Titanic-bound submersible suffered 'catastrophic implosion,' Coast Guard says

Expert Who Begged Off a Titanic Sub Mission Saw an Implosion Coming

When OceanGate Inc. offered Robert Mester a voyage aboard the Antipodes, a predecessor to the Titan, the privately operated five-person submersible that imploded while descending to the wreckage of the Titanic, he politely begged off the expedition.

“They were using off-the-shelf hardware from Radio Shack to operate inside, and quite frankly we’re talking about an environment that requires robust equipment that has certifications and qualifications that are established by different agencies for man-rated submersibles,” said Mester, a deepwater salvage master and ex-Marine based in Washington State. “None of the equipment that I saw inside the submersible was up to that [level], so I just chose not to go.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/worl...C?cvid=f0b7d10096a743d4b7fd02c06a7713ab&ei=10
 
guno said:
Expert Who Begged Off a Titanic Sub Mission Saw an Implosion Coming

When OceanGate Inc. offered Robert Mester a voyage aboard the Antipodes, a predecessor to the Titan, the privately operated five-person submersible that imploded while descending to the wreckage of the Titanic, he politely begged off the expedition.

“They were using off-the-shelf hardware from Radio Shack to operate inside, and quite frankly we’re talking about an environment that requires robust equipment that has certifications and qualifications that are established by different agencies for man-rated submersibles,” said Mester, a deepwater salvage master and ex-Marine based in Washington State. “None of the equipment that I saw inside the submersible was up to that [level], so I just chose not to go.”

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/worl...C?cvid=f0b7d10096a743d4b7fd02c06a7713ab&ei=10
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That guy would have mentioned the hull first. This is fake news.
 
Doc Dutch said:
Until this week it was a 0% failure rate. :)

Similarly, the Wright brothers flyer had zero fatalities until 17SEP1908 when, during a demonstration flight, Orville and 1LT Thomas E. Selfridge crashed due to a propeller failure. Although I couldn't find a direct online reference, the problem was the Wright Flyer didn't have seatbelts and 1LT Selfridge was thrown out of the aircraft. Presumably they didn't wear helmets either. Seatbelts in aircraft weren't invented until 1911 and not required by regulation until 1926.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Selfridge

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/after-lt-thomas-selfridge-180975437/

https://www.faa.gov/media/20816
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good point!

I think one needs an adequate sample size of data to make any statistically meaningful conclusions

The first 30 missions of the space shuttle were successful. But after the complete destruction of two space shuttle and loss of all their crews, it became fairly obvious that the space shuttle was an experimental technology that was never really ready for prime time. The later generation Russian Soyuz space craft routinely traveled safely to low Earth orbit and back, and we needed something like that, so our astronauts just started hitching rides on Russian spaceships to the ISS.
 
Lightbringer said:
Bullshit. Excuse me if I doubt your expertise on this.
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There's video of its construction. I watched one where they showed how the carbon fiber was wound on, then the end bells were glued in place to the carbon fiber. The design would work with an interior pressure of about 15 psi where greater outside pressure was pushing down against the hull, the glue bond only having to hold the two pieces together. Reverse that and it becomes a weak point on the sub.
 
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