(NewsNation) — The CEO of OceanGate, the company that created the Titan submersible that killed five passengers last summer, overstated how far along the project was and lied about issues with the vessel’s hull, a new Wired investigation revealed.
Concerns about the Titan go back at least to 2016. That June, a test tank that evolved into the Titan imploded thousands of miles ahead of the company’s safety margin during a smaller-scale test run.
The test model’s implosion happened in 2016 at the University of Washington as OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush pursued his dream of running commercial trips to the Titanic shipwreck. Seven years later, five passengers aboard OceanGate’s Titan submersible, including Rush, would die in an implosion that dominated headlines.
Rather than ordering new models to continue testing after the 2016 incident, OceanGate began work on its full-sized model, and the vessel first successfully ventured to the Titanic shipwreck in 2021, Wired reported.
Now, Wired’s investigation has revealed that Boeing and the University of Washington contributed early on to OceanGate’s carbon-fiber submersible project, but their work wasn’t included in the final design.
Documents, emails and interviews also pointed to a company culture that was dismissive of employees who were cautious of or questioned decisions along the way. Some were fired.
The report also accuses Rush of overstating OceanGate’s progress and lying about issues with the vessel’s hull.
According to Wired, the hull was warping under compression about 37% more than it should. When an engineer voiced concerns, however, OceanGate’s director of engineering suggested in an email that the employee simply didn’t “have the stomach for this type of engineering,” reporters found.
Ultimately, a handful of former employees who spoke with reporters said the June 2023 implosion didn’t come as a shock, describing Titan as a “ticking time bomb.”