Rebecca Morelle
Science editor
On
Tuesday Amber Bay, OceanGate’s Director of Administration, provided an insight into
OceanGate’s
finances.
The
cost of the sub’s development and build, and later its operations, were covered
by investors as well as money from passengers who were paying for dives to the
Titanic.
In
2021, a place on the Titan was marketed at about $150,000 but after 2022 that
rose to $250,000 per person. Bay said this was to cover the cost of
taking the support ship and expedition crew out to the middle of the Atlantic
for the dives.
She
said that if a customer didn’t get to see the Titanic, then no refunds were
offered – but the passenger was invited to try again on another
expedition.
This
created a backlog and added to costs. So the dives were then being funded by
deposits from the next group of passengers, suggesting cash flow was a problem.
Bay also said she and Rush had delayed their salary payments when funds were
short.
The
US Coast Guard asked whether there was a desperation within the company to
complete the dives.
Bay
replied that the company wasn’t desperate, but that “there was definitely was
an urgency to deliver on what we had offered”.
On
Monday Phil Brooks, OceanGate’s former director of engineering, said the
company was strapped for cash – and this was leading to safety shortcuts.
“It was clear that the company was economically very stressed,
and as a result that they were making decisions and doing things that I felt
the safety was just being compromised way too much.”
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