27 ms·

Like the video [1] mentions, they were only improvising on things (including the controller) that would not pose a safety hazard if they failed. The critical co

Like the video [1] mentions, they were only improvising on things (including the controller) that would not pose a safety hazard if they failed. The critical components like the capsule were designed alongside NASA and others. People aren't just tossing safety to the wind, but trying to create a better balance. NASA does spend a extreme amount of money on compliance and safety - yet that doesn't prevent them from doing things like blowing up $600 million Mars probes because of a mismatch between Imperial and Metric units. [2] Basically you cannot, no matter how much money you spend, prevent every possible mistake, or even every "obvious" mistake, because "obvious" is often only obvious in hindsight. And going too far on the side of risk avoidance leaves you frozen in time, unable to progress, even as you continue to make mistakes - which drives you even further into extremes of risk avoidance. Of course on the other end being completely cavalier about safety leaves you making mistakes you both can and should have foreseen. So I suppose we'll just get to see which this was. If anything my prediction here would be that they started becoming so comfortable with these dives that they impacted the Titanic, going for that epic view, resulting in a cascade of system failures or even a breach, bearing in mind you're already going to be near critical pressure thresholds. Absolutely zero basis for my prediction, but I think it's much more probable than a controller failure. They had redundancies on the controllers, and could surface without them. But human hubris has no such constraints. [1] - https://youtu.be/29co_Hksk6o?t=213 https://youtu.be/29co_Hksk6o?t=213 [2] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mars_Climate_Orbiter

