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> That’s according to legal documents obtained by The New Republic. According to the court documents, in a 2018 case, OceanGate employee David Lochridge, a subm

by mjhay 3y ago

> That’s according to legal documents obtained by The New Republic. According to the court documents, in a 2018 case, OceanGate employee David Lochridge, a submersible pilot, voiced concerns about the safety of the sub. According to a press release, Lochridge was director of marine operations at the time, “responsible for the safety of all crew and clients.” In this case, being fired was an ideal outcome.

hsjqllzlfkf 3y ago
He was "responsible for safety of all crew and clients". So, he voiced that the sub wasn't safe. He was doing his job. If he hadn't been fired maybe he would've been able to enact changes to prevent a disaster, so I disagree that being fired was an ideal outcome. Being fired is only an ideal outcome if you believe that Lochridge wasn't trying to enact change but only to avoid liability. I don't see a reason to such cynical view.
- margalabargala 3y ago
  Lochridge was also a submersible pilot. Being fired was an ideal outcome for Lochridge, because Lochridge was therefore not piloting the sub this week.
  - renewiltord 3y ago
    The ideal outcome for Lochridge, I'm sure would have been the sub being modified so that these problems did not occur. I'm pretty sure he does not set the utility of other peoples' lives at 0, so their surviving along with him would definitely be better. So this has to be the second-best outcome at best.
    - margalabargala 3y ago
      That's true. What outcome is ideal depends on the priors, I suppose. If the company not listening to Lochridge is a given, then being fired is better than not, and having to go down on the sub. The company listening to Lochridge is better than the company not listening to Lochridge. The company putting safety first and engineering something that met Lochridge's standards from the outset is better than the company listening to Lochridge when he brought up problems. And so on.
    - wnkrshm 3y ago
      I think they couldn't modify the sub to be safe - the big worry is the integral part of the sub (and the one with the highest cost in this one), the composite pressure hull. You cannot ensure its safety, since you cannot evaluate it for growing defects. As is best practice for all other DSVs in the world that use metal pressure hulls. I suspect a metal hull and all it entails (way more complex design and careful selection of materials, equipment, passenger space etc.) would have cost too much.
  - hsjqllzlfkf 3y ago
    > Being fired was an ideal outcome for Lochridge, because Lochridge was therefore not piloting the sub this week. What an absurd thing to say. Not having the sub sink has all the upsides and none of the downsides of having it sink. Ergo, being fired is guaranteed not to be optimal.
- ssnistfajen 3y ago
  If he resigned then it's plausible to speculate that he was trying to avoid liability, but he was fired. Someone didn't want him to do his job regardless of what he himself wanted.
- wnkrshm 3y ago
  I think there was simply no economically feasible alternative to the composite hull, so Lochridge was fired. I also suspect that if you go with a metal hull, you don't have positive buoancy anymore - you need syntactic foam. You need larger thrusters, those are heavier too, so more foam etc. The engineering becomes harder and also costlier, in addition to the material and equipment costs. What you gain is the ability to evaluate your pressure vessel for growing defects - which you didn't do in the first place (and can't do) with your composite hull.
EA 3y ago
...for risk adverse leaders in the company who wanted to utilize the system. This worker likely blew the whistle on the safety assessment of the system. Sometimes, external forces see product to market despite risks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disas...
ClumsyPilot 3y ago
This is like 20th case of employee warning about fraud and\or impeding disaster, and being punished as a result. And employee being 100% correct. See theranos and others. We really need to address this
- londons_explore 3y ago
  Problem is there are far far far more cases of an employee reporting irrelevant 'safety' problems just to try to win a settlement from a company. How do you separate the legit concerns from someone complaining that they can't go to work because their yellow safety vest is slightly dirty and therefore not safe anymore?
  - californical 3y ago
    Do you have a bunch of examples of employees filing concerns with OSHA that ended up being completely false? I feel like I’ve never heard of this
    - alach11 3y ago
      To be fair, there's a huge sampling bias issue here. We're talking about the submarine whistleblower because it made the news headlines. An employee raising concerns with OSHA and getting proven false doesn't make the front page.
- sho_hn 3y ago
  Mature companies definitely go to big lengths to address this, usually above and beyond what regulators prescribe as a baseline. All proper engineering companies have integrity and compliance processes, whistleblower systems, confidante contacts, etc. It's good business to do this. Fucking up kills people, and liability kills companies.
  - flangola7 3y ago
    > Mature companies definitely go to big lengths to address this, usually above and beyond what regulators prescribe as a baseline. Mature companies develop code to intentionally dodge regulations. They're not trustworthy regardless of "maturity".

