So, Dane Peter Madsen built himself a sizable submarine, using crowdfunding to raise the money (around $200,000). He took it for a spin with a Swedish journalist on board, it sank, she disappeared, and now he’s been arrested for her murder as the Danish authorities believe the sub was intentionally sunk.

Kim Wall: Danish submarine was ‘deliberately sunk’

I have to admit that I hadn’t heard of this sub until it sank. It actually looks pretty spiffy… but reading up on in on Wikipedia, some concerns began to grow:

It was built over a three-year period as an art project by Peter Madsen and a group of volunteers…

An “art project.” A friggen submarine as an ART PROJECT. Oh, no, who needs STEM…

Madsen took the sub out *alone* with the reporter. How is it ever a good idea to pilot a submarine alone?

It seems really unlikely to me that Madsen sank the sub in order to kill the journalist. But maybe he sank the sub for some purpose (Insurance scam? Drama? Art?) and the journalist died in the process. He claims that he dropped her off on shore before the sub sank, and her body hasn’t been found. Could this be some sort of ill-conceived hoax/joke thing, where the authorities are going to spend a whole lot of taxpayer money investigating this only to have her pop up and shout “Ta-Da!’ months down the line?