- OceanGate hired college-aged interns to design the Titan submersible’s electrical systems.
- “The whole electrical system — that was our design,” said a former intern.
- A community college that sent interns to OceanGate stopped offering internships with it in 2019.
OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush employed college-aged interns to design the electrical systems for the Titan submersible that vanished on June 18, according to The New Yorker.
The New Yorker’s wide-ranging story, published on Saturday, detailed the numerous safety warnings that Rush ignored. The CEO not only dismissed expert advice, per The New Yorker — he also hired interns from Washington State University to work on the Titan.
“The whole electrical system — that was our design, we implemented it, and it works,” former intern Mark Walsh, told Washington State University’s college newspaper in February 2018.
According to the college newspaper, Walsh graduated in 2017 with a degree in electrical engineering. He had started out as an intern before joining OceanGate full-time as their electrical engineering lead. Walsh also told the college newspaper that he had hired a few interns from his alma mater, and was keen to hire more to join him at OceanGate.
Insider was unable to independently verify which part of the Titan’s electrical system Walsh’s cohort of interns worked on. Representatives for OceanGate did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.
Walsh’s claim that a group of interns had created the electrical system on the Titan submersible is the latest in a number of bombshell revelations about what was going on behind the scenes at Rush’s company.
The ambitious seafaring company had touted its partnerships with NASA, Boeing, and the University of Washington on the Titan’s design. These claims were later denied by Boeing and the University of Washington, who said they did not work on the Titan submersible.
Washington State University said in a statement to the local daily The Everett Herald on June 22 that they do not “have an alliance with OceanGate.”
“We are aware that some of our graduates have worked at OceanGate. To our knowledge, one graduate currently works there,” the university added. According to Walsh’s LinkedIn page, he worked at OceanGate for two years and left the firm in 2019.
Besides Washington State University, OceanGate was also taking in interns from Everett Community College’s Ocean Research College Academy, per The Everett Herald. However, the college stopped offering internships with OceanGate in 2019.
Ardi Kveven, the academy’s executive director, told The Everett Herald that “there was often a disconnect between the exploration community, which embraced pushing the envelope, and the more methodical scientific community.”
Rush’s past comments on the Titan’s development have come into the spotlight after multiple media reports revealed that he ignored multiple safety warnings from experts.
All five passengers aboard the Titan, including Rush, were declared dead after the submersible imploded during a dive to the Titanic shipwreck on June 18.
Representatives for Washington State University and Everett Community College’s Ocean Research College Academy did not immediately respond to requests for comment from Insider sent outside regular business hours.