Titan submersible's scientific director testifies that the sub malfunctioned just prior to the fatal Titanic dive

Titan submersible's scientific director claimed that the sub reportedly malfunctioned just before it underwent its doomed voyage to the Titanic ruins. Appearing before the U.S. Coast Guard on Thursday, Steven Ross told the board about a platform issue the experimental submersible experienced in June 2023.

According to Ross, the malfunction caused several of the passengers — including OceanGate founder and CEO Stockton Rush — to "tumble about" and took over an hour for the company to get them out of the water. Ross allegedly told the panel that Rush crashed into bulkheading during the malfunction.

“One passenger was hanging upside down. The other two managed to wedge themselves into the bow end cap,” Ross said. The scientific director then added that he had no idea if the hull underwent an assessment after the incident.

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Earlier in the day, a mission specialist for OceanGate, Renata Rojas, told the panel that the company was staffed by competent people who just wanted to "make dreams come true."

"I was learning a lot and working with amazing people," Rojas told the board. "Some of those people are very hard-working individuals that were just trying to make dream come true."

Rojas' testimony was the complete opposite of previous witnesses who claimed that the company cut several safety corners in order to deliver a vessel able to get down to the ship's ruins. Both testimonies come on the third day of public hearings ordered by the Coast Guard after five people — including Rush — died when the submersible imploded.

During the hearings, former OceanGate operations director David Lochridge slammed his former boss and company and claimed that he raised several concerns before he was fired. "The whole idea behind the company was to make money," Lochridge testified. "There was very little in the way of science." The inquest is slated to run through Friday and will pick up next week with even more witnesses.

According to his testimony, Lochridge stated that no one in the company, except Rush, wanted to put people in the underwater vehicle. Lochridge stated that Rush was impatient and had a "total disregard for safety" and would often "fly off the handle."

Lochridge said that when he raised an issue with the hull's integrity to his boss, Rush "insisted" that they move on to the next phase of testing. "I knew that hull would fail - it was an absolute mess," Lochridge told the panel adding that it was still in a terrible state from a dive in 2018 and was made out of reusable material.

"Nobody is going to put anybody inside a submersible and put it down to depth without pressure testing," Lochridge explained. The panel asked the man if the former CEO understood the risk to which Lochridge gave the affirmative and added that Rush's ego would have been massively stoked if he had survived the trip.

The former employee stated that he firmly believes that all five passengers would still be alive today if a complaint he filed with OSHA had been taken seriously. "Had OSHA investigated the serious issues I raised, this tragedy may have been prevented," he said. According to the man, he withdrew his complaint from the agency after eight months of waiting for them to start an investigation.