Rescue efforts for the missing Titanic sub will probably cost millions, but it's unlikely OceanGate and its wealthy customers will be expected to foot the bill

• The search-and-rescue effort for the Titanic submersible likely cost millions of dollars.
• A former Coast Guard commandant said it would be unlikely for the vessel's operator to repay the US.

A former Coast Guard commandant says that the massive search-and-rescue operation for the missing Titanic submersible will likely end up costing millions but that it would be unusual for the company running the vessel to have to pay the US back.

The US and Canadian authorities deployed at least one submarine, several aircraft, and sonar buoys to search for the submersible, which disappeared on Sunday while on the way to the Titanic shipwreck.

On Thursday, the operation was called off after debris from the sub was found and the five-person crew was presumed dead by the US Coast Guard.

During the search, special equipment, including the US Navy's Flyaway Deep Ocean Salvage System, or FADOSS, and a French deep-diving robot, were dispatched to find and possibly retrieve the submersible.

Chris Boyer, the executive director of the National Association for Search and Rescue, told The New York Times that the mission would "probably cost millions."

Ret. Adm. Paul Zukunft, who previously led the Coast Guard, told The Washington Post that OceanGate Expeditions, the company that runs tours with the submersible, wouldn't be expected to reimburse the US government.

"It's no different than if a private citizen goes out and his boat sinks. We go out and recover him. We don't stick them with the bill after the fact," Zukunft told the outlet.

OceanGate charges people $250,000 each to see the Titanic, which rests some 13,000 feet underwater. The five people who died in the doomed vessel included the company's CEO and at least two billionaires.

The submersible, called Titan, was made of carbon fiber and started running annual tours in 2021. It went missing and imploded on its third expedition.

Mike Reiss, a former passenger who went on four trips with OceanGate, said that dives on the Titan were sometimes canceled due to dangerous weather conditions and that the vessel regularly lost communication with its mother ship.

In 2018, the Titan's designers were confronted with safety concerns from a now-fired company executive and the Marine Technology Society — though it's unclear whether those issues were later addressed by OceanGate.

It's also unclear whether OceanGate requires its customers to obtain insurance before their trips, but the passengers were likely aware of the risks of embarking on a dive in the submersible.

David Pogue, a CBS correspondent who tried the submersible last year, said he had to sign a waiver before participating in the dive that acknowledged the Titan was an "experimental vessel" that wasn't "approved or certified by any regulatory body, and could result in physical injury, emotional trauma, or death."

Reiss, a writer and producer for "The Simpsons," told CNN that he knew he might die when he visited the Titanic wreck with OceanGate last year.

"This wasn't a vacation. It wasn't tourism. It was exploration. And you're getting on a ship that's the best it could be, but they're learning as they go along," Reiss said.

The five people in the submersible knew the risks that came with the trip, Reiss added.

"They made it as safe as they could make it. They trusted their own lives to it," Reiss said. "But they knew it could end this way."