Titan submersible crew experienced 'terror and mental anguish' before death, lawsuit claims
Relatives of a French explorer who died in the Titan submersible implosion have filed a more than $50 million lawsuit, claiming the crew experienced "terror and mental anguish" before the disaster and accusing the sub’s operator of gross negligence.
Paul-Henri Nargeolet was among five people who died when the submersible during a voyage to the famed Titanic wreck site in the North Atlantic in June 2023.
No one survived the trip aboard the experimental submersible owned by OceanGate, a company in Washington state that has since suspended operations.
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Concerns were raised in the aftermath of the disaster about whether the Titan was doomed due to its unconventional design and its creator’s refusal to submit to independent checks that are standard in the industry. Its implosion also raised questions about the viability and future of private deep-sea exploration.
The crew experienced "terror and mental anguish" before death
Attorneys for Nargeolet's estate said in an emailed statement that the "doomed submersible" had a "troubled history," and that OceanGate failed to disclose key facts about the vessel and its durability.
According to the lawsuit, the Titan "dropped weights" about 90 minutes into its dive, indicating the team had aborted or attempted to abort the dive.
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"While the exact cause of failure may never be determined, experts agree that the Titan’s crew would have realized exactly what was happening," the lawsuit states. "Common sense dictates that the crew were well aware they were going to die, before dying."
The lawsuit goes on to say: "The crew may well have heard the carbon fiber’s crackling noise grow more intense as the weight of the water pressed on Titan’s hull. The crew lost communications and perhaps power as well. 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."
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The suit also criticizes Titan’s "hip, contemporary, wireless electronics system, and states that none of the controller, controls or gauges would work without a constant source of power and a wireless signal."
The lawsuit blames the implosion on the "persistent carelessness, recklessness and negligence" of Oceangate, Rush and others.
OceanGate has yet to respond to lawsuit
A spokesperson for OceanGate declined to comment on the lawsuit, which was filed Tuesday in King County, Washington. The defendants must respond to the complaint in the coming weeks, court papers state. The lawsuit describes Nargeolet as an employee of OceanGate and a crew member on the Titan.
What happened to the Titan submersible?
The Titan had been chronicling the Titanic’s decay and the underwater ecosystem around the sunken ocean liner in yearly voyages since 2021.
The craft made its last dive on June 18, 2023, a Sunday morning, and lost contact with its support vessel about two hours later. When it was reported overdue that afternoon, rescuers rushed ships, planes and other equipment to the area, about 435 miles south of St. John’s, Newfoundland.
The U.S. Navy notified the Coast Guard that day of an anomaly in its acoustic data that was "consistent with an implosion or explosion" at the time communications between the Polar Prince and the Titan were lost, a senior Navy official later told The Associated Press. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive technology.
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Any sliver of hope that remained for finding the crew alive was wiped away on June 22, when the Coast Guard announced that debris had been found near the Titanic on the ocean floor. Authorities have since recovered the submersible’s intact endcap, debris and presumed human remains from the site.
Who were the victims of the Titan submersible implosion?
The implosion killed the submersible's operator, Stockton Rush, and four others. Rush also co-founded OceanGate, the company that owned the submersible.
Art school students give final touches to a painting depicting five people aboard a submersible named Titan, that went missing near the wreck of the Titanic, in Mumbai on June 22, 2023. (Photo by INDRANIL MUKHERJEE / AFP)
In addition to Rush, the implosion killed two members of a prominent Pakistani family, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood; British adventurer Hamish Harding; and Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet.
Harding and Nargeolet were members of The Explorers Club, a professional society dedicated to research, exploration and resource conservation.
What happened to the Titanic?
The ocean liner Titanic struck an iceberg and sank in April 1912, killing all but about 700 of the roughly 2,200 passengers and crew. Since the wreckage’s discovery in 1985, it has been slowly succumbing to metal-eating bacteria. Some have predicted the ship could vanish in a matter of decades as holes yawn in the hull and sections disintegrate.
Where is the Titanic wreck?
The Titanic wreck site is located 963 miles northeast of New York and 453 miles southeast of the Newfoundland coastline, sitting 12,000 feet below sea level.