# "Titan" submersible investigation begins \[28-June-2023\] **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Tags:** breaking-news\ **Created:** [June 28, 2023, 4:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242 "2023-06-28T16:34:31Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 14
**Author:** ![Napier](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/ce73a5/32.png) [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)\ **Post date:** [July 18, 2023, 11:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/261 "2023-07-18T11:29:42Z")
> [@running\_coach](#): > > next thing you know, they cave under the pressure Dammit. Near lost a mouthfull of coffee on that one. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 9:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/262 "2023-07-19T09:57:08Z")
Finite-element simulation of the Titan’s implosion suggests a hoop-style failure as I had described in other threads, but with an interesting twist: > **[Simulation Reveals Exactly How Titan Submersible Imploded](https://www.engineering.com/story/simulation-reveals-exactly-how-titan-submersible-imploded)** > > For the victims, a moment of panic followed by a painless death. According to this simulation, the initial phase of the hoop failure occurred near the middle portion of the carbon-fiber hull, with the ends staying intact slightly longer, likely due to the added strength provided by the titanium rings that were epoxied on either end. It shows how the debris from the collapse may have been driven into the titanium end caps, and how the viewport window at the front end may have been blown outward by the impact of all the debris and seawater on the inner surface of the end cap. Important also to note that the article author appears to be using the wrong units of time: he’s labeling his numbers as milliseconds, when it’s quite clear that he should be calling them microseconds ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 10:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/263 "2023-07-19T10:37:34Z")
6 of one, 6,000 of the other. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/264 "2023-07-19T14:39:00Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > Important also to note that the article author appears to be using the wrong units of time: “At 36005 milliseconds, the middle of the cylinder has collapsed to about half its diameter. Still, the submersible appears to be intact.” 36 seconds! So much for “near instantaneous”. That’s really a bad error for a professional to make. ---
**Author:** ![Machine\_Elf](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/82dd89/32.png) [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/265 "2023-07-19T14:43:42Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > “At 36005 milliseconds, the middle of the cylinder has collapsed to about half its diameter. Still, the submersible appears to be intact.” > > 36 seconds! So much for “near instantaneous”. That’s really a bad error for a professional to make. At first I was willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, i.e. maybe it really was a slow ramp-up of external pressure over the first half a minute or so - but then I saw the _difference_ in times between the first two images in the collapse sequence, and figured it surely had to be 1092 microseconds, not 1092 milliseconds. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/266 "2023-07-19T15:02:10Z")
Assuming the milli- or micro- second issue is just a textural error, and does not affect the simulation… I find it fascinating that the titanium hemispheres are moving in towards each other. I would have thought the inrush of water would force them apart. But…obviously when the cylinder wall failed, the water pressure would force the hemispheres together. There should still be some force pushing out (the same force that crushed the people into jelly), but maybe not enough that the net force is still inward. When the USS Scorpion imploded, the failure was at the transition between the aft tapered end of the submarine and the cylindrical section. The end section was driven into the middle section. It wasn’t the cylindrical wall that failed, but the joint. Of course, it was steel and not carbon fiber. ---
**Author:** ![TroutMan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/troutman/32/6721_2.png) [@TroutMan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TroutMan)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 3:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/267 "2023-07-19T15:58:30Z")
It looks like they’ve already corrected that in the article. > _ **Corrections made on July 19, 2023** : Time sequence changed to step time in milliseconds instead of increment._ ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 4:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/268 "2023-07-19T16:14:54Z")
So the article rescaled from (unstated) microseconds to milliseconds, and the timeline looks credible and consistent with “too fast for the victims to understand they were dying”. ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 4:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/269 "2023-07-19T16:19:16Z")
Good on the corrections! ---
**Author:** ![pjd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pjd/32/3009_2.png) [@pjd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pjd)\ **Post date:** [July 19, 2023, 4:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/270 "2023-07-19T16:59:31Z")
Obviously Dopers. ---
**Author:** ![PastTense](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pasttense/32/14550_2.png) [@PastTense](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/PastTense)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 12:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/271 "2023-08-26T12:53:55Z")
> **[The ‘Titan’ Submersible Disaster Was Years in the Making, New Details Reveal](https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2023/08/titan-submersible-implosion-warnings)** > > To many in the tight-knit deep-sea exploration community, OceanGate’s submersible dives were reckless and often dangerous, writes best-selling author Susan Casey. ---
