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When Tracy Ryan learned Hamish Harding was one of the people missing in the Titan submarine, she pulled out every possible resource to try to help.
Ryan — who is friends with Linda Harding, wife of the late renowned explorer — tells PEOPLE Linda has been “very, very overwhelmed."
"She has such a beautiful soul," the NKore Biotherapeutics co-founder adds of her friend. "When I heard it was Hamish my heart dropped to my stomach."
Feeling helpless, Ryan immediately sprung into action.
"I had been working behind the scenes for four days to get the Magellan sub there and get their permits approved because they did have the capabilities to dive all the way down to the site," Ryan shares of the remotely operated vehicles, which are able to descend to depths closer to where the Titan submarine went missing. "And I actually brought a United States Congressman in to work with the Air Force, Navy and Coast Guard trying to get them clearance."
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Ryan first met the Hardings in 2019 through mutual friend Terry Virts, the retired NASA astronaut who has been handling communications for the family amid the tragedy.
"I went to Kennedy Space Center, NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Florida when Hamish had funded the around the world in 48 hours event where he and Terry were gonna try and circumnavigate the globe and break the Guinness Book World Records," Ryan says.
Ocean Gate / Handout/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
Ryan, a big NASA fan, was invited to attend by Virts, the former International Space Station Commander and United States Air Force colonel.
"Linda and I and Terry's dad were all on the same bus to go to the runway where they were gonna take off," Ryan recalls. "I got to meet Hamish and their son Giles. I spent a lot of time with Linda that day and she and I just really bonded."
The two women have stayed in touch ever since. "I loved watching her and Hamish's life and all these exciting adventures they get to go on," she says. "I've just really looked up to this man and this family as a whole for a long time since I met them."
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After the Titan went missing, Ryan saw a mass email asking for people to contact their local representatives to try and get the Coast Guard and the U.S. government to release the Magellan.
"And so that's when I brought in Congressman Eric Swalwell," says Ryan. "He responded to me within like 60 seconds."
"For two days he was on the phone with these guys trying to get the Magellan deployed," she adds. "And I had been, you know, messaging all this back and forth with Linda the whole time."
Tracy Ryan
Ryan says that Linda was "so thankful" for her efforts in trying to "get a capable sub in the water."
"This was really more of an effort for me to try and help the family get answers faster. Because the banging in the water that was happening every 30 minutes was giving them so much hope," Ryan recalls.
Though widely reported as "banging sounds," U.S. Coast Guard Petty Officer 3rd Class (PO3) Briana Carter told PEOPLE on Wednesday that those sounds had been "characterized as underwater noise.
JOEL SAGET,HANDOUT/Dirty Dozen Productions/OceanGat/AFP via Getty Images
Before news of the implosion broke, current and former members of the U.S. Navy reportedly aired their frustration internally over text exchanges on the Navy's delayed response from the start.
"They dragged their feet," one of the U.S. Navy's Master Divers said in the exchange, a Navy insider tells PEOPLE, adding that they were disappointed with their dive command, who took until Wednesday "to send the right equipment."
Per a second source, the submersible community had been telling the head of the Coast Guard and the Navy the entire time that they didn't have the right equipment. "They were stonewalling," the source claimed.
The U.S. Navy did not immediately respond to PEOPLE's request for comment.
"My big thing is that there were more capable submarines ready on the tarmac waiting to be deployed that were blocked for days," Ryan says. "It's my understanding that they called the submarine 'redundant.' They believed that they had all the equipment that they needed."
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According to Bretton Hunchak, former president and CEO of RMS Titanic, Inc., the Magellan never wound up getting clearance. He tells PEOPLE that he had partnered with Magellan on his own Titanic dive plan when he ran the expedition company, which is similar to OceanGate.
Hunchak, who says he was also working behind the scenes unofficially, claims the explorers who died "would have moved heaven and earth for us had the tables been turned. It was a truly irreplaceable group of folks."
EyePress News/Shutterstock
After the deaths of the sub's five passengers were announced on Thursday, U.S. Navy officials shared with The Wall Street Journal that a top-secret military acoustic detection system heard what is believed to be the Titan submersible implosion hours after the submersible began its voyage.
Though her efforts came when it was likely already too late, Ryan is proud she did all she could to help.
She credits her tireless dedication to helping her 10-year-old daughter Sophie Ryan, who has been battling incurable brain cancer since she was 8 months old.
The determined mom started a non-profit organization called Saving Sophie and has made it her lifelong mission to help find a cure and help ease the burden of other families going through similar situations.
Amanda Edwards/Getty
When asked if Sophie has been aware of her mom's heroic efforts this past week, Ryan responded: "Yes, she's been aware of it all. She's been very proud of me for trying to help."
Ryan went on to share her deepest condolences to the other families suffering as she remembered her friend's husband as a "remarkable, remarkable, decorated, accomplished human being."
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Friend of 'Titan' Sub Victim's Wife Tried to Help with Rescue - PEOPLE
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