Titan passenger says OceanGate CEO told them to SLEEP when they got stuck at bottom of Atlantic

A man who was once a passenger on the doomed submarine Titan has claimed that OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush suggested the crew spend the night sleeping on the ship while they were trapped at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean.

Jaden Pan’s 2021 expedition took a terrifying turn when the Titan’s battery died on the ocean floor just over two hours after its descent to the Titanic’s wreckage.

Speaking to the BBC last year, the videographer recalled the moment Rush told passengers the battery had gone ‘kaput’.

Rush reportedly told passengers to return to the surface when they were within two football fields of the legendary shipwreck.

“At first I thought he was joking because we were over two hours into our expedition and so close to the bottom,” Pan told the BBC.

Rush reportedly told passengers to return to the surface when they were within two football fields of the legendary shipwreck after the ship’s battery failed

Eventually Rush managed to use hydraulics to drop the weight and the ship floated back up safely with everyone on board. Pan’s crew pictured above

“But then he explained that one of the batteries had failed and we were having trouble using the electronic drops for the weights, so it would be difficult for us to resurface.”

While Rush tried to solve the problem, he reportedly offered the passengers to go to sleep as the ship sank to the bottom of the ocean.

Once the ship’s weights were resolved after 24 hours, the submarine could rise to the surface.

Half the crew, including Stockton, said they were fine sleeping on the ocean floor. However, the other customers were unwilling to spend the night under the ocean.

Eventually Rush managed to use hydraulics to drop the weight and the ship floated back up safely with everyone on board.

The CEO was featured in the BBC report telling the crew they would be out of service for a further ’16 to 24 hours’.

“We will float down. We will reach the bottom. We will have communication. We can talk to them,” Stockton added.

Pan’s story has come to light after five passengers, including Rush, British billionaire Hamish Harding and French explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet, died while diving to the Titanic last month.

Rush – a self-proclaimed “innovator” trying to push the boundaries of passenger diving – died in what turned out to be the Titan’s last voyage, after the pressure chamber imploded near the 12,000-foot depth where the Titanic rests.

Shahzada Dawood, 58, and his 19-year-old son Suleman were also on board. They were pictured smiling arm in arm before boarding the submarine on the $250,000 per person voyage in which she and three others perished.

Pan’s story came to light after five passengers, including Rush, were killed during a dive into the Titanic last month

Rush – a self-confessed “innovator” trying to push the boundaries of passenger diving – was one of five who perished on what turned out to be the Titan’s final voyage, after the pressure chamber imploded near the 12,000-foot depth where the Titanic peace.

He reportedly believed going to the depths of the Atlantic in the Titan was “safer than crossing the street,” despite being warned in 2018 by dozens of experts that his company’s “experimental” approaches could be “catastrophic.” .

The submarine’s safety and OceanGate’s disregard for several warnings has led to much criticism after the Titan went missing during a dive to the seafloor on June 18.

The CEO – who considered himself more of a scientist than a salesman, despite the fact that much of his effort was focused on marketing the subtrips – was begged in 2019 to suspend operations after a submarine expert heard cracking noises during a of the Titan’s dives in the Bahamas.