The last message received from the Oceangate’s Titan submarine: “I can’t breathe”. The international news is full of the missing Titan submarine. Was it Insured? Does it Pay?
A common man’s assumption would be that OceanGate is responsible for the accident. But it had obtained from all its passengers’ waiver, releasing them of any responsibility, even in case of death before embarking on deep-sea expedition.
Now OceanGate’s compliance with international safety law: There is no regulation for these kinds of submersible vehicles like Titan, unlike ships or other vessels. OceanGate vessel did not comply with the Passenger Vessel Safety Act in the United States, as it was operating in inter national waters.
The submersible industry is large, with many commercial vessels used in deep-sea drilling and cable laying. Agencies such as the American Bureau of Shipping provide classification. Classification is a process that assures ship owners, insurers, and regulators that vessels are designed, constructed and inspected to accepted standards. Titan was, by OceanGate’s own admission, not classed. OceanGate was founded with the goal to pursue the highest reasonable level of innovation in the design and operation of manned submersibles. By definition, innovation is outside of an already accepted system.
Which company insured OceanGate? The insurance company requires classification to ensure that the submersible meets all the requirements. OceanGate has not shared any information about the insurer for its deep-sea expeditions.
A family member/ employer etc. – can bring an application to the court for a missing passenger of the submarine to be presumed dead. But, in the absence of a catastrophic event, presumption of death orders is rare.
The courts always held that the missing person must be absent for at least Seven years before such an order could be granted. Moreover, a court has granted this order does not necessarily mean that an insurance policy will respond. The insurer can challenge the presumption of death order or rely on other “normal” grounds for repudiating the claim e.g., misrepresentation, non-disclosure, etc. Further some non-indemnity insurance policies expressly exclude cover for death resulting from adventurous activities.
It was a vessel that did not belong to any particular country. It was in international waters where there are no regulations. Titan went down around 2 hr. straight drop to bottom from a ship and it takes two hours to come up. It did not have ability to go up and down very far like regular submarines. Most Navy submarines go about 1,000 feet below the surface. Even top Navy subs can’t operate at the depth of the Titanic. There are trenches in the ocean as deep as 36,000 feet.
There will be no bones to recover as the bones dissolve rapidly into solutions at that depth. Catastrophic implosion is a very quick death. Hardly anyone is ever rescued from a submarine or a submersible. Rescuing a deep-sea submarine from the bottom of the ocean is near impossible. It is highly dangerous. We are not yet ready with a tourist submersible. It is almost freezing temperature down there, completely dark, and serious need for oxygen at those levels.
About the Author
Dr. K. Raja Gopal Reddy is a seasoned internationally qualified Insurance professional.
What you are reading here, may not answer all the questions we have, but has the absolute power of asking unsettling questions which increase the interest in the strange world, and show the contradictory wonders lying just below the surface of the commonest things of life. Look at this disturbing but beautiful thought of Friedrich Nietzsche “God is dead. God remains dead. And we have killed him”.
Dr. Reddy can be reached at: raja66gopal@gmail.com
