The wife of one of the victims of the Titan submarine disaster said it was her husband, Pakistani businessman Shahzada Dawood’s “lifetime dream” to see the Titanic and that he was “like a kid” before he set out with her son on the doomed expedition.
Christine Dawood also paid tribute to her son, 19-year-old Suleman, a Strathclyde University student, who took his Rubik’s Cube with him on the trip in hopes of breaking the world record for solving the puzzle at greatest depth.
Christine and her daughter were aboard Titan’s mother ship, the Polar Prince, when word broke that they had lost communication with the submersible shortly after beginning the descent at 8 a.m. Sunday, June 18.
A major search and rescue mission was launched and lasted for days, and while her daughter clung to hope the whole time, Christine said she “lost hope once we passed the 96-hour mark.”
“That’s when I lost hope.” So I sent a message to my family on land: “I’m preparing for the worst.”
At the end of her interview with the BBC, the heartbroken mum tearfully said: ‘I miss her.’ I really, really miss her.’
Shahzada Dawood and his 19-year-old son Suleman perished on the Titan submersible
Christine Dawood paid tribute to her son and husband in an interview with the BBC
Five people died aboard the Titan submersible after it suffered a “catastrophic implosion” 1,600 feet off the Titanic’s bow
According to the US Coast Guard, UK-based billionaire Shahzada and his son Suleman were two of the five victims who died instantly when the submersible suffered a “catastrophic implosion” just 1,600 feet from Titanic’s bow.
Christine revealed that she had planned to visit the Titanic wreck in the OceanGate submarine with her husband but her trip was canceled due to the Covid pandemic.
“Then I took a step back and gave them space to settle in.” [Suleman] “Get up because he really wanted to go,” she said.
After contact with the ship was lost, Christine and her 17-year-old daughter Alina waited for news at the spot where Titan was last seen during the search and rescue mission.
“We had loads of hope, that was the only thing that kept us going because we had hope,” she said.
In addition to her husband and son, three other people died aboard Titan: Stockton Rush, CEO of OceanGate, 61, British businessman Hamish Harding, 58, and Paul-Henry Nargeolet, 77, a former French Navy diver and veteran Titanic diver.
Shahzada Dawood, 48, (pictured with his wife Christine) was a UK-based board member of the Prince’s Trust charity. She said his enthusiasm “brought out the best in her.”
Suleman Dawood, 19, was the youngest victim of the Titan submarine tragedy. He is pictured with his mother Christine
Billionaire adventurer Hamish Harding, who lost his life aboard the Titan, is pictured gazing out to sea before boarding the submersible
French naval veteran PH Nargeolet (left) and Stockton Rush (right), CEO of the OceanGate Expedition, also perished on Titan
Christine said those afloat were trying to stay hopeful, telling themselves, “There were so many things people on that sub could do to surface … they dropped the weights, then the approval would be slower, we were constantly on the.” Search.” on the surface. There was that hope.’
She and her daughter initially gave hope after initially not returning.
She said: “We all thought they were just going to show up so the shock was delayed by like ten hours or so.”
“When they were supposed to be back up, there was a time … when they were supposed to be back up on the surface and when that time was up, the real shock came, not the shock but the worry and the not so good.” Feelings started .’
Despite the bleak outlook as the hunt dragged on, she said her teenage daughter never lost hope of saving her father and older brother.
“My daughter didn’t lose hope until she called the Coast Guard and practically told us she had found debris.”
Alina’s mother said, “She’s such an incredible young woman, she’s so confident.”
“She believes in science, and she really believes, just like when you get on an airplane, that the science, the mechanics, the engineering is going to work.”
Christine, aged 96, said she tried “really hard” not to show her daughter that she had lost hope.
After it was announced on Thursday that debris from the submarine had been found, the family returned to St. John’s in Newfoundland, Canada, on Saturday.
On Sunday, they held a funeral prayer for Shahzada and Suleman, which Christine said had “helped.”
In a tribute to her son, she admitted that he was a “mama’s boy” but also “loved his father.”
When asked what the family’s last words were to each other, she told the BBC: “We just hugged and joked because Shahzada was so excited to go down, he was like a little kid.”
“He had this ability to generate excitement in childhood, they were both so excited.”
Christine and Shahzada met at university before she spoke English, she said.
She recalled that the history buff knew more about the history of her native Germany than she did and that he was obsessed with documentaries.
“He let us all watch David Attenborough and the kids loved it.”
“His enthusiasm brought out the best in me and that’s how I really learned to love the story.” “He was really able to inspire and motivate others with his knowledge.”
Her son, she said, is practical and intellectual, and wouldn’t go anywhere without his Rubik’s Cube — which he taught himself to solve in just 12 seconds.
“Suleman built a 10,000-piece Lego Titanic.” He was competing for a world record by trying to solve a Rubik’s Cube at the deepest point.
According to the US Coast Guard, OceanGate’s Titan submarine submerged about 400 miles southeast of St. John’s, Newfoundland as of 8 a.m. Sunday, June 18. It lost contact at 9.45am but was not reported to the Coast Guard until 5.40pm
Though his request was denied, they still planned to film the attempt, with Suleman saying, “I’m going to solve the Rubik’s Cube 12,000 feet under the sea on the Titanic.”
Ms. Dawood said she and her daughter swore to learn how to complete the Rubik’s Cube in Suleman’s honor and that she intended to continue her husband’s work.
She said: “He’s been involved in so many things, he’s helped so many people and I think Alina and I really want to carry on that legacy and give him that platform as his work goes on and that’s great for my daughter too important.”
“Alina and I said we’ll learn how to solve the Rubik’s Cube. It’s going to be a challenge for us because we’re really bad at it, but we’re going to learn.”