09 July 2023 , 16:47
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OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush ignored multiple warning signs and safety concerns about the company's Titan submersible before it imploded on a dive to the wreck of the Titanic, reports suggest,
The vessel tragically imploded during its ill-fated dive on June 18, claiming the lives of Mr Rush and four other passengers.
Mr Rush previously bragged about 'breaking rules' before dying alongside British adventurer Hamish Harding and father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood and Frenchman Paul-Henri Nargeolet.
The is currently an investigation underway to determine how exactly the vessel imploded
In the aftermath of the tragedy, there were mounting reports of Mr Rush’s alleged determination to advance his company despite warnings from other industry experts.
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The court document concerns over "lack of non-destructive testing performed on the hull of the Titan" (Anadolu Agency via Getty Images)Testing concerns
Former director of marine operations at OceanGate, David Lochridge, claimed that there was a lack of non-destructive testing performed on the Titan's hull.
When he raised concerns about this issue in 2018, he was fired.
The Marine Technology Society, in a letter to OceanGate, also warned about the company's experimental designs and refusal to follow industry-accepted safety protocols, indicating the potential for catastrophic consequences.
OceanGate CEO and co-founder Stockton Rush had experimental designs (AP)Mr Lochridge's claims are detailed in a lawsuit he filed in 2018 after his termination from the company.
“I don’t want to be seen as a Tattle tale but I’m so worried he kills himself and others in the quest to boost his ego,” David wrote in an email to expedition leader and dive master Rob McCallum.
Safety is 'pure waste'
Several individuals expressed concerns about the sub's construction, describing it as having elements of "MacGyver-y jerry-rigged-ness."
This included the use of a PlayStation controller to steer the sub and the sub's buoyancy being maintained by rusty construction pipes resting on shelves on its side.
A video showed Rush overseeing the assembly of the carbon-fibre submersible (CBS News)This construction raised doubts about the sub's reliability and safety. Multimillionaire thrill-seeker Chris Brown withdrew from the voyage due to concerns that OceanGate was cutting corners.
CEO Stockton Rush said in an email to an industry expert that he had “grown tired of industry players who try to use a safety argument to stop innovation and new entrants from entering their small existing market.”, it emerged.
OceanGate Expeditions CEO Stockton Rush (AP)In a re-surfaced podcast from November 2022 with CBS, Mr Rush said: "You know, at some point, safety is just a pure waste. I mean, if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed, don't get in your car, don't do anything.
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"At some point, you're going to take some risk, and it really is a risk-reward question. I think I can do this just as safely while breaking the rules.", he added at 17 minutes into the episode.
Bluetooth-based system and lack of marine certification
Deep-sea expert Rob McCallum raised concerns about the Titan's system relying on Bluetooth for controls, highlighting that hardwired controls are the industry standard for safety in case the signal drops out.
“Every sub in the world has hardwired controls for a reason — that if the signal drops out, you’re not f***ed,” he said.
Titan submersible passengers (L-R, top to bottom) Hamish Harding, CEO Stockton Rush, Paul-Henri Nargeolet, and father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood (Dirty Dozen Productions/OceanGat)Rob also advised Mr Rush to have the Titan marine-certified, which he refused to do, disregarding classification agencies' support for his other projects.
The sub was not approved by any regulatory body and all passengers had to sign a waiver before the $250,000 (£195,000) trip.
Ominous cracking sound
During the two-hour, 12,000-foot descent, passenger Karl Stanley heard a cracking sound that “sounded like a flaw/defect in one area being acted on by the tremendous pressures and being crushed/damaged,” he wrote in an email to Rush, which was obtained by the New York Times.
The cracking noise meant that there was “an area of the hull that is breaking down,” he said, warning Mr Rush to cancel future expeditions and address the problem.
His warning went unheeded. Additionally, tests in 2020 revealed that the Titan's original carbon fiber hull was showing signs of fatigue, necessitating a complete rebuild. These hull-related issues compromised the sub's integrity and depth rating.
Debris from the Titan submersible is unloaded from the ship Horizon Arctic at the Canadian Coast Guard pier in St. John's, Newfoundland (AP)The idea, Mr Rush explained in interviews, was that he used carbon fibre as it was a strong material that was significantly lighter than traditional metals. “Carbon fibre is three times better than titanium on strength-to-buoyancy,” he said.
Mr Rush had confessed that he’d “gotten the carbon fiber used to make the Titan at a big discount from Boeing because it was past its shelf-life for use in airplanes.”
Other manufacturers don’t use carbon fibre in their hulls over safety concerns and instead use titanium.
Technical difficulties and mechanical failures
Prior to the doomed dive, the Titan had experienced various technical difficulties while on dives.
During a 2022 expedition, the pilot, named Scott Griffith, observed the submersible spinning strangely during the launch and Mr Rush and the team scrambled to fix the problem from the mother ship on the surface.
Captured on a BBC documentary. Scott shrugs at the time and tells passengers "they checked it and it seemed good," as he explains that the vessel's controls are not working, suggesting a problem with the thruster.
"When I'm thrusting forwards, one of the thrusters is thrusting backwards. Now the only thing I can do right now is a 360." he adds.
Mr Rush then suggests that Scott remaps the submersibles' controller and can be heard ringing a colleague for advice about "remapping the PS3 controller".
Another colleague in the ship then suggests a way to re-map it before Mr Rush says: "Yeah, but I don't remember which is up and down".