We’re in Georgia and, as always, I’m amused by how novel I find being in a country new to me while the people living in said country find it completely normal. It’s the sense of discovery that drives us to go to new countries – not an absolute sense of discovery, obviously the people in Georgia discovered their own country long ago. It’s my personal sense of discovery – seeing a place I didn’t know about, learning something I previously had no idea about. Discovery is a dopamine kick. [Click here if you want to follow along with our Georgia bikepacking trip]

As a consequence, I don’t understand the appeal of package tours – you lose a large portion of the feeling of discovery if someone else creates your itinerary, tells you where to go and what to expect. In the same vein, I would rather see a small waterfall I didn’t previously know about than a famous big waterfall. Particularly if the small waterfall has no one else viewing it and the big waterfall is thronged. As I mentioned in my last blog, I belong to the wild much more than I belong to the city.

On the topic of discovery, I get why the five people who just died in the OceanGate submersible accident wanted to go to the ocean floor. Personally, I’m not very excited by the idea of seeing the Titanic. It’s a decaying ship on the ocean floor which also could be viewed as a piece of rubbish. I’d much rather go and look at animal life in the depths of the ocean than a piece of broken human endeavour. And the submersible was the very definition of a package tour… However, seeing 4000m below the ocean surface would feel pretty novel.

What I don’t get is why there has been such a degree of effort put into rescuing the people after the submersible's disappearance. Well I do get it, but it doesn’t make a lot of economic sense. Why expend huge amounts of ship and aircraft and person time on five people who are almost certainly dead? It turns out the US Navy heard the implosion so thought the people were likely dead but didn't want to impede the rescue effort. The US Navy did release information about underwater banging noises that could have been people in a submersible (but clearly were not). Should they have provided all information for a balanced view?

What is also hard to understand is the plethora of media coverage for 5 people who were likely dead, compared with the coverage of the deaths of 500 Pakistani refugees as a fishing trawler foundered and sank in the Mediterranean a couple of weeks ago. And how about the 35 refugees from Africa who died last week when an inflatable boat sank en route to the Canary Islands? Heard about that one? Why such interest in such a small number of people who paid large sums of money to go on an exclusive trip, as opposed to large numbers of people fleeing oppression and starvation in unseaworthy vessels?

Sadly, the answers to such questions are relatively simply. In terms of the amount of effort put into rescues, it’s much more appealing to send fleets of planes and ships and complex technology out to trace and rescue extremely rich people in a one-off event that doesn't commit you to further action, but will give you heaps of positive press if you succeed. It's not appealing to search for and rescue refugees because there’s a constant stream of such boats. And if you rescue refugees you have to figure out what to do with them.

In terms of media attention, we, the public, like to hear about a submersible rescue. A rescue is exciting – we can imagine the ensuing movie. It’s suspenseful – are the passengers alive, or aren’t they? We are fascinated by the sinking of the Titanic – a legendary event, even if it was legendary stupidity! The idea of the disappeared submersible was thrillingly horrifying – being trapped in a coffin 4000m below sea level or waiting on the surface for a rescue boat to pop a hatch you can’t open. There’s even a welcome relief in the ending. It wasn’t a rescue but at least we know they didn’t suffer.

In contrast, hearing about refugees isn’t suspenseful or interesting. It makes us feel bad. Why are these people fleeing their country? Is the reason something, like climate change, that we have had a hand in or could prevent? Should our country be helping those refugees/migrants? And no one wants to imagine themselves a refugee, as opposed to having enough money to take expensive adventure trips. Therefore, why would we want news items that leave us feeling guilty and powerless? And there's little joy in the conclusion – either the peoples' dispatch to refugee camps or to death.

In conclusion, should we be blaming the media for the plethora of coverage of the Oceangate incident? The media is feeding us more of what we click on because that’s how media get advertising revenue, which they need to survive. The unpalatable corollary is, if it’s not the media who is at fault, is it us?