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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsSearch for sub could cost taxpayers millions of dollars
Titanic submersible search yields debris field, Coast Guard says
Updated 15 min ago
By Dan Rosenzweig-Ziff, Adela Suliman, Maham Javaid, Timothy Bella, Eve Sampson and Victoria Bisset
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1 hour ago
Search for sub could cost taxpayers millions of dollars
By Dan Lamothe, Alex Horton and Eve Sampson
The U.S. Coast Guard, which has led the search for the Titan, has not detailed the expense involved. But an operation of this magnitude could run well into the millions of dollars between costs for fuel, personnel and maintenance. ... Taxpayers will probably foot the bill, experts say. ... We have no idea what a response like this will cost, Mikki Hastings, president of the National Association for Search and Rescue (NASAR), told The Washington Post. It is still ongoing, so we will likely not hear any totals for a while. ... Most search-and-rescue operations are funded by the responding agency, Hastings said, which usually ultimately means the taxpayer.
The company involved will not be responsible for reimbursing the government, said Paul Zukunft, who led the Coast Guard from 2014 to 2018. ... Its no different than if a private citizen goes out, and his boat sinks, he said. We go out and recover him. We dont stick them with the bill after the fact. ... NASAR recommends against agencies charging for rescue operations, as it may discourage people from seeking help in emergency situations.
Jessica Lamirande, a spokeswoman for Canadas Defense Ministry, said Canadian officials will have a total cost calculated 60 to 90 days after the mission is complete. It will include all incremental costs, which are operation-specific for extra equipment, maintenance and personnel, Lamirande said. ... That total will not include regular salaries or the cost of equipment already in use, a factor that Michael Byers, a political science professor at the University of British Columbia, says mitigates costs.
Byers, a Canadian defense expert, said for U.S. Coast Guard and Navy rescuers, operations like this can double as training time required to maintain essential skills. ... There is extra fuel involved in any search-and-rescue mission, and perhaps some extra wear and tear on equipment, but the actual additional costs to taxpayers are not as high as one might expect, Byers said.
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Hassin Bin Sober
(27,277 posts)cilla4progress
(26,453 posts)aren't they billionaires onboard?
Will they have to pay us back?
Buns_of_Fire
(18,794 posts)JohnQFunk
(486 posts)That is all.
JT45242
(3,651 posts)There is a difference between the coast guard rescuing an individual caught in a storm and a company that was willfully negligent and skated US laws and regulations by operating in international waters.
Logically, there should be a evaluation if the company was negligent and then the company should have to pay for the rescue.
Otherwise this is just another sickening case of privatizing profits and socializing losses, again.
ProfessorGAC
(74,703 posts)It's mostly a sunk cost, because all those people & equipment are there "just in case".
I don't want to think like TFG who dismantled the virology monitoring team in China because "We can't be paying people just in case something happens."
That said, if it's anything other than a freak, unforeseeable accident, the company should be culpable for some portion of the cost.
Arkansas Granny
(32,179 posts)in the first place? Search and rescue is one of the Coast Guard missions described here:
.https://uscga.edu/careers/roles-and-missions/#:~:text=Missions%20of%20the%20Coast%20Guard&text=They%20are%20America's%20Maritime%20Guardians,regions%20as%20ice%20caps%20recede.
thucythucy
(8,996 posts)On the other hand, I do see a need for regulating some the more outlandish "bucket list" nonsense as practiced by the billionaire class.
Many years ago I spent time in Iceland during the winter. During that time I was told it was prohibited to wander into certain portions of the interior because of the risk and the cost of any rescue mission that would have to be mounted in the event of an emergency. Winter there is of course taken very seriously. So, maybe we should impose a ban on undersea tourism of this sort?
Aside from everything else, the Titanic wreckage is a sort of mass grave, and excursions like this do seem to me to be a mite ghoulish.
Aristus
(71,031 posts)Let's bleed what we can out of the estate.
moonshinegnomie
(3,683 posts)in this case its hundreds of miles off us waters,and other than the ceo of the company the passengers wernt even americans.
the amount of money being spend it ludicrous. meanwhile hundreds died when a ship of migrants capsized in the Mediterranean
misanthrope
(9,211 posts)That sounds about right for modern America.