“Everything is fine”: this is the last message sent by the crew of the Titan, the submersible that imploded in the North Atlantic in June 2023, as it approached the wreck of the Titanic, killing five people. These words were revealed during a public hearing, initiated by the American Coast Guard in Charleston, South Carolina (United States), this Monday, September 16, and reported by several American media outlets.
The message was sent to the icebreaker Polar Prince, the Titan’s support ship on the surface. Contact with the submersible was then lost after an exchange of questions about the submersible’s depth and weight during its descent.
The Polar Prince then repeatedly asked the Titan about the status of its onboard display. The submersible’s responses became increasingly erratic, until the final response was “everything is fine”, according to Sky News, which followed the hearing live.
An accident outside the norm
Maritime authorities now hope to shed light on this tragedy which occurred on June 18, 2023, during which the Titan, a small 6.5-meter-long submersible belonging to the American company OceanGate Expeditions, had dived to observe the wreck of the Titanic.
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The craft was due to resurface seven hours later, but contact was lost less than two hours after it set off. A huge, highly publicized rescue operation was launched to save the five passengers on board the submersible, which was supposed to have about four days’ worth of oxygen.
But the craft was destroyed shortly after its dive by a “catastrophic implosion” that killed all five men instantly, including 77-year-old French scientist Pierre-Henri Nargeolet, nicknamed “Mr Titanic”, the head of OceanGate Expeditions, Stockton Rush, 61, Shahzada Dawood, a 48-year-old Pakistani-British businessman and his 19-year-old son Suleman, and a 68-year-old British explorer, Hamish Harding.
“Presumed human remains” were discovered a few days later among the wreckage of the Titan, at a depth of 4,000 meters and 500 meters from the Titanic, according to the American coast guard, which then investigated this extraordinary accident for 15 months.
“I won’t go in there”
According to the New York Times, which attended the early proceedings, an engineer fired from OceanGate in 2019, Tony Nissen, testified that he was under pressure at the time from the company’s boss, Stockton Rush, to lie and claim that the submersible was completely safe despite worrying tests. “It’ll be OK,” Rush allegedly told him about the hull’s strength.
Tony Nissen also claimed that some tests had not been carried out due to lack of time and money. In the wake of the accident, a controversy had broken out over possible negligence by OceanGate Expeditions, noted by engineer Nissen, particularly over the porthole which could not technically withstand such depths.
The engineer also revealed that the Titan was struck by lightning during a test mission in 2018, which could have affected the integrity of the hull. Tony Nissen also recounted how he refused to pilot the submersible on its fateful mission, telling company boss Stockton Rush: “I’m not going in there.”
The investigation is “intended to identify any evidence of material errors (in construction or design) that may have caused the accident, in order to draw appropriate recommendations and prevent similar accidents from happening again,” the Coast Guard wrote in a press kit Sunday. Dozens of witnesses are expected to testify at the public hearings, scheduled to last two weeks, as investigators now seek to determine what caused the fatal implosion.
