New York, USA – France 24 spoke with one of the former passengers of the Titan: “Stockton Rush was not looking for money, he was convinced that his submersible was safe,” says CBS journalist David Poque. However, what caused the implosion and what will happen to this submersible industry after the tragedy remain questions to be clarified.
First modification:
The journalist of the American television channel ‘CBS News’ David Pogue He is one of the few people in the world who has been able to see up close the remains of the Titanic that lie 3,800 meters deep in the Atlantic Ocean.
Pogue boarded the Titan submersible three dives before it imploded, killing all five of its crew. “It was Russian roulette. I was lucky it wasn’t me,” he confessed to France 24. Now many accuse the CEO of OceanGate Expeditions, Stockton Rush, of being “a con man who knew this was dangerous, who was willing to kill to make money. I don’t think that’s the case, he really believed his submersible was safe.”
Even so, Rush never certified his Titan because he knew that it would not pass the tests since, as he explained in a television interview in 2021, “my submersible is so innovative (due to the construction materials) that it does not fit into the regulatory framework of the naval industry”. In March 2018, the ‘Marine Technology Society‘ also alerted him to the security problems it could pose: “The current experimental approach taken by Ocean Gate Expeditions could generate negative results (ranging from minor to catastrophic).”
03.27.2018 Letter to OceanGate Owner: “Our apprehension is that the current experimental approach taken by Oceangate could lead to negative results (ranging from minor to catastrophic) that would have serious consequences. Could the disaster have been avoided? pic.twitter.com/vRdtt1LcXP
– Mamen Sala (@MamenSala) June 27, 2023
There are still many doubts about what caused the implosion of the submersible, if it will be possible to recover the bodies of the deceased crew members, the consequences that the events will have for the company itself and if the incident will change the regulation of this type of vessel.
Most of the search operation has already returned to land, but a small remote-controlled robot, its parent ship’s crew, and a few support crew members continue to scour the seabed to recover as much of the Titan’s wreckage as possible and to be able to answer the most important question now: What happened? What made the mission fail?
The theory related to the construction materials of the submersible
Journalist David Pogue defends a theory that many experts have shared about what caused the implosion. “The Titan imploded, not because it was made of carbon fiber, but because it was made of carbon fiber, titanium and Plexiglas,” the journalist told France 24.
“And then going down and up and down 20 times. Gradually those three materials expand and contract by different amounts under pressure. So I think, over time, something weakened and there was a seal coming loose. That’s that’s it. my belief. And the only way to avoid that would be to not design this at all.”
Pogue did not have this information before boarding the Titan in the summer of 2022. Even so, if he was aware that it was an “experimental device”, that it did not have “approval”, as explained in the document that crew members must sign before starting their visit to the Titanic and when they have already paid $250,000 for the trip.
“I have gone swimming with sharks, and they often ask me for dangerous things (in the program in which he works.” And in all those expeditions, the journalist assures, they have made him sign the same document. “They are only things for lawyers. It is what I thought (when I signed the OceanGate agreement). I thought they were just protecting themselves from lawsuits. I really didn’t think anyone would die.”
“There was something deep down inside that told me this is dangerous, but intellectually I was completely satisfied.”
During their expedition to the seabed, Pogue recounts in a video that during their trip they lost communication with the parent ship and they were lost for two and a half hours. In fact, on the first dive they did not get to see the remains of the ocean liner and that is why Rush -the company’s manager- offered them to go down again on another occasion that was more successful.
Hours before embarking on the submersible, the journalist admits to France 24: “There was a difference in me between my sense of emotional and intellectual security.”
Pogue says that the night before he could not sleep, “because the boat” where you spend the night before the dive (1,500 km off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada), “was rocking.” “And deep down there was something that told me it was dangerous, but intellectually I was completely satisfied. I mean, I wasn’t worried at all.” When they got into the submersible, everything changed, all fears disappeared and “we were all excited.”
The OceanGate CEO “viewed himself as much of a rebellious cowboy as Elon Musk or Steve Jobs”
Stockton Rush was enjoying it the most, he wanted to make history. In an interview with an American chain in 2021, he assured that “the future was not on Mars, but on the seabed”, of which we knew nothing. In fact, only less than 10% of it has been mapped globally.
“He saw himself as a rebellious cowboy like Elon Musk or Steve Jobs, doing things better, in a new way.” His plan was to document what was left of the Titanic before she disintegrated or was swept away. “In fact, he wasn’t making any money from this business,” Pogue explains that Stockton Rush confessed to him. “He hoped to win one day” because the Titan was not cheap, “the submersible’s gasoline alone for one summer cost a million dollars.”
“That thing,” Pogue says of the Titan, “had completed 20 trips to the Titanic wreckage without issue.”
We ask Pogue if he will continue to report risky experiences on television after the misfortune, and the answer is clear: ¨No, I’m done. My wife would never let me do anything risky again.
