“The captain was repeatedly warned about ice ahead”: James Cameron Is Shocked After Titanic Submersible Tragedy Kills 5 Passengers
OceanGate is making headlines around the world due to the Titan Submersible tragedy, which went missing on June 18, after its dive to visit the Titanic wreckage site in the North Atlantic Ocean. OceanGate was founded in 2009 by Stockton Rush, who was one of the passengers on board the missing vessel. According to the OceanGate Expedition website, qualified explorers got the opportunity to join the expedition to the historical wreckage site of the Titanic.
However, the recent trip quickly turned into an unfortunate incident as almost two hours after the vessel’s dive, the crew of the Polar Prince, Titan Submersible’s support vessel, lost contact. As the U.S. Coast Guard in Boston underwent a search and rescue operation, they went on to mention that all four members along with the pilot were confirmed dead.
James Cameron Compared The Titan Submersible Tragedy With The Titanic Disaster
During an interview with ABC News, James Cameron spoke about the devastating incident. While drawing the similarities between the catastrophic implosion of the submersible and the sinking of Titanic, the director mentioned-
“A number of the top players in the deep submergence engineering community, even wrote letters to the company, saying that what they were doing was too experimental to carry passengers and that it needed to be certified. I’m struck by the similarity of the Titanic disaster itself, where the captain was repeatedly warned about ice ahead of his ship, and yet he steamed at full speed into an ice field on a moonless night, and many people died as a result.”
He spoke about the consequences of not paying attention to the warnings and said-
‘For us, it’s a very similar tragedy where warnings went unheeded. To take place at the same exact site with all the diving that’s going on all around the world, I think it’s just astonishing. It’s really quite surreal.”
The 68-year-old Hollywood personality mourned the loss of a friend who was on board the lost submersible- the Titanic expert and explorer Paul-Henri “PH” Nargeolet. He said-
“PH, the French legendary submersible dive, pilot was a friend of mine. You know, it’s a very small community. I’ve known PH for 25 years, and for him to have died tragically in this way is almost impossible for me to process.”
The incident has shocked the world and the reality behind the unfortunate catastrophic implosion of the Titan Submersible is coming to light in layers.
Everything You Need To Know About The Titan Submersible Tragedy
The Titan Submersible met its fate just like the Titanic almost after 111 years around a similar spot of the historical wreckage site in the North Atlantic Ocean on June 18, 2023. The Coast Guard mentioned that it had located five major pieces of the Titan Submersible amidst the debris around the Titanic site, which clearly proved the possibility of “catastrophic implosion due to the loss of the pressure chamber”.
According to OceanGate’s website, the lost submersible was 22 ft. Long x 9.2 ft. Wide x 8.3 ft. High. It looked like a minivan with respect to its internal structure. Made up of carbon fiber cylinders, the walls were curved and one can easily sit on the floor with their back against the wall. It weighed around 23,000 lbs and had a capacity of up to 1,510 lbs. It was designed to dive as deep as 4,000 meters (13,123 feet) in the ocean, as the Titanic wreckage site lies at 3,800 meters in the ocean. The submersible could hold up to 96 hours of oxygen reserves for five crew members.
According to NBC News, OceanGate Expeditions began their trips to the Titanic wreckage site in 2021 and had only made two previous trips before the June 18 expedition. It was built to hold only five passengers, including one pilot and four crew members, in a sitting position. The people who lost their lives in the expedition were British-Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, French diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet, British billionaire Hamish Harding, and OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who was piloting the voyage.
Source: Entertainment Weekly