weird-eye-issue 3y ago
Why is the capsule considered the only critical safety component? If everything else fails wouldn't it just fall to the bottom of the ocean? Even if it can survive that depth that only sounds good on paper. Nobody could get to you.
- Out_of_Characte 3y ago
  Because an implosion is a single point of failure leading to instant death. Anything else can be salvaged by staying calm and using one of multiple ways to resurface.
  - cheekibreeki2 3y ago
    Subs will always have 1000 ways to kill you and most of them are catastrophic. You're pretty much boned if anything goes wrong especially with so few crew members, lack of compartments, backup propulsion, etc.
  - weird-eye-issue 3y ago
    Really? Anything else can just be magically salvaged? I'm not sure there is that much room for error 2 miles below the surface
  - RC_ITR 3y ago
    They are visiting a debris field. There is a much more than zero chance they are stuck on something.
- lb1lf 3y ago
  The capsule itself is positively buoyant. As long as it can jettison the ballast (and is not tangled up in something on the seabed, say, the Titanic), it will come to the surface.
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    And the ballast is held on via electromagnets. Lose (or deliberately cut) power, you're going up.
    - barelyauser 3y ago
      Isn't this like a huge waste of energy?
      - adql 3y ago
        It's nothing compared to amount of power to the engines, you don't need kilowatts to "just" hold a ballast
      - andruby 3y ago
        I don't think weight is a huge issue for submarines (unlike say airplanes), so taking a few batteries along should be fine. (I don't know anything about subs) you could even store a few batteries in the ballast.
      - nvusuvu 3y ago
        Clear tradeoff for safety.
      - ceejayoz 3y ago
        Between "waste some power on a magnet" and "we're permanently stuck on the bottom of the ocean about to run out of air", I know which one I'd pick.
      - HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
        There's a difference between a "waste of energy" and a failsafe emergency system that happens to use a lot of energy.
jonathanstrange 3y ago
This is not true, the maker of this sub compromised substantially on safety and did not have it certified by an independent body like most other builders of deep sea submarines do. In fact, members of the small deep sea submarine community wrote a letter to the company warning them about the safety hazards and the lack of certification. Source: Today's interview with a deep sea exploration submarine commander on German TV (ARD Tagesschau). In particular, this company used carbon fiber materials that were neither tested nor certified for the intended operational depth, and they also did not do extensive testing like you do when you certify a craft.
- gambiting 3y ago
  As it's explained in another comment - the CEO wanted it tested but there isn't a facility anywhere on earth equipped to test it. Perhaps the argument then is that part of the company funding should have been building a custom rig designed for testing this highly custom 5 inch thick carbon fibre shell - but it's not like options to test it were available and were ignored.
  - jonathanstrange 3y ago
    This is not true either. As the submarine commander interviewed lays out, the testing is done by actual dives, and there is a certification body for it. Almost every other deep sea exploration submarine is certified. However, getting certified is voluntary. Of course, certifying it just means that independent experts take a look at the design and use sensors during dives. All of these vehicles are experimental. But not even trying is negligent.
    - hef19898 3y ago
      It is almost like there are already deep sea subs in existence. And that people already figures out how to test, and certify, them.
    - zirgs 3y ago
      I suspect that certification is not going to be voluntary any more after this.
mysterydip 3y ago
He told CBS News: "You know, there's a limit. At some point safety just is pure waste. I mean if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed. Don't get in your car. Don't do anything. At some point, you're going to take some risk, and it really is a risk/reward question. I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules." https://metro.co.uk/2023/06/20/titanic-sub-ceo-was-worried-about-resurfacing-18980155 https://metro.co.uk/2023/06/20/titanic-sub-ceo-was-worried-a...
- swid 3y ago
  I’ve know mountain climbers, hang glider/paraglider pilots, scuba divers, sky divers, and more and we pretty much say that exact thing. I’ve been casual acquaintances with people who have died doing extreme sports. Usually, the people in these sports say if the worst were to happen to them, they accept that risk and wouldn’t want their fate to stop other people from following their passions. That the feeling of being alive chasing these dreams fulfills a part of them, and they would be lost without that fulfillment. We all do take risks for our own happiness, different people just want different things from life and will drawn that line in different places. My guess is the five people on the sub would not want this incident to stop people from attempting to visit the Titanic.
  - salawat 3y ago
    ...Yes, you're going to take risks. Got it. This risk in particular ends up with you as chunky salsa 4 kilometers under the water, because you couldn't be bothered to sink a copy of the bloody thing with no one in it first. If it's worth making, make 2 or 3 of with at least one slated for being destroyed at one point. Space Shuttle Enterprise never saw Space or the launch pad. It was still made and flown.
  - pcthrowaway 3y ago
    There's a spectrum of risk comfort in mountaineering though. At the end of the day if there's a rockslide, there's nothing you can do, so you have to be willing to accept some level of risk. But at the same time, the majority of mountaineering deaths are due to people taking unnecessary risks (for the sport). Being poorly prepared in terms of gear, or making poor decisions, or not being educated enough in climbing, safety assessment, and rescue techniques. There's absolutely a lot you can do to mitigate the risk, and I think even the experienced mountaineers who choose to take more risk (say, traveling lighter and placing less protection in order to cover more ground in a day) don't advocate for that as the standard way to practice the sport. I'll be honest, I've had a few close calls myself, but I've taken those as lessons in how to do things more safely going forward, because I value doing things safely more than "bagging more peaks". I guess if your dream is something like "climb every mountain" accepting more risk is necessary. But I don't see why the people on this Titanic expedition couldn't have achieved their goals while spending a bit more time on R&D + QA. Also, people should be making these risk decisions for themselves, not others. The CEO may have had it coming to him, but I feel bad for the other crew on board if they weren't able to decline the expedition, or weren't provided adequate information about the testing that had been done.
ilamont 3y ago
The critical components like the capsule were designed alongside NASA I saw that claim, and wondered what it entailed. The founder is clearly in the mold of testing mission-critical/life or death systems in production, while skirting or floating the rules. Such a claim is like one of those logos you see on the front of software start ups home pages, claiming some usage by Google, MIT, or CERN, without any verification or context.
- somenameforme 3y ago
  Their release is here [1]. The NASA tracking number is SAA8-2031655. The agreement started in 2020, and concluded in 2022. One of the guys on board the sub is Stockton Rush, the founder/owner of the company. He clearly believes (or believed as it may ultimately be) in the product they created, and wasn't just casually playing games for bucks. I would largely tune the media out on this. They have no more special insight than you or I. All that's known is that a sub has gone dark; everything else is speculation. Within 3 days we'll know for certain whether the people on the ship have been rescued, or are dead. In case it's the latter, we won't have any realistic idea of what happened until the sub, or its remains, are recovered. And that may simply not happen. [1] - https://www.oceangate.com/news-and-media/press-releases/2020-0226-nasa-and-oceangate-enter-into-an-agreement-to-collaborate.html https://www.oceangate.com/news-and-media/press-releases/2020...
  - robertlagrant 3y ago
    > I would largely tune the media out on this. They have no more special insight than you or I. The older I get, the more I think this.
- gregors 3y ago
  You mean this NASA.... https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo1.html https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo1.h... https://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/invest.html https://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/invest.html Where a small fire in a controlled environment killed people in 30 seconds? or this, where they didn't listen to the engineer? https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781/30-years-after-disaster-challenger-engineer-still-blames-himself https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781... NASA isn't a magical place where they don't mess things up
RC_ITR 3y ago
>Like the video [1] mentions, they were only improvising on things (including the controller) that would not pose a safety hazard if they failed. This is an extremely dangerous attitude though (obviously). In the BBC documentary, the thrusters are out of orientation and they just solve it by saying 'turn the controller, since right is your new forward.' In the documentary it's played off as fun, but there's a non-zero chance the sub is currently stuck within seafloor wreckage and it could 100% be the fault of the controller. Bad steering certainly wouldn't prevent them from dropping ballast (which they imply is the ultimate failsafe), but it is not a zero-failure-risk system.
theonething 3y ago
> blowing up $600 million Mars probes because of a mismatch between Imperial and Metric units. Damn, if I were the person/team responsible for that mistake, I don't think I could live that down.

