Did They Know They Were About to Die?

Did the five passengers on the doomed Titan submersible know they were about to die at the bottom of the ocean after a failed expedition to the wreck of the Titanic?

More than a year since the June 2023 tragedy, questions around their final moments continue to make headlines.

In a lawsuit filed in early August, the family of explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet — also known as “Mr. Titanic” because of his extensive experience visiting the infamous ship in the Atlantic Ocean — claimed the passengers experienced “terror and mental anguish” and were aware they were in danger before the Titan imploded, according to the Associated Press, Sky News and Australia’s ABC News.

The $50 million lawsuit, filed against Titan operator OceanGate and others, alleges the submersible’s passengers were about 90 minutes into their dive to the Titanic‘s wreckage when they “dropped weights” in an apparent attempt to abort their dive and return to the surface to avert disaster.

“Experts agree that the Titan’s crew would have realized exactly what was happening,” the lawsuit states, per the reports.

However, the U.S. Coast Guard probe of what exactly happened has not yet concluded, officials said earlier this summer.

“The investigation into the implosion of the Titan submersible is a complex and ongoing effort,” the Coast Guard’s Jason Neubauer said in a statement in June. “We are working closely with our domestic and international partners to ensure a comprehensive understanding of the incident.” 

The Nargeolet family lawsuit claims members of the submersible’s crew “may well have heard the carbon fiber’s crackling noise grow more intense as the weight of the water pressed on Titan’s hull.”

Referring back to experts, the suit alleges the group “would have continued to descend, in full knowledge of the vessel’s irreversible failures, experiencing terror and mental anguish” before the implosion.

“Common sense dictates that the crew were well aware they were going to die, before dying,” the lawsuit claims.

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Titanic director James Cameron, who is no stranger to deep sea diving himself, has previously echoed some of the claims made in the new lawsuit, citing the view of other explorers like himself.

“We understand from inside the community that they had dropped their ascent weights and they were coming up, trying to manage an emergency,” he told ABC News.

Nargeolet himself spoke openly about the dangers of diving so deeply into the ocean but suggested that fear of the consequences didn’t faze him.

“If something bad happens, the result is the same. When you’re in very deep water, you’re dead before you realize that something is happening,” he said in 2019, “so it’s just not a problem.”

A deep water exploration expert tells PEOPLE that most specialists in this area likewise agree that the passengers would not have been able to consciously experience the unfolding calamity.

“Deep sea vehicles do make noises — there are crackles and pops, often from the ocean outside,” this outside expert says, “but an implosion like the one that happened to Titan is so sudden and violent — it takes around two milliseconds, and to register fear or stress takes 10 times that.”

“There would have been no time for fear or pain,” the source says, “They were instantly just … gone.”

OceanGate, which did not respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment on the lawsuit, has suspended “all exploration and commercial operations,” according to its now-defunct website.