OceanGate Sued Over Titan Sub Implosion, 'Mr. Titanic' Family Is Seeking $50 Million

On June 18, 2023, Titan took its first dive of that year to the Titanic wreck. Though it had only started manned dives two years prior and had been plagued by issues and delays for much longer than that, Titan was dubbed the world's deepest dive and largest submersible, mostly by Stockton Rush himself. It was the only way in which (rich) tourists could see the Titanic with their own eyes, which marked but a first step in Rush's vision for a new form of tourism and underwater exploration.

Titan was the start of a new business model but also, Rush hoped, the first step towards colonizing the big Deep Blue. He imagined underwater bunkers for prepper billionaires, with copies of Titan serving as public transport to and between their vaults. Along the way, Titan would help map the oceans and advance research – a most noble sentiment, even if it was a mere afterthought for Rush.

On June 18, 2023, Titan imploded right over the Titanic, killing all five people onboard: Rush, who doubled as pilot, crewmember Paul-Henri Nargeolet, and three paying customers. Titan was an unclassed, uncertified, and, according to reports, untested submersible that managed to use a legal loophole to carry people to Titanic depths, and those very people ultimately paid the price for it.

The official investigation into the causes of the crash is still ongoing, but the family of one person onboard has already made up their mind on who's responsible for it. The Nargeolet estate is suing OceanGate Expeditions, seeking over $50 million in damages and accusing the now-defunct company of deliberately withholding information.

Nargeolet was officially a crewmember on Titan, but he was also the man who brought credibility to the sub when it needed it the most. The French explorer had been to the Titanic 37 times and was a certified Titanic expert. Film director James Cameron, a Titanic expert himself and a good friend of Nargeolet's, used to refer to him as "Mr. Titanic," as did most of the exploring community.

As Cameron himself said in an interview earlier this year, Nargeolet wouldn't have agreed to dive on Titan had he been made aware of the many issues with the sub or the cost-cutting operated by Rush in the testing and construction phase. That's also the claim in the wrongful death lawsuit filed by his family in King County, in Seattle, Washington.

The lawsuit claims gross negligence and strict product liability on OceanGate's part, which repeatedly failed to disclose problems with previous Titan units and lack of proper testing.

"Had Stockton Rush been transparent about all the troubles that had been experienced with the Titan, as well as the previous, similar models, someone as experienced and knowledgeable as Paul Henri-Nargeolet would not have participated," Matt Shaffer, another attorney representing the Nargeolet family, says in a statement. "The filing asserts that Stockton Rush simply wasn't forthcoming with the crew and passengers about the dangers he and others knew about but the passengers and crew did not."

Recent leaked documentation shows that Rush was very careful about muffling all criticism of the way he operated his company and built his sub. It also revealed the kind of cost-cutting measures employed in the construction of Titan, ranging from ordering a hull after a prototype had blown up instead of doing more tests, to deciding to use carbon fiber instead of the more expensive (but durable) titanium for the hull and refusing to perform structural tests after each dive.

Because of all these things – and countless others – Titan's hull cracked when repeatedly subjected to 6,500 psi of pressure at Titanic depths.

The wreck itself sits at 3,800 meters/12,500 feet on the ocean floor, and Titan was able to reach it safely several times and come back up in one piece. The reason why carbon fiber isn't used in subs is that the material tends to crack with repeated exposure to this kind of pressure. Rush's refusal to do post-dive tests meant that the moment the five passengers inside realized the hull was cracking was right before the fatal implosion.

As the lawsuit puts it, the five men onboard knew the fate that was in store for them, right before Rush dropped the weights in an attempt to abort the descent. That took place 90 minutes into the dive, when the sub lost communication with the mothership and all power.

"Common sense dictates that the crew were well aware they were going to die, before dying," it claims. "By experts' reckoning, they would have continued to descend, in full knowledge of the vessel's irreversible failures, experiencing terror and mental anguish prior to the Titan ultimately imploding."

Nargeolet's family also contributed to an expose that highlighted Rush's (and OceanGate's) shady way of doing business from earlier this year, so the lawsuit should hardly come as a surprise. This was also when Cameron said Nargeolet wouldn't have gotten involved if he'd known the company's history, but it doesn't look like he's directly involved in the lawsuit.