Global News Podcast - Bonus: The Global Story - Titan sub implosion

Episode Date: September 29, 2024

Your weekly bonus episode of The Global Story. When OceanGate's Titan submersible went missing last June, it sparked a monumental rescue mission which captured the attention of the world. After days of searching, authorities concluded that the vessel had suffered a catastrophic implosion, and that all five passengers died almost instantly. For the past two weeks, the US Coast Guard has been hearing testimonies from former employees and industry experts, to try to identify what went wrong. On this episode, Azadeh Moshiri is joined by the BBC's science editor, Rebecca Morelle, to discuss the most revealing evidence, and consider whether the tragic event could have been avoided. The Global Story brings you trusted insights from BBC journalists worldwide, one big story every weekday, making sense of the news with our experts around the world.For more, go to bbcworldservice.com/globalstory or search for The Global Story wherever you got this podcast.We want your ideas, stories and experiences to help us understand and tell #TheGlobalStory. Email us at [e-mail] can also message us or leave a voice note via WhatsApp on [phone].Producers: Laurie Kalus and Eleanor Sly Sound engineers: Phil Bull and Mike Regaard Assistant editor: Sergi Forcada Freixas Senior news editor: Richard Fenton-Smith

Hello, this is the Global News Podcast from the BBC World Service, with reports and analysis from across the world. The latest news seven days a week. BBC World Service podcasts are supported by advertising. Life and death were two very realistic co-existing possibilities in my life. I didn't even think I'd make it to like my 16th birthday, to be honest. I grew up being scared of who I was. Any one of us at any time can be affected by mental health and addictions. Just taking that first step makes a big difference.

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Here's my colleague Azadeh Moshiri. When the Titan submersible was reported missing on its expedition to the Titanic last year, the eyes of the world became fixed on the recovery mission. But as the prospect of a rescue began to wane, authorities concluded the vessel had suffered a catastrophic implosion. Eventually, we learned all five on board died instantly. It was a tragedy, and for the past two weeks, the US Coast Guard has been hearing from numerous witnesses to try to piece together what went wrong. On this episode, we're sifting through the most revealing testimonies. Why did Ocean Gate staff have concerns? Was the fatal mission avoidable?

And what could the Titan's demise mean for the future of deep sea exploration? With me today is the BBC science editor Rebecca Murrell, who not only has been following every second of the proceedings, but has also been reporting on her passion, the deep sea, for years. Rebecca, hi, thanks for joining. Hello. We're going to get into the detail of what happened shortly. But first off, let's just clear something up.

Rebecca, what exactly do we mean when we talk about a submersible? That's a good question, because it's this word we've been hearing every day, all day for the last few weeks during the public hearing. So basically there are different kinds of underwater vehicles. You can have remotely operated vehicles, they're ROVs and they're basically underwater robots, there's no one inside of them. You can have submarines, these are kind of the bigger crafts that you think of that, you you know maybe the military use and the difference with them is that they can move under their own power they don't have to be sort of brought to and from their dive spot. A submersible they're generally smaller they need to be carried to the place where they're going to do their dive by a ship they have a support ship and in terms of

their own power they have batteries that might need to be replaced or recharged. So it's a subtle difference, but it's good to know what a submersible is. Well, digging into that, in this case, we're talking about the Titan submersible, which was supposed to be heading to the wreckage of the Titanic, which is 3,800 metres below sea level. That's about 12,500 feet. So could you tell us more specifically about that vessel and who was on board? This was a submersible owned by a company called Ocean Gate. The idea behind it was to take paying passengers down to see the Titanic, which is at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, you know, the world's most famous shipwreck.

It had been operating dives there for a couple of years before the accident. But in June 2023, the 18th of June, five people got on board the submersible. They were OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, Shazada Darwood, a British Pakistani businessman and his 19-year-old son, Suleiman. Hamish Harding, a British explorer. PH Najiala, a Titanic expert. So it was a team of five of them getting inside the submersible. They set off early in the morning, descended beneath the waves and messaged back and forth with a support ship.

