Ark Found

Chapter 2

Carter and Jayden exchanged concerned glances. Submersible deep diving was not the type of activity that could be safely rushed. Yet at the same time, their purpose for being here revolved around potential confrontation: someone’s been snooping around the Titanic and it was their job to find the map to Noah’s Ark before they did. And now it seemed that confrontation was about to transpire.

They stood on the submersible deck outside the control room, where Bud now piloted the robot back to the surface to keep the site clear for manned submersible operations. Jayden remarked what a blessing it was that the ship featured a “moon pool,” which was a rectangular opening farther towards the bow on the same deck. This meant that instead of having to swing the submersible over the side of the ship on a boom arm and lower it down into choppy waters, possibly risking a mishap where it slams into the side of the ship, it could instead be lowered directly into the sea from the safety of the middle of the ship. It also afforded them more privacy as well, since the sub going in and out of the water couldn’t be directly observed by prying eyes from other ships or aircraft.

“Tell me again how that giant hole in the ship with the ocean coming up through it doesn’t sink us?” Carter asked. He was half-joking since he’d seen them before, but knew that Jayden could explain it technically.

“It’s not really a ‘hole’ in the ship, it’s the shape of the ship. The four sides of the pool are sealed as part of the hull. Also, as you can see,” Jayden said, pointing down into the rectangular opening where seawater sloshed about below, “there is considerable distance between the surface of the ocean and the top of the pool.”

Hunt nodded. It looked like they were about one story, or ten feet above the waves. A waist-high metal railing lined the perimeter of the moon pool, and a retractable cover, now open, could be closed during heavy seas. Above them on one end of the moon pool was a platform deck with a small crane where additional equipment could be lowered into the water as needed.

“Let’s make sure the submersible is ready for action,” Jayden said, his eagerness evident by the fact that he was already walking toward the multi-million dollar machine. It was positioned on a cradle underneath a split-level deck so that it was shaded and protected from precipitation. “Usually they keep the batteries topped off, but if they used it recently they may not be ready to go yet.”

Carter shrugged as he started after Jayden. “If that’s the case, then we’ll just have to send an ROV back down until the sub’s ready.”

Jayden agreed and then they were standing next to the craft that would take them down to the RMS Titanic. “You can count on one hand the number of privately owned subs in the world that are capable of diving to the Titanic. So we know our client must have some deep pockets to spring for this.”

Carter nodded, reading the corporate logo painted on the sub’s body, with the craft’s name stenciled below that: Deep Voyager. “She looks like she’s up to the task. Hopefully we can do our client justice.”

Jayden nodded as he started to walk around the underwater craft. For a sub that held only two persons, it was much larger than Carter expected. Jayden told him it was because such a great depth rating required both crush protection from the immense pressures, as well as large battery banks to power the vehicle for the long periods of time it took to reach miles-deep depths, have some time at depth, and then return to the surface while leaving a margin for error. As with cave-diving, the rules of thirds applied: one-third oxygen and battery power for the actual dive, one-third for the return trip, with one-third remaining in reserve for contingencies. Both Navy men were well aware of this rule and would never willingly break it.

Jayden eyed Carter. “This sub will definitely allow us to have a decent look around the wreck and surrounding site. Whether or not we can find the safe, that’s another matter. But we’re going to give it a shot. Time for the pre-dive inspection.”

Jayden and Carter set about ensuring the craft was ready to dive, running through a diagnostic checklist that took the better part of an hour. They were assisted by a couple of crew members familiar with certain operations including operating the cranes to lower the sub into the moon pool. When Jayden pronounced the sub fit to dive, he and Carter entered the craft, with Jayden occupying the pilot’s seat on the left side and Carter on the right, where he would mostly be an observer but also able to operate certain equipment such as the external grab arms and spotlights.

Johnny came back to the work area to supervise the sub deployment, which included not only the crane operation to lower it into the moon pool, but also a dive team of four scuba divers who would inspect the submersible once it was underwater, and then accompany it for the first 100 vertical feet of its dive. Before they closed the hatch, Johnny called up to them from the deck while the sub was still suspended from the crane.

