James Cameron dissects structural flaws with OceanGate Titan submersible, says implosion would have been ‘like 10 cases of dynamite going off’

Director James Cameron, who has been to the Titanic wreckage site 33 times, spoke about the OceanGate Titan submersible tragedy and criticised CEO Stockton Rush as being irresponsible.

By: Entertainment Desk

New Delhi | June 23, 2023 11:16 AM IST

3 min read

James Cameron has been to the Titanic wreckage site 33 times.

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The Oscar-winning director James Cameron, who is also a deep sea explorer and inventor, has spoken about the recent tragedy that claimed the lives of five people on an expedition to the Titanic wreckage site in the North Atlantic. As someone who has made the same trip 33 times, and has also traveled solo to the Mariana Trench, the deepest point of the earth, Cameron expressed dismay at the safety issues with the Titan submersible, owned and operated by OceanGate.

Rescue operations were terminated on Thursday, four days after the submersible disappeared underwater, with OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush and four others on board. Cameron told the New York Times that this tragedy is the first of its kind in the deep sea exploration community, and that people were aware of the flaws with OceanGate’s vehicle.

Also read | James Cameron calls Titan tragedy ‘a prolonged nightmare’, says families were given false hope over four days

He said that while he can respect Rush’s sentiment about proper safety measures being an ‘impediment to innovation’, he believes its irresponsible to risk the lives of innocent people who’d put their faith in Rush. Cameron went on to discuss the structural flaws with the Titan submersible, and said that the implosion would likely have been “an extremely violent event — like 10 cases of dynamite going off.”

He cited the use of carbon-fiber composites as a design weakness, and said that deep sea exploration isn’t what the material, widely used in aeropsace, is designed for, because it has ‘no strength in compression’. Cameron also spoke about the sensors that OceanGate added as a safety measure to the hull of the submersible recently, claiming that it would let the pilot know if they should stop the descent. Cameron said that the sensors would only tell the pilot that the submersible was about to implode. Calling it an intrinsically inefficient solution to structural flaws, he said “It’s not like a light coming on when the oil in your car is low. This is different.”

In an interview to BBC, he also pointed out a “terrible irony” in the loss of Titan, comparing it to the loss of the Titanic. “We now have another wreck that is based on unfortunately the same principles of not heeding warnings,” he said as he pointed out that OceanGate was given warnings about the flaws in its craft. US court documents show a former employee of OceanGate warned of potential safety problems in 2018. Letters sent by the Marine Technology Society to the company, warning of ‘negative outcomes’, has also surfaced.

In an interview with ABC News, Cameron expressed condolences to the families of those lost in the tragedy, and said that it was unfair of authorities to give them ‘false hope’ for four days. Cameron is best known for directing three of the four biggest movies of all time — Titanic, Avatar, and Avatar: The Way of Water.

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