In 2023, five people were thought to be trapped 10,000 feet under the cold, dark ocean, in a little submersible without power. The now-infamous story of the Titan submersible would ultimately end in tragedy, but it's not actually the first incident of its kind. In the 1970s, there was another eerily similar situation, and this is that horrifying story.
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" Not too long ago, the world's attention was fixed on a situation in the middle of the North Atlantic Ocean, when a submersible traveling to the wreck of the Titanic began to hit news channels. It's now an infamous story with a terribly tragic ending, and the assumed scenario of the Titan submersible in 2023 as events were unfolding, was the stuff of nightmares. Five people were thought to be crammed into a small vessel that was without power and was stuck on the bottom of the ocean in complete darkness, tens of thousands of feet below the water.
But even worse, it was thought to have a limited supply of air that was dwindling with every passing minute. It was a literal race against time to recover the submersible that turned into an international effort to rescue those aboard. News outlets even displayed countdown clocks that crept closer and closer to zero, which were supposed to indicate when the five aboard would run out of air.
Meanwhile, expert after expert gave insight into just how challenging and improbable of a rescue effort this was. When those countdown clocks finally ran out, an underwater remote camera arrived at the scene and confirmed that the submersible had likely suffered a catastrophic implosion during its descent, contrary to what was initially thought. For many of us who were glued to news sources for any updates over those five days or so while the fate of those aboard was in question, there was no real point of reference for anything like this.
It was almost like a movie script playing out in front of our eyes. But for some people, this was not the first incident of the kind they'd seen play out. In 1973, Roger Mallinson was a 35-year-old engineer working on a Canadian commercial submersible called the Pisces III.
Alongside him was 28-year-old Roger Chapman, and the pair were working on a job for the US Postal Service to lay transatlantic telephone cable into the seabed about 150 miles southwest of Cork, Ireland. And while Chapman in particular was a submariner for the Royal Navy at one time, manning a submersible is a bit different. For one, these are often smaller vessels.
The Pisces III they were working on measured 20 feet, or 6 meters long, by 7 feet, or about 2 meters wide, and about 11 feet, or 3 meters high. This is almost identical to the dimensions of the Titan submersible. Submarines that he was used to are also much larger ships that are often powered by something on board, so they can enter and leave port on their own and operate independently in the ocean.
Submersibles, on the other hand, often have limited power. They can operate independently for a time, but rely on a mothership that both launches and recovers them. Now, due to this size difference, Mallinson and Chapman were working together in close quarters, but luckily, the two men got along extremely well, which is a plus, considering the work itself was dull and exhausting.
For the duration of their eight-hour shifts, they'd move along the seafloor at half a mile per hour, stirring up mud and bearing cable. Visibility would become extremely poor as the mud became unsettled, but regardless, whoever was piloting at the time would have to devote complete concentration to ensuring they were falling as straight a line as possible. It was mind-numbing work, and for Mallinson, on Wednesday, August 29th, 1973, it was made all the worse by lack of sleep.
An earlier dive had damaged something on the Pisces III, so beginning the previous day, he spent 26 straight hours fixing it. During this time as well, he performed some regular maintenance which included changing out the oxygen tank. The existing tank was still about half-full, and the protocol for a half-full tank was to leave it installed, but since sleep was out of the question anyway, Mallinson figured he'd just put in a fresh tank.
Just after 9:59 that morning, the shift was coming to an end for the pair, and the Pisces III surfaced. All Mallinson could think of was just how much he was looking forward to getting some rest, but as they were waiting for a tow line to be attached that would bring the submersible aboard the mother ship, one of the hatches was accidentally opened before it was safe. Water then began pouring into the self-contained portion of the Pisces III, and the submersible was suddenly pulled backward by the excess weight flipping the vessel upside down.
