Latest news with #TitanSubmarine
The Sun
26-05-2025
- The Sun
Doomed Titan submarine boss Stockton Rush was ‘psychopath' who ‘wanted fame' & it was a ‘certainty' vessel would implode
THE BOSS of the doomed Titan submarine has been labelled a "psychopath" who was desperate for fame by ex-OceanGate employees. Stockton Rush, 61, who died in the June 2023 disaster, had accused those who tried to raise safety concerns on the doomed sub of trying to stop innovation. 10 10 10 10 10 Brit Hamish Harding, 58, father and son duo Shahzada, 48, and Suleman Dawood, 19, and French national Paul-Henri Nargeolet, 77, also sadly died in the horror incident. A frantic search that captured the world's attention was sparked after contact was lost with the sub. While there was hope that the passengers might be found alive, it was later confirmed the vessel had imploded - killing all on board. A new bombshell Netflix documentary has revealed the events that unfolded in the run-up to the tragic 2023 incident, with those who knew the expedition company and its billionaire boss Rush sharing inside information on OceanGate. In 2018, OceanGate's then chief pilot David Lochridge was fired after his inspection report laid bare a series of safety risks. He has said that he believed Rush "wanted fame" to "fuel his ego". And a former engineering director at the firm Tony Nissen described the CEO as being "a borderline psychopath". Another ex-colleague to Rush, Bonnie Carl, also revealed a bizarre interaction she had with the OceanGate boss as she worked as a human resources and finance director at the firm. She recalled her reaction after Rush randomly announced she would be the company's next sub pilot. Carl said: "Are you nuts? I'm an accountant." 'What's that bang?' Chilling moment sound of doomed Titan sub imploding heard from support ship And despite there apparently being "no way of knowing" when the Titan would fail, there was "a mathematical certainty" that it would happen, another interviewee said. Rob McCallum, who has led seven dives to the Titanic, told The Sun last June that the tragedy was "unavoidable" as OceanGate received repeated warnings their sub wasn't safe. Titan was never certified or classed, and McCallum implored Rush to let an independent agency test his vessel. McCallum said the businessman refused to listen, however, and simply brushed aside warnings. He told The Sun: "I run an expedition company that had delivered over 1,500 expeditions - we are not cavalier, we manage risk as far as we can. "So when OceanGate say things like exploration involves risk, yes it does, but that doesn't give you carte blanche to ignore obvious danger." Rush accused those trying to raise safety concerns of trying to stop innovation. 10 10 10 10 10 The engineer, who co-founded OceanGate in 2009, created Titan with an experimental design made up of a carbon-fiber pod with titanium rings bolted on. McCallum, who founded expedition company EYOS, said carbon fiber material is not fit for submerging so deep underwater. But McCallum's warning that carbon fiber would not withstand such pressure, Rush informed him he was "going to carry on regardless". "He had a counter view, he figured he was being innovative," McCallum added. Rush had previously taken the sub down to sea off the Bahamas during testing four years earlier. Just days ago, a haunting video was obtained by the BBC and presented to the US Coast Guard's Marine Board of Investigation. It shows Wendy Rush – wife of Rush – staring at a computer used to receive messages from the Titan when a deep metallic thud rings out. Wendy, visibly startled, freezes before glancing up and asking the crew: 'What was that bang?' Seconds later, a message arrives from the sub: 'dropped two wts' – a reference to the Titan shedding weights to control its dive. But the timing of the message was tragically misleading. According to investigators, the sub had already imploded. The sound reached the surface faster than the delayed text, giving the false impression all was well. All five people onboard were killed instantly when the vessel collapsed under immense pressure at a depth of around 3,300m – just 90 minutes into the £195,000-a-head journey. Meanwhile, earlier this year, a 20-second audio clip recorded 900 miles from the implosion site emerged, capturing what experts believe was the actual moment the Titan was crushed. The eerie recording revealed the 'acoustic signature' of the vessel's final seconds. Rescue hopes were initially high when Titan vanished from sonar on June 18, 2023. But days later, its shattered remains were discovered scattered across