A billionaire from Ohio plans to take a $20 million sub to visit the ill-fated Titanic as a means to prove that the industry is now safe following the tragic OceanGate implosion last year.
Larry Connor, a real estate investor, told the Wall Street Journal he will partner with Triton Submarines co-founder Patrick Lahey to take a two-person submersible all the way down to the Titanic in hopes of demonstrating that the ocean can be a “wonderful and enjoyable” place.
“I want to show people worldwide that while the ocean is extremely powerful, it can be wonderful and enjoyable and really kind of life-changing if you go about it the right way,” Connor said.
The Triton Submarine vessel, the Triton 4000/2 Abyssal Explorer, cost $20 million to create.
“Patrick has been thinking about and designing this for over a decade. But we didn’t have the materials and technology,” Connor said. “You couldn’t have built this sub five years ago.”
Patrick Lahey had previously been critical of OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, who he said used predatory tactics to lure wealthy clients onto his vessel. He said the vessel’s carbon fiber hull created the conditions necessary for the catastrophic implosion, resulting in the deaths of five people, including Rush himself.
Related: Footage of Titanic Wreck Seen in Previous Trips Made by Doomed Submersible
OceanGate Expeditions via StoryfulAs Breitbart News reported last year:
Leading submarine expert Patrick Lahey said OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush was “predatory” in recruiting passengers for the Titanic dive.
Lahey, the president of Triton submarines, said Rush had a hard time locating wealthy clients for the dive to make it profitable, the Times reported.
Financier Jay Bloom said Rush offered him and his son $250,000 tickets for a “last minute” price of $150,000 each just weeks before the dive, the Daily Mail reported. Bloom said he decided to pull out after Rush flew to Las Vegas in “a two-seater experimental plane that he built” to convince him to join the dive.
As a result of its radical design flaws, which Lahey deemed a “monstrosity,” Stockton’s Titan submersible never received certification.
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