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OceanGate’s ill-fated Titan sub relied on a hand-typed Excel spreadsheet (www.theverge.com)
submitted 2 months ago by Korkki@lemmy.world to c/technology@lemmy.world
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[–] TommySoda@lemmy.world 167 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (4 children)

Jesus Christ that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard. The submarine in the game Iron Lung was safer to drive than this thing.

But Wilby said that for the Titan, the coordinate data was transcribed into a notebook by hand and then entered into Excel before loading the spreadsheet into mapping software to track the sub’s position on a hand-drawn map of the wreckage.

The OceanGate team tried to perform these updates at least every five minutes, but it was a slow, manual process done while communicating with the gamepad-controlled sub via short text messages.

Updates every FIVE MINUTES?! I wouldn't even trust this thing in a damn swimming pool.

[–] Korkki@lemmy.world 93 points 2 months ago (3 children)

I really do wonder why they ended up in this. It can' be that hard to make even a hacky DIY system to do it automatically. The navigation system just had to have some digital or even analog output, then it would be just the problem of interpreting the signal with some script and writing it into a file.

When Wilby recommended the company use standard software to process ping data and plot the sub’s telemetry automatically, the response was that the company wanted to develop an in-house system, but didn’t have enough time.

[–] superkret@feddit.org 102 points 2 months ago (3 children)

To write a script, you need someone who can write scripts.
If all you have is someone who can write VLOOKUPs in Excel, and the CEO is too cheap to hire someone, then that's what you use.

[–] rottingleaf@lemmy.world 76 points 2 months ago (1 children)

So basically it's a project done by MBA geniuses, entrepreneurs and visionaries who optimized by cutting on those mundane and boring nautical engineers and software developers?

God, do I like how evolution works.

[–] DogEatWaffle@startrek.website 31 points 2 months ago

someone who can write VLOOKUPs

I think you're overestimating the competence on display here...

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[–] 0x0@programming.dev 40 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I really do wonder why they ended up in this. It can’ be that hard to make even a hacky DIY system to do it automatically.

All-manager team, no devs?

[–] elvith@feddit.org 16 points 2 months ago (1 children)

That’s why they use, what they know: Excel. I wonder if the UI was done in PowerPoint?

[–] 0x0@programming.dev 14 points 2 months ago

Nah, FrontPage.

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[–] T156@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

I like how the company didn't consider using standard software to do it, and then switch to the in-house system that they made later, instead of just having it done by hand instead.

[–] Madrigal@lemmy.world 29 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There are better ways to do that even in Excel!

[–] doctortran@lemm.ee 13 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Right? I work with plenty of users in non-technical roles who have at best rudimentary Excel skills, and even they could figure out a better way to manage this. The whole thing with Excel is to make basic data work accessible even to a rube, and let them do an incredible amount of things otherwise outside their skillet.

Using Excel like this is like giving someone a microwave and they only use it as a kitchen timer.

[–] leftzero@lemmynsfw.com 11 points 2 months ago (1 children)

What's worse is that half the coordinates probably ended up as dates...

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[–] CluckN@lemmy.world 132 points 2 months ago (5 children)

According to Ross, six days before the Titan submarine imploded, the sub’s pilot and the company’s cofounder, Stockton Rush, crashed the vessel into a launch mechanism bulkhead while the vessel was attempting to resurface from dive 87. […] but Ross said he did not know if an inspection of the sub was carried out afterward.

How does every new detail about the excursion keep getting worse? Next week I’m going to learn they used Saran wrap for the windows.

[–] Wispy2891@lemmy.world 22 points 2 months ago

The sub was totaled. Like you need to change a helmet after a crash even it it looks fine

[–] captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 19 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

It is my understanding that Rush also hard-bottomed the sub (crashed into the sea floor) while diving to the Andrea Doria. And was a little piss baby about it the entire time.

That's apparently a shorter version of the video I'd seen previously; eventually Rush does hand over the controls, by throwing the playstation controller at the guy's head.

