Deadly Titan implosion en route to Titanic ‘preventable’: US Coast Guard
‘Inadequate design’ of submersible named as primary reason for accident that killed five people.
Published On 5 Aug 20255 Aug 2025
The United States Coast Guard says its investigation into the Titan submersible accident that killed five people in 2023 while it was on its way to the wreckage of the Titanic was a “preventable” implosion.
The guard’s Marine Board of Investigation concluded that the “inadequate design” of the Titan submersible was a primary contributing factor, its report issued on Tuesday said.
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All five people on board the Titan died on a tourist expedition to the remains of the Titanic in the North Atlantic. The disappearance of the Titan, owned by the US-based company OceanGate, led to a search that grabbed worldwide attention.
The report found the company’s safety procedures were “critically flawed”, noting that the core of the failures came down to “glaring disparities” between the company’s safety protocols and actual practices.
Investigators found that the submersible’s design, certification, maintenance and inspection process were all inadequate.
A Coast Guard statement said OceanGate also had a “toxic workplace culture” and its mission was hindered by the lack of a domestic and international framework for submersible operations.
Numerous OceanGate employees have come forward in the two years since the implosion to support that claim.
Jason Neubauer with the Marine Board of Investigation said the findings will help prevent future tragedies.
“There is a need for stronger oversight and clear options for operators who are exploring new concepts outside of the existing regulatory framework,” he said in a statement.
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The report said that for several years preceding the Titan’s implosion, OceanGate “leveraged intimidation tactics, allowances for scientific operations, and the company’s favourable reputation to evade regulatory scrutiny”.
The operator of the submersible at the time of the accident on June 18, 2023, was OceanGate head Stockton Rush, and he was among those who died.
The incident has led to lawsuits and calls for tighter regulation of the developing private deep sea expedition industry.
The Titanic was a British passenger liner that sank in 1912, killing at least 1,500 people. The ill-fated ship has spawned a litany of films and books as the disaster continues to grip public imagination more than a century later.