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A physicist who got trapped in the Titanic wreckage in a sub said its time to stop “joyride” trips.
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Michael Guillen told GBNews there should be more “restrictions” in the wake of the missing sub.
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“This is not a joyride. This is a serious business. The ocean is a merciless beast,” said Guillen.
A physicist who once had a near-death experience when his research sub got caught in the wreckage of the RMS Titanic said it’s time to stop “joyride” trips to the site in the depths of the North Atlantic as rescuers frantically search for the missing tourist submersible that was headed there.
“Certainly, we need to stop, pause all trips to the Titanic, I believe, and figure out, you know, what kind of restrictions should we place,” Michael Guillen said during an interview with GBNews published on Thursday.
Guillen added, “This is not a joyride. This is a serious business. The ocean is a merciless beast, really. It’s ready to swallow you up.”
Twenty-three years ago, Guillen became the first TV correspondent to report from the Titanic wreck site, which lies 12,500 feet below the ocean’s surface. He voyaged there in a Russian research submarine.
Guillen said disaster struck when the sub got caught up in a “very strong underwater current” and became lodged in the massive propeller of the iconic passenger liner at the bottom of the ocean floor off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.
“Somehow, we got trapped behind the blades,” Guillen, who worked for ABC News at the time, said in his interview with GBNews.
It took more than an hour for the sub’s pilot to finally break the vessel loose, and Guillen said he thought they would die.
“It seemed like an eternity down there, but I was ready to give up my life and join the people who have lost their lives” in the 1912 Titanic tragedy, Guillen said.
Guillen said he’s had to relive his harrowing experience since catastrophe unfolded for OceanGate Expeditions’ Titan sub and the five people on board the vessel.
The Titan lost communication with its mothership less than two hours into the sightseeing journey — which comes with a price tag of $250,000 a person — to the Titanic wreck site on Sunday.
Extensive search efforts by land, air, and sea have been underway to locate the sub, which has likely already run out of oxygen.
“It seems as though these five people are not going to be given that chance at life. And that just breaks my heart because I know what they’ve gone through,” said Guillen.
An emotional Guillen continued, “I went through it. I know what it feels like to be buried alive in a tin can at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. It’s terrifying — terrifying.”
Read the original article on Insider
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