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[–] xavier666@lemm.ee 108 points 2 months ago (5 children)

It's a good thing that no serious company uses excel spreadsheets to manage their data, right? Right?

[–] CosmicTurtle0@lemmy.dbzer0.com 85 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Of course not! We employees of Fortune 500 companies use Google Sheets to manage critical data.

It's in the cloud, that's how you know it's good.

(I'm not even joking....our VP said this)

[–] doctortran@lemm.ee 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

Excel effectively forces cloud usage now if you want to use autosave. And frankly, Microsoft is doing everything it can to shift users to cloud based Office apps.

They really, really want users and business owners to think of the local data storage and desktop computing as secondary to OneDrive and Webapps. I swear at some point in the future the consumer version of Windows will be little more than the Edge browser in a wig.

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[–] msage@programming.dev 14 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I just wish the whole 'cloud' thing would die in a ditch specifically for people like that.

No, most use-cases don't need to be in a cloud.

You are 99.9% paying more for that setup than having people who understand servers.

And if you need the cloud, then hooray for you, but it should not need to be subsidized by thousands of small customers who jumped on the wrong train.

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[–] _bcron@midwest.social 37 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Be me, postal worker. One of our machines uses a csv file to attach zip codes to bins. See fresh engineer decide to change one zip code in notepad really quick. See file's formatting get wrecked. Spend next 6 hours watching all the mail spit out of the very last bin every time they think they finally fix it as if machine has irritable bowel syndrome. Engineer earns nickname 'boy wonder' first week on job

[–] curry@programming.dev 20 points 2 months ago

This is why I always save contents as a new file instead of overwriting the original one when I'm using a machine that isn't mine. I've been burned so many times by flimsy newline characters, proper unicode support, legacy encoding and many other stuff you assume it should be already in place.

[–] marlowe221@lemmy.world 20 points 2 months ago

There are teams where I work that are basically using Excel as a database and SharePoint as S3 in automated processes… But at least no one is going to DIE when those things fall over!

[–] todd_bonzalez@lemm.ee 17 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Look, if Excel is the last mile and everyone is properly plugged into a corporate database to pull numbers, then great.

But way too many companies manage everything from a network share full of xlsx files...

[–] Squizzy@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago

Not us, ours are google sheets

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[–] MoondropLight@thelemmy.club 53 points 2 months ago (4 children)

I will never get over how much media attention this gets.

[–] frigidaphelion@lemmy.world 34 points 2 months ago

It's like an oasis in the desert right now. Everyone can look at this crazy spectacle and ignore all the polarized and heart-wrenching crazy bs that the rest of the news is full of.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 26 points 2 months ago (4 children)

Watching some of the hearing, they should be paying attention to how underfunded OSHA is. The agent assigned to one of the whistleblowers had several jobs in front of that case and never got to it before it was dropped. The company was also run on a cult of personality and anyone with any sense either left on their own or were driven out.

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[–] AbsoluteChicagoDog@lemm.ee 47 points 2 months ago (1 children)

So do 90% of corporations.

[–] frezik@midwest.social 12 points 2 months ago

90% of corporations aren't transcribing positioning data by hand every five minutes to figure out the sub's position.

[–] frezik@midwest.social 39 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

I have a little pet theory I've been stewing about when it comes to penny wise/pound foolish decisions from business owners of all types. From landlords, to local cafes, and all the way up to Fortune 500 CEOs. It comes down to bad accounting.

I've taken to setting aside money into buckets. There's a bucket that handles some filter replacements for our home furnace (it's a 5 inch thick HEPA filter, so it's bit pricey) and under sink RO system, for example. When it comes time to buy one, I just pull from that bucket. It doesn't feel like I'm losing anything off my usual budget for the month. The money is just there, and it feels nice to be able to pay without worry. It almost feels like a reward for good planning.

