Several complaints about the Titan submersible and OceanGate were levied years before the deadly June 2023 implosion.

On Tuesday, a former employee and whistleblower, David Lochridge, testified under oath about those concerns at the U.S. Coast Guard’s hearings in North Charleston on the tragedy that killed five people.

Lochridge, a former operations director at the company, said he started noticing red flags in 2016. It was around the time he started with the company.

He raised those concerns for years and no one listened, he claimed. Lochridge was eventually fired from OceanGate and that is when he went to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration to file a formal complaint.

“Everything I raised in that report, they had an excuse,” Lochridge said. “It was a disgrace.”

Lochridge said he told OceanGate founder Stockton Rush for years the Titan submersible would not be a safe machine.

“We all voiced concerns about the engineering of Titan,” Lochridge said.

Longridge then wrote a report for Rush and the board of directors outlining everything he felt needed to be remedied.

“I did this so all my voiced concerns were put down on paper,” he said. “I wanted them to see there were a lot of things that could impact the integrity of this hull.”

Instead of listening to him, Lochridge said the company fired him in 2018. Within a month of his dismissal, he went to OSHA.

OceanGate filed a lawsuit against Lochridge and his wife. In the suit, OceanGate alleged breach of contract, including violating terms of contractual employment and discussing confidential information. Lochridge said the company wanted him to drop his OSHA complaint.

“They stated if I don’t [drop the complaint], they will contact previous employers, immigration, previous spouses, fraud, theft, everything is in this,” he said. “This was a settlement agreement to get me and my wife to back off.”

Lochridge and his attorneys countersued OceanGate in federal court in August 2018. On Tuesday, he read emails from OSHA showing how, for nearly a year, his claim was not investigated. OSHA cited the need to take care of “older cases” first.

“Not once during all of this did they pay a visit, go down, talk to them, nothing,” Lochridge said.

In late 2018, Lochridge decided to drop the complaint against OceanGate. He said it was “too hard” and “too much” for his family.

He never paid OceanGate any money and they never paid him either, Lochridge said. However, he understood there was always a risk of tragedy at the company.

“It was investigable that something was going to happen,” Lochridge said, “it was just a matter of when.”

Hearings resume Thursday with testimony from the former OceanGate mission specialist and scientific director.