Rush during an interview, he said: "It seems like this submersible has some elements of MacGyver jerry-riggedness. I mean, you're putting construction pipes as ballast."

Rush replied: "I don't know if I'd use that description of it. But, there are certain things that you want to be buttoned down. The pressure vessel is not MacGyver at all, because that's where we worked with Boeing and NASA and the University of Washington. Everything else can fail, your thrusters can go, your lights can go. You're still going to be safe."

The sub never found the wreck, but thankfully the craft was recovered. On that specific occasion, the guests on board were given the chance to take the trip again.

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