According to family members, 19-year-old Suleman Dawood, who was aboard the Titan submersible that is believed to have imploded while visiting the wreckage of the Titanic last week, had doubts about going on the trip.
Suleman Dawood’s aunt, Azmeh Dawood, shared with NBC News that her nephew was “terrified” of the trip and felt hesitant about going but put his caution aside as he wanted to please his father, Shahzada Dawood, for Father’s Day.
Both father and son are believed to have died inside the submersible, as the U.S. Coast Guard shared last week that it had found proof the vessel imploded 1,600 feet from the deck of the Titanic.
Dawood spoke on Chris Cuomo’s show “CUOMO” last week, explaining that her nephew was a normal kid with fears like anyone his age.
“My nephew was a normal human being. A normal human being at 19, who had to go down that kind of tunnel and get into that kind of environment, would obviously be scared,” Dawood said. “He was scared, as any 19-year-old would be.”
The Dawoods are one of the most powerful families in Pakistan, as they own the chemical and agricultural firm, Dawood Hercules Corp.
The father and son had paid $250,000 each to go on the OceanGate Expeditions trip along with three other passengers, British billionaire Hamish Harding, Titanic expert Paul-Henri Nargeolet, and OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush.
Dawood shared with NBC News that her brother was obsessed with the Titanic and had been since he was a child. When he heard about OceanGate’s submersible and trips to its wreckage, it was hard to resist.
However, the Titan submersible was an experimental vessel that some have said was not up to the standards put in place by the American Bureau of Shipping. However, because they operated in international waters, there was no requirement to be up to code.
Sal Mercogliano, a professor of maritime history at Campbell University in North Carolina, spoke with KNX In Depth’s Charles Feldman and Rob Archer about the vessel, alleging that Rush knowingly dodged safety standards.
“In this case, OceanGate decided not to [follow standards], and the CEO basically came out and said, ‘These classification agencies are redundant. They slow us down. There’s too much red tape. We are on the cutting edge, and we are going to be better than they are,’” Mercogliano said.
While the Titan failed to make a safe return this time, the ship had been successful in previous voyages to the depths of the ocean. But, former passengers have said there were some issues on previous trips.
Dawood said that the company and its marketing of the Titan submersible are what played the biggest factor in her brother and nephew’s deaths, alleging that the risk was not stated properly.
“You can’t blame people for trusting what other people say to them,” she said. “What we can do is blame the fact that the problems were not highlighted.”
Dawood shared with NBC News the gratitude she has for all of those who came forward to help in the search for her family, despite the results.
“My brother Shahzada and his son Suleman are actually heroes. They went down there for an adventure of a lifetime, for knowledge, for bonding, to have something special in their lives,” she said. “My brother and his son are heroes, and that’s how I think they should be remembered.”
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