Featured Image Credit: Ocean Gate Expeditions / US Coast Guard
The US Coast Guard has revealed an image from the wreck of OceanGate’s Titan submersible at a recent court hearing.
The image was made public at a press conference on Monday and shows the vessel’s severed tail cone sticking out of the mud at 3,775m deep alongside other debris.
Taken last year, the image depicts the aftermath of the experimental watercraft’s implosion, claiming the lives of all five passengers on board.
Less than two hours into its dive toward the Titanic wreck in June 2023, the Titan submersible imploded, and recent investigations have caused a global debate about the future of private undersea exploration.
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British explorer Hamish Harding, father and son Shahzada and Suleman Dawood, OceanGate Expeditions' chief executive Stockton Rush, and French diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet all lost their lives aboard the Titan.
Shahzada Dawood was a London-based businessman and adviser to the King’s charity Prince’s Trust International and his 19-year-old son was a student at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow.
The crew onboard had been communicating with its mothership Polar Prince - the ship that launched the Titan - through text messages.
The court hearing also revealed the haunting last words of the onboard crew read: “All good here.”
The final message was sent at 10:47 am local time, when the sub was at a depth of 3,346 metres, stating that it had released two weights, before all all contact was lost.
The hearing aims to 'uncover the facts surrounding the incident and develop recommendations to prevent similar tragedies in the future', the Coast Guard said in a previous statement.
This investigation is the highest level of marine accident review that the Coast Guard conducts.
During Monday’s hearing, the Coast Guard heard from Tony Nissen, OceanGate’s former engineering director, who outlined a number of safety concerns within the company that were reportedly ignored by CEO Stockton Rush.
Investigators also disclosed that the Titan had experienced issues on earlier trips, with 70 equipment problems in 2021 and 48 in 2022.
OceanGates’ former finance director Bonnie Carl and former contractor Tym Catterson were scheduled to testify.
“There are no words to ease the loss endured by the families impacted by this tragic incident,” said Jason Neubauer of the Coast Guard Office of Investigations.
“But we hope that this hearing will help shed light on the cause of the tragedy and prevent anything like this from happening again.”
During Monday’s testimony, Coast Guard officials stated that Titan was left exposed to weather while in storage for seven months in 2022 and 2023.
They also added that the deep-sea vessel was never subject to third-party inspections.
