Stockton Rush Wikipedia

Stockton Rush was an American pilot, aerospace engineer and businessman who died in the ill-fated underwater Oceangate Expeditions trip to the Titanic.

Rush was one of five people aboard the submersible vehicle ‘Titan’ for its trip to the bottom of the North Atlantic Ocean for a peek at the remains of the Titanic.

The submersible had been missing since Sunday, June 18th – and it ran out of oxygen earlier today, leaving all five passengers in jeopardy.

UPDATE!!! – Five Titan Submersible Passengers Confirmed Dead After ‘Catastrophic Implosion’

Later Thursday, June 22nd 2023, the U.S Coast Guard confirmed that the Titan sub had lost all five passengers aboard in a ‘catastrophic implosion’.

This article presents a comprehensive look at Stockton Rush Wikipedia, career, wife, kids, Oceangate, Isidor and Ida Straus and much more.

Stockton Rush was an American pilot, engineer and businessman who gained public notoriety following the disappearance of a submersible vehicle during a trip to the Titanic.

Rush died at the age of 61 after debris from the previously thought missing sub was found scattered on the ocean floor.

OceanGate Expeditions, the company Stockton Rush founded, offers the trip down to the wreckage of the Titanic at $250,000 a seat.

Richard Stockton Rush III was born in 1962 to Richard Rush Jr. of Westminster, Vermont and Ellen Davies Rush of San Francisco, California.

Rush proved to be a prodigy from an early age when he became the world’s youngest jet transport-rated pilot in 1981.

At just the age of 19, he obtained his DC-8 Type/Captain’s rating at the United Airlines Jet Training Institute. He served as a DC-8 first officer during college summers, flying out of Jeddah, Saudi Arabia for Overseas National Airways under a subcontract from Saudi Arabian Airlines.

The daredevil Stockton Rush graduated from Princeton University in 1984 with a BSE in Aerospace, Aeronautical and Astronautical Engineering. He would go on to the University of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business for his Master of Business Administration (MBA) from 1987 to 1999.

In 1986, Stockton Rush married his wife Wendy Weil Rush, an American pilot and substitute teacher, who he met during their time together at Princeton. The couple have two kids.

Stockton Rush’s wife Wendy is descended from Isidor and Ida Straus, an elderly wealthy couple who died on the Titanic. Stockton himself is descended from two signers of the Declaration of Independence.

In 1984, Rush joined the McDonnell Douglas Corporation as a Flight Test Engineer on the F-15 program. During this time there, he spent two years at Edwards Air Force Base on the APG-63 radar test program and then on the Anti-Satellite Missile Program as the sole full-time representative of McDonnell Douglas.

Fast forward to the present, Stockton Rush founded Oceangate Inc in 2009 after trying, and failing, to buy explorer and businessman Steve Fossett’s submersible, after the adventurer died in a 2007 plane crash. Rush serves as Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Oceangate.

OceanGate is a privately held U.S. company operating out of Everett, Washington, that provides crewed submersibles for industry, research and exploration. In 2021, OceanGate began taking paying customers to visit the Titanic shipwreck in its Titan submersible at a cost of $250,000 per seat.

On 18 June 2023, contact with the Titan was lost during a mission to view the Titanic shipwreck with Stockton Rush among five people onboard.

The sub disappeared on Sunday, June 18, 2023, while diving to reach the Titanic shipwreck, and the U.S. Coast Guard and others have launched a search to find it before the vessel runs out of oxygen in the ocean deep

On Thursday, June 22nd 2023 around 11 am UTC, the Titan officially run out of oxygen.

Alongside Stockton Rush, others onboard include British businessman of Pakistani origin Shahzada Dawood, his 19-year-old son Sulemana Dawood, British billionaire Hamish Harding, and former French Navy diver Paul-Henry Nargeolet.

Stockton Rush and fellow his fellow passengers were pronounced dead Thursday, June 22nd 2023.

Rear Admiral John Mauger, the commander of the U.S. Coast Guard leading the search, announced on Thursday at a news conference in Boston that an ROV — or a remote operated vehicle — found “five major pieces of debris” that is consistent with the “catastrophic loss of the pressure chamber.” He added that the vessel was found 1,600 feet from the bow of the Titanic. The nose cone was among the five major pieces of debris found.

Mauger said that, upon this determination, the Coast Guard immediately notified the families, and he offered his “deepest condolences.”

“I can only imagine what this has been like for them,” he added. “And I hope that this discovery provides some solace during this difficult time.”

OceanGate Expeditions said in a statement that “we now believe that our CEO Stockton Rush, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood, Hamish Harding, and Paul-Henri Nargeolet, have sadly been lost.”

“This is an extremely sad time for our dedicated employees who are exhausted and grieving deeply over this loss. The entire OceanGate family is deeply grateful for the countless men and women from multiple organizations of the international community who expedited wide-ranging resources and have worked so very hard on this mission,” the statement continued.

“We appreciate their commitment to finding these five explorers, and their days and nights of tireless work in support of our crew and their families. This is a very sad time for the entire explorer community, and for each of the family members of those lost at sea. We respectfully ask that the privacy of these families be respected during this most painful time.”

Aside from Oceangate Inc – where he oversees financial and engineering strategies and provides a clear vision for the development of 4,000 meter (13,123 feet) and 6,000 meter (19,685 feet) capable crewed submersibles and their partner launch and recovery platforms – Stockton Rush is a co-founder and member of the Board of Trustees of OceanGate Foundation (2012).

The OceanGate Foundation is a non-profit organization which aims to catalyze emerging marine technology to further discoveries in marine science, history, and archaeology. His wife, Wendy, also sits on the board.

In 1989, Rush personally built a Glasair III experimental aircraft, which he still owns and flies. He completed a heavily modified Kittredge K-350 two-man submersible, in which he has conducted over 30 dives to date.

Stockton Rush has written numerous engineering articles on crewed submersible vehicles in subsea operations for a variety of trade publications and has spoken on private-public investment opportunities in the new ocean economy.

Wife

Wendy Weil Rush is an American pilot and substitute teacher, the wife of Oceangate Expeditions Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Stockton Rush.

Wendy Rush was born to Dr. and Mrs. Richard Weil of Denver. Her father, Dr Weil was a professor of surgery and director of transplantation at the University of Colorado Medical School whilst her mother, Polly Weil, was a partner in the Denver interior design firm of Reynolds & Weil.

Stockton Rush wife is a descendant of Isidor and Ida Straus, a wealthy elderly couple who died on the original Titanic.

She had her education at the Hotchkiss School, a coeducational preparatory school in Lakeville, Connecticut, United States, where she graduated in 1980.

Stockton Rush wife would move on to Princeton University, where she would graduate in 1984.

The Oceangate Expeditions CEO Stockton Rush married his wife Wendy in 1986 in a high society wedding. The pair met during their time togeter at Princeton University from 1980 to 1984.

A 1986 wedding announcement from the New York Times read: “Wendy Hollings Weil, the daughter of Dr. and Mrs. Richard Weil 3d of Denver, was married yesterday to Richard Stockton Rush 3d, a son of Ellen Davies Rush of San Francisco and Mr. Rush Jr. of Westminster, Vt.

“The Rev. George B. Edgar, the bride’s great-uncle, performed the Presbyterian ceremony at the Vail (Colo.) Chapel. Jean Hellen Weinberg was the maid of honor. John Christian Stauffer was the best man.”

Stockton Rush and wife, Wendy, have two kids, according to a post on Wendy Rush’s Facebook page.

Stockton Rush wife, Wendy has held many jobs throughout her life. At the time of her marriage, Wendy Rush was a licensed pilot and a substitute teacher in the Lancaster (Calif.) school system. She also worked as an account manager with Ladd Associates in San Francisco, a consultant to magazine publishers.

Currently, she serves as the Communications Director for Oceangate Expeditions, according to her LinkedIn page. It’s a position she’s held since January 2022 till date.

Isidor and Ida Straus

Isidor and Ida Straus were a wealthy elderly couple who died when the Titanic sunk back in 1912.

