OceanGate CEO Bragged About Using Expired Carbon Fiber to Build Doomed Sub

That guy was a backyard inventor and charlatan, like those 19th century backyard aircraft inventors. It's one thing to take yourself out of the gene pool through your own recklessness, it's another to take others with you.

Rush bypassed over a hundred years of engineering lessons learned the hard way with the rationale it stifles innovation. He even fired and sued one of his own employees for calling him out on it. The sub had zero certifications and then he lied to customers about it saying his designs were approved by NASA and Boeing who never even heard of the guy.

Aside from the lack of safety engineering and lack of proper fail-safes in his design, there's a reason engineers don't use carbon fiber composites in subs. They have a tendency to delaminate. When used in aircraft, composites have to be examined and certified at a regular service interval with special inspection equipment.

I think that sub was an accident waiting to happen from day one. The hull probably failed due to inspection negligence and a failure to detect delamination. That's even if the hull could have been rated properly for 4km. If it wasn't the hull, it would been one of the other jury-rigged systems.

I can't believe people smart enough to acquire the wealth for that excursion weren't smart enough to check out the qualifications of the company hosting it. I think it was plainly obvious just looking at the sub yourself. A navigation system that consists of a consumer laptop PC and Logitech gaming controller should have been a dead giveaway.

I think most billionaires have a bit of their brain set to believe in themselves rather more than is warranted. It's great for making money, but maybe not something you want to put your life on the line over.

the screen was mounted by screws into the carbon fiber. fuckin' what!?

The interesting thing is he really seemed to believe he knows better than all the experts.

There are reasons why ships and planes are all highly regulated. Its called physics.

It’s shocking how many corners one is willing to cut to save money even if it means lives.

Greed. Always greed.

It could have been fresh from the factory and would have had the same result It was an improper application of the material to save on the more expensive titanium Same with the acrylic viewport, while not the best material it's the design that was non-standard Quartz would have been better but more expensive Not the time to cheap out on materials, design, nor experience when lives are on the line

reading this almost feels like it was merely an effort to perform the most expensive suicide ever.

But then again, it could also seems to have been stupidity and a failure to listen to experts.

Man seems to have been unable to get his head out his own ass and was basically hearing every issue and going "this is fine"

Seems like in any case, he deserves a Darwin award, just sucks that other people went down with him.

From my limited experience with laying up carbon fiber, I know there's the raw carbon fiber cloth and there's liquid resin that you spread into the cloth. It's also very common to see carbon fiber cloth that is "pre-impregnated" - the resin is already applied to the cloth. Everyone calls this "pre-preg".

So I've seen a lot of folks online scratching their heads about "how can carbon expire?" or "my carbon fiber (bike/boat/etc.) is N-years old, is it expired?" but I think the most likely thing to expire is the resin. Once the resin is cured it is much more stable.

Any materials folks or structures engineers who want step in and correct me, please do.

Expired CF is the least of the problems with this project. The overall design was fundamentally compromised.

Much like that carbon fiber, he expired, too.

How did this man find a lawyer to represent him? What a nightmare client he would be. Basically throwing around liability grenades like it's nothing.

I just wish he didn't bring others with him with his hubris. The more info that comes out about this guy, the worse and sadder it gets

Lol fiberglass

This is why submarines are built out of steel.

This “engineer” failed at math class.

I know this entire sub was a shitshow, but... It had an interior wall. Stuff was mounted to that, not directly into the outer hull.

I am saddened as I read to think about the fact this could’ve been avoided.

Hah! Talk about getting what you pay for. This is why you don't cut corners on parts that can kill you if they malfunction.

If the guy weren't dead he'd be sued to death.

What do we call this scandal? It happened in the Atlantic ocean, and scandals are usually named -gate...

How about AtlanticGate?

It would have been a brilliant business move if it had worked. Shysters and cheats have been mixing in expired or substandard additives to food and drug products for all of history. As long as nobody dies, and you don't get caught, it's just free money in your pocket. I believe it was Heintz, around the turn of the 20th century, who lobbied strongly in favor of the Pure Food and Drugs Act in the US because he felt it would give him a competitive advantage over others by requiring the additives in food be safe. Crazy concept, right?

Sounds like the company and / or his estate will have $0 once all the lawsuits are over. One way to completely screw over your family I guess.

*Late / recently deceased CEO

I hear more and more about this every day, about some design flaw. Didn't they think it through? I may be dumb but even I would nope out if the sub was unable to complete any of its test runs successfully.

That fucking website have my phone cancer

The more I read about it, the more I think a reinforced metal bathtub would be a better choice for such voyage.

It's mind-bending how that shitshow keeps getting worse and worse and weirder and weirder, you think it can't get worse then "But wait! There's more!"