Also of interest via this blog is this statement from OceanGate about why their subs aren't classed.

innovation often falls outside of the existing industry paradigm.

Bringing an outside entity up to speed on every innovation before it is put into real-world testing is anathema to rapid innovation.

If I wanted to can and sell hubris, I know where to source it from now.

Some journalists did a story on this thing a while ago and it got lost for about 5 hours. During this time one of the reporters asked if it had some kind of beacon or transponder to locate it in situations like this. Their reply was something along the lines of “oh yeah that’s probably a good idea.” They never added it.

Man. That’s the control you give to your little brother because you don’t want him to get the good control all sticky.

I was about to defend this (the US military uses XBox controllers for subs & drones), but then I saw that it was off-brand. No excuse for that.

I saw a video of this submersible. The view was through a TV. Imagine going to the bottom of the damned ocean to look at the Titanic on a TV.

There's nothing wrong with using a game controller to steer the thing, I think the issue is more the lack of backup or failsafes.

Also, I'm very much a layperson in this field, but would it have not made sense to tether this thing to a ship on the surface? They could have kept in contact with the surface via the tether and had them reel the thing back in if there were problems with its propulsion or steering.

I saw the video of its interior. As someone who has claustrophobia, it's absolute nightmare fuel. It's a cylinder about 15 feet long and maybe 6 feet wide that you can't even stand up in. It's going to be very unpleasant for 5 people.

It seems like a really bad idea to use a wireless controller instead of a wired one. But I guess it shouldn't matter as long as they have a backup wired controller in case the wireless one dies.

For me the worst part is that there is a father and son aboard. And the son is only 19 years old. I can't imagine how horrible it would be to know that my own son is going to die because of my idea to go on such a risky expedition (even if it was the kid's idea the father should've nixed it).

https://au.lifestyle.yahoo.com/london-tycoon-shahzada-dawood-son-104752797.html

I keep seeing this headline and it's a bit misleading to imply that its not a functional way to control that type of vehicle, even the American military has been known to use them.

The purpose for the control method was to have something to have a go when it was safe, they had several on hand in the off chance something happened to it.

These controllers are a product of decades of functional advancements, them being intuitive to use doesn't mean that they are not efficient and functional.

Will the resulting scandal be known as OceanGategate?

Water and an X-Box controller. What could possibly go wrong?

I've used the F710 so that our family can couch co-op in the living room. For a Logitech controller it's pretty solidly built and is of the era where Logitech peripherals were of good quality (unlike now, rip new G503s). I noticed that the wireless range kinda sucked if it didn't have direct LOS to the receiver, but it has good rumble feedback and I like the smooth matte black underside material (feels good to the touch).

Holy shit. BBC has a short video that shows the interior of the sub and how it's controlled. It's a featureless tube with one button and the wireless controller. I wasn't expecting the submersible from Life Aquatic, but I wasn't expecting anything like what's shown in the video.

I think this is how you make a link? Like in wiki markup

here's plain text if that link doesn't work.
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-us-canada-65953941

UK billionaire Hamish Harding, who holds three Guinness World Records and was both in space and in the lowest depth of the Mariana Trench, is one of the people currently on board the Titan.

Yikes, that’ll be some big trouble for them

The next version will use a Mad Catz controller