But about an hour and a half into their journey, contact was lost. Live from London, this is BBC News. A huge search operation is underway after a tourist submarine carrying five people to the wreck of the Titanic went missing in the North Atlantic. This sparked an absolutely vast search and rescue operation because the US Coast Guard was notified and for days following the news that this submersible had gone missing there was a search happening by air by sea underwater robots were sent down to try and work out what was going on there were reports of

underwater noises so there was this idea that the people might be in the sub still alive. Banging noises. Banging noises. Yeah, that's right. That's how it was reported. But a few days after they'd gone missing, the news came in that the wreckage of the submersible had been found and all five people had died on board. And it had actually happened an hour and a half into their descent. I was in the US at the time, and it felt like everyone was holding their breath, counting every minute until we had an answer to that key question, are there any survivors? How many days are we talking about here? So the dive began on the 18th of June when the submersible didn't

resurface at the time. It was expected to, people on the support ship phoned the US Coast Guard. They started their major search and rescue operation the next day. That was the Monday when that really began. And on Thursday, so a few days after that, that was when the wreckage was discovered. It had indeed confirmed that all five people on board had died. This morning, an ROV, a remote-operated vehicle, from the vessel Horizon Arctic discovered the tail cone of the Titan submersible approximately 1,600 feet from the bow of the Titanic on the seafloor. The search and rescue operation was unprecedented, really.

I mean, the U.S US Coast Guard is, you know, usually used to looking for a lost ship, perhaps, or someone lost at sea. So trying to sort of work out how to find a submersible that maybe had come to the surface, but was bobbing around and, you know, no one knew where it was, or was at the bottom of the ocean with people in it, or, as it turned out, had imploded was very difficult. So people from all over the world, it was a massive search and rescue operation, also because of the nationalities of the people on board, you know, it's a mix of British, French, US, it really was unprecedented. Yes, I remember our own teams in South Asia were contacting relatives, it really was a global story at the time. We keep talking about a

catastrophic implosion. What does that mean exactly? At the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, where the Titanic is, 3,800 metres down, the pressure is absolutely immense. It's basically the weight of all the water above you pushing down on you. So any craft has to be able to basically withstand, resist that pressure. So a catastrophic implosion happens when the submersible that is down at this sort of depth, the hull, which is the area where the passengers are in, is somehow breached. And the pressure, it basically crushes the vessel. But it happens incredibly quickly. It's instantaneous.

Now, at the time you interviewed James Cameron, the award-winning director of the Titanic film, he has actually completed more than 30 submersible dives to the Titanic wreck during development. He was among many who called this preventable. I would submit that there's a terrible irony here. Here we have at the wreck of Titanic, we now have another wreck that is based on unfortunately the same principles of not heeding warnings. And the US Coast Guard has spent the last two weeks attempting to answer that key question, could this have been prevented?

Yeah, that's right. I mean, what emerged during the week that the Titan submersible was missing and after the wreckage had been found were just how many people within the deep sea community were really concerned about the safety of the submersible that Ocean Gate had designed. There are two purposes behind the investigation and they've actually been investigating this for the last 15 months. So they've been trying to work out what were the events leading up to the catastrophic implosion and could anything have been done running up to that to have stopped it and what lessons can be learned in the future to prevent it from happening again. So as you've mentioned, one of those who tragically died was the company's co-founder Stockton Rush. But throughout these hearings, much of the scrutiny has focused on decisions he made as CEO prior to that fatal

voyage. What have we learned about him and why he founded OceanGate? Well, he was an interesting character. His background was in engineering and aviation. So in 2009, Stockton Rush founded the OceanGate company. The idea originally was to actually buy ready-made submersibles in and to take passengers down in them. So basically to charter trips to paying customers. A few years after that, they had a slight change of tact. So they did buy some submersibles, but then they decided that they wanted to build their own submersible. Yes, that was Guillermo Sonlin, the co-founder of OceanGate, who said that. At the time, we had absolutely no intention of building our own subs. Now, what we did intend to do was buy a used sub. I mean,

we ended up calling it our training wheel sub, so that when we went to build this fleet of four or five setups and deploy them around the world, we would know what we were looking for. What's emerged about Stockton Rush during the hearings? I mean, he was a complicated man by the sounds of it. I mean, he was warned repeatedly about the safety of his submersible by many people. He wanted me to be the pilot that runs the Titanic missions. And I told him I'm not getting in it because the operations crew, I don't trust them. But I didn't trust Stockton either. He didn't listen to the safety concerns. And in fact, he was absolutely certain that the sub he was building was safe. I mean, a transcript was actually released with him

