By ART CHANCE
Anyone who has read or watched Tom Clancy’s “The Hunt For Red October” knows that the U.S. Navy knew of the catastrophic failure of the “Titan’s” hull if not at the time it happened, as soon as the computers reviewed the sound recordings, say a few hours later. Despite the spin from the Biden-media, there was nothing secret.
The United States has had a line of sonobuoys and hydrophones from Murmansk to New York since the early days of the Cold War. If it happens in the North Atlantic, an American submarine or listening station knows about it.
Suffice it to say that I don’t believe anything the Biden Regime says about anything so it wouldn’t surprise me if they ordered the Coast Guard and Navy to string the “Search for Titan” drama out just to cover for Hunter Biden’s bad news, but I don’t know for sure and that is giving them more credit for smart than I like to give them. Maybe it was some sort of sham; maybe they’re just that stupid.
I want to talk about boats not politics. Those of us who’ve been around boats and boating know the term “Six Pack License.” A “Six Pack” isn’t a license; it is a description of a type of boat technically called an “uninspected passenger vessel.”
All those pretty and not-so-pretty things you see bobbing around out there on a holiday weekend are mostly “uninspected passenger vessels.” Almost all the consumer boats are uninspected passenger vessels, meaning they are not built under Coast Guard supervision nor to Coast Guard specifications except in regard to a limited number of safety requirements.
The ”Six Pack” comes from the fact that if you’re a licensed professional mariner, no matter what your rating from 25 ton to unlimited ocean, you cannot take more than six passengers for hire in an uninspected passenger vessel.
If the USCG wants to mess with you about it, they can. If you’re licensed and you take a party out and some of them bring some nice wine to express their appreciation, you can’t legally take it if you have more than six aboard. You sure as hell can’t charge a quarter million bucks to ride an uninspected submersible if you have more than six paying passengers on it.
So, let’s address “The Hunt for Titan.” It is clear that the owner did everything in his power to avoid Coast Guard supervision and inspection of his vessel. He built an “uninspected passenger vessel” to go 14K meters to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. He made it down and back a few times.
I had a mid-range uninspected passenger vessel for several years. From what I could see, mine was much better equipped than the “Titan.” It was strictly a good-weather boat. It was pretty safe up until the seas got into the six-foot range, but then uncomfortable and at times downright scary. I could have sold you a ticket to cross the Gulf of Alaska or even run to Kodiak or the Aleutian Chain, and we might have made it safely; a good weather eye and good luck goes a long way, but if anything at all had gone wrong, we were going to die. The guys on the “Titan” had it better; as the French guy said, if anything goes wrong, you’re dead before you know anything is wrong. On the surface, it takes a while to die from cold water and exposure. A Mustang life suit really just helps them find the body.
People will be screaming for retribution, but I think he gamed the system. He built the deep-sea submersible version of a Bayliner Capri, a Sunday afternoon play boat, and sold tickets to take it two miles down in the North Atlantic. I think he found and used a loophole in the USCG regulations and any claim against him would have to be some sort of tort/negligence claim.
At the time they wrote the regulations, the USCG probably wasn’t thinking that some fool would try to take a beer keg or a propane tank to the bottom of the ocean as a passenger vessel. The Pakistani guy and his son probably didn’t know enough to know better, but a couple of the others were experienced mariners and explorers who should have known better than to get inside that thing. What were they thinking?
Art Chance is a retired Director of Labor Relations for the State of Alaska, formerly of Juneau and now living in Anchorage. He is the author of the book, “Red on Blue, Establishing a Republican Governance,” available at Amazon.
I completely agree! This country is in dire straits and the Biden administration will do ANYTHING to distract we the people from what is happening to our freedoms!!! AMERICA… REMEMBER WHO YOU ARE!!!
But the ‘engineering’ team was so diverse!
Diversity is our strength, right?
Isn’t that all that really matters?
Nice article Art. Mr Rush had the sub trucked to Canada where it went to Newfoundland, loaded on a mother ship, then taken to international waters where it was boarded, bolted up, and slung over the side for its voyage. Mr Rush claimed rules and regulations stifle innovation. His type of innovation I choose to avoid. I did like the Camping World lighting system and video game controllers though.
