[xienze]

The cynical part of me thinks everyone involved knew what had happened on Sunday. There was ample evidence that the submersible imploded (repeated stress on a carbon fiber frame, zero regard for safety, the fact that all communication was lost permanently). Then there was the fact that the logistics involved in a rescue were basically insurmountable. The Navy/Coast Guard saw this as a good live training exercise and the media got a great story. No one was gonna ruin things by admitting that the whole thing was hopeless and not really worth pursuing.

[lamontcg]

Even if you can guess they're gone, you're still going to try to mount a rescue in the case that you were wrong.

And nobody with any shred of PR training would make a "heard a big boom, they're probably fucked" statement with all the world's media and the families listening. Nobody wants to tell the families that its over until they've got hard proof.

[gexla]

Add to that the fact that it didn't surface by releasing the ballasts. It lost communications before it reached the wreckage. The pilot needed that communication to find the wreckage.

Maybe they would have continued to make the attempt. But unless it got snagged, the ballasts were designed to break off after 24 hours and rise to the surface.

[listenallyall]

> hopeless and not really worth pursuing

Even a hopeless situation, people still want to see, and possibly recover, the surviving wreckage. The whole point of the original exploration was to view the Titanic wreckage. Various military spent enormous resources looking for MH370 for months/years.

[fransje26]

> the media got a great story.

Don't quite know what was so great about this story. It was a textbook example of the catastrophic consequences of hubris meeting ignorance, and that was about it. The rest was just milking the drama as timed passed by with decreasing theoretical oxygen reserves.

[TheHumanist]

I think they mean from the perspective of the heartless suits at news companies and/or their parent conglomerates, this was a 'great' story. Lots of eyes. People checking back in for updates. ie. Lots of clicks and clickthroughs

[poorlyknit]

> what was so great about this story [?]

> catastrophic consequences of hubris meeting ignorance

Icarus calling. People have been telling this story for thousands of years.

[appleflaxen]

If you are the media, a good story is one that drives clicks.

It seems like this story did that.