Youtuber Alan Estrada had to organize a press conference on Thursday to answer questions about various videos he made two years ago. The actor was the first Mexican national to travel aboard the OceanGate submersible Titan, which has now sunk in the North Atlantic with five people on board. Estrada has a YouTube channel called Alan around the World and a travel blog. In July 2021, he attempted to embark on an expedition to visit the wreck of the Titanic, which had sunk at a depth of 3,800 meters (12,467 ft), 600 kilometers (372 miles) south of Canada. However, the Titan’s systems failed and the voyage had to be cancelled. A year later he tried again and this time he succeeded. He now confirms that it was a “spectacular journey”, although he did not want to repeat it: “I was aware that I was risking my life. I knew what could happen.”
Estrada, 42, received dozens of calls Monday as soon as the news broke: contact with a private submarine had been lost en route to the wreck of the famous ocean liner that sank in 1912. The search was urgent as the submersible had an oxygen reserve of just 96 hours. Two days later, Estrada recounted the details of the expedition in which he took part.
First, he admitted it was “very expensive.” He was looking for sponsors who could pay the $150,000 required for the trip. Now it costs even more: 250,000 US dollars (about 230,000 euros). “Since the expeditions were successful, they increased the price because in the beginning it was basically ‘let’s see if that happens,'” explained the Youtuber to build such a submersible and be at sea for weeks,” he said.
Before boarding the Titan, the first carbon fiber submersible capable of reaching depths of 4,000 meters, one must sign several documents “explaining exactly what risks” one is taking, “including the loss of one’s life, of course.” We knew this was an incredibly risky expedition, we knew we weren’t going to an amusement park,” said Estrada, who insisted at several points in the press conference that those who board the Titan are adults who be aware of the kind of adventure they are embarking on. “For example, one of the clauses is not to suffer from claustrophobia.”
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Inside the submersible, if all goes well, it takes about two hours to descend to 12,000 feet, four hours to view the Titanic wreck and seabed, and another two hours to ascend to the surface. Such was the case with Estrada’s expedition: “It was one of the most successful. The attack ahead of us, on the other hand, lasted 27 hours due to problems in salvaging the submersible.”
Inside, the Titan resembles an empty tube, 6.5 meters long and 2.8 meters wide, with no seating or standing room. There is also no bathroom per se, but a cabin separated by a curtain. The Titan is scheduled to make a short voyage, although Estrada believes it has what it takes to keep the crew alive for 96 hours if “the submersible is intact”.
There is space for five people. These are usually the pilot and co-pilot plus three civilians called “mission specialists”. Estrada ended his expedition with one of the now-missing men, French explorer Paul Henri Nargeolet: “He was the co-pilot, but when we got to the ship he was the one piloting the sub, because he knows the wreck very well. ” So. He has been to the wreck of the Titanic almost 40 times and is one of the most trusted people. But when asked for his opinion, he says there is always a risk and there are always complications. On some of his dives – he also went down with French submarines – the crew even had to put out internal fires.”
Estrada is also well acquainted with OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, another of the missing crew members. “Stockton is a very positive person. I named the Titan; It’s his dream, his mission. I hope they are all inside and awaiting rescue,” he said. The other three people on the submersible are British businessman Hamish Harding, an adventurer who holds three Guinness World Records, and Shahzada Dawood, a Pakistani-born British businessman, and his son Suleman.
Communications with Titan broke off on Monday when the expedition lasted only one hour and 45 minutes. According to Estrada’s calculations, things were still going down. Communication takes place via radio for the first few meters, and then via messages if the signal is lost. It is part of the protocol that the submersible must return to the surface if communications are not restored within an hour. Based on this information, the YouTuber assumes that there is a possibility that the submarine has risen and is now in the sea awaiting rescue. Another fundamental complication is that the Titan cannot be opened from the inside, only from the outside.
In the worst case, Estrada said, the submersible got tangled up in something: “If it gets stuck, it has no systems. It cannot grab objects; There is no such technology. Another submersible would be needed to find them.” All of this is known to the crew members: “We knew that it was a test submersible.” For example, on his first attempt at an expedition in 2021, the trip had to be canceled because the ballast system – the mechanism by which the submarine descends and ascends – jammed. “Titan was able to sink but not rise again because the ballast casting system got stuck. There was a contingency system in place where the sub could eject the entire mechanism, not just the ballast, for Titan to come back up, and that’s what happened.”
OceanGate offered Estrada an expedition on July 2, 2022 as compensation. “By the following year the company had changed the ballast system from tubes to some sort of bags of weights. It also has other emergency mechanisms, such as an airbag that activates internally and inflates externally, allowing Titan to become buoyant and rise to the surface,” he said. “The security protocols seemed serious to me. It was like a rocket launch. Before each maneuver of the submersible, be it on the launch pad, in the water or before we submerged, all equipment was stopped and all systems checked.”
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