the ocean floor – an area the size of six football pitches. How the Titan tragedy unfolded By Katie Davis, Chief Foreign Reporter (Digital) FIVE men plunged beneath the surface of the North Atlantic in a homemade sub in a bid to explore the Titanic wreckage. Four passengers paid £195,000 each to go on the sub, with the fifth member of the trip being a crew member. But what was supposed to be a short trip spiralled into days of agony as the doomed Titan vanished without a trace on June 18, 2023. The daring mission had been months in the making - and almost didn't happen at the hands of harsh weather conditions in Newfoundland, Canada. In a now chilling Facebook post, passenger Hamish Harding wrote: "Due to the worst winter in Newfoundland in 40 years, this mission is likely to be the first and only manned mission to the Titanic in 2023. "A weather window has just opened up and we are going to attempt a dive tomorrow." It would be his final Facebook post. The following morning, he and four others - led by Stockton Rush - began the 12,5000ft descent towards the bottom of the Atlantic. But as it made its way down into the depths, the vessel lost all contact with its mother ship on the surface, the Polar Prince. It sparked a frantic four-day search for signs of life, with the hunt gripping the entire world. There was hope that by some miracle, the crew was alive and desperately waiting to be saved. But that sparked fears rescue teams faced a race against time as the passengers only had a 96-hour oxygen supply when they set out, which would be quickly dwindling. Then, when audio of banging sounds was detected under the water, it inspired hope that the victims were trapped and signalling to be rescued. It heartbreakingly turned out that the banging noises were likely either ocean noises or from other search ships, the US Navy determined. Countries around the world deployed their resources to aid the search, and within days the Odysseus remote-operated vehicle (ROV) was sent down to where the ghostly wreck of the Titanic sits. The plan was for the ROV to hook onto the sub and bring it up 10,000ft, where it would meet another ROV before heading to the surface. But any hopes of a phenomenal rescue were dashed when Odysseus came across a piece of debris from the sub around 1,600ft from the Titanic. The rescue mission tragically turned into a salvage task, and the heartbroken families of those on board were told the devastating news. It was confirmed by the US Coast Guard that the sub had suffered a "catastrophic implosion".
Daily Mail
24-05-2025
- Daily Mail
Titan submarine victim's devastated wife blames 'ego and arrogance' after her billionaire husband and son were killed on undersea trip to see the Titanic
The wife of one of the men to die in the Titan submarine disaster has blamed 'ego and arrogance' for the deaths of her husband and son. Christine Dawood lost her billionaire British-Pakistani husband Shahzada, 48, and son Suleman, 19, on board the Oceangate vessel on a tour of the Titanic wreck in June 2023. OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, 61, British businessman Hamish Harding, 58, and former French navy diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet, 77, also died when the submarine imploded almost 4km under the sea, instantly killing everyone on board. Now Ms Dawood, who was born in Germany but is from Surrey, is calling for proper regulation of the sector after concerns were raised about the safety of the vessel in the first place. Criticising Stockton, who she said enticed her Titantic-obsessed husband and son on the $250,000-per-head trip, she told the BBC: 'I guess the American way of talking and presenting themselves is very different to ours, so I just thought they are a lot more egocentric. 'I mean, there is a lot of, 'we are awesome,' and the American dream, and, 'we can do it.' Ms Dawood has been left horrified by the ongoing two-year investigation into the tragedy, questioning how OceanGate were able to operate after safety were flagged multiple times. 'I wanted to hear the confidence of the person who built it, who ran the company, but also he surrounded himself with literal experts. I mean, one died with them. If you have an expert like this with you, I mean, you don't doubt.' She continued: 'The arrogance of the people in charge when they think that they're above everything. That really gets to me. 