Why The Titan Sub Was Doomed To Fail

This idea expands, to an enormous diploma, when deep sea diving — the world the place OceanGate operated. As one would anticipate, there are quite a few regulatory our bodies to make sure that submersibles do not implode a number of miles beneath the waves. From seemingly the start, OceanGate and its CEO Stockton Rush had an hostile perspective in the direction of security. 

On the Unsung Science podcast by CBS Information, Rush mentioned: “You recognize, in some unspecified time in the future, security simply is pure waste. I imply, in the event you simply need to be protected, do not get away from bed. Do not get in your automobile. Do not do something. Sooner or later, you are going to take some danger, and it truly is a danger/reward query. I believe I can do that simply as safely by breaking the foundations.”

There’s an enormous logical flaw in Rush’s pondering. All the things he mentions — your automobile, your mattress, and many others. — are all regulated to be moderately protected. Your automobile is inspected by the Nationwide Freeway and Site visitors Security Administration, and your mattress is product of sure supplies that stop it from collapsing, catching fireplace, or irritating your pores and skin. When Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin, and Michael Collins set off on the Apollo 11 mission, they had been violating some security practices by exiting the Earth’s ambiance and touchdown on the Moon for the primary time in human historical past. 

That is not the case with Titan’s mission of visiting the wreck of the Titanic, a feat that has been accomplished a number of instances by a number of totally different individuals — together with “Titanic” director and deep-sea knowledgeable James Cameron, who mentioned to ABC “I am struck by the similarity of the Titanic catastrophe itself, the place the captain was repeatedly warned about ice forward of his ship and but he steamed at full velocity into an ice discipline.”