Key Points
I told him Im not getting in it, former OceanGate engineering director Tony Nissen said to a panel of Coast Guard investigators, referring to a 2018 conversation in which CEO Stockton Rush allegedly asked Nissen to act as a pilot in an upcoming expedition to the Titanic...
Nissens testimony, which focused on the design, building, and testing of OceanGates first carbon fiber submersible, was a dramatic start to nearly two weeks of public testimony in the US Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigations hearings into the fatal June 2023 implosion of the Titan..
Before Nissen took the stand, the Coast Guard presented a detailed timeline of OceanGate as a company, the development of the Titan submersible, and its trips to the wreck of the Titanic, resting nearly 3,800 meters down in the north Atlantic..
The Coast Guard also confirmed reports that the experimental carbon fiber sub had been stored in an outdoor parking lot in temperatures as low as 1.4 degrees Fahrenheit (17 Celsius) in the run-up to last years Titanic missions..
One former OceanGate engineer believes this supports the theory that the implosion was allegedly caused by damage to the carbon fiber there, perhaps from freezing water or lifting the sub without using the correct equipment, rather than a failure of the hull from pressure alone.. The hearing continues this week and next...
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