EVERETT, Wash. — The Everett office of OceanGate will be closed indefinitely after five people aboard its submersible were presumed dead, including the company’s CEO.
The company’s offices, which are located on the Everett waterfront, will be closed “while the staff copes with the tragic loss of their team member,” according to a statement released by the Port of Everett.
“This is an extremely sad time for our dedicated employees who are exhausted and grieving deeply over this loss,” OceanGate said in a statement.
OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush was among five people on the Titan submersible, which lost contact about an hour and 45 minutes after it began its journey to the wreckage of the Titanic on Sunday.
British businessman Hamish Harding, French Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, and Shahzada and Suleman Dawood, a father and son from a prominent Pakistani family, were also on board.
Several agencies launched an extensive search for the submersible, which covered an area twice the size of Connecticut in waters 2 ½ miles deep.
The Coast Guard announced Thursday there was a “catastrophic implosion” of the submersible after debris was found about 1,600 feet from the Titanic. A senior Navy official told the Associated Press that the U.S. Navy analyzed its acoustic data and found an anomaly that was consistent with an implosion or explosion when communication was lost.
This was the third year that OceanGate has operated expeditions to the Titanic, following trips in 2021 and 2022.
The company takes paying customers to see the Titanic’s wreckage at a price tag of $250,000 per person. Its goal is to document flora and fauna living in the wreckage, document the condition of the wreck and capture data and images to be used for scientific study, in addition to adventure tourism.
However, the company faced allegations of safety concerns even before it launched its first Titanic mission. In 2018, a former OceanGate employee sued the company claiming he was wrongfully terminated after he sounded the alarm about the “potential danger to passengers of the Titan as the submersible reached extreme depths."
That case was settled outside court.