‘What could go wrong?’ joked OceanGate CEO before Titan sub disaster

Only two months before the now-infamous Titan submersible disaster, OceanGate Expeditions CEO Stockton Rush appeared on a Canadian radio show where he joked, “What could go wrong?”

Today, the comment is chilling, as Rush and four others were killed in an underwater implosion of the sub as it approached the Titanic shipwreck in June 2023.

Their deaths are now the subject of a new documentary entitled Minute by Minute: The Titan Sub Disaster. Rush’s interview with St John’s Radio was included in the two-part series, created by ITN Productions.

“What could go wrong?” Rush chuckled in the resurfaced clip, adding that the expedition team decided to undertake the mission in June because that was when the North Atlantic waters would be “calmest.”

View image in full screen

The Titan submersible disappeared on June 18, 2023.

After land-based teams lost contact with the sub, the frantic search caught the attention of international audiences concerned for the fates of Rush and the Titan’s other passengers: two members of a prominent Pakistani family, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, British adventurer Hamish Harding and Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet.

Get breaking National news

For news impacting Canada and around the world, sign up for breaking news alerts delivered directly to you when they happen.

Sign up for breaking National newsletter Sign Up

By providing your email address, you have read and agree to Global News' Terms and Conditions and Privacy Policy.

Contact with the sub was lost about an hour and 45 minutes into the journey. Reports that the vessel was only equipped with 96 hours of oxygen made the search urgent and involved both U.S. and Canadian teams.

3:49 ‘It’s probably a mercy’: Expert says Titanic sub implosion was likely instantaneous

On June 22, four days after the disappearance, the U.S. Coast Guard located debris from the submersible and presumed all five passengers dead. The debris was found about 500 yards from the Titanic shipwreck.

The vessel’s implosion is believed to have been near-instantaneous due to the immense pressure deep underwater.

OceanGate Expeditions suspended all of the company’s exploration and commercial operations in July 2023.

Haunting ‘knocking’ sounds from the sub

Last week, a teaser clip for Minute by Minute featured new audio of strange, rhythmic knocking noises that were believed to be coming from the sub while rescuers searched.

The sound clip, previously not released to the public, was given to the U.K.-based documentary crew by the Canadian Air Force, which led the search and rescue mission.

1:08 Haunting ‘knocking’ sound from Titan sub heard in trailer for ‘Minute by Minute: The Titan Sub Disaster’

“It sounds like it could be somebody knocking, the symmetry between those knockings is very unusual,” Ryan Ramsey, a former Navy submarine captain from the U.K., says in the documentary clip.

The mysterious sounds were picked up by Canadian aircraft that dropped sonobuoys in the area of the missing sub. The knocking was heard periodically “every 30 minutes,” according to a statement from the U.S. Coast Guard at the time.

A U.S. Navy official told CBS News the banging noises were most likely either ocean noise or noise from other search ships.

Minute by Minute: The Titan Sub Disaster aired on the U.K.’s Channel 5 on March 6, and again on March 7.

The two-part documentary features rarely seen footage from adventurer Arthur Loibl’s previous Titan expeditions. Loibl is one of the first people to ever to travel to the Titanic wreck in Oceangate’s submersible, in 2021.