Titanic tourist sub goes missing sparking search

[rhwestfall]

Just had to....

 

[FF / EMT]

Worse if bobbing on the surface and not being found before the air runs out. At least if they were inside the wreck they'd have something to look at.

Maybe they could finally turn that darn faucet off…

 

[makar0n]

Just some fun from wiki:

OceanGate - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Limitations​

Once the occupants are aboard, the hatch is closed and bolted from the outside; there is no way to open the hatch from inside the vessel. In addition, there is no on-board navigation system; the support ship, which monitors the position of Titan relative to its target, sends text messages to Titan providing distances and directions.[23] In 2019, OceanGate published a blog post explaining why Titan was not certified by a ship classification society. In the post, OceanGate stated "the vast majority of marine (and aviation) accidents are a result of operator error, not mechanical failure" and argued that classification focused solely on the physical state of the vessel and not its corporate actions, which it characterized as a "constant, committed effort and a focused corporate culture" of "maintaining high-level operational safety".[24] Journalist David Pogue, who rode in Titan to view the Titanic in 2022, noted that Titan was not equipped with an emergency locator beacon; during his expedition, the surface support vessel lost track of the Titan "for about five hours, and adding such a beacon was discussed. They could still send short texts to the sub, but did not know where it was. It was quiet and very tense, and they shut off the ship's internet to keep us from tweeting."[25]

Testing and inspection​

A 1⁄3-scale model of the pressure vessel was built and tested at APL-UW; the model was able to sustain a pressure of 4,285 psi (29.54 MPa; 291.6 atm), corresponding to a depth of approximately 3,000 m (9,800 ft).[26]

David Lochridge, the OceanGate Director of Marine Operations, inspected the Titan as it was being handed over from Engineering to Operations and filed a quality control report in January 2018 in which he stated that no non-destructive testing of the carbon fiber hull had taken place to check for voids and delaminating which could compromise the hull's strength. Instead, Lochridge was told that OceanGate would rely on the real-time acoustic monitoring system, which he felt would not warn the crew of potential failure with sufficient time to safely abort the mission and evacuate. The day after he filed his report, he was summoned to a meeting in which he was told the acrylic window was only rated to 1,300 m (4,300 ft) depth because OceanGate would not fund the design of a window rated to 4,000 m (13,000 ft). In that meeting, he reiterated his concerns and added he would refuse to allow crewed testing without a hull scan; Lochridge was dismissed from his position as a result.[27] OceanGate filed a lawsuit against Lochridge that June, accusing him of improperly sharing proprietary trade secrets and fraudulently manufacturing a reason to dismiss him. The suit was settled in November 2018.[27]

OceanGate stated that unmanned testing of Titan to 4,000 m (13,000 ft) was performed in 2018 to validate the design,[28] followed by a statement that a crew of four had set a record by descending in Titan to 3,760 m (12,340 ft) in April 2019.[29] The tests were conducted near Great Abaco Island, near the edge of the continental shelf, as the platform would only need to be towed 12 mi (19 km) to depths exceeding 15,000 ft (4,600 m).[2] During the first human-piloted descent, which Rush performed solo, he used the vertical thrusters to overcome unexpected positive buoyancy when descending past 10,000 ft (3,000 m), which caused interference with the communication system, and he lost contact with the surface ship for approximately one hour. Rush became the second human to dive solo to 13,000 ft (4,000 m), after James Cameron, who in 2012 dove to Challenger Deep in the Mariana Trench, approximately 36,000 ft (11,000 m).[2] After these tests were completed, in January 2020, the hull of Titan began showing signs of cyclic fatigue and the craft was de-rated to 3,000 m (9,800 ft).[30] The Spencer-built composite cylindrical hull either was repaired or replaced by Electroimpact and Janicki Industries in 2020 or 2021, prior to the first trips to Titanic.[27]

No navigation, no emergency beacons, no way of getting out, no teether, no comms beyond text messages, not bothering with things like hull scan "bc we have our monitoring system 5000" or certifications "bc we have corporate culture ya know". Plus material fatigue. And a window certified to 3x less pressure. Well, what could possibly go wrong. Seems a rush job alright.

Interestingly the company who built the original hull, Spencer Composities, also did DeepFlight Challenger, also using carbon composites and things. But then:

Based on testing at high pressure, the DeepFlight Challenger was determined to be suitable only for a single dive, not the repeated uses that had been planned as part of Virgin Oceanic service. As such, in 2014, Virgin Oceanic "scrapped" plans for the five dives project using the DeepFlight Challenger, as originally conceived, putting plans on hold until more suitable technologies are developed.[23]

DeepFlight Challenger - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

One would think that people with 250K to spare would be more careful as to how and where they spend it, but then 250K for a bored 1%-er (and nothing to do with motorbikes) is a mere pocket change I suppose.

 

[Rearviewmirror]

I thought this visualization was good:

 

[DebbyDiver]

I thought this visualization was good:

That's brilliant. Thanks for the share.

 

[Gone for diving]

So, basically the hatch is the viewport at the horizontal position of the submersible?

OceanGate Home

oceangate.com

From what I can tell by pictures

The hinge is yellow,
And the whole dome swings open, red

I don't think the veiw dome is removed it swings with the door.

I saw pictures of a ring being glued on. Then the dome mounts on the ring, with the hinge and the bolts everyone complains about.

If you have ever read the story about Pisces lll where before they lifted them off the sea bed. They were instructed to release the inside hatch lock mechanism. So if they where unconscious or dead they could open it up from the outside....
That fact that someone has to open it from the outside is just part the physics, and probably the best.

I'll take bolts over a latch that penetrates the hull.
Besides
Water pressure is doing a pretty good job of it. Once underwater you don't need bolts,
(if it floods you don't care. The bolts only will keep the door closed when it equalize, and bodies inside.)

 

[Pearlman]

So how long is a typical trip on this craft expected to be? From the surface to the bottom followed by a tour of the Titanic and back up to the surface? When was the craft and crew expected back on the mother ship originally?

 

[makar0n]

So how long is a typical trip on this craft expected to be? From the surface to the bottom followed by a tour of the Titanic and back up to the surface? When was the craft and crew expected back on the mother ship originally?

2023 Titan submersible incident - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

On 16 June, the expedition to the Titanic departed from St. John's, Newfoundland, aboard the research and expedition ship MV Polar Prince. The ship arrived at the dive site on 17 June, and the dive operation began the following day on 18 June at 9:00 ADT.[21] For the first hour and a half of the descent, the Titan communicated with the Polar Prince every 15 minutes, but communication stopped after a recorded communication at 11:47 ADT.[21] The vessel was expected to resurface at 18:10 ADT.[21] Authorities were notified about the incident at 18:35 ADT.[21]

 

[Bob DBF]

If you have ever read the story about Pisces lll where before they lifted them off the sea bed. They were instructed to release the inside hatch lock mechanism. So if they where unconscious or dead they could open it up from the outside....
That fact that someone has to open it from the outside is just part the physics, and probably the best.

I'll take bolts over a latch that penetrates the hull.

Sounds like the latch does not penatrate the hull if they have to release it, and the crew outside cannot.

 

[Dan]

So how long is a typical trip on this craft expected to be? From the surface to the bottom followed by a tour of the Titanic and back up to the surface? When was the craft and crew expected back on the mother ship originally?

From some news, it plan to descend to the bottom in 2.5 hours, dropping ballast, hovering above the wreck, taking pictures, etc. for 5-7 hours, then ascend for 2.5 hours to make a total roundtrip of 10-12 hours.

It descent around 9am and the support ship called for called USG around 9:13pm to report the list of contact with Titan, 12 hours later.