Report: OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush was to blame for Titan sub disaster
OceanGate's Titan submersible imploded during a June 2023 dive to the Titanic, killing five people, including CEO Stockton Rush. More than two years on, a report spanning 335-pages concluded that the company 'failed to properly investigate and address' known issues, and pointed to worrying trends behind the scenes. The board found that OceanGate failed to properly investigate and address 'known hull anomalies' identified in 2022. It said the Titan's real time monitoring system produced data that 'should have been...acted on' a year before the tragedy. The Coast Guard determined that the Titan's implosion was ultimately caused by the loss of structural integrity of its hull, resulting in the 'instantaneous' death of everyone on board.
'The lack of both third-party oversight and experienced OceanGate employees on staff during their 2023 Titan operations allowed OceanGate's Chief Executive Officer to completely ignore vital inspections, data analyses, and preventative maintenance procedures, culminating in a catastrophic event,' the report concluded. The board also cited 'a toxic workplace culture at OceanGate, an inadequate domestic and international regulatory framework for submersible operations and vessels of novel design, and an ineffective whistleblower process'.
The Coast Guard convened its highest level of investigation in the aftermath of the 2023 implosion off Canada. The disappearance of the Titan led to a search that garbed worldwide attention. The submersible disaster has led to lawsuits and calls for tighter regulation of the developing private deep sea expedition industry. In its report, the board of investigation made 17 safety recommendations 'aimed at strengthening oversight of submersible operations, improving coordination among federal agencies and closing gaps in international maritime policy'.
Its conclusions focused on how OceanGate had failed to address the 'fundamental engineering principles' needed to dive in an 'inherently hazardous environment'. The submersible was designed to be able to reach some 4,000 meters below sea level - two hundred deeper than the wreck of the Titanic. The U.S. Navy detected sounds 'consistent with an implosion' shortly after the sub lost contact at around 3,500 meters below sea level. The submersible was designed to withstand the enormous pressure put on it at such depths. But according to the Coastguard's assessment, the Titan's carbon fibre construction led to flaws testing its integrity. 'Vital' inspections and data analyses were also then overlooked and 'completely ignored', it found.
The report goes on to take aim at perceived failures of company culture, lambasting a 'toxic workplace environment' at OceanGate. It claimed the company used the firing of staff to dissuade them from whistleblowing safety concerns. The report cites 'an experienced underwater explorer and submersible pilot' hired to pilot OceanGate's ANTIPODES, who suggested that 'the culture of OceanGate was one of "safety is not important"'. On one dive years prior, Mr Rush was alleged to have told the experienced pilot to 'sit the dive out so he could take his "rich friends" on the dive', the report says.
During the project, OceanGate had an incident that damaged the ANTIPODES, causing approximately $10,000 worth of damage to the vessel. During another dive in 2015, the CYCLOPS I experienced a malfunction. A Near Miss Report flagged how the starboard hatch latch mechanism became stuck and unable to fully engage while still at the dock. The mission nonetheless went ahead 'without 100% consensus from the group as to the safety of the partially latched starboard hatch.'
