The mission to the sunken ocean liner in 1985 was a front for testing a new deep-sea imaging system, according to the expedition’s leader
The 1985 discovery of the sunken RMS Titanic by American researchers was actually part of a larger, classified US Navy operation designed to test a newly developed deep-sea imaging system, the expedition’s head, Bob Ballard, has revealed to CNN.
In an article published on Monday, the media outlet quoted Ballard as saying that after an unsuccessful initial attempt in the 1970s to locate the liner, he sought military funding to develop a remotely operated underwater vehicle that could transmit live video to a surface ship.
The US Navy eventually agreed to finance Ballard’s deep-sea imaging system, named Argo. He disclosed that the “Titanic [search] was cover for a top-secret military operation I was doing as a naval intelligence officer.” He explained that his defense sector sponsors “didn’t want the Soviets to know” about these activities.
According to CNN, military officials intended to use the system to examine two sunken US nuclear submarines, the USS Thresher and the USS Scorpion, with the intention of later deploying it for “broader Cold War intelligence-gathering purposes.”
Ballard assisted the US Navy in the examination of the two aforementioned vessels, with the time spent searching for the Titanic serving as a “cover story for the Navy’s secret mission,” the publication noted.
The Titanic, one of the largest passenger liners of its time, sank on April 15, 1912, off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada, after striking an iceberg during its maiden voyage from Southampton, UK, to New York City. Of the estimated 2,224 passengers and crew aboard, more than 1,500 people perished, making it one of the deadliest incidents of its kind in modern history.