The Real Cause of the Loss of the Titan

At this point in time, the majority of the ships that rushed to the Mid- Atlantic, to try to find and rescue the Titan submersible, have left the area. Two ships remain in an effort to get to the bottom of what happened. No doubt the crews of those two ships are raking over the bottom of the ocean for debris, hopeful of discovering the cause of what we now know was a fatal implosion of the vessel.

Questions being asked will be along the lines of "Was it a failure of the carbon fiber hull?", "Did perhaps the fixings that screwed down the hatch fail?" Or, "Was it an explosive ignition of oxygen inside the hull." We may never know. And yet, we do already know!

The cause of this preventable tragedy was the self-same cause of the loss of the Titanic that the Titan was en route to explore. In a word, it was 'Hubris', an excessive, unjustified, degree of self-confidence.

Another word for hubris is arrogance, which can lead a person to believe that they can do no wrong. In history, there are many examples of hubris being the downfall of the culprit. From Achilles to King Lear, from Icarus to Macbeth, from Captain Smith of the Titanic to Stockton Rush of the Titan. It is amazing to think that this man, for all of his involvement and familiarity with the story of the Titanic, did not seem to learn a single lesson from it.

Looking back now at the history of Stockton Rush and the Titan, one can see that it really was only a matter of time before disaster struck. For here was a man who did not tolerate any sort of well-intentioned, sound advice or positive criticism.

Rush saw himself as a maverick entrepreneur, as somebody who was capable of thinking outside of the box with untested, new, and innovative technologies, like carbon fiber.

Rob McCallum, who runs his own ocean exploration company, exchanged a variety of emails with Rush in which he expressed his concerns about the submersible, Titan. McCallum urged Rush to stop using the Titan until it had been certified by some independent agency.

Rush replied that he was " tired of industry players who try to use a safety argument to stop innovation." He went on to say...

"We have heard the baseless cries of, you are going to kill someone, way too often. I take this as a serious personal insult."

In other exchanges, Rush told people, that once inside the Titan, it was the safest place on Earth to be. In another, he told a potential client that getting in the Titan was safer than crossing the street. At one point Rush stated that the issue of safety was 'pure waste'. This all stinks to the high heavens, of the Titanic myth that "This ship is unsinkable."

When asked why he hadn't brought in an independent agency to oversee the integrity of the vessel Rush replied...

"Bringing an outside entity up to speed on every innovation before it is put into real-world testing is anathema to rapid innovation."

In 2018 an ex-employee of OceanGate, David Lochridge, claimed that he had been terminated because he had had the temerity to raise critical safety concerns about the Titan.

We can see a pattern here of crass ignorance and overconfidence. Stockton Rush was a man who just would not listen. He clearly considered himself to be above all other, vastly more experienced, players in the oceanographic industry.

The reason he was able to ignore his critics was that there wasn't, and still isn't, any regulatory body overseeing what happens in international waters. Trains, buses, ships, and taxis, all are regulated by some licensing authority or other. The reason for this is a deeply felt need and concern for public safety. Yet Stockton Rush was able to, unhindered, run an excursion service to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean in an untested, unlicensed vessel of unknown structural integrity and questionable safety levels. How on this Earth can that be allowed to happen?

It would seem that hubris trumps common sense. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is precisely what caused the loss of the Titan and the four innocent lives aboard it, in the hostile, cold, and dark depths of the Atlantic Ocean. The fatal character flaw of Hubris, on the part of Stockton Rush, is what killed them all, just as it killed the 1500 souls on the Titanic itself, over 100 years ago. God may they all rest in peace.