Major search underway for missing Titanic wreck submarine

[spaminator]

Engineer says he felt pressured to get Titan submersible ready
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Patrick Whittle and Lisa J. Adams Wagner
Published Sep 16, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 4 minute read

The lead engineer for an experimental submersible that imploded en route to the wreck of the Titanic testified Monday that he felt pressured to get the vessel ready to dive and refused to pilot it for a journey several years earlier.


“’I’m not getting in it,”’ Tony Nissen said he told Stockton Rush, co-founder of the OceanGate company that owned the Titan submersible.

Nissen, OceanGate’s former engineering director, was the first witness to testify at what is expected to be a two-week U.S. Coast Guard hearing. The Titan imploded on June 18, 2023, killing Rush and four others on board and setting off a worldwide debate about the future of private undersea exploration.

Nissen said Rush could be difficult to work for and was often very concerned with costs and project schedules, among other issues. He said Rush would fight for what he wanted, which often changed day to day. He added that he tried to keep the clashes between the two of them behind closed doors so that others in the company wouldn’t be aware.


“Most people would eventually just back down to Stockton,” he said at the hearing in North Charleston, South Carolina.

Nissen also noted that the Titan was struck by lightning during a test mission in 2018, and that might have compromised its hull.

When asked if there was pressure to get the Titan into the water, he responded, “100%.”

He said that he refused to pilot the Titan years ago because he didn’t trust the operations staff, and that he stopped the submersible from going to the Titanic in 2019, telling Rush that the Titan was “not working like we thought it would.” He was fired that year. The Titan did undergo additional testing before it made later dives to the Titanic, Nissen added.

Asked if he felt the pressure from Rush compromised safety decisions and testing, Nissen paused, then replied, “No. And that’s a difficult question to answer, because given infinite time and infinite budget, you could do infinite testing.”


The submersible was left exposed to the elements while in storage for seven months in 2022 and 2023, and the hull was also never reviewed by any third parties as is standard procedure, Coast Guard representatives said in their initial remarks. The absence of an independent review and the submersible’s unconventional design subjected the Titan to scrutiny in the undersea exploration community.

One of the last messages from the Titan’s crew to the support ship Polar Prince before the submersible imploded stated, “all good here,” according to a visual re-creation presented earlier in the hearing.

The crew lost contact after an exchange of texts about the submersible’s depth and weight as it descended. The Polar Prince then sent repeated messages asking if the Titan could still see the ship on its onboard display.


OceanGate, based in Washington state, suspended operations after the implosion. The company’s former finance and human resources director, Bonnie Carl, testified Monday that she was aware of safety concerns about the Titan, and that the company’s operations director, David Lochridge, had characterized it as “unsafe.” Lochridge is scheduled to testify on Tuesday.


Among those not on the witness list is Rush’s widow, Wendy Rush, the company’s communications director. Asked about her absence, spokesperson Melissa Leake said the Coast Guard would have no comment. She said it’s common for a Marine Board of Investigation to “hold multiple hearing sessions or conduct additional witness depositions for complex cases.”


Also scheduled to appear later in the hearing are OceanGate co-founder Guillermo Sohnlein and former scientific director, Steven Ross, according to a list compiled by the Coast Guard. Numerous guard officials, scientists, and government and industry officials are also expected to testify. The U.S. Coast Guard subpoenaed witnesses who were not government employees, Leake said.

OceanGate has no full-time employees at this time but will be represented by an attorney during the hearing, the company said in a statement. The company has been fully cooperating with the Coast Guard and NTSB investigations since they began, the statement said. The Titan had been making voyages to the Titanic wreckage site going back to 2021.


Last year, the submersible lost contact with its support vessel about two hours after it made its final dive. When it was reported overdue, rescuers rushed ships, planes and other equipment to an area about 700 kilometres south of St. John’s, Newfoundland.

The search for the submersible attracted worldwide attention, as it became increasingly unlikely that anyone could have survived the implosion. Wreckage of the Titan was subsequently found on the ocean floor about 330 yards (300 metres) off the bow of the Titanic, Coast Guard officials said.

The time frame for the investigation was initially a year, but the inquiry has taken longer. The ongoing Marine Board of Investigation is the highest level of marine casualty investigation conducted by the Coast Guard. When the hearing concludes, recommendations will be submitted to the Coast Guard’s commandant. The National Transportation Safety Board is also conducting an investigation.

“There are no words to ease the loss endured by the families impacted by this tragic incident,” said Jason Neubauer of the Coast Guard Office of Investigations, who led the hearing. “But we hope that this hearing will help shed light on the cause of the tragedy and prevent anything like this from happening again.”