'Why is ego and arrogance more important than safety? The irony is not lost on me that the Titanic sunk for exactly the same reasons.' It is believed the vessel imploded around 90 minutes into its descent with its wreckage later found 330 yards away from the bow of the ship. The submersible suddenly lost contact with its support vessel, Polar Prince, after just about an hour and 45 minutes into the two-and-a-half hour descent. One of the last messages from the crew to Polar Prince before the submersible imploded stated, 'all good here,' according to a visual re-creation presented at a Coast Guard hearing last year. But the loss of contact sparked an international manhunt to track down the missing vessel which had plunged 12,400ft - more than twice as deep as the Grand Canyon - under the North Atlantic ocean. Eventually, however, the wreckage of the ship was found on the ocean floor about 330 yards off the bow of the Titanic, with Coast Guard officials reporting that no one on board survived. Ms Dawood told how there was some comfort in learning that the submarine had imploded, as it meant her husband and son did not suffer as they would have been killed instantly. And she is currently part-way through a challenge to honour her son's death, by walking 800km from Surrey to Glasgow. Following the tragedy, questions emerged about the safety of the submersible, which had been making voyages to the Titanic wreckage site going back to 2021. It was later revealed that the vessel was being operated by a video game controller, and leaders in the field of deep-sea exploration had even warned Mr Rush five years earlier that the company's 'experimental' methods could end in 'catastrophic' disaster. Others inside the company also expressed concerns, including David Lochridge, who worked as the Titan project's director of marine operations. He had demanded more rigorous safety checks on the sub - including 'testing to prove its integrity'. Lochridge also wanted the company to carry out a scan of Titan's hull to 'detect potential flaws' rather than 'relying on acoustic monitoring' – which would only detect an issue 'milliseconds before an implosion'. But he was unceremoniously booted from the company in the aftermath, as Rush continually brushed off the concerns. He even suggested at one point that questions about the Titan's safety credentials was 'personally insulting' and he branded claims he was 'going to kill someone' as 'baseless.' Rush went as far as saying he was 'tired of industry players who try to use a safety argument to stop innovation' as he appeared resentful of the 'obscenely safe' regulations he viewed as an obstacle to development and innovation. He, too, died in the incident. By September last year, the US Coastguard conducted public hearings to grill company executives on what may have gone wrong. At the hearing, Karl Stanley, a submersible pilot and designer of the Roatan Institute of Deepsea Exploration, claimed Rush was more concerned with leaving 'his mark on history' than keeping his passengers safe. 'He knew that eventually it was going to end like this, and he wasn't going to be held accountable,' Stanley testified. 'But he was going to be the most famous of all his famous relatives.' Stanley went on to say he had tried to flag safety concerns he noticed during a test drive in April 2019, including cracking noises and issues with drop weights. He emailed Rush, who dismissed the concerns. 'I felt also, this exchange of emails strained our relationship from what it had been previously,' he said. 'I felt like I pushed things as far as I could without him telling me to shut up and never talk to him again.' And this week new footage released by the US Coastguard shows Wendy Rush, the wife of Stockton Rush, trying to contact the doomed crew during their descent to the wreck of the Titanic. Mrs Rush, who was monitoring the sub's progress from a support ship, can be seen reacting to a noise that sounded like a 'door slamming'. She then turns to a team member sitting behind her and asks 'what was that bang?' Moments later Mrs Rush, who was a director of OceanGate with her husband, received a text message saying the sub had dropped two weights. While she initially assumed this meant the dive was proceeding as planned, investigators now believe the 'bang' she heard was the moment the sub imploded. It is thought the message she received was in fact sent just before the tragedy with its arrival being delayed due to the sound of the implosion. OceanGate, based in Washington state, suspended its operations after the implosion. The company has no full-time employees currently, but was represented by an attorney during the hearing. The company said it has been fully co-operating with the Coast Guard and the National Transportation Safety Board investigations since they began.