Companies do this, as well. In fact, I helped setup a similar system at my local community makerspace (which runs as a 501(c)3). We pay into buckets for things like insurance every month, and then we pay it when the bill comes due each year. Again, it doesn't feel like we're stressed for anything.

Not all companies do this, or if they do, they don't do it for everything. If you're not setting aside a little bucket for something that you know will come up, then it has to be paid out of your general funds. That's money you wanted to use for something more fun than furnace filters or insurance or a software package that can process navigation data automatically.

So when you see billionaires or landlords complain about something important being too expensive, it might be because they aren't tracking their accounting buckets properly. If this keeps happening, that's a good indication that they are anything but a glorious Captain of Industry.

[–] telllos@lemmy.world 18 points 2 months ago (1 children)

My son is kinda struggling with his allowance money. I might not be the greatest example or at least, a good financial teati him.

But the other day, my friend told me their kids received a special wallet with envelopes inside. Exactly the kind of buket system you describe.

So I'm going to buy this for both my kids, I think it's going to be helpful for them.

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[–] TonyOstrich@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

I would add to this that almost all the companies I have worked for (from local businesses to multi national corps) constantly "save" money by hiding it in labor costs. There is some line item or other thing that is clearly definable on a budget and so they will outsource it in some capacity and then pat themselves on the back for the cost savings. However, what ends up happening is the resulting product that comes in is dog shit and it forces the people on the ground to fix it or otherwise make it work.

Most regular people just want to do their job and not rock the boat, so rather than make this new issue a pain point for management, they just deal with it. Over time those types of things start to add up and burn people out, but the higher ups are never directly effected and so I think they get a weird sense of anything they say ultimately "just working out".

[–] CompostMaterial@lemmy.world 28 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Good thing the world didn't lose anything valuable.

[–] ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml 29 points 2 months ago (3 children)

Hey, that was an ok controller they used to navigate

[–] Blackmist@feddit.uk 10 points 2 months ago

That was a Player 2 controller if ever I saw one.

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[–] BelatedPeacock@lemmy.world 28 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Man, a hand typed spreadsheet must have been hard to navigate with the PlayStation controller.

[–] ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml 12 points 2 months ago

What an incredible sentence.

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[–] Corno@lemm.ee 25 points 2 months ago (1 children)

There were so many things relating to this incident that bewildered me. The titanium end caps were stuck on using glue, by hand. Also, while carbon fiber is great at handling tensile loads at 14 PSI, it's not so great at handling compressive ones at 5500 PSI. For such a delicate mission, the whole thing seemed unprofessional in so many ways.

[–] PyroVK@lemmy.zip 24 points 2 months ago (2 children)

Supposedly the glued on titanium is the same thing the US Army does for their small Submarines, though I'm sure they found some way to cheap out/fuck up.

[–] Corno@lemm.ee 21 points 2 months ago (4 children)
[–] captain_aggravated@sh.itjust.works 10 points 2 months ago

I know of at least a couple maintenance shops that will give their expired composite materials to a mechanic school for students to use in class projects. This usage is actually a good idea, completely unlike using it to build a manned submersible.

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[–] Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee 25 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Everything I hear about this contraption is worse than I expected.

[–] sugartits@lemmy.world 18 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Come on now, Excel isn't that bad.

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[–] tias@discuss.tchncs.de 24 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I don't know how these guys didn't get a Darwin award yet

[–] Buffalox@lemmy.world 55 points 2 months ago

A Darwin award isn't given, it is earned. And they earned it when they died.

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[–] peopleproblems@lemmy.world 17 points 2 months ago

The more you hear about this sub the worse it gets.

I'm not surprised, of course, given the shortcuts Rush was determined to take.

Also it's the first time I saw the picture in that article of the other crushed remains. I'm pretty impressed they could get pictures that deep.

[–] pastermil@sh.itjust.works 13 points 2 months ago

Of course it did!

[–] NABDad@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

I'm ready to weep from this.

Every time any problem comes up, my current manager insists we must use Excel to solve it.

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