Submarine that went missing on tour of Titanic will 'run out of oxygen in 48 hours'

The submarine that went missing on a tour of the Titanic only has a maximum of 96 hours of oxygen.

US and Canadian rescuers are trying to locate where the OceanGate sub is after it vanished in the ocean, 1,448km from Cape Cod, Massachusetts, at a depth of 4km, on Monday (June 20).

BBC News reports there are five people on board, with one pilot.

Rescuers are using sonar, aerial searches and surface vessels to track the submarine.

Rear Admiral John Mauge added they were using visual and radar searches ‘to improve our search capability’, as per ABC News.

"It is a remote area and it is a challenge to conduct a search in that remote area, but we are deploying all available assets to make sure that we can locate the craft and rescue the people on board," Rear Admiral Mauger told reporters.

OceanGate, which deploys submersibles for deep-sea expeditions, also revealed that it had received help from several government agencies for the search.

David Concannon, an adviser to the company, who was meant to be on board the missing Titanic submersible craft, said that the sub only had between 96 to 70 hours of breathing time left in a letter to AP News.

Experts have also warned that the sub could have fallen to foul ‘catastrophic failure’ or even become entangled in the debris of the famous ship.

“There’s an optimistic option, and that’s that it’s either lost an umbilical communication with the surface or indeed there’s been a malfunction and the submarine continues to operate but obviously out of contact with its mother ship,” former Royal Navy Rear Admiral, Chris Parry told The Mirror.

“Obviously, on the other end of the scale, there could have been an accident. It could have become entangled in the wreckage of the Titanic. It could indeed have had a catastrophic failure," he added.

The news outlet claims the oxygen will run out in the vessel at 6am BST on Thursday (June 22).

In a statement, OceanGate said its entire focus was on the crew members and their families.

"We are deeply thankful for the extensive assistance we have received from several government agencies and deep sea companies in our efforts to re-establish contact with the submersible," it added.

Following the success of the Titanic's submersible expeditions in 2021 and 2022, this voyage for OceanGate was the third of its kind.

It costs $250,000 for a spot on the sub that explores the famed shipwreck that struck an iceberg and sank in 1912.