Inside the OceanGate disaster: Netflix's new documentary dives into the tragic descent that killed 5 people

Nearly two years after the OceanGate submersible Titan was presumed to have imploded during its expedition to the wreckage of the Titanic, killing the five people on board, a new documentary offers a fresh look at the disaster — and the man at the center of it.

Netflix’s Titan: The OceanGate Disaster explores how Stockton Rush, the CEO of OceanGate, did everything in his power to continue his trips to explore the ocean floor, even as it became more and more evident that the submersible was not safe. The film uses footage commissioned by Rush himself, who hired a videographer to document the journey, and shines a light on Rush’s hubris, which ultimately had deadly consequences.

Here’s what to know about OceanGate, Rush and how this tragedy unfolded.

Who is Stockton Rush?

Rush was a businessman who was born into a wealthy San Francisco family — and the descendant of two founding fathers, Benjamin Rush and Richard Stockton, per the Seattle Times. In 1986, he married Wendy Weil, who was the great-great-granddaughter of Isidor and Ida Straus, a wealthy couple who died on the Titanic.

Rush was passionate about exploration. At 19, he became the youngest pilot in the world to qualify for jet transport rating, per the BBC. He received his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in aerospace engineering before getting an MBA from the University of California, Berkeley. Later, he worked as a flight test engineer on the F-15 program at McDonnell Douglas and later held leadership roles at Remote Control Technologies, Entomo and BlueView Technologies.

But despite his aerospace degree and work experience, he eventually turned away from space — and to the ocean instead. In 2009, he cofounded the Bahamas-based OceanGate Expeditions with Argentine-American businessman Guillermo Söhnlein to make ocean exploration more accessible.

All about OceanGate and the Titan

OceanGate’s first submersible, Antipodes, completed around 130 dives between 2010 and 2013, offering underwater trips to clients for prices ranging from an estimated $7,500 to $40,000.

In 2015, the company began developing what would become known as the Titan (originally named Cyclops II), a deep-diving submersible built with a carbon fiber hull — an unusual and controversial design choice that received much pushback from experts and employees. It was reported that OceanGate used carbon fiber from Boeing that was past its shelf life for use on airplanes; later it came to light that NASA was supposed to aid in the creation of the Titan but that plans changed due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Rush never had the Titan “classed,” or independently certified to meet strict safety and design rules — choosing to skip the process despite expert warnings. David Lochridge, the company’s director of marine operations, raised serious concerns about the submersible design and testing, believing that Rush’s main concern was ensuring that the mission continued no matter what, as his focus was on making money. Lochridge testified to the U.S. Coast Guard in 2024 that he expressed these concerns, only to be fired from the company in 2018 and sued for breach of contract.

Though Lochridge filed a complaint with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration against OceanGate, he said that they never investigated his concerns.

In an email in January 2018 to deep-sea exploration specialist Rob McCallum, Lochridge wrote, per the New Yorker: “I would consider myself pretty ballsy when it comes to doing things that are dangerous, but that sub is an accident waiting to happen.”

But in July 2021, the company made its first successful dive to the Titanic, and by January 2023, the Guardian reported that the company took about 60 paying customers and 15 to 20 researchers to the Titanic in their submersible.

In a 2022 interview with CBS Sunday Morning, Rush said, “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 gonna take some risk, and it really is a risk/reward question. I said, ‘I think I can do this just as safely by breaking the rules.’”

What happened on the Titan

On June 18, 2023, Rush and four other people — British billionaire Hamish Harding; French Titanic expert and former navy diver Paul-Henri Nargeolet; Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood; and his 19-year-old son, Suleman Dawood — left the coast of Newfoundland in the Titan on a mission to explore the wreckage of the Titanic. Each passenger onboard reportedly paid $250,000 for the trip, with Rush as the pilot.

But about an hour and 45 minutes into its descent, the Titan lost contact with its support vessel. A large international search and rescue operation began, involving the U.S. Coast Guard, as well as Canadian and French authorities. At the same time, the media — and the world — watched, knowing that the crew only had 96 hours of oxygen at the beginning of their venture.

On Thursday, June 22, debris from the Titan was found roughly 1,600 feet from the Titanic’s bow. The U.S. Coast Guard confirmed the Titan had suffered a “catastrophic implosion,” and that all five passengers had died instantly. Investigations later revealed that the vessel’s carbon fiber and titanium design had raised serious safety concerns for years. In the aftermath, Rush was accused of eschewing regulations and testing, forging ahead despite all safety issues flagged.

“It comes down to Stockton Rush. The decisions he made led to this,” Mark Monroe, director of the Netflix documentary, told People. “It was a cult of personality. If you went against him, you were likely to be out.”

OceanGate officially suspended all exploration and commercial operations in July 2023. It also removed most of its internet presence. The company has not yet filed for bankruptcy and still exists as a registered business, per Today.