And although they were still safely secured inside and separated from the section that was flooding, Mallinson and Chapman were tossed around as the submersible started to sink fast. Now rocketing toward the ocean floor at almost a vertical angle, the two men aboard started releasing about 400 pounds, or 180 kilos of lead weight, but this did little to slow their descent. They also shut down all the electrical systems and flipped off the depth gauge as it could have burst with how fast they were falling.
Then, about 30 seconds after the hatch was opened on the surface, the Pisces III slammed into the seabed at around 40 miles, or 65 kilometers per hour. When it finally settled upside down, Mallinson and Chapman were trapped 1,575 feet, or 480 meters below the surface of the ocean in pitch-black darkness. This also began a clock, much like that of the Titan submersible, of how much air the men had before they ran out.
It would now be a race to save them before they suffocated. As everything went deathly quiet, one of the men took out a flashlight and flicked it on. They checked each other over, and miraculously, neither of them was injured.
Surrounding them, however, were parts and pieces of the submersible that had dislodged either during the descent or from the hard impact with the sea floor. Meanwhile, at the surface, a frantic effort began to try to rescue the men, but there was one significant obstacle to clear. No one in the submersible or at the surface knew where the Pisces III even landed.
On the way down, a buoy line connected to the vessel snapped, which was vital in locating the sub, and when the submersible came to rest on the seabed, it did so in a gully that was partially buried under mud and sediment. Thankfully, less than 30 minutes after the submersible sank, the surface was able to make contact with Mallinson and Chapman via the telephone. They would then inform the surface team that they were both fine, and they were making preparations on their end, doing whatever they could to figure out how to survive as long as possible; hopefully long enough to be rescued.
The surface team then let the men know that they didn't know where the Pisces III landed, so they'd first had to locate them which could take some time. When the call ended for the two men, their top priority was extremely clear— they would need to conserve as much oxygen as possible. In order to do that, they'd have to do nothing— no moving around, no talking—literally nothing.
Mallinson also suddenly remembered that he changed out the oxygen tanks the day before and felt a brief moment of relief. Each tank was approximately 72 hours of air. After their eight-shift, they were down to 66 at the time of the accident, but had Mallinson not installed a new tank, they'd have very little time before they ran out.
So, the two men then made themselves comfortable, as high up in the flipped-over submersible as possible, and just lay in the darkness, trying to control their breathing rate. Every so often, one of them would reach over to the other, and the two would grab each other's hands and squeeze as if to say they were okay. A little after 10:30 AM, a ship in the North Sea was contacted to return the Pisces II which was the sister ship of the Pisces III, back to port so it could be transferred to the scene.
The US Navy was also reached, and they immediately dispatched a submersible known as Curv III which would be transported to the scene by a Canadian Coast Guard ship. By 8 o'clock that night, another mothership made it to Cork to pick up both the Pisces II and the Pisces V and set off for the site of the disabled Pisces III by 10:30. This was just over 12 hours since the submersible slammed into the ocean floor.
Below the ocean surface, the two men would then make it through the night, but the longer they were stuck in the submersible, the more dire the situation would become. Not only was the very real clock ticking down on the amount of oxygen they had left, but they had next to nothing in terms of food and water. Between the two of them, there was just one cheese sandwich and one can of lemonade, but they decide to save them both and hold out as long as they could without them.
Luckily though, as time went on in the disabled submersible, they discover that condensation was forming along the walls, and while it wasn't much, it at least gave them a bit of water. Every so often, once enough condensation built up, they'd lick the walls, which really only afforded them enough fluid to wet their dried mouths; but still, it was better than nothing. Then in order to stretch their oxygen supply as much as possible, the men also allowed carbon dioxide to build up a bit more than normal.
During regular operation of the submersible, a lithium hydroxide fan would need to be flipped on every 40 minutes or so to soak up and scrub the submersible of CO2. They still needed to do this, but they had to conserve things even more than usual. So while they waited in the dark, they'd use an egg timer they'd set to 40 minutes, and when it went off, they'd wait a little while longer before flipping on the fan.
