SanDisk SD card found intact in OceanGate Titan debris

The investigation into the 2023 OceanGate Titan submersible tragedy yielded an unexpected find. Among the wreckage, specialists discovered a SubC Rayfin Mk2 Benthic deep-sea camera housing a consumer SanDisk Extreme Pro 512 GB SD card priced at just $62. Despite the immense pressure on the ocean floor, the storage medium proved fully functional.

The camera was located near the main debris field during a follow-up expedition. Its lenses and electronic boards had been destroyed, but the compartment with the memory slot remained sealed. In a Newfoundland laboratory, engineers extracted the card without any signs of physical damage. Experts at the Transportation Safety Board of Canada created a bit-for-bit copy to preserve the data for analysis.

Twelve photos and nine videos were recovered from the card, at 12.3 MP and 4K UHD. However, they depicted only the Marine Institute workshop in Newfoundland, where equipment was prepared; there were no images of Titan’s final minutes underwater. During missions, footage from the submersible’s cameras was recorded to an external drive.

The durability of an inexpensive memory device surprised the researchers: a mass-market component endured conditions that destroyed the submersible. The find underscores the toughness and reliability of modern solid-state storage—and, quietly, the irony of what survives in the deep.