OceanGate co-founder Guillermo Sohnlein testifies at the Titan marine board of investigation hearing Sept. 23, 2024, in North Charleston, S.C.The co-founder and former CEO of OceanGate said the company originally never planned to build its own submersibles while testifying during akilled in a catastrophic implosion while on a deep-sea voyage to see the Titanic wreckage in June 2023.
"We wanted to change that," Sohnlein said. "We wanted to give humanity greater access to the ocean -- and specifically the deep ocean, anything deeper than 1,000 meters."Sohnlein said they eventually realized they would need to build their own submersible to achieve that business model. "They have very low resistance to impact loads, and the hull is susceptible to deformation under applied external loading," he said."We were transitioning from an operations phase to an engineering phase, and that was really his strength and not mine," Sohnlein said of Rush. "It made sense for him to take the reins of the company."
MORE: Titan passenger said he understood risk if something went wrong in experimental sub: 'It wasn't supposed to be safe'"As a shareholder, I didn't want to take up room in the sub. I wanted to make that available for the people that the dive was intended for," he said, people for whom seeing the Titanic was their "life dream.""Neither Stockton nor I were ever driven by tourism," he said.