The Titan submersible tragedy continues to unfold, revealing new insights into the operations of the underwater tourism company, OceanGate.
In June 2023, Stockton Rush, the founder of OceanGate, took a Titanic expert along with three tourists on an ill-fated journey to explore the wreckage of the Titanic. Tragically, contact was lost with the Titan submersible, and it was later discovered that the vessel had suffered a catastrophic implosion, resulting in the loss of all five lives on board.
Recent investigations by the U.S. government have shed light on the circumstances surrounding this disaster. Newly released footage has brought attention to the wreckage of the Titan submersible.
Insights from Antonella Wilby, a former contractor for OceanGate, provide a deeper look into the operational practices of the company.
Excel Spreadsheets as Navigation Tools
During a recent hearing held by the U.S. Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation, Wilby disclosed that OceanGate relied heavily on an Excel spreadsheet for navigating the submersible. This critical data was manually inputted into the spreadsheet.
Wilby explained that the submersible’s ultra-short baseline positioning system relied on sound pings to gather essential data, including the sub’s velocity, depth, and positioning.
Typically, this data would be captured automatically and integrated into specialized mapping software to monitor the submersible’s location effectively. Instead, OceanGate’s practice involved documenting the data by hand and later inputting it into Excel.
Wilby criticized the company’s methodology, describing it as “absolutely idiotic.” She elaborated, “Delays occurred because there was this manual process of first writing down the latitude and longitude coordinates and then typing them in. We aimed to record this information every five minutes, but it was a significant challenge.”
The investigation by the Coast Guard into the tragic implosion of the Titan submersible is ongoing this week.
