In a report issued today, the U.S. Coast Guard panel investigating the loss of OceanGate’s Titan submersible and its occupants in 2023 blamed the disaster on a series of safety lapses — and issued recommendations that were aimed at heading off future tragedies.
“This marine casualty and the loss of five lives was preventable,” Jason Neubauer, the chair of the Coast Guard’s Marine Board of Investigation, said in a news release.
The 335-page report said the Coast Guard would have referred the CEO and founder of Everett, Wash.-based OceanGate, Stockton Rush, to the Justice Department for criminal investigation if he had survived Titan’s catastrophic implosion on June 18, 2023. Rush, who piloted the sub, died instantly during a dive to the wreck of the Titanic, along with four passengers: Titanic expert P.H. Nargeolet, British billionaire adventurer Hamish Harding, and Pakistani-born business executive Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son, Suleman Dawood.