This caused them to become groggy and lethargic from the excess CO2 buildup, but again, they just had no other choice. Then, between trying to lap up as much condensation as possible and seeing how long they could go without a fresh burst of oxygen, they simply lay in the submersible with nothing but their thoughts to keep them occupied. During this, their main thoughts were about their families and wondered how they were reacting to the situation.
Chapman was recently married but didn't have children yet, but Mallinson on the other hand was a married father of four who was growing more and more concerned about them and what their lives might be like without him if he didn't survive. In addition to these darker thoughts and the physical and mental toll of being awake for more than two days, Mallinson was also physically recovering from a bout of food poisoning that had wracked him for three or four days before the accident. It was like one moment, they were going through a regular shift, and the next moment, they were in a living nightmare.
Later that day, however, the men would have something to take their minds off of everything. The phone in the submersible rang to give them an update. As part of their conversation with the men trapped below, the surface team relayed a message from Queen Elizabeth, who sent her best wishes for a speedy recovery.
Mallinson and Chapman were taken aback by hearing this and asked for confirmation that the Queen herself was aware of their situation. When the surface team responded back though, they clarified that the message was from the crew of a passenger ship called the Queen Elizabeth II, which had been on its way to America, but turned around to respond to the call for help for recovering the Pisces III. The conversation ended with a surface team member saying, "Sorry boys, wrong lady.
" But despite the message not coming from the Queen of England, this moment of confusion was a welcome distraction. And the fact that even a passenger ship was coming to help them let them know that all efforts were being made topside to rescue them. On the morning of Friday, August 31st, so two days after their initial shift was going on, the very first support ship started to arrive at the scene, including the ship carrying both the Pisces II and V.
Later in the day, the Curv III also arrived, and while all of these developments were promising, the rest of the day was a complete disaster. Almost everything that could go wrong in the rescue effort that day, did. First, the Pisces II was deployed with a special rope, but one of the lifting ropes tore, and the submersible had to return to the mothership for repairs.
In its place, the Pisces V hit the water with the same type of rope attached to it and managed to descend all the way to the seabed. But again, no one knew exactly where the Pisces III came to rescue, so the first task of the Pisces V was to begin searching for it once it reached the bottom of the ocean. However, it then ran low on power before finding anything, forcing it to return to the surface to recharge before it could try again later.
By then, it was estimated that the men had approximately just 18 hours of air left, and they still hadn't even been located. Either way, around one o'clock that afternoon, the Pisces V was ready to go again, and someone on the support team came up with a plan. A team member then got back on the phone with Mallinson and Chapman and asked one of them to sing, hoping that the sonar would be able to pick up the sounds.
Once off the phone, Chapman then began to belt out song after song as the Pisces V scanned along the bottom. This was an idea that was just crazy enough to work, and in fact, it did. After pulling up next to the Pisces III, the members of the Pisces V immediately began trying to attach a rope to the disabled submersible, but the rope ended up being too buoyant to get the hook attached.
As attempt after attempt to connect the rope to the Pisces III failed, the Pisces II was finally ready to get back in the water. As soon as it was placed into the water, however, it started to take on water just like what happened to the Pisces III, and had to be pulled back onto the mothership. A couple of hours later, at 5:30 that afternoon, the second ship pulled up to the scene with the Curv III on board.
However, as soon as that submersible was untethered to the deck and powered up, it suffered an electrical fault and was stranded aboard its mothership. Repairs then got underway for both the Curv III and the Pisces II, but these fixes would take time, and by midnight, engineers were still feverishly going to get them working. By then, the Pisces V was also ordered to resurface so it could recharge which was crushing for both of the stranded men.
After sitting for hours in the cold darkness, just the Pisces V being around was comforting, but now they were being left at the bottom of the ocean again alone. Not only that—but sometime late in the night or early the next morning, their 72 hours were officially up. They were also low on lithium hydroxide to scrub the carbon dioxide from the interior.
