The doomed Titan submersible that its very last ride on June 18 before imploding underwater and killing five onboard, also faced operational problems in another mission to survey the wreckage of Titanic in the past.
Issues with the submersible, owned by OceanGate Expeditions, were caught on camera in a 2022 BBC documentary that aired outside of the United States. In the documentary. Scott Griffith, who at that time was piloting the vessel, lost control of its thrusters 300 meters from the wreck of the Titanic. ” We have a problem,” he was heard saying before he explained to the crew inside the submersible that they had lost control.
“I don’t know what’s going on, I feel like… I don’t know what’s going on. There’s something wrong with my thrusters. I’m thrusting and nothing is happening,” Griffith is heard saying. Meanwhile, the submersible, stuck 5000 meters away from the mothership, was spinning at 360 degrees, refusing to move forward or backward.
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At this point, one of the passengers was seen with her head in her hands as she started to panic. Griffith also had concern written all over his face as he tried his best to gain control of the situation and work frantically at the computer. He also asked the crew to look out of the only porthole on the sub and tell him if the vessel was spinning. Mexican passenger Reneta Rojas answers in the affirmative, Griffith is shocked by the information.
“Oh no, we have a problem. When we are thrusting to move forward one of the thrusters is going backwards right now.” Griffith said. “The only thing I can do right now is a 360.”
The mission, however, did not end as tragically as the one taken on June 18 by the Titan Five, including British billionaire Hamish Harding, OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, British-Pakistani-British businessman Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman, and French pilot Paul-Henry Nargeolet.
After surviving the previous mission, Rojas told BBC in an interview: “You know what I was thinking, we’re not going to make it. We’re literally 300 meters from the Titanic and although we are already in the debris field, we can’t go anywhere but go in circles.”
