2023-07-02 19:10:33
The New York Times newspaper describedhow the preparations for the descent of the Titan submersible to the wreckage of the Titanic took place and what were the last hours of the life of its passengers. The publication studied the promotional materials of OceanGate Expeditions, which organized the descent, and spoke with a participant in one of the previous dives and with Kristin Dawood, who lost her husband and son as a result of the bathyscaphe tragedy. OceanGate declined The New York Times’ requests for an interview.
The last descent of the apparatus took place on June 18. The participants prepared for the expedition on the ship “Polar Prince”, on which they arrived in advance. According to the NYT, the team held general meetings twice a day, at which they discussed, among other things, safety issues and preparations for the descent. Sometimes the film Titanic was shown at these meetings, the newspaper writes. OceanGate’s goal was to make sure that passengers who paid for the dive were not passive participants in the mission, the newspaper notes: the company insisted that they should not be addressed as “tourists” or “clients”, but called “mission specialists”. A ticket for Titan cost $250,000, but the price could be reduced by agreement, writes NYT.
On the day of the descent, June 18, Titan passengers had to gather on deck at 5 am. At this time, the OceanGate team was completing the final preparations of the bathyscaphe before diving. “It seemed that all their actions were well debugged – it was clear that they had already done this many times,” recalls Kristin Dawood.
As the NYT writes, those gathered on the deck once again discussed the dive plan: it was supposed to take 12 hours, of which about four were allotted directly to the examination of the wreckage of the Titanic. Titan pilot and OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush used to recommend following a “slag-free” diet before diving and not drinking coffee in the morning – you could only relieve yourself on board in a camping toilet hidden behind a curtain. He also advised to wear warm socks and a hat, try not to get your feet wet and not try to see anything through the windows when diving – the apparatus’s lighting was turned off to save the energy needed to inspect the wreckage of the Titanic. Rush also encouraged passengers to download their favorite songs to their phones so they could listen to them on board via a Bluetooth speaker. He asked them to refrain from choosing country music.
Participants in the last dive were told to be ready to board the submersible by 7:30 am. Passengers donned waterproof pants and jackets, as well as steel-toed boots, life jackets and helmets. After that, each of them was weighed and helped to sink into the Titan.
From the inside, the device resembled an SUV without seats, the newspaper describes. There was a rubber mat on the floor, and two handles on the ceiling to hold on to. Then the hatch was battened down, the bolts were additionally tightened. The device began to dive.
Titan lost contact with the Polar Prince about 1 hour and 45 minutes after the start of the descent on June 18. Its wreckage was discovered four days later, 488 meters from the bow of the Titanic that sank in 1912, by a robotic deep-sea probe from Pelagic Research. All Titan passengers – Pakistani businessman Shahzad Dawood and his 19-year-old son Suleiman, British businessman Hamish Harding, French oceanographer Paul-Henri Narjolet, and Stockton Rush – died. On June 23, the US Coast Guard reported that, judging by the debris found, an implosion could have occurred on board, that is, an explosion directed inwards.
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