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Glasgow Times
3 hours ago
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Titan disaster 'was preventable', says US Coast Guard
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The National
5 hours ago
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The Independent
9 hours ago
- The Independent
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'A lot of our songs were coded, and this language is a language of survival, a language of resilience, a language of tenacity,' Singleton-Prather said, adding that despite slavery's brutality, the Gullah people were able to thrive, 'giving our children a legacy — not a legacy of shame and victimization, but a legacy of strength and resilience.' Discovering Gullah culture and the roots of Kumbaya Gullah culture includes art forms, language and food by the descendants of West Africans who have lived on the coasts of the Carolinas, Florida and Georgia since slavery. 'It's important to preserve the Gullah culture, mainly because it informs us all, African Americans, where they come from and that it's still here,' said Eric Crawford, author of 'Gullah Spirituals: The Sound of Freedom and Protest in the South Carolina Sea Islands.' For most of his life, he hadn't heard the word Gullah. That changed in 2007 with a student's master's thesis about Gullah culture in public schools. 'As I began to investigate it, I began to understand that 'Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen,' 'Roll Jordan Roll,' 'Kumbaya!' — all these iconic songs came from this area,' he said. Versions of these songs, he said, can be traced back to the 19th century when 'Slave Songs of the United States,' the first book of African American spirituals, was recorded on St. Helena Island. 'And so my question was: 'These songs that trace back to the 1800s — were they still being done over 150 years later?'' He was so curious that he traveled to St. Helena, where he met the singers and began recording their music. 'These songs became pivotal,' Crawford said, sitting on the original wooden pews of the island's Mary Jenkins Praise House. 'They were forced to go to their owners' church and stay in the balcony. But then in the evening, typically on Sunday evenings, Tuesday and Thursday, they had this space by themselves, away from the watchful eye of the owners, and they could engage in their own songs.' At the praise houses, he said, they connected with their ancestors following West and Central African practices. Prayers and song would end with a counterclockwise dance and a 'ring shout' — a rare outlet of joy for the enslaved. These days the singers no longer rise to do the ring shout due to their age. But at a recent concert they clapped their hands in one rhythm, stomped the floor in another and swayed, singing at the island's Brick Baptist Church. 'These singers are as close as we would ever come to how the enslaved sang these songs,' Crawford said. 'That authenticity — you just cannot duplicate that.' The Voices of Gullah goes global He began to take the singers on tour in 2014. Since then, they've performed across the U.S. as well as in Belize and Mexico. The touring band's members include Gadson; 89-year-old Rosa Murray; 87-year-old Joe Murray; and their son, Charles 'Jojo' Brown. 'I'm gonna continue doing it until I can't do it no more, and hope that younger people will come in, others younger than me, to keep it going,' said Brown who, at 71, is affectionally called the 'baby.' His mother agrees. Sitting in her living room, surrounded by framed photos of dozens of grandchildren, she said she'll continue singing for them. 'I hope and pray one or two of them will fall in my footsteps,' she said. 'I'm leaving a legacy for them to do what I'm doing for the Lord.' Other community members share that mission to teach future generations. The Gullah Heritage Trails Tours take visitors through historic neighborhoods surrounded by beaches, wealthy vacation homes and golf resorts on Hilton Head Island. The tours were started by a family of 12 brothers and sisters in 1996. 'We thought it was important for people to know that Gullah people live on this island,' said Emory Campbell, 82, who helped translate the New Testament into Gullah and for decades led the respected Penn Center, one of the country's first schools for freed slaves. 'If we don't know who we are, we're lost,' said Marlena Smalls, a singer and actor who for decades has been performing adaptations of Gullah spirituals for new audiences and founded the popular Gullah Festival. Her work even appeared on an SAT question about Gullah culture. 'I want to know who I am. And I want my children to know who they are and their children to know who they are. That's why it's important,' said Smalls, who is also known for playing Bubba's mother in the film 'Forrest Gump.' Her adaptations of Gullah music, she said, are a way of preserving it by appealing to a mass audience. But she treasures the old spirituals, calling the group of singers, 'true keepers of the culture.' Given their age, Crawford sometimes asks himself 'who will carry the torch.' He has been working to get grants so students can also start projects to preserve the songs, language and culture. On a recent day, a group of students from Atlanta's Morehouse College arrived at the Mary Jenkins Praise House to admire a site built in the early 1900s. 'It is a portal into the past and a window into the future,' said Tendaji Bailey, 35, founder of 'Gullah Geechee Futures,' a project that focuses on the preservation of Gullah communities and cultural sites. For the past three years, he has been bringing Morehouse students to visit praise houses. 'They hear some of the prayers, some of the songs, and they always come out of that experience transformed. So, I know that there's power in this place, still.' ___ Associated Press journalist Jessie Wardarski contributed to this report. ___ Associated Press religion coverage receives support through the AP's collaboration with The Conversation US, with funding from Lilly Endowment Inc. The AP is solely responsible for this content.
