[nirui]

Maybe somewhat off-topic, but if you don't know, there is a video on YouTube published 11 months ago by "CBC NL - Newfoundland and Labrador" titled "This submersible takes passengers to The Titanic wreck. Climb in!" (see: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClkytJa0ghc)

If I put myself 11 months in the past watching that video, I would probably think this company OceanGate is so professional with zero possibility of merging and mixing their passengers with whatever content in that tiny toilet box.

In my mind, all 5 lost souls are explorers. But 11 months... that's long enough time for someone to generate doubts on the thing to either fix it or speak out.

[nelox]

None of them were explorers. The wreck of the Titanic is not a new discovery. They were paying passengers in an underwater ocean tourism venture.

[anonu]

> passengers

Except they all signed waivers, per the article, that they were mission specialists. The nuance was important and the jury is out on whether the implication was fully communicated to the people who paid to join. The article seems to indicate that it was...

[elromulous]

IANAL, but I very strongly suspect that a court would rule in favor of OceanGate. I think a court would say "a mission specialist who pays you, and not the other way around, is a passenger"

Calling them anything other than passenger (per the article) was specifically designed to subvert regulations that would have required them to certify the sub. And courts don't like that very much.

[zarzavat]

If that was the reason then he was probably paying his lawyers $15 an hour too.

You can waive risks, but not a certainty of death. If it was inevitable that the sub would implode at some point because it was so poorly constructed, and Stockton Rush was just playing a very elaborate game of Russian roulette with his customers, then the waiver isn’t worth the paper it’s written on.

The other problem is that I’m fairly sure that OceanGate didn’t disclose everything they knew, which would also invalidate the waiver.

For example, David Pogue signed the waiver and went down in it (albeit not very far). He seems like a fairly sensible person with a family who doesn’t have a death wish, did they really disclose to him about the window not being rated for the depth, the whistleblower lawsuit, the letter in 2018 to OceanGate warning them to stop development, etc?

A waiver built on lies is worse than useless, far from getting them out of legal peril it proves that they knew that death was a real possibility.

[elromulous]

Fyi - I had a typo. I meant the court _wouldn't_ rule in favor of OceanGate.

[elromulous]

Edit: I posted that pretty late. I meant the court is likely to rule in favor of the passengers.

[tweetle_beetle]

I'm not sure the word explorer should ever be diluted to be just sitting down in a vehicle as a passenger. At worst, they sat on a plane to Newfoundland for a number of hours, sat on a boat to get to the launch site and sat in a submarine for a few hours (assuming a successful itinerary).

Mitigating factors for an explorer should be (imho): novel destination, novel experience of natural forces, novel challenge of actively piloting/driving, unusual physical hardship, unusual mental hardship, novel engineering challenge, unusual training requirements, committing to significant unknowns, etc.

[peteradio]

novel destination:

  few have been to Titanic

novel experience of natural forces:

  few have experienced the significant pressures involved

novel challenge of actively piloting/driving:

   ever drive a car while actively sweating bullets and shitting bricks?

unusual physical hardship, unusual mental hardship:

   see above

novel engineering challenge:

   See significant pressures.

unusual training requirements:

   Can't say this was required since the interface was a console controller

committing to significant unknowns:

   See engineering challenges + novel materials

[CaptainZapp]

> But 11 months... that's long enough time for someone to generate doubts on the thing to either fix it or speak out.

There were enough doubts and enough competent people speaking out in the five previous years.

The problem seems that Mr. Rush was just not willing to listen.

You don't fuck with physics, especially not in 4000 metres depth.

Reading this (excellent) story I caught myself almost permanently shaking my head about the callousy of that guy.

[Xen9]

This isn't off-topic. I find your recommendation very therapeutic to watch.