Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - What REALLY Happened To That Submarine? - The REAL Story of OceanGate

Episode Date: May 23, 2025

OceanGate submersible Titan catastrophically imploded during a descent to the Titanic wreck site in the North Atlantic, killing all five people aboard, including OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush. The vessel lost contact approximately 1 hour and 33 minutes into its dive, and debris was later found about 1,600 feet from the Titanic's bow. Investigations revealed that the sub's carbon fiber hull had begun delaminating as early as June 2022, compromising its structural integrity. Despite warnings from experts and former employees about design flaws and safety concerns, OceanGate continued missions without obtaining third-party certification.

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My whole world is falling apart right now. It's chaos. Watch the Hulu original series. The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives. Now streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for Bumno subscribers. Terms apply. Do you remember when a bunch of billionaires died and like the whole internet celebrated? Well it all starts with this guy, his name Stockton, and Stockton is a pilot and an engineer,

but what he really wants to do is explore the universe, like Captain Kirk on Star Trek. But one day in 2004, when he's 42 years old, he decides to do just that, except he's going to start specifically underwater. And so he starts renting private submarines to travel down into the deep. And he is shocked at how few submarine rentals there are out there. And so after a little research, he starts thinking, hey, I'll build a private submarine myself and I'll let people rent it from me. So in 2009, that's what he does. Stockton starts his own company, Ocean Gate. Hi, my name is Stockton Rush. I'm the CEO and founder of Ocean Gate.

Then in 2016, he and Ocean Gate start taking tourists in a small submarine to tour underwater ruins from this Italian ship It's pretty cool. But that's apparently not enough for Stockton. He's thinking bigger. He wants to take tourists down to a destination that's really hard to get to, a destination that's going to get his company a lot of buzz and attention. That destination, the wreckage of the Titanic. And so Stockton gets to work, and he starts designing a submarine that can withstand the pressure of the ocean at 13,000 feet deep. And old school standard submarines, they're too expensive and way too big. And Stockton, he wants his to be cheap. And so, boom, he starts building it. He apparently cuts some corners on the material he uses on it, and he adds a bunch of other

pre-made parts so that Ocean Gate can save some money. And he also installs a Logitech video game controller to steer it. Now, he does get a lot of criticism for this, but I actually looked into it, and it's apparently not uncommon to use Logitech video game controllers to control certain parts of submarines. So he's not entirely crazy for installing one on his. Apparently. Anyway, once it's built, he calls this new submarine, Titan. And it ends up being about the size of an SUV. And so Stockton tests the Titan without anyone inside to see if it can withstand the pressure, and actually it holds up. And so it looks like his dreams are going to come true. He's actually going to get to explore the ruins of the Titanic.

Not everyone is on board with Stockton's Titanic submarine plans, particularly this guy, David. And David is an employee at Ocean Gate. And so David looks at the Titan and he immediately sees some things that could ultimately turn into a leak. And so David lets it be known. And he brings all these serious safety concerns up in a meeting with all the bosses at Ocean Gate. He's like, this sub, it isn't strong enough. And he insists that they They get it inspected and certified by the American Bureau of Shipping to verify that it's safe and up to standard. But I guess Stockton is like, nah, that won't be necessary.

Because he feels that most accidents are caused by mistakes made by the operator, not by the equipment. And so getting extra inspections won't really matter. And then, boom, they immediately fired David and they give him 10 minutes to clear out his desk and then they escort him out of the building. I guess they really did not like being. being questioned. Regardless, now that no one is poking holes in this business plan, Stockton can move forward with testing the Titan with an actual human inside, and of course he insists

on taking it down first by himself. And so he takes the Titan down and everything seems to be going fine. But then, once the Titan is around 10,000 feet down, suddenly, bam, it loses all communication with the support crew on the surface. But Stockton, he is, he is, he is, he He isn't scared, he's down in the submarine looking out the little window and seeing all this magical deep sea shit that makes him feel like he's finally living his childhood dream of becoming Captain Kirk. But anyway, he eventually pilots the sub back up until he gets communication back. Now, that little test run would suggest that this sub isn't exactly safe. But Old Stockton, he doesn't seem to be bothered by this. In fact, at one point he's quoted as saying, you know, at some sort of,

some point, safety is just pure waste. I mean, if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed. Oh, boy. So anyway, in 2021, Stockton and Ocean Gate start taking tourists down to see the wreckage of the Titanic, all for the low, low price of $250,000 a person. So basically, you've got to be super wealthy to engage in this. And they take, I believe, 13 expeditions down to see the wreckage. And most of these trips are in fact successful. However, they do lose communication with the surface a bunch of times during some of them, and apparently the Titan has over 118 different major and minor technical issues, including one time the battery died and passengers got trapped inside the sub for 27 whole hours, which is definitely enough to make me say, fuck all that, but I don't know, I guess these

billionaires are just built different because they keep paying the money and they keep going. And by 2023, Stockton and his company Ocean Gate, they're getting a lot of attention from the news media. So this is great for him. I mean, more media means more attention and therefore more customers. And so that summer, Titan heads out for its next expedition. Another trip to see the Titanic. And five people are supposed to go on this trip, Stockton and four others. And they aren't all billionaires.

Only two of them are actually billionaires. One of them is actually one of the billionaire's 19-year-old son, and one of the guys is a Titanic expert. And so all five of these people get in the sub and it takes off and it starts to submerge. And everything's going fine. And over an hour goes by. And so far, so good, everything's going as planned. In fact, the sub sends a message to the support crew on the surface saying, all good here. And so I assume they're all chilling in this tiny little sub looking out the winter.

Or whatever checking out the fish and then suddenly out of nowhere Boom they lose power and the Titan slowly tilts and it starts to nose dive toward the ocean floor and all the passengers are now sitting in the pitch dark like what the fuck is going on and this goes on for about 60 seconds and now they're panicking like why did they lose power is this the end for them and then boom the Titan implodes and it crushes everyone like a soda can. I guess it wasn't constructed right and it was under too much underwater pressure and all five people on board die instantly. And it's not dramatic, it's not long and drawn out suffering, it's instant death within milliseconds. So they felt nothing. And here is actually footage of a piece of the sub they later found on the ocean floor. Now there is some speculation that the five passengers did not lose power before the sub imploded, that it just imploded instantly and there was no panicking and no darkness or anything like that. But the truth is, we actually don't know for

sure. And so then this story breaks and it's all over the news. And then the internet hears about it and they are ruthless. Like they fucking celebrated these five people's demise. Do you remember that? Like the general consensus when this happened was yeah, fuck those billionaires. Like they deserve Like what? And people are like making memes out of it? Tons of memes like these people were just trying to explore the ocean and the internet is over here dancing on their grave. It was wild