I don't understand why they didn't just drop it to the bottom of the ocean without people hundred times to see if it still holds. Who experiments with a crew in the age of remote control sensors and computers?
From what I've read, in there minds there hull design was the best part of the sub. I inclined to believe he believed it, since the CEO frequently dove in it.
"This is shaping up as a rebuilding year for the nearly 11-year-old venture, based in Everett, Wash. The main task on the agenda is to build two new submersibles capable of diving as deep as 6,000 meters (3.7 miles), which is more than a mile deeper than the part of the North Atlantic ocean floor where the Titanic is resting.
OceanGate will take advantage of lessons learned during the construction of its carbon-hulled Titan submersible, which was originally built for Titanic journeys. Rush said tests that were conducted at the Deep Ocean Test Facility in Annapolis, Md., revealed that the Titan’s hull “showed signs of cyclic fatigue.” As a result, the hull’s depth rating was reduced to 3,000 meters.
“Not enough to get to the Titanic,” Rush said."
From:
https://www.geekwire.com/2020/oceangate-raises-18m-build-big...
> Because Titan was once known as Cyclops 2, the working titles for the new submersibles will be Cyclops 3 and 4.
So they lowered the depth rating of Titan back in 2020 .. but then continued to dive down to the Titanic with it?
Even the diver that piloted it imagined at least one way how it could implode (window).
Based on what I've seen, it doesn't sound like OceanGate had decided on a fixed number of dives. Instead they were planning to continually monitor it (x-ray scans after every dive and real-time acoustic monitoring during the dive) with the assumption that they would get some warning before it failed.
Material science is hard, especially on a budget. This is definitely daredevil territory.
Also the Titan did successfully complete ~20 deep dives from what I've read, so the design was apparently sufficient to stand up to the pressure more than once, meaning even a non-trivial testing program might not have detected the problem. Unfortunately the problem (as many have stated) seems to be in the choice of carbon fiber, which (particularly when taking into account the interfaces with other materials) will weaken over time even if the initial flaws are very small. All materials experience fatigue but the problem is much worse with carbon particularly under those kind of pressures.
There's no absolutely safe way to dive that deep, just like there's no absolutely safe way to ascend K2. People still want to do it.
This submersible was basically a rollercoaster ride that wasn't up to spec. If a participant doesn't need to know or do anything on a trip, they are going for a ride not an adventure, and they aren't expected to be safety experts in the field.
Also one of the passengers was a teenager who was concerned about going, but went along to make his dad happy. Hardly a clear eyed risk taker who was fine with the risk.
He even said he was well aware of the risks involved and kissed his wife goodbye not knowing if he would see her again. Just because something is insanely dangerous doesn't make you an explorer, and you're not performing in any research capacity, you're a former writer for the Simpsons and this is TOURISM. Get some perspective.
That's true, but there are (substantially) safer ways. This design should have never been used for passengers.
I really draw the line there: innovators are free to do whatever the hell they want to do with their own lives and if a professional who really understand the risks decides that they want to take those risks they should be free to do so.
But to charge passengers for a ride requires a completely different attitude towards safety. No matter what you are going to write on your consent forms. Besides being unable to properly evaluate the risks inherent in your design they will be subject to all kinds of pressure to participate which will reduce their ability to properly assess the risks.
This is why we have different classes of aircraft, and why depending on your goals you will be assessed differently by the authorities if you intend to operate one for ferrying (paying) passengers.
Is that entirely true? In a scenario like this they're going to incur tremendous costs borne by others in search and recovery, and potentially put rescue personnel in harm's way. Modulo these things being used as useful exercise and training for the military.
Besides the legal complications of being in a place that technically is outside of the legal boundaries of all countries, so who would enforce that?
That's cheap talk. As soon as there is some major accident, some people creep up to declare: it was obvious all along. Of course it wasn't quite obvious enough for them to actually make that declaration in advance.
That he fired.
Then sued.
They consented, but were they aware of the actual risks? That seems unclear at best, given the active concealment of safety issues and the misleading marketing that has been cited in various reports.
> There’s no absolutely safe way to dive that deep
Nothing is absolutely safe, but deep submersion diving isn’t a new field, there are established safety standards and practices (including in the latter third-party audits to confirm compliance to the former) and OceanGate uniquely among operators of manned vehicles refused to conform to either (though it marketed its subs as exceeding the standards it decided not to be certified against). And its also unique in experiencing a manned disaster.
Now, we aren’t at the point where it can conclusively be shown that those two unique features are directly connected (and practical issues with investigating a disaster at this depth may not make that practical any time soon), but, its not unreasonable to suspect that they are.
I would take that bet.
> I would take that bet.
And I would agree that that is where the smart money is, I’m just acknowledging that the actual specific cause of the disaster and any connection to specific cut safety corners remains unknown.
The fact that the two end bells are separated from the central cylinder and that the cylinder itself can't be located pretty much singles out the carbon fiber structure. The company was aware of problems with previous iterations of the hull of Titan which may have been rebuilt at least once and possibly more than once (this is a bit unclear in what I've been able to dig up about it so far). If the window blew first I would expect things to look a bit different.
I wonder to what extent gross negligence trumps the language in the consent waiver.
No, but using a vessel built the same way as the one James Cameron used would be safer (he did 33 dives).
https://www.geekwire.com/2020/oceangate-raises-18m-build-big...
They didn't change the name and technically the cylinder is just another part but it suggests that the same hull was used which isn't correct as far as I read it.