by mjhay 3y ago

hsjqllzlfkf 3y ago

He was "responsible for safety of all crew and clients". So, he voiced that the sub wasn't safe. He was doing his job. If he hadn't been fired maybe he would've been able to enact changes to prevent a disaster, so I disagree that being fired was an ideal outcome. Being fired is only an ideal outcome if you believe that Lochridge wasn't trying to enact change but only to avoid liability. I don't see a reason to such cynical view.

margalabargala 3y ago
Lochridge was also a submersible pilot. Being fired was an ideal outcome for Lochridge, because Lochridge was therefore not piloting the sub this week.
- renewiltord 3y ago
  The ideal outcome for Lochridge, I'm sure would have been the sub being modified so that these problems did not occur. I'm pretty sure he does not set the utility of other peoples' lives at 0, so their surviving along with him would definitely be better. So this has to be the second-best outcome at best.
  - margalabargala 3y ago
    That's true. What outcome is ideal depends on the priors, I suppose. If the company not listening to Lochridge is a given, then being fired is better than not, and having to go down on the sub. The company listening to Lochridge is better than the company not listening to Lochridge. The company putting safety first and engineering something that met Lochridge's standards from the outset is better than the company listening to Lochridge when he brought up problems. And so on.
  - wnkrshm 3y ago
    I think they couldn't modify the sub to be safe - the big worry is the integral part of the sub (and the one with the highest cost in this one), the composite pressure hull. You cannot ensure its safety, since you cannot evaluate it for growing defects. As is best practice for all other DSVs in the world that use metal pressure hulls. I suspect a metal hull and all it entails (way more complex design and careful selection of materials, equipment, passenger space etc.) would have cost too much.
- hsjqllzlfkf 3y ago
  > Being fired was an ideal outcome for Lochridge, because Lochridge was therefore not piloting the sub this week. What an absurd thing to say. Not having the sub sink has all the upsides and none of the downsides of having it sink. Ergo, being fired is guaranteed not to be optimal.
ssnistfajen 3y ago
If he resigned then it's plausible to speculate that he was trying to avoid liability, but he was fired. Someone didn't want him to do his job regardless of what he himself wanted.
wnkrshm 3y ago
I think there was simply no economically feasible alternative to the composite hull, so Lochridge was fired. I also suspect that if you go with a metal hull, you don't have positive buoancy anymore - you need syntactic foam. You need larger thrusters, those are heavier too, so more foam etc. The engineering becomes harder and also costlier, in addition to the material and equipment costs. What you gain is the ability to evaluate your pressure vessel for growing defects - which you didn't do in the first place (and can't do) with your composite hull.

EA 3y ago

...for risk adverse leaders in the company who wanted to utilize the system. This worker likely blew the whistle on the safety assessment of the system. Sometimes, external forces see product to market despite risks: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_Shuttle_Challenger_disas...

ClumsyPilot 3y ago

This is like 20th case of employee warning about fraud and\or impeding disaster, and being punished as a result. And employee being 100% correct. See theranos and others. We really need to address this

londons_explore 3y ago
Problem is there are far far far more cases of an employee reporting irrelevant 'safety' problems just to try to win a settlement from a company. How do you separate the legit concerns from someone complaining that they can't go to work because their yellow safety vest is slightly dirty and therefore not safe anymore?
- californical 3y ago
  Do you have a bunch of examples of employees filing concerns with OSHA that ended up being completely false? I feel like I’ve never heard of this
  - alach11 3y ago
    To be fair, there's a huge sampling bias issue here. We're talking about the submarine whistleblower because it made the news headlines. An employee raising concerns with OSHA and getting proven false doesn't make the front page.
sho_hn 3y ago
Mature companies definitely go to big lengths to address this, usually above and beyond what regulators prescribe as a baseline. All proper engineering companies have integrity and compliance processes, whistleblower systems, confidante contacts, etc. It's good business to do this. Fucking up kills people, and liability kills companies.
- flangola7 3y ago
  > Mature companies definitely go to big lengths to address this, usually above and beyond what regulators prescribe as a baseline. Mature companies develop code to intentionally dodge regulations. They're not trustworthy regardless of "maturity".