Good story also on American Thinker web page today titled ‘Diversity’s Fatal Attraction’ that dovetails well with Arts article above. Stockton Rush, the owner of the Titan, also clearly valued ‘diversity’ over competence and experience.
That whole fiasco is one big monument to leftism and woke. P.T. Barnum said there is a sucker born every minute. So so true. I hope these poor souls did not not suffer, and the science indicates they did not.
It pays to do your Due Dilligence with Guides, Outfitters, Transporters, and Tours. Paying particular attention to experienced staff, equipment, facilities, past track record, and safety violations – incidences.
Competence: the rock upon which wokeness chooses to die.
Megalomaniacs appear in all varieties. They all seek to have complete control over some people completely for as long as possible. Tyrants. If they go to a social security office it’s an uncomfortable challenge. They must control everybody in a room – the room, the space. Nothing else matters to them. The do it any way possible by sound, impeding movement, delimiting and controlling any “other”. It’s quite a frailty to stuck with and is incurable but essentially deadly.
I think Art is hovering over the facts since I am quite certain there were several listening devices with the volume on high alert just for that event alone. What are the chances of other craft in deep water creating noise similar to an implosion at two miles deep in that same area. It certainly wasnt a fish fart as the media from the white house would speculate.
I am sure the white house was ecstatic to hear the news that would surely divert MSM attention like flies on a turd away from DOJ’s complete lack of competence showing favoritism for criminal behavior. Jan 6 trespassers are still in prison.
Billionaires can build anything they want and there are enough people that can be convinced it is completely safe because it made the trip already “safely”. Another vessel resting on ocean floor that needs to be viewed and researched close enough to the Titanic it can be marketed as a “double feature”.
What goes down doesn’t necessarily come up, even with the help of a game controller. The LLC contains, in all likelihood, just the Titan, making his liability solely tied to the destroyed “vessel”. Check out any entity’s corporate orchestration, and you’ll see where their risk lies. Then decide. For example: 10 helicopters, 10 LLCs- 1 for copter; plus 1 for the hanger, and 1 for the office/business.
Reminds me of the Hunley !
The ever helpful scriptures states unequivically: “Do not be misled”. It’s on you. The Commander said: ” Do not be mislead”. That is a command. Periodically we must pause and say to ourselves “Who is leading me around (with a metal ring through my nose) right now?”.
Good job, Art. $250K for your funeral. No thanks,
I’ll stay on the surface. What the hell is the attraction to go to 400 atmospheres in the Atlantic to see an old rust bucket that sank 110 years ago? Nothing to see except the graveyard of 1500 souls. It reminds me of an old bus that used to be parked on the Stampede Trail where a wacko loner died from the harsh Interior Alaska elements. Kids from all over the world made it a cult pilgrimage to risk their lives to go see it. And a few died in the process. Some people are Nuts!
Don’t underestimate stupidity and arrogance, Kemosabee.
Face it: a couple of years from now, there will probably be ANOTHER private submersible company, selling berths for $500,000 a pop, to go down to see the wreckage and (the remains of) the bodies from the late “Titan” submersible.
Yep, the kids on “the bus” journey are almost as dumb as the billionaires who unloaded their wealth to go on a one-way trip to Davey Jone’s Locker.
The designers of this sub suffer from the same leftist mentality that says “history is worthless, and nobody has ever been as smart as me.” Essentially the same as any 16 year old boy. Throw in “You’re not the boss of me,” and you get the entire picture. Basing your life on this? Madness.
Notice how Biden’s document scandal died when the MSM was instructed to focus on the weather balloon. After our fighter jets shot down the weather balloon, no one was able to resusitate the document story. So of course the Dems cued up a few days of suspense for us little people when to take the air out of the story on the Bid Guy’s son.
RE: 14k meters is incorrect. Titanic is 12500 feet deep. Or about 4k meters.
Fat fingers. Plus I don’t naturally think in metric other than small stuff like nuts and bolts on automobiles.
The infamous, always-missing 10mm wrench comes to mind.
