Titan submersible/Francis Scott Key Bridge salvager to speak at Tarkio Tech

Paul Hankins, who is retired from the U.S. Navy and is the Director of Salvage Operations and Navy Supervisor of Salvage and worked on the salvage operations of both the Titan submersible implosion and the Francis Scott Key Bridge collapse, will be speaking at Tarkio Tech. Listen to Paul, whose wife and mother-in-law are former Tarkio residents and Tarkio College students, share about his life and work. He will give a presentation at 10:00 a.m. Monday, September 22, at the Rotary Theatre in the Curnutt Center on the Tarkio Tech campus. The event is open to all.

The Titan submersible was a deep-sea vessel operated by OceanGate that imploded June 18, 2023, killing all five passengers during a voyage to the wreck of the Titanic in the northern Atlantic Ocean. It was the first privately owned submersible with a claimed maximum depth of 4,000 meters and the first completed crewed submersible with a hull constructed of titanium and carbon fiber composite materials. On March 26, 2024, at 1:28 a.m. EDT, the main spans and the three nearest northeast approach spans of the Francis Scott Key Bridge across the Patapsco River in the Baltimore metropolitan area of Maryland collapsed after the container ship Dali struck one of its piers. Six members of a maintenance crew working on the roadway were killed, while two more were rescued from the river. The collapse blocked most shipping to and from the Port of Baltimore for 11 weeks and the economic impact of the closure of the waterway has been estimated at $15 million per day.