**Author:** ![Broomstick](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/broomstick/32/246_2.png) [@Broomstick](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Broomstick)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/272 "2023-08-26T13:24:58Z")
I found the link informative and worth the time to read it. Thank you. ---
**Author:** ![Spice\_Weasel](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/spice_weasel/32/5435_2.png) [@Spice\_Weasel](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spice_Weasel)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/273 "2023-08-26T14:53:17Z")
This part stood out to me: > “Rush disregarded these safety instructions. He landed too close, got tangled in the current, managed to wedge the sub beneath the Andrea Doria’s crumbling bow, and descended into a full-blown panic. Lochridge tried to take the helm, but Rush had refused to let him, melting down for over an hour until finally one of the clients shrieked, “Give him the fucking controller!” At which point Rush hurled the controller, a video-game joystick, at Lochridge’s head. Lochridge freed the sub in 15 minutes.” The sad thing here is literally everyone tried to stop him. The fact that he _couldn’t_ be stopped is as concerning as the fact that he didn’t stop. ---
**Author:** ![ASL\_v2.0](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/asl_v2.0/32/3525_2.png) [@ASL\_v2.0](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ASL_v2.0)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 4:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/274 "2023-08-26T16:37:06Z")
[Burning Bridges](https://youtube.com/watch?v=kgeIINs1TrQ) from _Kelly’s Heroes_ could have been his theme song. It sounds upbeat and inspiring from the melody, but when you actually pay attention to what’s being said in the lyrics, it’s clear that his life is an absolute train wreck. ---
**Author:** ![Al128](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/al128/32/16541_2.png) [@Al128](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al128)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 4:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/275 "2023-08-26T16:56:32Z")
_ **As the world** now knows, [Stockton Rush](https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/22/us/stockton-rush-dead.html) touted himself as a maverick, a disrupter, a breaker of rules. So far out on the visionary curve that, for him, safety regulations were mere suggestions. “If you’re not breaking things, you’re not innovating,” he declared at the 2022 GeekWire Summit. “If you’re operating within a known environment, as most submersible manufacturers do, they don’t break things. To me, the more stuff you’ve broken, the more innovative you’ve been.”_ No matter their name, but that is the huge red flag for “Entitled Asshole Tech Bro Narcisist for whom the laws don’t apply” … that became somewhat fashionable in the past 1-2 decades … chances are they will not go out alone or silent … ---
**Author:** ![Magiver](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4491bb/32.png) [@Magiver](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Magiver)\ **Post date:** [August 26, 2023, 8:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/276 "2023-08-26T20:57:00Z")
Death by innovation. I think there’s a song in there somewhere. “For whom the (diving) bell tolls” ---
**Author:** ![Coriolanus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/coriolanus/32/18769_2.png) [@Coriolanus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Coriolanus)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2023, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/277 "2023-08-27T15:33:27Z")
> Two miles down, they entered the abyssal zone—so named because it’s the literal abyss. I thought abyss either meant the _bottom_ of the sea or the infinite void. That big greenish tinted picture with people sitting in that sub/pipe in the middle of the article: Wow. I’ve built _literal_ snowforts and crawled through aluminum culverts that had better construction. > “Would you ever agree to pilot a sub that wasn’t classed?” I asked. > “Never. Nope. No.” Good advice! ---
**Author:** ![Northern\_Piper](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/northern_piper/32/5304_2.png) [@Northern\_Piper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Northern_Piper)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2023, 5:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/278 "2023-08-27T17:17:27Z")
@PastTense , thanks for sharing an excellent article. The closing really stands out: > [@](#): > > Those rules Rush so disdained? They had been refined, honed, universally adopted—and they had worked. Submersibles had earned their title as the world’s least risky mode of transportation even as they operated in the world’s riskiest environment. Because there is one last rule that every deep-sea explorer knows: > > The goal is not to dive. > > The goal is to dive, and to come back. ---
**Author:** ![EddyTeddyFreddy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eddyteddyfreddy/32/18796_2.png) [@EddyTeddyFreddy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/EddyTeddyFreddy)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2023, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/279 "2023-08-27T19:19:22Z")
Thanks for that link; it’s an excellent explanation. (And I’ve ordered the author’s book through my library.) More than ever, I’m glad that Stockton was aboard so he could die along with his victims. No amount of after-disaster punishment would ever have been sufficient had he not gone down with his folly. ---
**Author:** ![Al128](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/al128/32/16541_2.png) [@Al128](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Al128)\ **Post date:** [August 27, 2023, 7:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242/280 "2023-08-27T19:23:42Z")
well, at least it saves the world a lot of gaslighting … _the problem was not the craft, but rather xyz … (musky-trumpish mumble)_ [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242.md?page=13) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/titan-submersible-investigation-begins-28-june-2023/986242.md?page=15)