So whatever oxygen remained was a result of their efforts to conserve it, but their time, as well as their hope of being rescued, was running dangerously thin. They could run out at quite literally any second. At around 4 AM on Saturday, September 1st, the Pisces II was finally ready after a second round of repairs.
Once again attached with a special rope with a hook on the end of it, it descended. After reaching the seabed, it only took moments to locate the Pisces III and only a few more to successfully attach the hook to it. Then, another several hours later, at close to 10 AM, the Curv III disappeared beneath the surface and made its way to the site, too.
Within an hour, it also got its rope attached to the Pisces III, and lifting was set to begin. Upon hearing that they were ready to resurface, the two men broke out that cheese sandwich and lemonade to celebrate, but as soon as he heard where the two submersibles had attached their ropes, Mallinson grew concerned. The strong point of the Pisces III was an area known as the fore sphere.
However, rather than attaching the ropes there, the rescue submersible hooked onto the aft sphere. Unfortunately, there was just no way to reach the strong point based on how the submersible had come to rest on the ocean floor. And where the ropes were attached, if they broke, it would either strand them indefinitely or it could risk the integrity of the compartment they were in.
At 10:50 AM, however, neither of them had a choice as the Pisces II and the Curv III started to head toward the surface. The Pisces III then shook and shuttered as it dislodged from the ocean floor, but slowly, they started to make upward progress. They then slowly ascended, getting closer and closer to finally seeing sunlight for the first time in days.
More than an hour into the operation though, there was another problem. The lift had to stop because the Curv III became entangled in a rope. Fortunately, this was only a brief delay, and raising the Pisces III resumed.
As they continued though, the closer and closer they got to the surface, the more the disabled submersible rocked and swayed the water, so to stabilize it, around a hundred feet, or 33 meters from the surface, divers attached much stronger ropes to the outside of the vessel. Then, finally, at 1:17 PM, the Pisces III cleared the surface of the water for the first time in 83 hours. Now, this might seem like the end of the ordeal, but there was one final incredibly serious problem.
When the sub impacted the seabed days earlier, it damaged the hatch to the point that it was jammed shut. As the support team raced to unjam the hatch, Mallinson and Chapman checked their oxygen levels and found that they had less than an hour left of breathable air. It was unimaginable that their ship would be recovered only for them to suffocate on the surface because of the hatch door, but that was the reality they were facing.
10 minutes went by, then 20 minutes, and time continued to tick by as the support team jabbed and pried at the hatch door to get it open. But finally, after about 30 minutes of this, a loud bang echoed through the ocean air as if a gun had just been discharged. It momentarily confused everyone inside and outside the Pisces III, but with that ear-shattering noise, the hatch popped open, and fresh air and sunlight rushed into the disabled submersible.
The two men were both blinded and hit with immediate headaches, but it was a small price to pay for being saved. Before exiting the submersible, Mallinson checked the oxygen tank levels and found that they had just 12 minutes of air left. In the immediate aftermath of their rescue, Mallinson and Chapman were looked over by doctors who found that the two men were in great condition considering the circumstances.
Malson was suffering from some hypothermia, and both were dehydrated, but those were the only ill effects. They owed all of this to their efforts to conserve air beneath the surface of the ocean. And in total, they managed to save just enough to be rescued and stretch their oxygen supply 12 and a half hours longer than normal.
When they emerged from the disabled Pisces III, the two had been stuck in there together for 84 hours and 30 minutes. As you might imagine, their ordeal in the Pisces III created a lifelong bond between the two men. And so every year afterward, at the exact moment the submersible was rescued, Mallinson would pick up the phone and call Chapman.
The experience so inspired Chapman that he devoted the rest of his life to submersible rescue, creating a company for that specific purpose. Chapman would pass away in 2020 from cancer, but Mallinson, now in his 80s, is still alive as of this video. Their ordeal still stands as the deepest underwater rescue ever achieved.
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