Former OceanGate Finance Director Quits Job after CEO’s Surprising Job Offer: A Tale of Concerns and Departure.
In a revealing account shared with The New Yorker’s Ben Taub, an anonymous former director of finance and administration at OceanGate disclosed how the CEO, Stockton Rush, approached her in 2018 with an unexpected proposition. She was asked to assume the role of chief pilot for the Titan submersible, a suggestion that ultimately led to her resignation.
According to the former director, Rush broached the topic of her becoming the head pilot after the dismissal of David Lochridge, the initially designated submarine pilot for the position. It is worth noting that OceanGate had previously sued Lochridge in 2018, but he countersued, alleging that he was terminated after raising significant concerns about the safety of the Titan’s hull. In Taub’s report, Lochridge’s conversations with other submersible experts are detailed, where they also expressed apprehensions about the Titan’s safety to Rush.
Following Lochridge’s departure, Rush turned to the finance director and proposed that she step in as the pilot. “It freaked me out that he would want me to be head pilot since my background is in accounting,” she shared with The New Yorker.
The former director expressed a lack of trust in Rush due to the circumstances surrounding Lochridge’s exit from OceanGate. As soon as she secured a new position elsewhere, she promptly resigned from her role, as reported by Taub.
Additionally, the former director mentioned that some of OceanGate’s engineers were teenagers or in their early twenties when working for the company, with some earning only $15 per hour at a certain point, according to The New Yorker’s account.
The ill-fated Titan, with Stockton Rush among its occupants, suffered a catastrophic collapse on June 18 during its descent to the depths of the Titanic wreckage, approximately 13,000 feet underwater. The submersible lost contact with its mother ship roughly one and a half hours into the descent, and it likely imploded thousands of feet below the surface.
Prior to the tragic dive, submersible experts had repeatedly warned Rush about the experimental nature of the vessel. However, he disregarded their concerns, driven by his desire to innovate and his belief that industry safety standards were overly stringent.
Rush firmly believed that the Titan was capable of conducting reliable tours to the Titanic, stating in 2018 that he would shut down OceanGate before operating an unsafe vessel, according to a conversation with a friend.
When approached for comment, a representative for OceanGate informed Insider that the company had no further information to share at this time.
