The CEO of Triton Submarines says safety is paramount if you’re putting people in vehicles used in deep sea exploration.
Patrick Lahey testified at U.S. Coast Guard hearings into the Titan disaster in South Carolina Friday.
All five people on board the Titan died during an expedition to the Titanic wreck site in June of 2023—including OceanGate CEO and Titan pilot, Stockton Rush.
Lahey was one of a number of people in the submarine community who raised red flags about OceanGate’s expeditions and their safety processes.
(OceanGate Titan Submersible via Horizon Marine.)
He says certification, and building redundancies into craft that carry humans into the depths is absolutely necessary.
“It’s foundational, it’s fundamental, it’s essential” Lahey testified. “to me…any machine that’s going to be carrying human beings into the deep sea has to meet the high bar of certification by an independent third party classification society. I don’t believe it is negotiable, I don’t believe we should be operating experimental vehicles in the deep sea.”
The hearings continue Monday.
