Stockton Rush, the captain of the ill-fated Titan, was, according to one of his colleagues, “a maverick in the worst sense of the word.”
Rob McCallum, an undersea exploration expert, said the loss of five lives when the ship imploded during a visit to the famous 1912 wreck 10,000 feet below the surface of the Atlantic Ocean could have been entirely avoided but for the captain’s ego and recklessness.
The lawsuit accused Rush, who also developed the sub with his company, Ocean Gate, of thinkinglessly and hastily designing and launching the submersible and of rejecting the idea of having it certified by an outside agency to ensure it was safe.
“Stockton will be remembered as a Cavalier maverick in the worst sense of the word,” McCollum told the Post.
“Stockton believed in his own abilities and was not ready to accept a third party’s opinion.”
He added: “Most submersibles meet rigorous standards, but Titan did not. And the fact that it did not meet those standards made deep diving dangerous.”
The Titan set off on June 18, 2023, with five passengers on board: Rush (61), French Titanic expert Paul-Henri Narjolet (77), tourist Hamish Harding (58), businessman Shazada Daoud (48) and his son Suleiman Daoud (19).
Passengers had paid up to $250,000 each to board the spacecraft, which lost communication with the surface ship about an hour and 45 minutes into its voyage, shortly before reaching the site of the sinking.
The passengers were believed to still be alive and over the next harrowing few days a monumental international effort was undertaken to locate them.
It was only after an unmanned rescue vessel found the remains of the sunken ship that it was confirmed that all crew members were missing.
Mr McCallum said deep-sea exploration officials were “deeply saddened and disappointed” by the passengers’ deaths.
One major flaw in Titan’s design is that the hull of the submersible where passengers sit is made primarily from carbon fiber, whereas other deep-sea vessels are made from titanium and hardened steel to withstand the immense pressures of the ocean’s depths.
Mr McCallum, a former adviser to Mr Rush, said he tried to warn him about the risks he was taking but was ignored and threatened with legal action.
He also believes Rush failed to properly inform passengers of the risks involved in the expedition.
“Passengers were influenced by the marketing and enthusiasm. No one cared about the technical details. They were blindsided by the excitement of seeing the Titanic,” McCallum said.
He also thinks the situation will be used as a case study in engineering classes for years to come. Various investigations of Titan’s wreckage are still ongoing, including by the US Coast Guard and the Canadian Safety Board.
McCallum argued that because the Stockton Rush is a U.S. citizen, the U.S. Coast Guard should have played a greater role in making sure the vessel was licensed before taking on passengers.
But he was in favor of a new voyage to the wreck, planned to prove that deep-sea diving is still safe, spearheaded by billionaire Larry Conner and Triton Submarines president Patrick Lahey, because they are using a professionally classified and certified $20 million vessel.
