- Carl Stanley boarded Ocean Gate's Titan submersible in April 2019.
- He expressed his concerns about the hull to Ocean Gate CEO Stockton Rush shortly after the voyage.
- Surprisingly, this week's report included even more information about the dive into Titan's interior.
Early passengers on Ocean Gate's Titan submersible were unaware until a year after the incident that they were on the brink of experiencing a “catastrophic” malfunction that sealed the vessel's fate in 2023.
In April 2019, submersible expert Carl Stanley and his colleague, OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, dived into an early version of the Titan vessel off the coast of the Bahamas.
Stanley, Rush, and two other passengers safely dived to a depth of more than 12,000 feet, nearly as deep as the wreck of the Titanic, which lies about 12,500 feet below the Atlantic Ocean.
But Stanley left with concerns.
According to an email shared with Business Insider, Stanley warned Rush that the hull may have a defect after hearing a cracking sound.
“I believe there is a defect near the hull flange that is only going to get worse,” Stanley wrote to Rush in May 2019. “The only question in my mind is whether it will fail catastrophically.”
Stanley called on Rush to take precautions and conduct more testing on board before allowing passengers on board. But those warnings were largely I was ignored.
The investigative report was published by Wired on June 11th, almost a year after the fateful Titan expedition. — It has emerged that Ocean Gate CEO Rusch was so intent on cutting ship-building costs that he repeatedly ignored warnings from colleagues.
Stanley told BI in a recent interview that he didn't know the extent of the hull problems, or how close he'd been to danger during his dive with Rush, until he read the Wired article.
Emails between Ocean Gate CEO and Stanley published by BI Last year, Rush dismissed Stanley's concerns about the Titan's hull, writing at the time that “a single empirical data point is insufficient to determine the integrity of the vessel.”
However, Wired reports that during his expedition with Stanley, Rush was also concerned about “the loud noise the boat would make in the deep seas.”
According to the report, the ship's problems were not fully resolved until two months after the Stanley's dive, and just three weeks before Titan set sail for the Titanic.
An inspection found a crack in the Titan's hull that an anonymous Ocean Gate pilot told Rush was “pretty serious,” Wired reported.
An internal report later seen by Wired showed that layers of the carbon fiber hull had separated over an area of at least 11 square feet, a defect that forced Rush to postpone the Titanic voyage and build another Titan submersible, according to Wired.
“The more evidence that comes to light, the stronger my position becomes.”
Stanley told BI he was shocked to read the Wired report that revealed further details about his 2019 dive with Rush.
“The Doomsday Clock was a little closer to midnight,” Stanley said. “We knew the ship wasn't in good shape, but [report on the] I was surprised at the visible damage.”
Stanley said he has been frustrated with Rush's aides as information about the Titan affair has emerged, as they feel more could have been done to stop Rush from succumbing to his own ambitions.
“The more evidence that comes to light, the stronger my position is,” he said. “I think Stockton had some idea how this was going to end.”
On June 18, 2023, a little more than four years after Stanley's journey, Rush and four other passengers paid up to $250,000 each to climb into Titan seats and dive into the historic wreckage.
Less than two hours into the dive, the Titan lost contact with its mother ship on the surface, sparking a massive international search and rescue operation.
Five days later, US Coast Guard officials said the Titan had imploded due to “catastrophic failure of a pressure chamber.” Five passengers, including Rush, were killed instantly.
A federal investigation into the explosion continues to this day.
Ego-Driven Startups
A spokesman for Ocean Gate, which suspended all operations immediately after the Titan disaster, could not be reached for comment.
OceanGate co-founder Guillermo Sonnlein, who left the company in 2013, had some communication with Rush but told BI in an interview that he didn't know whether he told Rush to do anything differently because he wasn't always aware of what was happening at the company after he left.
While Zonlein agreed that Rush's Titan project was born out of ego, he said that trait is common to any ambitious innovator, especially in the field of exploration.
“Karl built two submarines in his garage,” said Sonnlein, who spoke with Stanley recently. “It's a real show of pride. He's one of the most experienced submarine pilots in the world right now.”
Stanley continues to operate a submersible for tourists in Honduras, and he told BI that last year marked his 25th year in business.
“I just surfaced from a four-hour dive,” Stanley wrote to BI on Thursday, “so I'd say things are going well.”
