Efforts to rescue the Titanic submersible are being delayed because US officials haven't approved paperwork, an OceanGate advisor says

• An advisor to the company that owns the missing Titanic submersible described bureaucratic delays.
• He said vital equipment was being held up by US officials.

A delay by US officials in approving paperwork is hampering the mission to find a submersible with five people trapped on board, an advisor to the company that owns the sub said.

The Titan craft was conducting a trip to the wreck of the Titanic organized by the tourism company OceanGate when it submerged on Sunday morning.

Its support vessel lost contact with it about an hour and 45 minutes into its trip, the Coast Guard has said.

David Concannon, an advisor to OceanGate, told NewsNation on Monday that vital search-and-rescue equipment was sitting on a plane on the island of Guernsey because US officials hadn't signed off on the paperwork.

"The same group, the experts, that did the advanced survey of the Titanic last year — they are mobilized," Concannon said. "They're sitting on the tarmac, ready to go. We have a ship off Newfoundland that is ready to take them to the site."

The situation is increasingly urgent; the vessel is believed to have had about 96 hours' worth of oxygen available when it embarked on its trip to the site of the wreck, about 2.3 miles under the sea.

The crew in the submersible could run out of oxygen by Thursday afternoon if the vessel is still intact.

"We have people whose lives are at stake. You have to move. We have assets that are ready to go, and they're sitting and waiting," Concannon said.

"We need to move. We do not have minutes or hours. We need to move now," Concannon added.

He told NewsNation: "This equipment has been on the tarmac for hours. And when I communicate with the United States government, I get 'out of office' replies — not from everyone, but from key people that have a sign-off on this."

He added, "That is unacceptable."

The rescue effort is being led by the US Coast Guard, supported by the Canadian coast guard and military. The US Coast Guard did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Concannon, an attorney and rescue diver, told the Associated Press he was supposed to have been among the passengers on the submersible but had to cancel to attend to another urgent client matter.

He told the AP that officials were working to get a remotely operated vehicle that could reach a depth of up to 3.7 miles to the site to search for the submersible.

The search is being conducted about 435 miles south of St. John's, Newfoundland, where in 1912 the Titanic sank on its maiden voyage, with more than a thousand passengers and crew members perishing.