saying, no one is dying on my watch. This was from 2018 during a key meeting where someone had brought up safety concerns. And I think diving in it is one of the safest things I'll ever do. And despite his passion, what do we know about how the company was performing financially? We know that the company was strapped for cash. We heard evidence from Amber Bay, who was the director of administration for the company. And she was talking about their sort of business model. So when the sub first started operations, the company was marketing a seat at 150 000 dollars and there wasn't actually a seat you'd actually sit on the floor in the submersible the next year that went up to 250 000 dollars but diving to the titanic wasn't easy so they had lots

of attempts to get down there where something went a bit wrong with the submersible and they came back up so the idea was if a paying passenger didn't get down to see the Titanic, they didn't get a refund, they were offered another dive. But the problem is every dive and every extra expedition costs money. So they were funding the next set of dives with the deposits from future passengers who were going to go down. I mean, she also spoke about how she and Stockton Rush had delayed getting their salary for a month. I believe it was the beginning of 2023. We were looking to make ends meet. And there was an offer that Stockton had derived, I believe,

with an attorney or whomever, that we could delay our paychecks and be paid a small amount of interest and recapture it at a specific time. It was quite hand to mouth I think and some people who gave evidence at the hearing also said that this shortage of cash was leading to safety shortcuts particularly when it came to checking the submersible carefully after a particular problem had been seen during a dive. And when it came to safety regulations in particular, there was an issue around certification, wasn't there? Yes, that's right. So the process of certification, which we've been hearing a lot about during the hearing. This is basically an independent safety assessment carried out by a third party specialist marine organisation. So they're organisations like the American Bureau of Shipping or the DMV, which is based in Norway, or Lloyd's Register, which is based in the UK.

What happens is someone from one of these organisations follows the submersible through from design to construction to testing to operations to confirm that it conforms to certain standards. Now, almost all deep sea submersibles, and in fact, all known deep sea submersibles have been certified but it isn't mandatory and Stockton Rush and Ocean Gate opted not to have the Titan certified they talked about it at the beginning when it was in development which was very interesting we didn't know that about before they had been thinking about it but it costs money and whether that was their motivation for not doing it, we can't hear from Stockton Rush because he died in the disaster, but they chose not to do it. I mean, he said that he believed that certification really sort of stimmied innovation.

If you're not breaking things, you're not innovating. To me, the more stuff you've broken, the more innovative you've been. And if you're operating within a known environment, as most submersible manufacturers do, they don't break things. That was his argument. He said, what we're doing is too innovative for, you know, these organisations. They want to hold us back. But deep sea experts really vehemently disagree with that. And basically, they say the more experimental a submersible gets, the more it needs to be tested by outside bodies to make sure that it's safe. And the problem that many have raised here is the fact that there were tourists, essentially passengers on board. Yes, that's right. So it's a very interesting point, because OceanGate did not call them tourists or passengers,

or paying customers, which is basically what they were. Because they were paying money to go down in the submersible. They called them mission specialists. So you can look at this two ways. You can look at it as a marketing tool to say to someone who's wealthy with a lot of money, look, you're not just buying for a place in the sub. You're going to get involved with the expedition you're going to be involved with checking over the submersible with life on board the ship so it's a more experiential term but other people have said actually the term mission specialist by not classifying the crew as tourists or paying passengers, it helped to circumvent some of the transport rules

about what you can take people down in. So it was a workaround, that's what they're saying. So we've reminded ourselves about the fatal implosion of the Titan submersible and heard about the maverick mastermind behind the company which developed it. Next, we'll take a closer look at the red flag staff members say they raised before the titan's demise. If you're hearing this, you're probably already listening to BBC's award-winning news podcasts. But did you know that you can listen to them without ads?

Get current affairs podcasts like Global News, AmeriCast and The Global Story, plus other great BBC podcasts from history to comedy to true crime, all ad-free. Simply subscribe to BBC Podcast Premium on Apple Podcasts or listen to Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts. We've heard how Stockton Rush might have been somewhat resistant to what he viewed as bureaucratic red tape but

let's dig into some of the specific safety concerns that were raised about the Titan. Now the design of the submersible itself has come under the spotlight during the hearing hasn't it? Yeah, that's right. And before, actually, I mean, it's a very unorthodox submersible. There were plenty of concerns about its design from the basic stuff, like its shape, the shape of its hull. Now, the hull is the bit of the submersible that the passengers go in. It's the bit that resists the immense pressure at these sort of very, very deep spots in the ocean. But it was cylindrical. It wasn't spherical. Most subs are spherical because it means the effects of that pressure are felt equally all around the structure of the hull. That wasn't the case with this one. There were questions about the window in the submersible. The people who designed the window we've been hearing would only rate it to 1,300 metres,