Only God knows how many 10MM sockets and wrenches I’ve bought over the years.
I carry multiple 10mm wrenches and sockets in my Argo tool kit. Then, when I break down, it will be the need for a second 13mm wrench that will force me to start walking.
Murphy’s Law………
I have memorized the metric conversion factor: 0.3048
What I really want to know is whether the infamous porthole window only designed for a depth of 1300 meters was the cause of the implosion – and what would be the physical process of a hull breach in that fashion. Or did the hull suddenly compress like a squished beer can due to the failure of the out-of-service -date carbon fiber/titanium hull design?
It would be more than a squished beer can. The pressure differential was enormous. Inside, the sub maintained constant sea level pressure, while at 12,500 feet it was nearly 400 atmospheres pushing against the exterior. Even a small hairline crack in the sub’s cylinder shape would create an instant dynamic equalization, enough to implode, followed by a reverse explosion. Underwater laws of physics are harsh.
A better description of what SOSUS can do is in the book”blind mans bluff”. Described how USS Scorpion was found after she imploded
I was just looking to refer to something popularly accessible.
What a joke! Total waste of time reading this article and associated comments.
Maybe Art Chance will find an illustrator to put his columns in picture story for you next time. Hahaha. What’s the matter he talk too smart for you too? He one of the few mrak contributors I have to concentrate when I read it. He brings out the best in the regular readers who were blessed by receiving better education and professional work experience.
I once wrote a whole column in the Juneau Empire in words of one syllable just for people like you.
Federal waters extend 12 miles from shore, the USCG and taxpayers should not be funding rescues of any party that is not paying taxes, or is doing dumb stuff in international waters
You pays your money. You takes your chances. In parallel, we have the growth of manned commercial spaceflight, starting with the filthy rich. Like deep sea trips, ticket prices will come down. Like deep sea trips, there will be some craft that don’t come back.
I am struck by the example of previous experience leading you down the primrose path to disaster. There are stories of the composite hull of the Titan cracking and groaning during testing. Yet on every single submarine movie from WWII to today, a deep dive always involves some amount of groaning of the hull. Problem is that metal is ductile, and behaves however it behaves. Composites, great under tension, don’t behave all that well in compression. I predict we will learn a lot about the behavior of composites under pressure depending on how much of the debris is recovered.
Another example came from the Columbia accident. A chunk of ET insulation separated during launch, putting a hole in the leading edge of the orbiter wing. That hole let hot gas enter the wing and destroy it during reentry. Yet NASA spent decades watching ice fall off rockets as they came off the pad (ice from high humidity air formed around liquid oxygen / hydrogen tanks). They learned falling stuff during launch? No problemo, which ended up being the wrong lesson for Columbia.
When we use new equipment in previously known regimes, that equipment doesn’t always behave as expected. When we use known equipment in new regimes, it doesn’t necessarily behave as expected either. This is why the testing regime is really important. And dangerous. And why they get paid the Big Bucks. Cheers –
We scattered a lot of airframes, engines, and, yes, bodies over the landscape learning to more or less safely fly airbreathing aircraft and many more trying to learn to fly non-airbreathing craft. Who knows how many bodies the USSR and Chinese scattered about. What is glaring about this event is the lengths the owner went to to avoid regulation USCG supervision.
That foam was a new more “environmentally friendly” kind of foam way more important than not falling off
Boats sink, and planes crash. That’s all you need to know. Happy trails.
If they didn’t have PFDs for each passenger, they can be cited.
I am guessing the owner did not have a “Six-Pack license” or any kind of marine engineering license. I am not guessing when I say that the owner did not respect the sea.
This “Titan” story is the perfect metaphor for the presidential election of 2020. The credulous voters of the USA supposedly elected a poorly designed, corrupted, and uninspected (MSM!) beer keg to the presidency. The nearly-continuous groaning sounds that we have heard coming from the thin skin and skull of that character are a clear warning sign to the nation, yet many are still prepared to risk all to take a trip to the bottom of the deep sea to view some sort of ‘brave new world.” I’ll remain on the surface with my survival gear, and rest my hope in an eternal Captain.
75 minute movie out already?
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