Deep sea tourism
GONE are the days of visiting attractions like the Eiffel Tower in Paris or the Empire State Building in New York City. Now more and more exploration companies are offering paying tourists the opportunity to go beyond their wildest travel dreams.
OceanGate Expeditions is one such company. They take paying tourists in submersibles, or submarines, to shipwrecks and underwater canyons. But you need pretty deep pockets for a trip to the seabed. The company charges about R4,2 million to travel more than 3 800 metres into the depths of the ocean where the Titanic wreckage rests on the seabed. OceanGate recently released high-definition footage of the wreck of the Titanic, which sunk after it hit an iceberg on the night of 14 April 1912. The company’s underwater footage shows incredible details of the sunken ship which lies off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. The 110-year-old shipwreck has long fascinated historians and archaeologists. Now, with the help of OceanGate, they will be able to further their research on the ship. “The amazing detail in the 8K footage will help our team of scientists and maritime archaeologists characterise the decay of the Titanic more precisely as we capture new footage in 2023 and beyond,” says Stockton Rush, president of OceanGate Expeditions.