Engineer says he felt pressured to get Titan submersible ready

The engineer for a submersible that imploded en route to the wreck of the Titanic testified that he felt pressured to get the vessel ready.

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[spaminator]

A key employee who called the Titan unsafe testifies the company only wanted to make money
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Patrick Whittle
Published Sep 17, 2024 • Last updated 1 day ago • 4 minute read

A key employee who labeled a doomed experimental submersible unsafe prior to its last, fatal voyage testified Tuesday that he frequently clashed with the company’s co-founder and felt the company was committed only to making money.


David Lochridge, OceanGate’s former operations director, is one of the most anticipated witnesses to appear before a commission trying to determine what caused the Titan to implode en route to the wreckage of the Titanic last year, killing all five on board. His testimony echoed that of other former employees Monday, one of whom described OceanGate head Stockton Rush as volatile and difficult to work with.

“The whole idea behind the company was to make money,” Lochridge said. “There was very little in the way of science.”

Rush was among the five people who died in the implosion. OceanGate owned the Titan and brought it on several dives to the Titanic going back to 2021.

Lochridge’s testimony began a day after other witnesses painted a picture of a troubled company that was impatient to get its unconventionally designed craft into the water. The accident set off a worldwide debate about the future of private undersea exploration.


Lochridge joined the company in the mid-2010s as a veteran engineer and submersible pilot and said he quickly came to feel he was being used to lend the company scientific credibility. He said he felt the company was selling him as part of the project “for people to come up and pay money,” and that did not sit well with him.

“I was, I felt, a show pony,” he said. “I was made by the company to stand up there and do talks. It was difficult. I had to go up and do presentations. All of it.”

Lochridge referenced a 2018 report in which he raised safety issues about OceanGate operations. He said with all of the safety issues he saw “there was no way I was signing off on this.”

Asked whether he had confidence in the way the Titan was being built, he said: “No confidence whatsoever.”


Employee turnover was very high at the time, said Lochridge, and leadership dismissed his concerns because they were more focused on “bad engineering decisions” and a desire to get to the Titanic as quickly as possible and start making money. He eventually was fired after raising the safety concerns, he said.

“I didn’t want to lose my job. I wanted to do the Titanic. But to dive it safely. It was on my bucket list, too,” he said.

OceanGate, based in Washington state, suspended its operations after the implosion.

OceanGate’s former engineering director, Tony Nissen, kicked off Monday’s testimony, telling investigators he felt pressured to get the vessel ready to dive and refused to pilot it for a journey several years before Titan’s last trip. Nissen worked on a prototype hull that predated the Titanic expeditions.


“‘I’m not getting in it,”’ Nissen said he told Rush.

When asked if there was pressure to get Titan into the water, Nissen responded, “100%.”

But asked if he felt that the pressure compromised safety decisions and testing, Nissen paused, then replied, “No. And that’s a difficult question to answer, because given infinite time and infinite budget, you could do infinite testing.”

OceanGate’s former finance and human resources director, Bonnie Carl, testified Monday that Lochridge had characterized the Titan as “unsafe.”

Coast Guard officials noted at the start of the hearing that the submersible had not been independently reviewed, as is standard practice. That and Titan’s unusual design subjected it to scrutiny in the undersea exploration community.


During the submersible’s final dive on June 18, 2023, the crew lost contact after an exchange of texts about the Titan’s depth and weight as it descended. The support ship Polar Prince then sent repeated messages asking if the Titan could still see the ship on its onboard display.

One of the last messages from Titan’s crew to Polar Prince before the submersible imploded stated, “all good here,” according to a visual re-creation presented earlier in the hearing.

When the submersible was reported overdue, rescuers rushed ships, planes and other equipment to an area about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. John’s, Newfoundland. Wreckage of the Titan was subsequently found on the ocean floor about 330 yards (300 meters) off the bow of the Titanic, Coast Guard officials said.


Scheduled to appear later in the hearing are OceanGate co-founder Guillermo Sohnlein and former scientific director, Steven Ross, according to a list compiled by the Coast Guard. Numerous guard officials, scientists, and government and industry officials are also expected to testify. The U.S. Coast Guard subpoenaed witnesses who were not government employees, said Coast Guard spokesperson Melissa Leake.

Among those not on the hearing witness list is Rush’s widow, Wendy Rush, the company’s communications director. Asked about her absence, Leake said the Coast Guard does not comment on the reasons for not calling specific individuals to a particular hearing during ongoing investigations. She said it’s common for a Marine Board of Investigation to “hold multiple hearing sessions or conduct additional witness depositions for complex cases.”