but Titan was diving three times deeper. And we heard evidence with an engineer who had looked at the design of the window saying actually the deep pressure would have shifted it slightly in its place in the sub. It wasn't just acrylic windows. Plastic materials creep. All materials creep, which means when you're under pressure, it deforms. The creep test is really important. And part of it is if it's under pressure, does it keep moving? Metal doesn't do that. Acrylic does. One of the biggest issues, though,

is what the submersible was actually made of, what the hull was made of. Now most deep sea subs are made of metals like titanium. They're very reliable under pressure but they're also expensive. Titanium is really expensive, it's really heavy which kind of constrains the size of the sub. You can't make a very big submersible to get lots of people in there. You can maybe build one with a spot for one or two people. Stockton Rush used carbon fibre. It was actually a mix of carbon fibre layers mixed with a resin. Now this is used in aviation. It's really good on planes. It performs really well in those kinds of situations. It's lightweight and it works well under tension. But it is not a good material under pressure. It doesn't like being compressed. You get a thing called delamination, which is basically where the

layers of carbon fibre come apart, which is an issue. The other thing is that every time it was going down and becoming compressed and then coming back up again and going down again because it had done lots of dives it was weakening the material so in a weird sort of way the passengers who went on the first dive with the Titan actually probably would have been safer than the people who went on the last dive with Titan which is so counterintuitive you would think oh well it's been down lots of times it's fine it's done it before when actually the opposite was true. And the third thing we've heard from the evidence is that it could just go at any time without warning. So it was a really unorthodox material. And there were a lot of concerns over the fact it hadn't been tested.

If you're going to use something unorthodox, I mean, it's a fairly new industry. Try new materials. But the experts are saying you've got to test it. And again, so much of what you're saying there, red flags are popping in my head nonstop listening to you. And it just keeps going towards that key question. And the answer feels like it could have been prevented. I mean, that's what these hearings are trying to determine right now. One person, David Lockridge, a former operations director, said he was among those to raise concerns, didn't he? Yeah, no, he was very interesting because he basically worked for the company in 2018 when

the Titan sub was in development and he did not like what he was seeing. The way the company were going with this project and bypassing all the standardised rules and regulations that are set in place by people with experience. It was inevitable something was going to happen and it was just when. So he brought his concerns to Stockton Rush. He assembled a quality assessment report that was presented to the company in 2018. He was summoned to a meeting which the transcript is now available on the US Coast Guard's website and it's a very heated exchange between them with basically David Lockridge repeatedly saying I'm

really worried about this merciful no one's listening to me and Stockton Rush saying I think it's safe we're at an impasse. Lockridge was fired after that meeting, but he was so worried, he actually took his concerns to the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration. That's OSHA. And he detailed all of his worries about the sub's design. But Ocean Gate then sued him for revealing confidential information. I mean, he also countersued them for unfair dismissal. So, you know, this is costing more and more money. I think about 11 months after raising the concerns and going to OSHA,

he decided to drop the case and signed a non-disclosure agreement. I mean, what was very interesting at the hearing, at the end of an entire day's worth of evidence, he basically said, you had the information, OSHA had everything. So there are definitely questions there about whether the US authorities could have stepped in. And he described the company culture as smoke and mirrors, didn't he? We've also heard from other staff during the hearings

that there wasn't necessarily a culture of transparency while communicating safety concerns. I just felt that it didn't seem like the customer's concerns were taken particularly seriously. When people would have a legitimate concern, it just seemed like they either wouldn't bring it up, or in my case, I was entirely dismissed. But when it comes to the customers, not everyone felt that way. Yeah, that's right. I mean, we heard evidence from two of the paying passengers, Renata Rojas and Fred Hagen. And both of them actually spoke about a company that was safety conscious.

