Wealthy Individual Plans to Visit Titanic Site with $20 Million Submarine Following OceanGate Incident – One America News Network
OAN’s Sophia Flores
6:49 AM – Thursday, May 30, 2024
Ohio real estate investor Larry Connor is planning a deep-sea submersible expedition to the Titanic shipwreck site. His goal is to demonstrate the safety of the deep-sea diving industry, countering concerns raised by last year’s OceanGate vessel incident.
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Along with Triton Submarines co-founder Patrick Lahey, the duo will embark down 2.3 miles (12,400 feet) underwater in a submersible to the site of the shipwreck.
“I want to show people worldwide that while the ocean is extremely powerful, it can be wonderful and enjoyable and really kind of life-changing if you go about it the right way,” Connor told the Wall Street Journal.
The two-person submersible costs $20 million, and it is called the “Triton 4000/2 Abyssal Explorer.” It was designed with the hopes of carrying out the deep-sea voyage a number of times.
“Patrick has been thinking about and designing this for over a decade. But we didn’t have the materials and technology,” Connor said. “You couldn’t have built this sub five years ago.”
The sub was built after the OceanGate submersible went “missing” on June 18th, 2023.
After weeks of hopeful optimism and conspiracy theories regarding the vessel, it was revealed that the Titan submersible, along with all five of the affluent individuals onboard, suffered a “catastrophic implosion” an hour and 45 minutes into their exhibition.
“[Lahey said], you know, what we need to do is build a sub that can dive to [Titanic-level depths] repeatedly and safely and demonstrate to the world that you guys can do that, and that Titan was a contraption,’” Lahey told the WSJ.
Lahey is one of many notable figures in the industry who criticized the “doomed” company OceanGate in regards to its safety standards prior to the tragedy. He often referred to OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush’s deep-sea adventure approach as “quite predatory.”
Rush built the Titan out of carbon fiber and titanium, a typical no-go for deep sea explorations. He also operated the Titan by using a video game controller.
Following the tragedy, Rush’s company, OceanGate, suspended all exploration and commercial operations.
No submersible has ventured to the Titanic wreck site since the June implosion.
Connor has yet to announce the date that the voyage will take place.
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