A sister and aunt of a father and son on board the missing Titan submersible has spoken out on the horror of her family being trapped deep in the Atlantic Ocean.
British-based Pakistani billionaire Shahzada Dawood, 48 and his 19-year-old son Suleman are two of the five people who spent around £200k to board a submarine to view the Titanic shipwreck.
Sabrina Dawood, the sister of businessman Shahzada, has acknowledged the global interest in finding her relatives but requested privacy at this difficult time.
"We are deeply grateful for the efforts of news agencies during this difficult time; your constant coverage of the missing Titan submersible is undoubtedly playing a large role in the world's ability to access relevant updates on the matter," she said to Sky News.
The statement continued: "At this time, the Dawood family's sole focus is the rescue of our beloved Shahzada and Suleman Dawood and we are unable to address any questions or comments at the moment.
"We trust that the family will be granted privacy as we deal with this crisis.
"May Shahzada and Suleman return to us safe and sound.
"We are sure they would be as moved as we are by the support of the global community during this period of difficulty."
The pair are with fellow British billionaire adventurer Hamish Harding, along with French submersible pilot Paul-Henry Nargeolet and chief executive and founder of OceanGate Expeditions, Stockton Rush.
The trip should have taken eight hours to the bottom of the Atlantic but the crew lost contact around 90 minutes after they plunged below surface level.
There is only a set amount of oxygen on the vessel and rescuers fear there may only be around 24 hours of breathable air left.
Shahzada is from one of Pakistan's richest families but lives in Surbiton, south-west London with his wife, Christine, and another child, Alina.
Shahzada is vice-chairman of Pakistani conglomerate Engro Corporation, which is a large fertiliser firm.
He is also a huge supporter of two charities founded by King Charles - the British Asian Trust and the Prince's Trust International.
A family statement described teenager Suleman as a "big fan of science fiction literature and learning new things".
An array of ships are involved in the search effort, including Bahamian research vessel Deep Energy, French research vessel L'Atalante, His Majesty's Canadian Ship Glace Bay and four Canadian Coast Guard vessels, according to the US Coast Guard.
Speaking to PA news agency, former Royal Navy submarine captain Ryan Ramsey said the rescue operation is made harder due to there being no replica of the Titan submersible to model a rescue attempt off should they find it.
He said: "It would have to be bespoke equipment. I don't think anyone has planned for this kind of operation so they would have to create some kind of bespoke process to get a cable round or a fixing point on that particular submersible.
"The problem with that is, with most submersibles, they make two of them, they make two of them for reasons - for example, if something does happen to one of them the rescuing porters can go see the other one and figure how they're going to exercise the rescue.
"In this particular case, they only made one and so there's no opportunity for people to work out what that solution is and to work that problem through and achieve a successful outcome."
He added that Titan may never be found as search rescues continue their efforts in a race against time.
He said: "Hope is a very human emotion, and we should all hope that there is a successful outcome, I would really like to be proven completely wrong and they turn up on the surface, in the next few hours, they're located, and everything ends well.
"But I think you have to be realistic, and the odds are against them in every single way possible.
"We may never know the outcome of this because they never detect it and so we have to make the assumption that this is not going to end as well as we would like.
"My thoughts go out to the families because they must be struggling through this time trying to comprehend what's happening and hoping this is going to come to a successful conclusion but, hour by hour, as the time frame collapses, that's very unlikely."
