What the Titanic submersible saga and the Greek migrant shipwreck say about our reactions to tragedy

Across the span of nearly a week, the saga of a lost submersible that had gone into the depths of the ocean to see the Titanic wreckage rippled across the national and global conversation — culminating in news that the craft had imploded and its five occupants were dead.

But a far bigger disaster days earlier, the wrecking of a ship off Greece filled with migrants that killed at least 80 people and left a horrifying 500 missing, did not become a moment-by-moment worldwide focus in anywhere near the same way.

One grabbed unrelenting, moment-to-moment attention. One was watched and discussed as another sad, but routine, news story.