What Went Wrong With the Doomed Titanic Sub?

On Sunday, June 18, five passengers, including one pilot and four paying tourists, were on board a 22-foot submersible headed for the wreck site of the Titanic when they lost signal in the Atlantic Ocean. On Thursday, after a days-long, around-the-clock search for the missing vessel known as the Titan, authorities have confirmed that the submersible suffered a "catastrophic implosion."

The news came after a remote-controlled vehicle located debris from the Titan, including its tail cone, on the ocean floor, about 1,600 feet from the bow of the Titanic. “The debris is consistent with a catastrophic implosion of the vessel,” U.S. Coast Guard Rear Admiral John Mauger said in a news conference.

“On behalf of the United States Coast Guard and the entire unified command, I offer my deepest condolences to the families,” he said.

Here's a better understanding of what may have happened to the doomed submersible, according to experts.

Related: Who Was on the Doomed Titanic Submersible?

What do experts think happened to the Titanic-bound submersible?

According to the U.S. Coast Guard and other experts involved in the search, the Titan suffered a "catastrophic implosion."

In a statement released to NBC News, OceanGate, the company responsible for the excursion, said, "We now believe that our CEO Stockton Rush, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, Hamish Harding, and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, have sadly been lost."

What is a "catastrophic implosion"?

A catastrophic implosion implies that the vessel had a rupture or leak in its hull, causing an implosion. Unlike an explosion, which occurs when pressure builds from the inside of a contained space, an implosion indicates that the pressure was applied from the outside, in this case by the Atlantic Ocean.

It's unknown where along the Titan's descent the implosion took place, but the wreck of the Titanic rests more than two miles beneath the surface of the ocean, where the pressure exerted by the water is about 375 times greater than the pressure of the Earth's atmosphere.

Experts have feared the possibility of a catastrophic implosion since the Titan went missing, as it would instantly kill everyone on board.

Related: The Internet Calls Out Titanic Tourist Sub Footage That Did Not Age Well

For a brief period, there was hope that the ship's loss of signal was due a power outage. If that were the case, drop weights would have been released from the submersible, bringing it to the surface where rescuers could have, in theory, located it. But that never happened.

Some experts thought the sub might have become tangled up in wreckage at the Titanic site. Far from being neat and tidy, debris from the ship is spread out over several miles at the bottom of the sea. But that scenario wasn't exactly encouraging. Alistair Greig, a professor of marine engineering at University College London, told the AP, "if [the submersible] has gone down to the seabed and can’t get back up under its own power, options are very limited. While the submersible might still be intact, if it is beyond the continental shelf, there are very few vessels that can get that deep, and certainly not divers."

Had the Titanic sub ever lost contact before?

This isn't the first time that an OceanGate sub has lost contact with the ship above. In 2022, CBS correspondent David Pogue took an OceanGate trip to the Titanic and his own submersible lost contact for two hours. However, the crew was able to regain communication at that point, something that has yet to happen for the current crew.

Did the Titanic sub have safety concerns before?

Yes. OceanGate, the company responsible for the excursion, came under scrutiny in recent days as reports surfaced that the CEO (one of the five people who died in the doomed expedition) failed to have the Titan inspected and certified by a leading agency despite expert warnings that his refusal to do so could have catastrophic results.

One such warning came from OceanGate’s former director of marine operations, David Lochridge, who, according to court documents, stressed in writing the need for more testing and warned of “the potential dangers to passengers of the Titan as the submersible reached extreme depths.”

OceanGate fired Lochridge in 2018 after he expressed his safety concerns, then sued him that same year, claiming he had breached his employment contract by disclosing confidential information when he filed a whistleblower complaint with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Lochridge countersued for wrongful termination.

Among other things, his legal filing stated, "The paying passengers would not be aware, and would not be informed, of this experimental design, the lack of non-destructive testing of the hull, or that hazardous flammable materials were being used within the submersible."

In his aforementioned blog post, Williams wrote about the overall controversial nature of "manned submersibles, wherein each deployment incurs a safety risk."

"Currently, most underwater research and offshore industrial work is conducted using unmanned and robotic vehicles," he wrote. "A loss to one of these vehicles might compromise the work being done, but at least lives aren’t at stake. In light of these events, there will likely be intense discussion about the risks associated with using these systems to support deep-sea tourism."

Next, Who Were the Titanic Survivors and What Happened to Them After They Were Rescued?