Final Report Released on OceanGate Titan Disaster — Were Human Remains Ever Found?

In 2023, the world was shaken when a submersible carrying five men appeared to vanish into thin air while making a deep dive down to the wreckage of the Titanic.

While a search and rescue team was deployed, it became clear that something had gone horribly wrong, and eventually, the wreckage of the Titan Submersible was found, which included human remains.

Two years later, an in-depth investigation into what went wrong was completed, and in August 2025, some of the findings were shared by investigators, giving more insight into what went wrong and who was to blame for the death of all five of the people on board.

You can learn more about the Titan Submersible and the end of the investigation into the implosion below.

While the Coast Guard was unable to recover any of the men aboard the Titan — OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush, Hamish Harding, Paul-Henri Nargeolet, Shahzada Dawood, and his 19-year-old son Suleman — they were able to recover some of the items belonging to the men.

According to the Discovery Channel, the details of what they found included a sludge-like material containing carbon fibers from the ship, electronic parts, and fiberglass.

The Coast Guard was tasked with sifting through the sludge to separate the personal belongings and ship parts from what they believed to be human remains. This included some pieces of Rush's clothing and some of his business cards that may have been in his pocket.

All of this was mixed together with sand and in the remaining pieces of the ship that was recovered from the ocean floor.

According to Good Morning America, the Coast Guard released a 335-page report on Aug. 5, 2025. The report was nearly a year in the making and followed a two-week hearing during which the sea-faring organization heard testimony and read reports related to the Titian's implosion.

The report includes details about all of Rush's warnings about the submersible's safety, including complaints filed on behalf of concerned employees who claimed they were then threatened with discipline, including termination and lawsuits.

The Coast Guard determined that this led to an inflated sense of security surrounding the submersible, which included falsified records and exaggerated data about test missions.

In the end, the agency decided that it was Rush's actions and deceit that ultimately led to the preventable tragedy. Had he survived the incident, the Coast Guard says they would've recommended that he be charged with manslaughter as a result of his role.

Titan MBI chair Jason Neubauer released a statement after the release of the report, calling the accident "preventable" and saying that there was something to be learned from what happened.

"The two-year investigation has identified multiple contributing factors that led to this tragedy, providing valuable lessons learned to prevent a future occurrence," he said in a statement that called for more oversight into innovations like these.

While we can only imagine that the end of the investigation will offer a bit of closure to those left behind, it may serve as a launch pad for further legal troubles for OceanGate, since lawsuits have already been launched as a result of the deaths that occurred during that fateful dive.