"We have a problem."
Those are the words former Titan pilot Scott Griffith said to crew members aboard the OceanGate submersible on a venture down to the wreckage of the Titanic.
In footage published in a BBC documentary in 2022, the vessel can be seen spinning out of control.
"There's something wrong with my thrusters. I'm thrusting and nothing is happening," he can be heard saying.
One of the thrusters had allegedly been mounted improperly, meaning that one was propelling the sub in one direction while the other was taking it the other way.
Titan ultimately started spinning in circles, and terrified crew members had to wait for hours while CEO Stockton Rush worked to address the issue from the mother ship.
"You know what I was thinking, we're not going to make it," passenger Reneta Rojas told the BBC. "We're literally 300m (600 feet) from the Titanic, and although we are already in the debris field, we can't go anywhere but go in circles."
Footage showed Rojas putting her head in her hands, her anxiety mounting.
The crew had to reprogram the video game controller that manages the vessel's movement.
"We were just so happy we had figured out how to move forward," Rojas said. "We started clapping inside the submersible and saying 'Yes we can go.'"
Rojas and the rest of the crew were ultimately able to see the wreckage during that dive.
Once they returned to the surface, Rush addressed them and dismissed their concerns about the thruster malfunction.
"Almost every deep-sea sub makes a noise at some point," he said.
Rush also admitted in a separate interview, published in the same documentary, that he had "broken some rules" while constructing the vessel.
"I'd like to be remembered as an innovator," he said. "I think it was General MacArthur who says you're remembered by the rules you break."
He asserted, however, that he had relied on "logic and good engineering" when determining exactly how he would be breaking the rules.
The sub historically imploded during a June 18 dive, killing the five crew members on board and launching a two-day international manhunt, which later turned into a recovery.