The Sun
23-05-2025
- General
- The Sun
Chilling moment doomed Titan sub disappears into the bottom of the sea in ominous test dive before implosion tragedy
THIS IS the horrifying moment the doomed Titan submarine was plunged into darkness during an ominous test dive. The sub would later implode in a tragedy that stunned the world - and left its five passengers dead. 7 7 7 7 Brit Hamish Harding, 58, father and son duo Shahzada, 48, and Suleman Dawood, 19, and French national Paul-Henri Nargeolet, 77, would sadly die in the June 2023 disaster. Then OceanGate Expeditions Chief Executive Stockton Rush, 61 also perished on the fateful voyage. Rush had previously taken the sub down to sea off the Bahamas during testing four years earlier. Passengers on this trip have outlined how the sub ran into trouble during in a forthcoming documentary on BBC Two next Tuesday at 9pm. In a terrifying moment, they are said to have heard a noise "like a gunshot", after which the exterior lights went off. The sub then lost full vertical thrust availability when one of its battery banks failed. One passenger claimed the vessel was "within a few percentage points of implosion" during the April 2019 trip. Submersibles expert Karl Stanley told the documentary: "I did not even come close to appreciating the real danger. "I was the one that was like 'hey, capture this moment'. I was happy to be there." Underwater electronics technician Petros Mathioudakis was also on the dive. 'What's that bang?' Chilling moment sound of doomed Titan sub imploding heard from support ship He said: "I was aware that this was extremely risky. And Stockton was very clear. "He said do you have a wife, and I said 'no'. Do you have kids? And I said 'no'. And he said OK, you're in." Describing the terrifying moment, he added: "The first time the carbon fibre made a noise in that hull, it was extremely loud - it was like a gunshot. "Any noise would have been loud – that was loud. "Everyone stops talking for a little bit and 'OK, I think we're OK', you know." Along with the loud noises, the sub's lights went dark - with a video from onboard showing the nerve-shredding conditions. Stanley said: "The supposed goal of the trip was to test it to the exact depth of the Titanic. They got 96% of the way there. "The cracking sounds were continuing, so at some point collectively we came to a decision of 'well, that's good enough." Despite warnings from experts and former OceanGate staff, Titan continued to make dives. How the Titan tragedy unfolded By Katie Davis, Chief Foreign Reporter (Digital) FIVE men plunged beneath the surface of the North Atlantic in a homemade sub in a bid to explore the Titanic wreckage. Four passengers paid £195,000 each to go on the sub, with the fifth member of the trip being a crew member. But what was supposed to be a short trip spiralled into days of agony as the doomed Titan vanished without a trace on June 18, 2023. The daring mission had been months in the making - and almost didn't happen at the hands of harsh weather conditions in Newfoundland, Canada. In a now chilling Facebook post, passenger Hamish Harding wrote: "Due to the worst winter in Newfoundland in 40 years, this mission is likely to be the first and only manned mission to the Titanic in 2023. "A weather window has just opened up and we are going to attempt a dive tomorrow." It would be his final Facebook post. The following morning, he and four others - led by Stockton Rush - began the 12,5000ft descent towards the bottom of the Atlantic. But as it made its way down into the depths, the vessel lost all contact with its mother ship on the surface, the Polar Prince. It sparked a frantic four-day search for signs of life, with the hunt gripping the entire world. There was hope that by some miracle, the crew was alive and desperately waiting to be saved. But that sparked fears rescue teams faced a race against time as the passengers only had a 96-hour oxygen supply when they set out, which would be quickly dwindling. Then, when audio of banging sounds was detected under the water, it inspired hope that the victims were trapped and signalling to be rescued. It heartbreakingly turned out that the banging noises were likely either ocean noises or from other search ships, the US Navy determined. Countries around the world deployed their resources to aid the search, and within days the Odysseus remote-operated vehicle (ROV) was sent down to where the ghostly wreck of the Titanic sits. The plan was for the ROV to hook onto the sub and bring it up 10,000ft, where it would meet another ROV before heading to the surface. But any hopes of a phenomenal rescue were dashed when Odysseus came across a piece of debris from the sub around 1,600ft from the Titanic. The rescue mission tragically turned into a salvage task, and the heartbroken families of those on board were told the devastating news. It was confirmed by the US Coast Guard that the sub had suffered a "catastrophic implosion". Deep-sea explorer Victor Vescovo said: 'I specifically told them that it was simply a matter of time before it failed catastrophically.' Another clip from the day of the tragedy shows Wendy Rush – Stockton Rush's wife – looking at a computer used to receive messages from the Titan when a deep metallic thud rings out. All five people onboard were killed instantly when the vessel collapsed under immense pressure at around 3,300m of depth. 7 7
