As the world learns the fate of the five Titan submersible crew members, the descendants of those who perished in the sinking of the R.M.S. Titanic have slammed tourist excursions to the final resting place of the doomed passenger liner as disrespectful.
“Plenty of people passed away down there [in 1912], and I don’t think should be dealt with as a tourist attraction,” T. Sean Maher, whose great-grandfather James Kelly died in the shipwreck, told The Daily Beast. While Maher says he had no issue with expeditions like the one Robert Ballard led in 1985 that located the Titanic wreckage, he is “not comfortable” with people going down to view the site like a tourist attraction.
“The Ballard expedition discovered where the Titanic was, and now we know. It is what it is. It’s down there. That’s where all those people lost their lives. That should be it. It should be left just as it is. We should let those people down there lie in peace,” Maher argued.
Families with relatives who died or survived the 1912 Titanic disaster say that the wreckage site is a “graveyard” that should be treated with respect—not as a tourist destination.https://t.co/qQvdSk4Xqt
— The Daily Beast (@thedailybeast) June 21, 2023
His sentiments were shared by 69-year-old John Locascio, whose two uncles were waiters on the Titanic and went down with the ship. “I think it’s disgusting, quite honestly,” Locascio said of the paid excursions to the shipwreck. “There’s no sense of it. You’re going down to see a grave. Would you want to dig up your uncles or aunts to see the box? That’s basically what I compare it to. There’s no reason for it.”
Brett Gladstone, the great-great grandson of two of Titanic’s most famous victims, Ida and Isidor Straus, argued that while he’s “not wild” about the idea of paid excursions to see the wreckage, if they are done they should be regulated and respectful. (RELATED: ‘Most Important And Well-Documented’ Piece Of Titanic Memorabilia Sells For $243,000)
“My great-great-grandfather’s body was found floating with a locket around his neck that the family still has, but my great-great-grandmother’s body was never found,” Gladstone told the outlet. “So, her body lays down there today—the site is a graveyard for my great-great-grandmother and so many others. I’m a little bit uncomfortable with people making money over diving down and spending what I understand to be a quarter of a million dollars to go down in these submersibles—because it is a graveyard and it should be treated as such.”
Even descendants of those who survived the 1912 disaster find the excursions in bad taste. Shelley Binder, whose great-grandmother Leah survived the sinking at 18 years old, revealed she was haunted the rest of her life by the tragedy. “My 92-year-old father remembers her sitting him down in 1960 to tell him she could never get away from the sound of people dying in the water. She remembered it all through her life. She could never reckon with that. It tortured her,” she told The Daily Beast.
Mark Petteruti grandmother, who survived the sinking at age 24, “never wanted to go on a ship again” after escaping in the last lifeboat to leave the ship. “She always had PTSD and she would wake up in the middle of the night screaming, thinking about all the people who died around her,” Petteruti stated, according to the outlet.
Of the excursions, Petteruti expressed disbelief that people would pay $250,000 to look at a graveyard. “It’s almost like Disneyland with all the people going down there to look,” he stated, adding that he understood the curiosity to a point, but didn’t think the risk was worth it.