They said that there were extensive safety briefings before every dive. You know, they felt that on the ship, the support ship, there was a good culture of safety. They didn't describe a rogue operation in that sense. And Fred Hagen in particular said that he felt like he was going into the sub with his eyes open. I mean, he knew it was a dangerous endeavor, but, you know, he was willing to take the risk. Anyone that felt safe going to depths in the Titan was deluded or delusional. I mean, it was an experimental vessel. It was clear that it was dangerous. And anyone that wanted to go, it was either delusional if they thought it wasn't dangerous or they were just embracing the sense of risk. And Fred Hagen, in fact, had testified

that the mission was scrapped when there were mechanical issues before, right? So the risk to the submersible wasn't just theoretical, people did describe actual physical damage. One of the things that was very interesting during the public hearing was that the Titan submersible over 2021 and 2022 had gone down to see the Titanic 13 times. It had 13 dives there, but lots of other dives in between where it hadn't quite made it down as deep, passengers hadn't seen it. But during these two years of expeditions, 118 technical incidents were listed and they ranged from the batteries dying so on one dive the passengers were stuck inside for 27 hours on another dive while this sub was being recovered out of the water and brought up to the deck of the ship it was dropped and the front dome sheared off

it fell off i mean this is a bit that's supposed to be water tight there's been a lot of discussion about a loud bang that was heard while the sub was coming back up to the surface after one of the dives and actually the US Coast Guard heard evidence that this was most likely caused by damage to the hull although at the time Ocean Gate said it was actually just the sub shifting around in its metal frame. Thrusters not working, you know, the sub spinning. Fred Hagen described it being tangled up in the wreck of the Titanic only for a minute or two. So I mean, it's been very interesting to hear this catalogue, this list, this litany of incidents where things went wrong during the dives. So I want to look beyond the hearings now.

Once the testimony concludes, what actually happens next? Well, the testimony is not the end of this. It's part of the process. So the US Coast Guard will continue to gather evidence. And one of the things they do have to do is to really carefully examine the wreckage that was recovered. I think one of the most startling images really that were released were the pictures of the wreckage of the submersible

in pieces, mangled and crushed, scattered across hundreds of metres across the floor of the Atlantic. So they want to find out which part of the submersible was the first to fail. And they will eventually be publishing a report detailing everything they've learned. It's likely that there will be prosecutions by the US government, because the question is, if you knew about their safety concerns, but ignored them before the event what does that mean we have to watch that space but I think that is likely to follow and then you know there are private lawsuits happening the family of PH Najia Le the titanic expert who died in the implosion they're already suing looking towards the future I think the big question is how can you stop something like

this from happening again? Everything goes back to the regulations and certifications. One of the things I think is likely to come out of this is that submersibles will have to be certified. So you think this will likely have broader implications for the industry? People won't be able to bypass certification like happened in this case? That's right and I mean interestingly the parallel with this is after the Titanic sank it changed the rules and regulations about what you could do at sea. So this is likely to change the rules and regulations of what you can do down in the deep sea. It's very interesting this because a few people have said, I hope that this incident doesn't stop innovation, doesn't stop exploration. But in a way, you sort of testing and regulations can increase innovation.

It means you can look at new materials. The thing I think it's really important to say, though, is OceanGate were an outlier in this. I mean, I've been reporting on the deep sea for 10 or 15 years, and people in the industry take safety really seriously. I love the deep sea. You know, I think it's a fascinating place.

I'm fascinated by the people who go down there to explore it. There's a guy called Victor Vescovo. He's got his own submersible that's been to the bottom of the Mariana Trench multiple times. But he got his submersible certified. You can explore and innovate safely. And people have been doing it for years. Rebecca, thanks so much. Thanks. If you want to get in touch, you can email us at theglobalstory at bbc.com or you can send us a message or even a voice note on WhatsApp. You can find those details in our show notes. Wherever you're listening in the world, this has been The Global Story. Thank you for having us in your headphones. Bye. If you enjoyed listening to The Global Story and would like to hear more,

there's a new episode every weekday. Just search for The Global Story wherever you get your BBC podcasts and be sure to click subscribe or follow. We'll have another edition of the Global News Podcast later. Until then, bye-bye. Life and death were two very realistic coexisting possibilities in my life. I didn't even think I'd make it to like my 16th birthday, to be honest. I grew up being scared of who I was. Any one of us at any time can be affected by mental health and addictions. Just taking that first step makes a big difference. It's the hardest step.

But CAMH was there from the beginning. Everyone deserves better mental health care. To hear more stories of recovery, visit CAMH.ca. If you're hearing this, you're probably already listening to BBC's award-winning news podcasts. But did you know that you can listen to them without ads? Get current affairs podcasts like Global News, AmeriCast and The Global Story, plus other great BBC podcasts from history to comedy to true crime, all ad-free.

Simply subscribe to BBC Podcast Premium on Apple Podcasts or listen to Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts or listen to Amazon Music with a Prime membership. Spend less time on ads and more time with BBC Podcasts.