OceanGate has no full-time employees at this time but will be represented by an attorney during the hearing, the company said in a statement. The company said it has been fully cooperating with the Coast Guard and NTSB investigations since they began.

The time frame for the investigation was initially a year, but the inquiry has taken longer. The ongoing Marine Board of Investigation is the highest level of marine casualty investigation conducted by the Coast Guard. When the hearing concludes, recommendations will be submitted to the Coast Guard’s commandant. The National Transportation Safety Board is also conducting an investigation.

A key employee who called the Titan unsafe testifies the company only wanted to make money

When asked if there was pressure to get Titan into the water, Nissen responded, "100%."

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[spaminator]

NTSB engineer says carbon fibre hull from Titan submersible showed signs of flaws
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
Patrick Whittle and David Sharp
Published Sep 25, 2024 • Last updated 16 hours ago • 3 minute read

The carbon fibre hull of the experimental submersible that imploded en route to the wreckage of the Titanic had imperfections dating to the manufacturing process and behaved differently after a loud bang was heard on one of the dives the year before the tragedy, an engineer with the National Transportation Safety Board said Wednesday.


Engineer Don Kramer told a Coast Guard panel there were wrinkles, porosity and voids in the carbon fibre used for the pressure hull of OceanGate’s Titan submersible. Two different types of sensors on Titan recorded the “loud acoustic event” that earlier witnesses testified about hearing on a dive on July 15, 2022, he said.

Hull pieces recovered after the tragedy showed substantial delamination of the layers of carbon fibre, which were bonded to create the hull of the experimental submersible, he said.

OceanGate co-founder Stockton Rush was among the five people who died when the Titan submersible imploded in June 2023.

Kramer’s statements were followed by testimony from William Kohnen, a longtime submersibles expert and key members of the Marine Technology Society. Kohnen emerged as a critic of OceanGate in the aftermath of the implosion and has described the disaster as preventable.


On Wednesday, Kohnen pushed back at the idea the Titan could not have been thoroughly tested before use because of its experimental nature. He also said OceanGate’s operations raised concerns among many people in the industry.

Kohnen said “I don’t think many people ever told Stockton no.” He described Rush as not receptive to outside scrutiny.

“This is not something where we don’t want you to do it. We want you to do it right,” Kohnen said.

The Coast Guard opened a public hearing earlier this month that is part of a high level investigation into the cause of the implosion. Some of the testimony has focused on the submersible’s carbon fibre construction, which was unusual. Other testimony focused on the troubled nature of the company.


Coast Guard officials noted at the start of the hearing that the submersible had not been independently reviewed, as is standard practice. That and Titan’s unusual design subjected it to scrutiny in the undersea exploration community.

Earlier in the hearing, former OceanGate operations director David Lochridge said he frequently clashed with Rush and felt the company was committed only to making money.

Lochridge and other previous witnesses painted a picture of a company that was impatient to get its unconventionally designed craft into the water. The accident set off a worldwide debate about the future of private undersea exploration.

The hearing is expected to run through Friday and include several more witnesses, some of whom were closely connected to the company.


The co-founder of the company told the Coast Guard panel Monday that he hoped a silver lining of the disaster is that it will inspire a renewed interest in exploration, including the deepest waters of the world’s oceans. Businessman Guillermo Sohnlein, who helped found OceanGate with Rush, ultimately left the company before the Titan disaster.

OceanGate, based in Washington state, suspended its operations after the implosion. The company has no full-time employees currently, but has been represented by an attorney during the hearing.

During the submersible’s final dive on June 18, 2023, the crew lost contact after an exchange of texts about Titan’s depth and weight as it descended. The support ship Polar Prince then sent repeated messages asking if Titan could still see the ship on its onboard display.


One of the last messages from Titan’s crew to Polar Prince before the submersible imploded stated, “all good here,” according to a visual re-creation presented earlier in the hearing.

When the submersible was reported overdue, rescuers rushed ships, planes and other equipment to an area about 700 kilometres south of St. John’s, Newfoundland. Wreckage of the Titan was subsequently found on the ocean floor about 330 yards (300 metres) off the bow of the Titanic, Coast Guard officials said. No one on board survived.

NTSB engineer says carbon fibre hull from Titan submersible showed signs of flaws

Engineer Don Kramer said there were wrinkles, porosity and voids in the carbon fibre used for the pressure hull of the Titan submersible.

torontosun.com

 

[spaminator]

Titan implosion hearing paints a picture of reckless greed and explorer passion
Author of the article:Associated Press
Associated Press
David Sharp
Published Sep 27, 2024 • Last updated 19 hours ago • 4 minute read

Two weeks of testimony suggested the company responsible for an experimental deep-water submersible that imploded, killing five people, either recklessly ignored warning signs in the name of profits or represented the nation’s explorer spirit in taking calculated risks to push humankind’s boundaries.


