You remember the OceanGate Titan submersible? That little submarine that went missing last summer and the subsequent search took over the internet for a couple of weeks? This week, the Coast Guard’s Marine Board of Investigation began a hearing to investigate what exactly went wrong and caused the implosion, which resulted in the death of everyone on board.


From the beginning, it was obvious that the Titan excursion was equal parts stupid and dangerous. But with each new piece of information, the whole thing proves to be even more of a moronic, greed-fueled disaster than anyone could have guessed.



Several OceanGate employees have spoken during the hearing, including Tony Nissen, who was the company’s engineering director at one point and shared that he refused to pilot the Titan because of safety concerns. Not exactly what you want to hear from the guy in charge of the sub’s design.


But the big name was former operations director David Lochridge, who went into excruciating detail about just how painfully clear it was that this "abomination of a sub” was destined to fail. “The whole idea behind the company was to make money,” Lochridge explained. “There was very little in the way of science.”


Here are a few of the revelations from Lochridge’s testimony:


  • Lochridge raised concerns about the Titan as early as 2018 but now deceased OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush dismissed any criticism outright.


  • In 2016, Rush wanted to pilot the Cyclops 1 vessel to the site of the Andrea Doria shipwreck. Lochridge told him it was a bad idea, so Rush ignored his advice and ended up crashing the submersible. Lochridge took back control of the Cyclops 1, and Rush angrily threw a controller at his head.


  • Rush’s “vision was give somebody this PlayStation controller and within an hour they’re going to be a pilot” of the Titan. According to Lochridge, it takes years of training to be able to comfortably pilot such a submersible.


  • OceanGate continually cut corners on safety and engineering, hiring “children that were coming in straight out of university” because of “the desire to get to the Titanic as quickly as they could to start making profit.”


  • Despite these massive issues, Lochridge said that OceanGate ran a social media campaign that was “all smoke and mirrors” in order to make it look like a magical and safe voyage without any of the very real danger.


Lochridge was fired in 2018 after voicing his objections to Rush wanting to be onboard the Titan during its unmanned testing. Despite no longer working with OceanGate, he "didn’t want to see anybody dying for the sake of going in a sub.” So, a month later, he contacted the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) and was placed under the whistleblower protection scheme.



Sadly, Lochridge’s efforts were all in vain. The Titan set sail on June 18, 2023 with Rush and four others onboard. The planned expedition was to explore the wreckage site of the Titanic but instead, communication was lost between Titan and its mother ship less than two hours into the dive, and after several days of searching, the remains of the submersible were found not too far from the remains of the sunken ship they were heading for.


Focusing on this story so long after the crash can feel a bit excessive. After all, there are tragedies all around the world every day, so why focus on this one?


To me, what makes something like this really stand out is how easily avoidable the whole thing was. There was no need for anyone to die but the blind desire for profit caused OceanGate to act recklessly and foolishly and, as a result, five people lost their lives.