US Coast Guard confirms ‘underwater noises’ during search for missing sub

TIL Desk/World/Washington/ The US Coast Guard on Wednesday confirmed that a Canadian P-3 aircraft “detected underwater noises in the search area” for the missing tourist submarine with five people on board. In a series of tweets, the Coast Guard said: “Canadian P-3 aircraft detected underwater noises in the search area. As a result, ROV operations were relocated in an attempt to explore the origin of the noises. Those ROV searches have yielded negative results but continue.

“Additionally, the data from the P-3 aircraft has been shared with our US Navy experts for further analysis which will be considered in future search plans.” This is the first official confirmation from authorities conducting the search operation, although they did not specify what the “banging” sounds were.

Before the official confirmation by the US Coast Guard, several American media outlets citing internal US government memos, reported that a Canadian search aircraft detected “banging” in 30-minute intervals coming from the area where the sub disappeared on June 18. It is unclear when and how long the banging lasted. The submarine was lost about an hour and 45 minutes into its dive to the Titanic’s wreckage in the Atlantic on June 18, according to the Coast Guard.