Carbon fiber seems like a weird choice for this application anyway because its big advantage is in its tensile strength compared to its weight.
Here, it’s in compression, not tension. And its light weight doesn’t matter.
Here, it’s in compression, not tension. And its light weight doesn’t matter.
From their perspective it kinda made sense even though its not safe at all.
If they could they probably still wouldn't have done so. The founder who was onboard the Titan was known for calling safety regulations unnecessary and a barrier to "innovation", like a window only rated for a depth of 1300m used at 4000m.
It probably did, but unfortunately, I think the window of time was not enough the return to the surface (perhaps milliseconds, but who knows)
Carbon fibre is a ply. Plies are much harder to nondestructively inspect for flaws. That is an immediate, obvious risk in a use case involving cyclic pressure of hundreds of atmospheres. It is also brittle, so strain deformation does not occur nearly as much before fracture.
Welds are a vastly more well-understood feature that is possible to easily design around and - more critically - inspect afterwards. Metals also stretch before snapping, which is why you can go and measure the spacing of links on your bike chain and know when it’s time to replace it. All of this makes through-life maintenance and inspection much easier.
Carbon fibre was an incredibly poor design choice, selected to prioritise cost over safe operation.
So it seems it's more a matter of cost and passenger space than just weight alone.