“I’m just back from the bridge. That ship — its name is the Transoceanic—it’s positioned itself on site, about a hundred yards away from us.”

“You have any communication with them?” Carter called down.

Jameson nodded while holding his hands out in a gesture of what gives. “Yeah, we told them that we have the legal permits to dive the site and asked them what they were doing here, but they were basically uncooperative, saying only that they also have permits on file, which I know is a crock.”

“Does it look like they have manned subs or only ROVs or AUVs?” Carter asked, referring to Autonomous Underwater vehicles, an ROV variant that could be programmed to dive a certain course and therefore be tetherless.

Jameson shrugged. “We observed them with binoculars and it looks like they have both ROVs and AUVs, but we didn’t see a manned craft. There could be an indoor moon pool, though. It’s a large vessel, only a little smaller than ours. It’s a little strange, because they seem to be privately funded — there are no government or institutional markings of any kind on the ship — and yet they’re very well equipped. I mean, I realize that we’re privately funded, too, but how common is that?”

At this Carter and Jayden exchanged a concerned glance. They had past experience with just such an outfit — private and extremely well-funded — that would stop at nothing to obtain priceless historical artifacts and treasures.

“You’d be surprised who comes out of the woodwork for the lure of historical treasure,” Carter said to Jameson.

Then Jayden said to Carter, “Remind you of somebody?”

Hunt slowly shook his head as he recalled a hair-raising race to find the lost city of Atlantis, a quest that ended in success and a reputation that enabled him to launch his treasure hunting and safeguarding business, Omega — so-named because the Greek symbol represented a unit of resistance-the reason they were here today. “It does, but let’s not jump to conclusions just yet. We’ve got a job to do.”

Jayden nodded and signaled to Jameson and Johnny that they were ready to dive. A crewman secured the sub’s hatch, causing Carter and Jayden to feel a slight pressure in their ears, and then stepped back off of the craft before the crane operator began slowly lowering the Deep Voyager toward the water in the moon pool. Jayden peered down below them to make sure their path was obstacle free while Carter gazed up, watching the crew wave as water sloshed over the top of the hatch.

They passed down through the moon pool, enclosed on all sides by the hull of the ship, until they cleared the bottom of the hull into open ocean. When they were safely below the ship, a scuba diver wearing a full face mask asked them over the communications system if they were ready to be released from the cable. Jayden responded via radio that they were, and the diver unhooked them from the crane.

Jayden flipped a switch to release air from the sub’s buoyancy tubes. To rise or sink up and down, the sub did not have to rely on its thrusters. In order to conserve power, to sink it released compressed air stored in tanks in the buoyancy tubes, and to rise it either released ballast in the form of lead weights, or added more air to the tubes from the tanks. He informed the support crew of every action over the radio. “Releasing air…” He knew it was of paramount importance to quickly sink below the ship lest a freak upwelling slam them into the hull.

Slowly, the submersible began to drop deeper into the North Atlantic. The four support divers swam around them — one either side, one above and one below — as they began their descent. When they reached a depth of seventy-five feet — safely below the ship — Jayden performed a quick systems check to ensure everything was operational before beginning the long descent to the Titanic. A school of silver fish swarmed past them, temporarily obscuring one of the scuba divers before disappearing into the blue.

“All systems go,” Jayden intoned into the comm system’s microphone. “Commencing descent to the wreck, over.” He vented more air from the buoyancy system and the Deep Voyager sank at a faster rate toward the bottom of the ocean. Even at this pace, it would take them over three hours to reach the seafloor. When they arrived at the 100-foot mark, the dive team performed a final visual inspection of the sub and reported that all looked well. Jayden also completed one last systems check, also verifying that all systems were operating as they should.

Then the scuba team began their slow ascent to the surface, where they would need to decompress for some time at the twenty-foot level before returning to the ship. Jayden and Carter continued on into the depths alone, plummeting toward the RMS Titanic.