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https://www.engadget.com/2017-09-19-us-navy-high-tech-submarine-xbox-controller.html
Granted the evaluated this for periscope controls not steering but still. The leap isn't huge and if you got some backup options that's probably a pretty sensible path to take.
So is everyone else thinking they accidentally fucking plowed into the Titanic because a controller input got stuck?
Pretty unlikely. It's easy to dunk on them for the controller, but they apparently carried backups, and it's nowhere near the most concerning thing about their operations. It's much more likely that their extremely brittle carbon-fiber hull fatigued (again), their homegrown acoustic fatigue detection system didn't detect it (or it did and they ignored it), and the ship was crushed in a fraction of a second.
That or lost connection/battery.
The only wireless controller I ever owned would continue any repeating input active when connection dropped, if batteries or wifi died; they could just be cruising at max speed off in whatever direction they were facing, until the motor batteries run dry.
You'd like to think they'd carry backup interface, or even just use a wired controller, but this whole op sounds pretty McGuyver top to bottom.
What an absolute shit way to die: freeze to death from hypothermia due to the electric heaters running out of battery, crushed to death by water pressure compressing you inside a compartment, or drown to death in a dark unforgiving cold that strips you completely from all hope as it slowly rises and takes your precious air.
It’s barely a consolation but I read that during the Thresher submarine disaster the men would have been killed in 1/20th of a second, too fast for their nervous systems to process the implosion.