Titan sub hearings live: OceanGate CEO said he would ‘buy a congressman’ to make problems vanish, witness says
US Coast Guard’s two-week long hearing into the disastrous Titan submersible voyage operated by OceanGate enters its final day in North Charleston
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OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush allegedly declared that he would “buy a congressman” to make issues surrounding the Titan sub’s certification go away, a witness testified.
Matthew McCoy, who worked at the submersible company for six months from April 2017, addressed the Titan Marine Board of Investigation panel on Friday for the final day of the two-week long hearing into Titan’s disaster voyage in June 2023.
After raising concerns about an alleged lack of certificate of inspection for the first Titan sub in 2017, McCoy testified that Rush told him, “I would buy a congressman” to make problems disappear during a lunch meeting. The ex-OceanGate employee said that he quit soon after.
“He was either trying to intimidate me or impress me,” he testified.
McCoy also alleged that the OceanGate engineering department was “full of college interns” during his time at the company, adding that he “doesn’t believe” there was a professional engineer on staff.
Captain Jamie Frederick, member of the US Coast Guard who oversaw rescue mission of the Titan and its five crew, began testifying after McCoy. Coast Guard Search and Rescue Specialist Scott Talbot will be the last witness of the inquiry.
Thursday hearing kicks off with NASA engineer
Today’s hearing before the Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation kicked off with testimony from Justin Jackson, a materials engineer with NASA.
OceanGate had approached NASA about performance testing in their deep-sea facility, Jackson’s testimony revealed.
Soon afterward, the COVID-19 pandemic hit and OceanGate sought other partners as in-person facility use was limited, Jackson said.
Testimony to resume on Thursday
Testimony in the OceanGate Titan sub hearings before the US Coast Guard are set to resume today.
Expected to testify are experts from the Coast Guard, NASA and Boeing. They are expected to talk more about the disaster that claimed the lives of five people.
It's part of 10 days worth of testimony as investigators try to determine what went wrong before the implosion and if there were warning signs that were missed by OceanGate officials.
Blog coverage to resume Thursday morning
Wednesday’s testimony before the Coast Guard Marine Board of Investigation has ended.
Blog coverage will resume when the next hearing begins on Thursday morning.
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