Titan’s sub-implosion was due to faulty engineering, says US Safety Board – National

Faulty engineering caused an experimental submersible to implode, killing five people on its way to the shipwreck Titanicthe National Transportation Safety Board concluded in a report Wednesday.

The NTSB made the statement in its final report on the failure of the helmet and the implosion of the titan submersible in June 2023.

All aboard the submersible died instantly in the North Atlantic when Titan suffered a catastrophic implosion as it descended into the wreck.

The NTSB report states that the Titan’s flawed engineering “resulted in the construction of a carbon fiber composite pressure vessel that contained multiple anomalies and did not meet the required strength and durability requirements.” He also claimed that OceanGate, the Titan’s owner, failed to adequately test the Titan and was unaware of its true durability.

The report also said the Titan likely would have been found sooner if OceanGate had followed standard emergency response guidance, and that would have saved “time and resources even if a rescue was not possible in this case.”

The NTSB report dovetails with a Coast Guard report released in August that described Titan’s implosion as preventable. The Coast Guard determined that security procedures at OceanGate, a private company based in Washington state, were “critically flawed” and found “glaring disparities” between security protocols and actual practices.

OceanGate ceased operations in July 2023 and ended. Company representatives did not respond to a request for comment Wednesday. A company spokesman offered his condolences to the families of the deceased after the Coast Guard report was released in August.

The Titan’s implosion killed OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush and sparked lawsuits and calls for stricter regulation of private high-seas expeditions. The implosion also killed French underwater explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet, known as “Mr. Titanic”; British adventurer Hamish Harding; and two members of a prominent Pakistani family, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood.

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The NTSB report recommends that the Coast Guard commission a panel of experts to study submersibles and other pressurized vehicles for human occupation. It also recommends that the Coast Guard implement regulations for the vehicles informed by that study.

He also asked the Coast Guard to “disseminate the study’s findings to the industry,” which has grown in recent years as privately funded exploration has grown.

The vessel had been making trips to the Titanic site since 2021. Its final dive occurred on the morning of June 18, 2023. The submersible lost contact with its support vessel about two hours later and was reported overdue that afternoon. Ships, planes and equipment were moved to the site about 435 miles (700 kilometers) south of St. John’s, in Newfoundland.

A multi-day search for survivors outside Canada made international news. It soon became clear that there would be no survivors, and the Coast Guard and other authorities began lengthy investigations into what happened.

© 2025 The Canadian Press