weird-eye-issue 3y ago

Why is the capsule considered the only critical safety component? If everything else fails wouldn't it just fall to the bottom of the ocean? Even if it can survive that depth that only sounds good on paper. Nobody could get to you.

Out_of_Characte 3y ago
Because an implosion is a single point of failure leading to instant death. Anything else can be salvaged by staying calm and using one of multiple ways to resurface.
- cheekibreeki2 3y ago
  Subs will always have 1000 ways to kill you and most of them are catastrophic. You're pretty much boned if anything goes wrong especially with so few crew members, lack of compartments, backup propulsion, etc.
- weird-eye-issue 3y ago
  Really? Anything else can just be magically salvaged? I'm not sure there is that much room for error 2 miles below the surface
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  They are visiting a debris field. There is a much more than zero chance they are stuck on something.
lb1lf 3y ago
The capsule itself is positively buoyant. As long as it can jettison the ballast (and is not tangled up in something on the seabed, say, the Titanic), it will come to the surface.
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  And the ballast is held on via electromagnets. Lose (or deliberately cut) power, you're going up.
  - barelyauser 3y ago
    Isn't this like a huge waste of energy?
    - adql 3y ago
      It's nothing compared to amount of power to the engines, you don't need kilowatts to "just" hold a ballast
    - andruby 3y ago
      I don't think weight is a huge issue for submarines (unlike say airplanes), so taking a few batteries along should be fine. (I don't know anything about subs) you could even store a few batteries in the ballast.
    - nvusuvu 3y ago
      Clear tradeoff for safety.
    - ceejayoz 3y ago
      Between "waste some power on a magnet" and "we're permanently stuck on the bottom of the ocean about to run out of air", I know which one I'd pick.
    - HeyLaughingBoy 3y ago
      There's a difference between a "waste of energy" and a failsafe emergency system that happens to use a lot of energy.

jonathanstrange 3y ago

This is not true, the maker of this sub compromised substantially on safety and did not have it certified by an independent body like most other builders of deep sea submarines do. In fact, members of the small deep sea submarine community wrote a letter to the company warning them about the safety hazards and the lack of certification. Source: Today's interview with a deep sea exploration submarine commander on German TV (ARD Tagesschau). In particular, this company used carbon fiber materials that were neither tested nor certified for the intended operational depth, and they also did not do extensive testing like you do when you certify a craft.

gambiting 3y ago
As it's explained in another comment - the CEO wanted it tested but there isn't a facility anywhere on earth equipped to test it. Perhaps the argument then is that part of the company funding should have been building a custom rig designed for testing this highly custom 5 inch thick carbon fibre shell - but it's not like options to test it were available and were ignored.
- jonathanstrange 3y ago
  This is not true either. As the submarine commander interviewed lays out, the testing is done by actual dives, and there is a certification body for it. Almost every other deep sea exploration submarine is certified. However, getting certified is voluntary. Of course, certifying it just means that independent experts take a look at the design and use sensors during dives. All of these vehicles are experimental. But not even trying is negligent.
  - hef19898 3y ago
    It is almost like there are already deep sea subs in existence. And that people already figures out how to test, and certify, them.
  - zirgs 3y ago
    I suspect that certification is not going to be voluntary any more after this.

mysterydip 3y ago

He told CBS News: "You know, there's a limit. At some point safety just is pure waste. I mean if you just want to be safe, don't get out of bed. Don't get in your car. Don't do anything. At some point, you're going to take some risk, and it really is a risk/reward question. I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules." https://metro.co.uk/2023/06/20/titanic-sub-ceo-was-worried-about-resurfacing-18980155 https://metro.co.uk/2023/06/20/titanic-sub-ceo-was-worried-a...

