Global Courant
Suleman and Shahzada Dawood.
Thanks to: Family Dawood
The OceanGate Expeditions submarine that went missing with five people on board while trying to visit the Titanic wreck site has only 41 hours or less of oxygen left, U.S. Coast Guard officials said Tuesday.
Also on Tuesday, federal court records from a 2018 lawsuit emerged that showed a then-OceanGate executive warned that the company’s submarine potentially posed “extreme danger” to passengers because it had not been properly tested for operation at very low water depths.
Rescuers are searching an area of the ocean “larger than the state of Connecticut” for the submarine Titan, Coast Guard Captain Jamie Frederick said at a news conference Tuesday.
But so far there are “no results,” he said.
“Search and rescue crews are working around the clock to find the submarine and crew,” said Frederick, who called it a “very complex search.”
The submarine disappeared about 900 nautical miles off the coast of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, less than two hours after its dive on Sunday.
Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate Expeditions, is aboard the ship.
Also on board are Action Aviation billionaire Hamish Harding; Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood, 48; and his 19-year-old son Suleman. The fifth person is a crew member of the ship.
OceanGate began offering trips on the submarine in 2021, with passengers paying $250,000 each.
Zoom in IconArrows pointing out
“This is your chance to step outside of everyday life and discover something very special,” the company said on its website advertising the trips.
In a November “CBS Sunday Morning” segment about his trip on the submarine, correspondent David Pogue read aloud the text of a waiver he signed for the excursion.
“An experimental submersible that has not been approved or certified by any regulatory agency and could result in bodily harm, disability, emotional trauma or death,” Pogue read.
lawsuit 2018
Court documents from a 2018 lawsuit between OceanGate and former director of maritime operations, David Lochridge, show that he “disagreeed with OceanGate’s position to allow the submarine to dive without any non-destructive testing to ensure its integrity to prove”.
Lochridge said in a lawsuit first reported by The New Republic that failure to perform those tests would “expose passengers to potentially extreme danger in an experimental submarine.”
“Lochridge first raised verbal concerns about the safety and quality control issues related to the Titan to OceanGate’s executive management,” Lochridge’s lawsuit said. “This verbal communication was ignored.”
The filing said that Lochridge had been denied access to information about the ship’s vantage point – the part where passengers could see out from the submarine – which showed that it was “only built to a certified pressure of 1,300 metres, although OceanGate of plan was to take passengers down to depths of 4,000 meters.”
“Lochridge found that the viewing window manufacturer would only certify to a depth of 1,300 meters due to the experimental design of the viewing window provided by OceanGate, which fell outside Pressure Vessels for Human Occupancy (‘PVHO’) standards,” the filing reads. .
FILE – Submarine pilot Randy Holt, right, interacts with the support boat as he and Stockton Rush, left, CEO and co-founder of OceanGate, dive into the company’s submarine, “Antipodes,” about three miles off the coast of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., June 28, 2013.
Wilfredo Lee | AP photo
“OceanGate refused to pay for the manufacturer to build a viewing window that would meet the depth requirement of 4,000 feet,” the filing said. “The paying passengers would not be aware of and would not be made aware of this experimental design, the lack of non-destructive testing of the hull, or that dangerous flammable
materials were used in the submarine.”
OceanGate had sued Lochridge and his wife in Washington State Court in June 2018 alleging breach of contract, fraud and other claims the company said arose from him discussing OceanGate’s confidential information with at least two other people, as well as with representatives of the federal professional association. Safety and Health Administration in alleged violation of a confidentiality agreement.
Lochridge then filed a counterclaim against OceanGate in U.S. District Court in Seattle.
The case was settled at the end of 2018.
OceanGate did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the lawsuit.
The Titanic sank on its maiden voyage from England to New York City on April 15, 1912, after hitting an iceberg. More than 1,500 people died in the disaster.
The wreck of the ship was not found until 1985 off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. It lies about 13,000 feet below the Atlantic Ocean.
This is the latest news. Check back later for updates.
CNBC Politics
Read more about CNBC’s political coverage:
