Revisiting Regulations

Some time back, the Titan, a submersible took 5 people to the Titanic wreck 4,000 meters below sea level. As we know, everyone died. Rahul Matthan wrote a piece with an interesting angle to the tragic events.

 

He writes:

“The company steadfastly refused to submit its vessels for classification by third-party agencies like the American Bureau of Shipping.”

And passengers had to sign legal undertakings that they understood that the vessel was not certified by any regulatory body; and of course, things could go horribly wrong.

 

At this point, you’d be shaking your head and muttering about corporate greed and callousness. But wait, there is more. The article is about thinking from first principles. In this case, the first question is – What is the purpose of regulations? Usually, it is to ensure a minimum level of safety and quality.

 

The company had been claiming that they had far superior and different safety features, but the existing regulatory system did not recognize them. The technology had evolved, but the regulations were not getting updated – that had been the company’s argument from long before this tragedy.

 

For example, the regulations called for re-testing of the certified equipment every 3 years. This was too late, argued the company. We have sensors that monitor the equipment status on a continuous basis, they argued. Isn’t that better, they said, continuous checks rather than once in 3 year checks? Another new measure:

“Another new safety feature was a small vacuum created on the inside of its sub before each dive, so that passengers could verify the integrity of its low-pressure O-ring seal, thus radically lowering the risk of a leak underwater.”

 

To summarize the company’s arguments:

“Since none of these advanced features was part of traditional classification processes, OceanGate would have received no credit for having deployed them. This and other such examples seem to have been the primary reason why the company decided against submitting its vessels for the standard classification process.”

 

On the other hand, if they had followed regulations, they would have installed a transponder and emergency position-indicating radio beacon which would have made it easier to locate it once it had lost contact.

 

So yes, Matthan says, this isn’t black and white. Some features of the existing regulatory system were still relevant and useful (but omitted in this case), while other features were better in the product but not counted by the regulations.

 

Matthan is not saying that regulations are useless or unnecessary. Rather:

“If we base certification processes solely on what has worked in the past, we will never come up with modern safety techniques that incorporate all that latest technology makes possible. If we do not re-evaluate certification in the context of new innovations, we will be incapable of regulating technologies whose very operation exceeds the current technical assessing capabilities of certifying agencies.”

 

Striking that balance, updating periodically, keeping an eye for technological changes, remembering the purpose, not getting lost in whatever rules have been framed – that, as always, remains the challenge.