swid 3y ago
I’ve know mountain climbers, hang glider/paraglider pilots, scuba divers, sky divers, and more and we pretty much say that exact thing. I’ve been casual acquaintances with people who have died doing extreme sports. Usually, the people in these sports say if the worst were to happen to them, they accept that risk and wouldn’t want their fate to stop other people from following their passions. That the feeling of being alive chasing these dreams fulfills a part of them, and they would be lost without that fulfillment. We all do take risks for our own happiness, different people just want different things from life and will drawn that line in different places. My guess is the five people on the sub would not want this incident to stop people from attempting to visit the Titanic.
- salawat 3y ago
  ...Yes, you're going to take risks. Got it. This risk in particular ends up with you as chunky salsa 4 kilometers under the water, because you couldn't be bothered to sink a copy of the bloody thing with no one in it first. If it's worth making, make 2 or 3 of with at least one slated for being destroyed at one point. Space Shuttle Enterprise never saw Space or the launch pad. It was still made and flown.
- pcthrowaway 3y ago
  There's a spectrum of risk comfort in mountaineering though. At the end of the day if there's a rockslide, there's nothing you can do, so you have to be willing to accept some level of risk. But at the same time, the majority of mountaineering deaths are due to people taking unnecessary risks (for the sport). Being poorly prepared in terms of gear, or making poor decisions, or not being educated enough in climbing, safety assessment, and rescue techniques. There's absolutely a lot you can do to mitigate the risk, and I think even the experienced mountaineers who choose to take more risk (say, traveling lighter and placing less protection in order to cover more ground in a day) don't advocate for that as the standard way to practice the sport. I'll be honest, I've had a few close calls myself, but I've taken those as lessons in how to do things more safely going forward, because I value doing things safely more than "bagging more peaks". I guess if your dream is something like "climb every mountain" accepting more risk is necessary. But I don't see why the people on this Titanic expedition couldn't have achieved their goals while spending a bit more time on R&D + QA. Also, people should be making these risk decisions for themselves, not others. The CEO may have had it coming to him, but I feel bad for the other crew on board if they weren't able to decline the expedition, or weren't provided adequate information about the testing that had been done.

ilamont 3y ago

The critical components like the capsule were designed alongside NASA I saw that claim, and wondered what it entailed. The founder is clearly in the mold of testing mission-critical/life or death systems in production, while skirting or floating the rules. Such a claim is like one of those logos you see on the front of software start ups home pages, claiming some usage by Google, MIT, or CERN, without any verification or context.

somenameforme 3y ago
Their release is here [1]. The NASA tracking number is SAA8-2031655. The agreement started in 2020, and concluded in 2022. One of the guys on board the sub is Stockton Rush, the founder/owner of the company. He clearly believes (or believed as it may ultimately be) in the product they created, and wasn't just casually playing games for bucks. I would largely tune the media out on this. They have no more special insight than you or I. All that's known is that a sub has gone dark; everything else is speculation. Within 3 days we'll know for certain whether the people on the ship have been rescued, or are dead. In case it's the latter, we won't have any realistic idea of what happened until the sub, or its remains, are recovered. And that may simply not happen. [1] - https://www.oceangate.com/news-and-media/press-releases/2020-0226-nasa-and-oceangate-enter-into-an-agreement-to-collaborate.html https://www.oceangate.com/news-and-media/press-releases/2020...
- robertlagrant 3y ago
  > I would largely tune the media out on this. They have no more special insight than you or I. The older I get, the more I think this.
gregors 3y ago
You mean this NASA.... https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo1.html https://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/apollo/missions/apollo1.h... https://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/invest.html https://history.nasa.gov/Apollo204/invest.html Where a small fire in a controlled environment killed people in 30 seconds? or this, where they didn't listen to the engineer? https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781/30-years-after-disaster-challenger-engineer-still-blames-himself https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/28/464744781... NASA isn't a magical place where they don't mess things up

RC_ITR 3y ago

>Like the video [1] mentions, they were only improvising on things (including the controller) that would not pose a safety hazard if they failed. This is an extremely dangerous attitude though (obviously). In the BBC documentary, the thrusters are out of orientation and they just solve it by saying 'turn the controller, since right is your new forward.' In the documentary it's played off as fun, but there's a non-zero chance the sub is currently stuck within seafloor wreckage and it could 100% be the fault of the controller. Bad steering certainly wouldn't prevent them from dropping ballast (which they imply is the ultimate failsafe), but it is not a zero-failure-risk system.

theonething 3y ago

> blowing up $600 million Mars probes because of a mismatch between Imperial and Metric units. Damn, if I were the person/team responsible for that mistake, I don't think I could live that down.