The estate of a Titanic researcher who was among the five people killed when the Titan submersible catastrophically imploded while on a deep-dive voyage to the site of the famous shipwreck last year has filed a wrongful death lawsuit seeking more than $50 million in damages.
The lawsuit, filed by the estate of French explorer Paul Henri Nargeolet, accused OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who also died in the implosion, and others of gross negligence by designing, building and operating Titan “in almost every way, in a manner outside the norms of the diving community and industry, driven by Rush’s apparent obsession with being remembered for innovation alongside such luminaries as Steve Jobs and Elon Musk” and to cultivate an image as a “maverick genius” of the deep-sea diving world.
The lawsuit also alleged crew members aboard the doomed vessel knew they would die before the June 2023 implosion and experienced “terror and mental anguish,” claiming that an acoustic safety system installed in Titan would have detected cracking and then warned the pilot to begin an ascent.
“While the exact cause of failure may never be determined, experts agree that the Titan’s crew would have realized exactly what was happening,” the lawsuit stated. “Rush’s vaunted ‘acoustic safety system’ would have alerted the crew that the carbon-fiber hull was cracking under extreme pressure — prompting the pilot to release weight and attempt to abort. Common sense dictates that the crew were well aware they were going to die, before dying.”
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday in Washington state, where OceanGate is based.
The submersible company suspended all exploration and commercial operations after the deadly implosion.
