Former Navy submarine commander talks about why this rescue mission of the Titanic submersible is so difficult

NEW YORK — A former Navy submarine commander explains the challenges that the rescuers are up against in their search for the missing submersible near the Titanic.

Former Navy Submarine Commander David Marquet told Eyewitness News, “I fear a catastrophic failure has incapacitated the crew because if they lost communication, the protocol would have been to go back up to the surface.”

He speculated on where he felt the missing sub may be located.

“I’m thinking they are down on the bottom in the vicinity of the Titanic,” Marquet said.

A search on Wednesday of the area where a Canadian aircraft heard sounds turned up nothing so far.

If they had a power failure, they would be making sounds, “human-sounding sounds,” Marquet said.

The search area is the size of Connecticut and is taking place in the air and under the sea.

From the air, Marquet said that waves make the submarine difficult to spot.

Then at the bottom, the sub wouldn’t have gone too far from the Titanic, Marquet said, “But it’s pitch black and you can’t see very far.”

His comparison of the situation was bleak. “It’s like taking a magnifying glass and walking down a football field looking at blades of grass on your hands and knees,” he said.

The submersible is the size of a minivan. You cannot open it from the inside.

He said that the people aboard have no seats, and are sitting or laying uncomfortably on the ground.

There’s a curtain and a Ziplock bag for the bathroom.

The former commander of the USS Santa Fe said that as far as the Navy goes, “There is not really a military reason to have the ability to operate down there,” and that they “operate about 10% as deep as these guys go.”

However, there is a wind system device that they can mount to a boat with a long cable and he says that it is designed to pick up things that are heavier and deeper than the submarine. So that is at least a glimmer of hope.