Titanic Sub Latest: Former Titan Pilot Lost Control of Vessel, Passengers Trapped for Hours
The scary ordeal was caught on camera.
Ever since the devastating implosion of OceanGate, the private submersible that disappeared during a trip deep into the ocean to explore the wreckage of the Titanic with all passengers (British businessman Hamish Harding; Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood and his teenage son, Suleman; French explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet; and Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate) dying instantly, more stories have been surfacing surrounding the safety of the submarine.
The general consensus? There were several signs that the ill-fated vessel wasn't exactly safe and that it was no secret. This week footage of a former OceanGate pilot losing control of the sub surfaced, adding fuel to the fire.
Scott Griffith, a former pilot of OceanGate, can be seen losing control of the sub during a previous dive, captured in a BBC documentary. The vessel spun in circles, and the terrified passengers were reportedly stuck inside of the sub for hours.
"We have a problem," Griffith says in the video, as the sub was close to its final 12,500 feet below sea level descent. According to the video, the five-person crew was just 300 meters from the wreckage when the Titan's thrusters started malfunctioning.
"There's something wrong with my thrusters. I'm thrusting and nothing is happening," Griffith can be heard saying, per the Mirror. According to the documentary, the malfunction was the result of thrusters being mounted improperly, causing them to push in opposite directions.
The late OceanGate CEO Rush attempted to fix the malfunction from the mothership while the crew waited for hours. "You know what I was thinking, 'We're not going to make it,'" passenger Reneta Rojas told the BBC.
"We're literally 300 meters (600 feet) from the Titanic, and although we are already in the debris field, we can't go anywhere but go in circles."
Eventually, the thrusters were fixed, and the crew could visit the wreckage. "We were just so happy we had figured out how to move forward," Rojas said. "We started clapping inside the submersible and saying, 'Yes, we can go.'"
"I was thinking, 'Oh no, don't tell me that we are 300 meters away from the Titanic and we are going to have to go up to the surface,'" said another passenger, Oisin Fanning, according to the Daily Mail.
During the documentary, videographer Jaden Pan expressed concern about the dangers of the mission. "The dome slowly closes in front of me. I have this moment of 'This is the point of no return.' I'm not claustrophobic by any means, but at that moment, I was like, if there was any point to freak out, now would be the point to freak out," Pan said.
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Rush brushed off the incident when the 2022 documentary crew emerged from the water. "Almost every deep-sea sub makes a noise at some point," he said.
