Passenger on a previous Titan sub dive says his mission was aborted due to apparent malfunction
CBC
A paid passenger on an expedition to the Titanic with the company that owned the Titan submersible testified before a U.S. Coast Guard investigatory panel Friday that the mission he took part in was aborted due to apparently mechanical failure.
The Titan submersible imploded last year while on another trip to the Titanic wreckage site. A Coast Guard investigatory panel has listened to four days of testimony that raised questions about the company's operations before the doomed mission.
Fred Hagen was first to testify Friday and was identified as a "mission specialist," which he and other witnesses have characterized as people who paid a fee to play a role in OceanGate's underwater exploration. He said his 2021 mission to the Titanic was aborted underwater when the Titan began malfunctioning and it was clear they weren't going to reach the fabled wreck site.
"We realized that all it could do was spin around in circles, making right turns," Hagen said. "At this juncture, we obviously weren't going to be able to navigate to the Titanic."
Hagen said the Titan resurfaced and the mission scrapped. He said he was aware of the potentially unsafe nature of getting in the experimental submersible.
"Anyone that wanted to go was either delusional if they didn't think that it was dangerous, or they were embracing the risk," he said.
OceanGate co-founder Stockton Rush was among five people who died when the submersible imploded en route to the site of the Titanic wreck in June 2023.
Earlier this month, the Coast Guard opened a public hearing that is part of a high-level investigation into the cause of the implosion. The public hearing began Sept. 16 and some of the testimony has focused on problems the Washington state company had prior to the fatal 2023 dive.
During Thursday's testimony, company scientific director Steven Ross told the investigators the sub experienced a malfunction just days before the Titanic dive. Earlier in the week, former OceanGate operations director David Lochridge said he frequently clashed with Rush and felt the company was committed only to making money.
"The whole idea behind the company was to make money," Lochridge testified. "There was very little in the way of science."
Other witnesses scheduled for Friday include engineer Dave Dyer of the University of Washington Applied Physics Lab and Patrick Lahey of Triton Submarines. The hearing is expected to resume next week and run through Sept. 27.
Lochridge and other witnesses have painted a picture of a company led by people who were impatient to get the unconventionally designed craft into the water. Lochridge said he filed a complaint with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration about the company. OSHA "promptly referred his safety allegations regarding the Titan submersible to the Coast Guard," a spokesperson for the agency said Thursday.
The deadly accident set off a worldwide debate about the future of private undersea exploration. Coast Guard officials noted at the start of the hearing that the submersible had not been independently reviewed, as is standard practice. That and Titan's unusual design subjected it to scrutiny in the undersea exploration community.
But Renata Rojas, a mission specialist for the company, told the Coast Guard the firm was staffed by competent people who wanted to "make dreams come true." Rojas' testimony struck a different tone than some of the earlier witnesses.
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