You don’t need to hold a masters’ degree in oceanic engineering to know that a submersible that has scaffolding bars that can roll off as ballast, a games controller as the main control, one button and no certification is a potential death trap. Careful with the argument from authority.
How are you defining expert? Training? Accreditation? Qualifications? Education? Experience? Do you need to hold a doctorate in sports medicine to advise a team not to sign Naby Keita?
I build and fix things for a living. I do it my way. Does that comport with whatever passes of legislation and requirements in my industries? No because there really aren’t any. Do they work? Yes. Have they for years? Yes. You don’t need to be an expert on a subject to point out flaws and problems in areas in which you have no expertise.
How many of us are qualified football coaches? Trained managers? Expert scouts / physios? Yet we all have a lot to say about LFC. If you can only make a judgement if you’re an expert, I pity the human race.
When a submarine hull collapses, it moves inward at about 1,500mph (2,414km/h) - that’s 2,200ft (671m) per second, says Dave Corley, a former US nuclear submarine officer.
The time required for complete collapse is about one millisecond, or one thousandth of a second.
A human brain responds instinctually to a stimulus at about 25 milliseconds, Mr Corley says. Human rational response - from sensing to acting - is believed to be at best 150 milliseconds.
The air inside a sub has a fairly high concentration of hydrocarbon vapours.
When the hull collapses, the air auto-ignites and an explosion follows the initial rapid implosion, Mr Corley says.
Human bodies incinerate and are turned to ash and dust instantly.”
And massively got the calculation wrong, demonstrating pretty clearly that thinking you know what you’re talking about, even confidently thinking it, doesn’t make it true. The kid in that pic, one of those who died, knew nothing and according to reports from other members of his family was terrified of it felt pressured into going with his dad for fear of letting him down. He, a know nothing, was far closer to properly evaluating the real risk.
People have opinions about a wide range of things. People have informed, meaningful opinions about a much much smaller range of those things.
But that’s pretty much what he’s done. Let’s have a look at his record shall we?
Installs a window rated to 1300m. Nah it’s good for 4000m
Uses a material every other submarine manufacturer decides against. Now I’m not wholly against this but you can’t just dismiss everyone else as wrong
Builds a deep submersible to a shape that most others don’t… I know better attitude
Doesn’t hire SME’s because we can only presume they know what they’re doing.
Ignores concerns regarding fatigue on his hull design
Testing comprised of a dive. I think that’s it. At least he took this on himself.
Has no back up systems, don’t need them. Sub control is reliant on Bluetooth!!
Decides against normal check in procedures and decides on an auto system
No protocol in place in case of communication loss
No means of deep rescue. I don’t think there was even a lifting point you could hook onto with an RV.
No means of escape. You could be at the surface and still suffocate.
No beacon.
Paint it white so it’s invisible from the air.
I’ll guess but I bet the ballast release required the subs systems to be working. No manual over ride.
Now tell me what’s innovative about that. Material choice and sub shape at best, but clearly proven inadequate. Insufficient testing.
With regard to SpaceX my concern is more with regard to their processes and I’ll be honest I’m wondering how close they are to what we’ve seen here. But at least Musk had enough beans between his ears to have unmanned testing and a self destruct option.
Is the inside some sort of perforated acoustic/insulation panelling - maybe…!
It really does seem to resemble something you would build for the kids to play on in the garden… as you would a fort, or a tree-house, that type of mentality
