A set of photos, claiming to show debris of OceanGate Expedition's 'Titan', a submersible vehicle that was used to explore the wreck of the RMS Titanic, is being shared on social media.
The context: The submarine, which had five passengers – including OceanGate's CEO Stockton Rush – had disappeared in the North Atlantic Ocean on 18 June.
US Coast Guard officials said that they found five major pieces of the craft amid the debris they found at the site and suspect an implosion of the submersible, which was initially believed to have upto 40 hours of emergency oxygen on board.
OceanGate Expeditions issued a statement saying that all those on board had "sadly been lost."
The claim: The photos are being shared to claim that they show Titan's remains after the implosion, caused by external high pressure due to the depth of the craft.
An archive of this post can be seen here.
(Source: Twitter/Screenshot)
(Archives of more posts sharing the same photos can be seen here, here and here.)
But..?: There were no official photos of the debris at the time of writing this article.
Two photos of shoes show the belongings of the people who died when the Titanic sank in 1912. The photos, however, have been on the internet since 2012 and date back to 2004.
The other photo is also an old one, dating back to at least 2013, and shows debris and garbage on the ocean floor.
How did we find out?: Using reverse image search, we looked for more details related to the viral photos.
IMAGE 1
One of the photos shows shoes and coloured tiles.
(Source: Facebook)
A reverse image search on TinEye took us to the same photo on stock image website Alamy.
The photo was taken by the Institute for Exploration and Center for Archaeological Oceanography, University of Rhode Island and the National Oceanic and Atomospheric Administration's (NOAA) Office of Ocean Exploration in 2004, according to its caption.
It added that the photo showed "the shoes of one of the possible victims of the Titanic disaster."
The caption mentioned that the photo was taken in 2004.
We found the same photo from a different angle in a 2017 video by National Geographic with film director James Cameroon, which was also about the wreckage of the Titanic.
Nat Geo's video shows the same photo from a different angle.
(Source: YouTube/Screenshot)
IMAGE 2
One of the photos shows garbage on the ocean floor.
(Source: Facebook)
We ran a simple reverse image search on this photo, which led us to a YouTube video on the National Oceanic and Atomospheric Administration's (NOAA) verified YouTube channel.
The video, which was published on 9 April 2013, was about marine debris and how it was found in every ocean in the world.
The part of this video used in the viral claim can be seen 55 seconds into the video.
The video dates back to 2013.
(Source: YouTube/Altered by The Quint)
IMAGE 3
One of the photos shows a boot.
(Source: Facebook)
Like the first photo, this photo is from the same 2004 ocean exploration expedition near the Titanic's wreckage, according to the caption on Alamy.
As per Alamy, the photo was taken in 2004.
(Source: Alamy/Altered by The Quint)
The NatGeoTV video with James Cameroon also had this photo.
Nat Geo's video shows the same photo.
(Source: YouTube/Screenshot)
News agency Associated Press also carried this photo as a photo of wreckage of the Titanic in a 2021 article.
Conclusion: None of these photos show the remains of OceanGate's Titan submersible which went missing on 18 June.
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