The Titanic submarine was purposely designed low-tech to cut costs, says the man who helped build it

A former OceanGate subcontractor who worked on the Titan submarine that went missing near the Titanic said the ship was deliberately designed to be low-tech.

Doug Virnig, who worked on the development of the submarine controlled by a wireless Logitech video game controller, said it uses “off-the-shelf” components as much as possible to cut costs and conduct timely research and development.

Virnig added that OceanGate’s main interest was exploring the ocean rather than adventure tourism. He said the tourist expeditions, which cost up to $250,000 for a seat, were simply a way to fund the research.

Near the ancient wreckage, a massive multi-national search is underway to find and retrieve the five people aboard the six-inch-thick carbon fiber submarine.

The submarine departed with 96 hours of air, according to OceanGate, so the oxygen tanks would likely run out around 12:08am UK time (7:08am EDT) today, but exactly when will depend on factors such as whether the vessel still has power and how calm those on board are , experts say, and whether the craft is still intact.

Referring to the $29.99 Logitech gaming controller, Virnig shared CNN“It seems a little cheesy, but if you knew how much technology is in that controller and what its capabilities are, and how much money it costs to develop something like that, it’s just off the charts.”

“So if you can take these components off the shelf and integrate them into a project like this, where you don’t have the timelines and costs for research and development, I think that’s a wise choice.”

Virnig emphasized that OceanGate had “gotten advanced where it needed to be

He said the submarine company had “built in a good chunk of conventional wisdom” during its development.

The former Titan subcontractor added that he believed the 6.7-foot carbon fiber vessel would eventually be found.

“It has a titanium dome door and it’s not going anywhere,” Virnig said. “That thing is indestructible… It’s a huge piece of metal, so there are ways to detect that and they’ll find it.”

In an interview with CBS last year, pilot Stockton Rush, who is currently aboard the ship, said it was “intended for a 16-year-old to throw it around.”

In the interview, he demonstrated by throwing the controller around the Titan’s small cabin. He said there are a few spares on board “just in case”.

The submarine had seven backup systems for returning to the surface, including sandbags and lead pipes falling down and an inflatable balloon.

The sub itself does not have a GPS system. Instead, it uses Elon Musk’s Starlink to communicate via short text messages with a tracking team on its mothership, MV Polar Prince.

The submarine is intended to communicate every 15 minutes with the main ship – which was listed on eBay in 2005 with a reserve price of $1 million – to inform the team of its location.

There are no seats on board and only one toilet – a small black box of Ziploc bags – with a black curtain over it and music for privacy.

However, the company’s website recommends “restricting your diet before and during the dive to reduce the likelihood of having to use the facilities.”

The walls of the submarine are heated as conditions can become extremely cold.

It comes after newly discovered allegations suggested that significant warnings about the ship’s safety had been issued during the development of the submarine.

One of the company’s early clients characterized a dive he made to the site two years ago as a “kamikaze operation.”

‘Imagine a metal pipe a few meters long with a metal plate as a floor. You can’t stand. You cannot kneel. Everyone is close or on top of each other,” says Arthur Loibl, a retired businessman and adventurer from Germany. “You can’t be claustrophobic.”

During the 2.5-hour descent and ascent, the lights were off to conserve energy, he said, with the only illumination coming from a fluorescent glow stick.

The dive was repeatedly delayed to resolve a problem with the battery and balancing weights. The journey took 10.5 hours in total.

Documents also showed that OceanGate had been warned that catastrophic safety issues could arise from the way the experimental vessel was being developed.

David Lochridge, OceanGate’s director of maritime operations, said in a 2018 lawsuit that the company’s testing and certification were inadequate and would “expose passengers to potentially extreme danger in an experimental submarine.”

The company maintained that Lochridge ‘was not an engineer and had not been hired or asked to perform any engineering services on the Titan’. The company also says the ship under development was a prototype, not the now-missing Titan.

The Marine Technology Society, which describes itself as “a professional group of ocean engineers, technologists, policymakers and educators,” also expressed its concerns in a letter that year to Rush, OceanGate’s CEO.

The airline said in documents first reported by The New York Times that it was critical that the company subjected its prototype to testing under the supervision of an expert third party before launching to protect passengers.

The other passengers lost on the Titan are British adventurer Hamish Harding; Pakistani nationals Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman, whose eponymous company invests across the country; and French explorer and Titanic expert Paul-Henry Nargeolet.

Retired Navy Vice Admiral Robert Murrett, who is now deputy director of the Institute for Security Policy and Law at Syracuse University, said the disappearance underlines the dangers associated with deep-water operations and recreational reconnaissance. of the sea and space.

“I think some people think that because the modern technology is so good, you can do this kind of thing and not have an accident, but that’s just not the case,” he said.