Search teams are racing against time to find a tourist submersible that went missing during a dive to the Titanic’s wreck on Sunday.
Five people were onboard when contact with the small sub was lost about an hour and 45 minutes into its dive.
The rescue operation is continuing overnight in the mid-Atlantic but there has been no sign so far of the vessel.
US and Canadian agencies, navies, and commercial deep-sea firms are all helping the rescue operation.
As of Monday afternoon, it was thought the crew members had roughly four days of oxygen left at most. Among them is the British billionaire businessman and explorer Hamish Harding.
Pakistani businessman, Shahzada Dawood and his son, Suleman, were also on board, their family said in a statement.
French explorer, Paul-Henry Nargeolet is thought to be on board, according to a Facebook post by Mr Harding before the dive started.
Stockton Rush, chief executive of OceanGate, the firm behind the dive is also being widely reported to be on the vessel.
“Right now, our focus is on getting as much capability into the area as we can,” Rear Adm John Mauger of the US Coast Guard told a press conference.
Military planes, a submarine and sonar buoys have so far been used in the search for the vessel.
Titanic’s wreck lies some 435 miles (700km) south of St John’s, Newfoundland, though the rescue mission is being run from Boston, Massachusetts.
The US Coast Guard said a research ship called the Polar Prince had conducted a surface search for the sub on Monday evening. It is used to transport submersibles to the wreckage site and was the support ship on Sunday’s tourist expedition.
The missing craft is believed to be tour firm OceanGate’s Titan submersible, which CBS journalist David Pogue travelled aboard last year to reach the wreckage of the Titanic.
He has told the BBC that when the support ship is directly above the sub, short text messages are able to be sent between the two.
Otherwise, communication via GPS or radio systems is not available as neither work underwater.
Pogue says it is also not possible for those aboard the sub to escape by themselves because they are sealed inside by bolts applied from the outside.
BBC / Titilayo Kupoliyi
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