Where to begin?
I know three of the five people on the missing submersible Titan.
I had spent eight days with two of them less than a month ago, and four days with the other last week.
The one I saw most recently was Hamish Harding, frequently described in media as a "British billionaire and explorer." The other two, Stockton Rush and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, were leaders on an OceanGate Expeditions mission to the Titanic that I had joined last month. We bobbed over the wreck in the North Atlantic on the submersible Titan's mothership, the Polar Prince, waiting for conditions to be right for me to join them on a dive down to the site.
The weather never cleared, and I never dived, nor did the weather clear for guests on the next two missions. As a result, the lost submersible was on its first dive of the 2023 season, a "first" that I once thought I could lay claim to.
I have known Hamish the longest; we met two years ago when we were seated, by chance, at the same table at the Explorers Club global conference, known as GLEX. He told me then about going down to Challenger Deep, the lowest point in any ocean, in a submersible piloted by multiple Guinness Book of World Records honoree Victor Vescovo. The next year, Hamish went into space on the Blue Origin New Shepard rocket.
Since we met, he and I have connected a few times at Explorers Club functions, most recently last week at this year's GLEX. Earlier, in April, he had told me that he was going to see the Titanic site in June; I told him I was going in May. I told him it was a shame we wouldn't be on the same mission, but the June dates wouldn't get me back in time for a speaking commitment; the May dates meant only that I would have to postpone my birthday party.
This is the first in a three-part series by Arnie Weissmann about his experiences with OceanGate Expeditions. Read part 2 and part 3.
So last month, instead of preparing for a party, I rose at 4 a.m. on my birthday and headed off to St. John's, Newfoundland, to board the Polar Prince.
A submersible vs. a submarine
I had learned that the difference between a submarine and a submersible is that a submarine can operate autonomously, but a submersible requires a surface support vessel. Titan is attached to a launch and recovery platform that, once on the ocean surface, descends about 30 feet. The bolts holding Titan to the platform release and the submersible moves forward off the platform and then freefalls for two-and-a-half miles for two-and-a-half hours to the ocean floor. The surface crew on the ship tracks its progress and location and once it lands on the ocean floor, uses text messages to guide the Titan to the wreck site.
When it's time to return to the mothership, ballast is dropped and the Titan rises at about the same rate it descends, reattaches to its platform and rises to the surface. Twenty-eight nonstaff passengers visited the wreck last year in this fashion.
For the past two years, the platform and Titan were carried by the support ship Horizon Arctic, where they sat on the deck and were lowered into the water via a ramp. This year, however, Oceangate CEO, Titan designer and pilot Stockton Rush told me that the cost of leasing the Horizon Arctic skyrocketed to $200,000 a week. The economics of chartering the Polar Prince, built in 1959, made more sense, even though it required that the platform and submersible be towed behind the ship, hitched to the Polar Prince's stern by a long rope. Although Rush told me the platform was designed to be towed, this would prove problematic in a few days.
Being part of OceanGate's 'missions'
The OceanGate dive season, from mid-May to mid-July, is broken down into eight-day missions. Nonstaff who have either paid $250,000 or were invited, as I was, to go down in the Titan are called mission specialists. The title is not simple puffery; you are part of the working crew, attending meetings and contributing to the preparation for the dives.
Each mission specialist contributes to their level of expertise. For me, that involved being a gofer and completing tasks that could be explained in less than a minute. On the other hand, a different mission specialist on the ship had been in the Australian Navy, working on a submarine for 10 years, and was able to work on more complex tasks.
There was one invited passenger who had more experience diving to wrecks than all others aboard put together: 77-year-old Paul-Henri Nargeolet, or "P.H." as he preferred to be called. I had a drink with him the first night in St. John's before we departed, and he told me about his undersea accomplishments, including having been down to see the Titanic wreck 37 times. If all went well, he and I would go down for his 38th.
Aboard the Polar Prince in May 2023, Paul-Henri “PH” Nargeolet narrates a video of one of his previous dives. Photo Credit: Arnie Weissmann
We were to have left St. John's for the 36-hour trip out to the Titanic site in the wee hours of May 20, but the platform was not ready. Shortly after dawn, Rush put on scuba gear and dove to work on the hatches beneath the platform.
How to prepare for a Titan dive
The days started early: breakfast was at 6 a.m., and an all-hands meeting started promptly at 7. These meetings tended to be strictly business. Rush would put a checklist of things that had to be done on a monitor, prioritized by importance, and give out crew assignments. Although it was serious, the lighthearted side of crew culture also came through.
There would be, for instance, a line reading, "Check Stewie Battery."
"What's a Stewie Battery?" I asked one of the crew. "Stewie's the name of one of the [inflatable] dinghies," was the reply. (The other was named Max.)
In fact, Stewie figured prominently in the day's to-do list. He had been punctured when he rubbed up against something sharp on the platform and needed to be patched. (Also on the day's list of tasks was padding the sharp edges on the platform.)
The numbers "4-19" appeared repeatedly, as in "Install 4-19 Line." I asked Rush what a 4-19 line was. "You remember the movie 'Monsters Inc.'? When the monster comes back and has a white sock on his shoulder? That was a '23-19' - 'w' is the 23rd letter of the alphabet, and 's' is 19.
"'4-19' means 'disabled sub.'"
In retrospect, not so lighthearted.
The 4-19 tasks arose from a problem last year when something went wrong putting the sub back onto the Horizon Arctic, and the Titan bobbed overnight on the sea. Hamish had told me about it during our April conversation. "I heard it was pretty rough on the people inside," he had said. It was, to be honest, the first time I considered that the things that could go wrong were more varied than what was obvious.
But at the next morning's meeting, I heard the news I had been hoping to hear. "Looks like we can dive Tuesday," Rush said. "Arnie, Craig and Stephen are mission specialists; PH is the advisor; and I will pilot. Dive will be at 6 a.m."
This is the first in a three-part series by Arnie Weissmann about his experiences with OceanGate Expeditions. Read part 2 and part 3.