Photos and video of the doomed Titan submersible has been released by the U.S. Coast Guard.
One eerie photo, taken in June last year, shows Titan’s tail cone on the ocean floor which exploded on June 18, 2023, killing all five passengers onboard. The sub was regularly used for filmmaking and photography.
The photos, taken by a remotely operated vehicle searching for the sub, were made public at a press conference on Monday. The release came at the beginning of a public hearing conducted by the Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation.
Video of the ill-fated sub has also been released this week showing contents of Titan splilled across the seabed at a depth of 3,776 meters (12,000 feet). The footage was filmed during the search for the sub last year.
“This video led to the conclusive evidence of the catastrophic loss of the submersible Titan and the death of all five members aboard,” the Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation says of the video.
The Titan submersible was a privately operated underwater vessel owned by OceanGate and was used for missions to the wreck of the Titanic.
The investigation is looking at the causes of the catastrophic failure with Oceangate CEO Stockton Rush — who died in the incident — having fingers pointed at him for recklessness.
Investigators said there were over 100 recorded problems with Titan leading up to its implosion. OceanGate’s former engineering director Tony Nissen testified that Rush would brush aside safety concerns when he raised them. He revealed that he refused to get in Titan and that Rush pressured the engineering team to get the sub operating in the water.
Nissen was fired in 2019 after he refused to sign off on an expedition and he is the first of 10 former OceanGate employees who will be interviewed during the hearing.
Rush reportedly liked to “do things on the cheap”, according to veteran diver and submersible pilot David Lochbridge who worked for the company in 2016.
Last year, PetaPixel reported on photographer Brian Weed who said he was alarmed by Rush’s “cavalier attitude” when he worked with him for a TV show. Weed described Rush as being “blinded by his own hubris” and despite spending his career in extreme environments, he said being in the Titan sub was the only time he felt something was “wrong.”