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In June 2023, a deep-sea adventure tour of the Titanic wreck turned into a disaster when the OceanGate submersible, Titan, lost all contact while descending. The trip, commanded by OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, had sought to transport five individuals close to 3,800 meters beneath sea level to observe the sunken vessel. A few hours after contact was lost, there was an international search operation for Titan.
OceanGate's Titan submersible imploded on June 18, 2023, during its descent to the Titanic wreck site.
The company has now dropped Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster, a documentary on Netflix, revisiting the chronology of what happened before and after the tragedy. Directed by Mark Monroe, the documentary not only explores the technical malfunctions that caused the disaster but also delves into OceanGate's culture and the relentless drive of its founder.
Through exclusive interviews, previously unheard audio, and rare images, the documentary offers a deeper insight into the risks that were being taken and the lives that were lost.
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Exploring details on OceanGate's implosion
On June 18, 2023, the Titan submersible headed down to the Titanic wreck site, situated about 380 nautical miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. The ship lost contact with its support vessel, the Polar Prince, in less than two hours of diving.
Search and rescue groups from the U.S. Coast Guard, Canadian agencies, and international organizations combed the North Atlantic for four days using aircraft, sonar buoys, and remotely operated vehicles.
On June 22, 2023, the wreckage of the submersible was found on the ocean floor. The U.S. Coast Guard verified that the wreckage was in accordance with a catastrophic implosion.
The five passengers on board, Stockton Rush, French Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, British businessman Hamish Harding, Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood, and his son Suleman, were confirmed dead. Experts think that the implosion happened right after the sub started descending, so the deaths were probably immediate.
What does the new Netflix documentary Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster explore?
The recent Netflix documentary Titan: The OceanGate Submersible Disaster aims to settle the remaining question: How could this catastrophe have happened in light of multiple warnings and internal alarms?
The film, directed by award-winning documentarian Mark Monroe, examines the buildup to the June 2023 implosion, from the decisions made by OceanGate executives to the engineering of Titan and the risk culture that defined the project.
At the heart of the film is Stockton Rush, the man Monroe calls charismatic but consumed by vision.
Rush had long been an advocate of using carbon fiber, a light but as-yet untested material at such extreme depths, for the hull of the Titan. Safety concerns were voiced by industry experts even as early as 2018, including former OceanGate director of marine operations David Lochridge.
The documentary states that Lochridge was fired after he gave a report suggesting further safety testing and even warned Rush against engaging in test dives.
Monroe's film combines a blend of insider accounts with expert commentary. David Lochridge is interviewed in an exclusive conversation, accompanied by audio of his termination.
Rob McCallum, who has decades of experience in deep-sea expeditions, provides a counter-narrative to OceanGate's approach, detailing how his own operations valued safety over publicity.
The movie features interviews from Sydney Nargeolet, the daughter of Paul-Henri Nargeolet, who gives a personal account of the human toll of the tragedy.
Most of the documentary concerns the ship's unusual design. Unlike conventional deep-sea submersibles, which are typically constructed of titanium or steel, the hull of Titan utilized a combination of carbon fiber and titanium, a choice that the documentary examines closely.
While the incorporation of carbon fiber reduced the weight of Titan and possibly its cost of operation, the documentary observes that carbon fiber had no established history of standing up to the extreme pressure of deep-ocean conditions.
Monroe expounds in the movie that the pressure vessel's structural integrity could have weakened with time from repeated cycles of pressure, but it was still sent out without thorough testing.
The documentary implies that, in spite of several warning signs, OceanGate made publicity, customer bookings, and mission schedules a priority at the expense of stringent safety testing. As more interviews are revealed, a picture begins to emerge of a company compromising on shortcuts in its quest for innovation.
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The submersible shut down all activities after the Titan tragedy. Investigations by American and Canadian agencies continue.
The documentary shows that the implosion was not just the outcome of a single technical failure, but the result of heeded warnings, defective decision-making, and poor regulation in private deep-sea tourism.