Those contrasting viewpoints emerged as the Coast Guard panel tasked with determining why the carbon-fibre Titan was lost 12,500 feet (3,810 meters) deep wrapped up testimony Friday with new information that could have changed how rescuers responded and more discussion of the company co-founder’s cavalier attitude.

Capt. Jamie Frederick, commander of the Coast Guard sector based in Boston, appeared surprised to learn Friday that the crew of Titan’s support vessel, in hindsight, felt there was a slight shudder around the time the submersible imploded on its way to the wreckage of the Titanic last year.

Frederick said it was “unconscionable that they wouldn’t share that” and said it could have changed the rescue response. “It certainly would’ve changed the equation,” he testified.


Also Friday, an OceanGate employee testified he resigned after a “tense” conversation in which co-founder Stockton Rush told him the vessel would be flagged in the Bahamas and launched from Canada to avoid U.S. scrutiny — and arrogantly brushed aside U.S. regulatory concerns if it went to a U.S. port.

The worker, Matthew McCoy, said Rush told him: “If the Coast Guard became a problem, then he would buy himself a congressman and make it go away.”

Previous testimony painted contrasting images of greed and hubris with well-heeled clients paying to ride in a submersible made from carbon fibre — a material that was untested at such depths — versus modern-day explorers taking calculated risks to open the ocean’s deepest depths to more people.


Guillermo Sohnlein, who helped found OceanGate with Rush, described the lofty goal “to give humanity greater access to the ocean, specifically the deep ocean.” Using carbon fibre for the pressure hull was hardly a novel idea, he said, and noted Rush himself was the first human to test the design.

But former operations director David Lochridge said the company was committed only to profit making.

“The whole idea behind the company was to make money,” he testified. “There was very little in the way of science.”

Witnesses could not even agree on what to call the wealthy clients who paid $250,000 for the experience. Some said they were simply passengers, even though OceanGate called them “mission specialists” who were given tasks.


Killed in the implosion were Rush and four others including Paul-Henri Nargeolet, who was director of underwater research for RMS Titanic, which holds the legal rights to salvage the wreck of the ship. Nargeolet’s family is suing for more than $50 million, accusing the sub’s operator of gross negligence.

The carbon-fibre pressure hull of Titan was the subject of much of the discussion. An expert witness, Roy Thomas, senior principal engineer at the American Bureau of Shipping, testified that carbon-fibre may be strong and light, but that it’s tricky to manufacture. Carbon fibre also is “susceptible to fatigue failure” under repeated pressurization and salt water can weaken the material in multiple ways, he said.


Coast Guard officials noted at the start of the hearing, held in South Carolina, that the submersible had not been independently reviewed, as is standard practice.

Witnesses testified they had heard loud cracking sounds in past descents. And scientific director Steven Ross said that, on a dive just a few days before the Titan imploded, the vessel became unstable because of a ballast problem, causing passengers to tumble and crash into a bulkhead.

During its final dive on June 18, 2023, the crew lost contact after an exchange of texts as it descended. One of the last messages from Titan’s crew to the Polar Prince support ship before the submersible imploded stated, “all good here.” The crew of Polar Prince, meanwhile, grew increasingly concerned.


Ships, planes and other equipment assembled for a rescue operation about 700 kilometres south of St. John’s, Newfoundland. Wreckage of the Titan was subsequently found on the ocean floor about 330 yards (300 metres) off the bow of the Titanic, Coast Guard officials said.

Frederick testified Friday about the massive effort to bring together experts and resources, while noting that OceanGate had no emergency backup plan. “We brought a team together, came up with a plan,” he said.

After receiving reports of noises from the ocean floor, the Coast Guard-led team operated under the possibility there could be survivors until several days after contact was lost with the Titan, when the Navy said its analysis was “100% certain” that the underwater sounds were not human in nature, Frederick said.


“As soon as we received that information, I shared it with the families before we released it to the media,” said Frederick, who personally handled the notifications to family members.

It took a massive effort to get a remote submersible capable of researching the ocean floor to the scene, he said.

Three C-17 military transport aircraft moved 70,000 pounds (32,000 kilograms) of gear to Canada’s Newfoundland, where it was transferred to a ship and transported to the scene, Frederick said. Once there, Pelagic Research Services’ remote-operated submersible “Odysseus” quickly found the Titan’s debris field, he said.

Titan implosion hearing paints a picture of reckless greed and explorer passion

Witnesses testified that the company that operated an experimental deep-water submersible put profits over safety.

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