The company claimed “operator error” was responsible for the vast majority of accidents. In the post, the company acknowledged that classification assures “vessels are designed, constructed and inspected to accepted standards”, but claimed it did little to “weed out sub-par vessel operators”. It’s that manoeuvrable.”Īlmost a year after the Marine Technology Society letter was sent, OceanGate published a blogpost explaining why it would not have Titan certified. But if it’s very calm … I can write my name in the mud with the sub. If the currents are high then you change your profile and how close you’ll get to the wreck. He added: “We’ve been fortunate that on the wreck the currents have been fairly light. There’s a huge shift at the thermocline and we don’t have a way of tracking that.” And they change day to day and season to season and they change at 300 metres. “One of the hardest things we have to do is get inches from the Titanic, because we’re dropping two and a half miles through the water column and we don’t know what the currents are. Rush also spoke of the dangers of the expeditions. “But it’s no more claustrophobic than taking a plane.” “People come in thinking ‘oh, I’m claustrophobic,’” he said. He said the vessel had room for five people. And it because it’s smaller and lighter, it’s much more manoeuvrable. “So our sub weighs about half as much as any other deep diving sub, or research sub, that’s been down there. In an unpublished interview with the Guardian late last year, Rush said the vessel had been custom built to reach and view the Titanic, describing it as capable of making a 2.5-mile drop through the water column but deft enough to be steered just inches from the wreck. In its letter, the Marine Technology Society wrote: “We recommend that at a minimum, you institute a prototype testing program that is reviewed and witnessed by DNV-GL.”Ī spokesperson for OceanGate declined to comment on the 2018 letter when approached by the New York Times. In the case of vessels such as Titan, the DNV classification process examines whether “internationally recognised rules” were followed and includes inspections during the constructions and operations phase. The DNV is an independent organisation, described as the world’s leading classification society for the maritime industry, which certifies vessels such as submersibles and issues regulations for such products. The Marine Technology Society was critical of OceanGate issuing marketing material that stated the Titan design would “meet or exceed the DNV-GL safety standards” while apparently not intending to have the vessel assessed by that same organisation. The Marine Technology Society, an industry group made up of ocean engineers, technologists, policymakers and educators, expressed “concern regarding the development of Titan and the planned Titanic expeditions” and warned against the “current experimental approach adopted by OceanGate”.Īt issue was whether the Titan vessel would be independently assessed by industry regulators or risk assessors. On Tuesday, the New York Times published a letter written in 2018 by industry leaders in the submersible vessel field, warning Rush of possible “catastrophic” problems with Titan’s development.
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