Amazingly, records show they are ancestors of Stockton Rush wife, Wendy.

The wife of the missing OceanGate CEO Stockton Rush is a descendant of two famous Titanic victims, The New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing archival records.

Wendy Rush is a great-great-granddaughter of Isidor and Ida Straus, a wealthy elderly couple who died when the ocean liner sank in 1912. Isidor was the co-owner of the department store Macy’s.

Joan Adler, the executive director of the Straus Historical Society, told the Times that Wendy was related to one of the Straus’ daughters on her father’s side.

A great-grandson of Isidor and Ida Straus, Paul A. Kurzman told the Today Show in 2017 that Isidor and Ida Straus were first-class passengers on the Titanic who chose to die together when the ship started sinking after hitting an iceberg.

As shown in James Cameron’s Titanic, women and children were given priority to board the lifeboats. However, Kurzman said that a ship’s officer made an exception for Isidor because of his age and who he was.

“And, my great-grandfather said, ‘No. Until I see that every woman and child on board this ship is in a lifeboat, I will not enter into a lifeboat myself,’” Kurzman told the Today Show.

In a remarkable show of support, Ida Straus chose to stay behind with her husband Isidor rather than leave.

Ellen Bird, a maid of the wealthy couple Isidor and Ida Straus, reportedly witnessed the couple’s last moments, according to Kurzman.

“Isidor wrapped his arms around her,” Kurzman told Country Living Magazine. “Then, a great wave came over the port side of the ship and swept them both into the sea. That was the last time they were seen alive.”

The tragic story of Isidor and Ida Straus inspired an iconic, heartbreaking scene in James Cameron’s “Titanic” of an elderly man and woman embracing each other in bed as their room begins to flood.

Over a century later, in an apparent amazing twist of fate, Isidor and Ida Straus’ descendant, Wendy, the wife of Stockton Rush, is embroiled in yet another Titanic tragedy!

Stockton Rush White Guys

Stockton Rush has faced tons of criticism over his daredevil and take no prisoners attitude to underwater exploration. The media has churned out a series of articles following the disappearance of the Titanic submersible about him being warned over potential safety issues but discarding them.

“At some point, safety just is pure waste,” Stockton Rush told journalist David Pogue in an interview last year, according to CNN.

“I mean, if you just want to be safe, don’t get out of bed. Don’t get in your car. Don’t do anything.”

In another interview, Stockton Rush boasted that he’d “broken some rules” in his career.

“I think it was General MacArthur who said you’re remembered for the rules you break,” Rush said in a video interview with Mexican YouTuber Alan Estrada last year. “And I’ve broken some rules to make this. I think I’ve broken them with logic and good engineering behind me.”

Stockton Rush was also quoted in a now infamous interview explaining why how he didn’t hire 50-year-old white guys with military experience to captain his vessels because they weren’t “inspirational.”

Stockton Rush, 61, added that such expertise was unnecessary because “anybody can drive the sub” with a $30 video game controller.

“When I started the business, one of the things you’ll find, there are other sub-operators out there, but they typically have, uh, gentlemen who are ex-military submariners, and they — you’ll see a whole bunch of 50-year-old white guys,” Rush told Teledyne Marine in a newly resurfaced undated Zoom interview.

“I wanted our team to be younger, to be inspirational and I’m not going to inspire a 16-year-old to go pursue marine technology, but a 25-year-old, uh, you know, who’s a sub pilot or a platform operator or one of our techs can be inspirational,” he continued.

He added: We’re taking approaches that are used largely in the aerospace industry, is related to safety and some of the preponderance of checklists, uh, things we do for risk assessments and things like that, that are more aviation-related than, uh, ocean-related and we can train people to do that,”

“We can train someone to pilot the sub, we use a game controller, um, so anybody can drive the sub.”

Stockton Rush’s Oceangate Expeditions has made two previous trips to the 1912 wreckage of the “unsinkable” ship, Titanic, which is 12,500 feet underwater at the bottom of the Atlantic some 370 miles off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada.

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