Part 10/14:
The Culprit: Structural Weakness and Misjudged Safety Margins
The technical analyses strongly suggest that the hull's flaws—delaminations, wrinkles, weak glue bonds—were the superstructures for the eventual failure. These weaknesses likely developed over multiple prior dives, storage, or transportation mishandling. Notably:
Faulty Manufacturing and Quality Control: The composite hull layered construction, although robust in principle, suffered from manufacturing defects that compromised strength.
Inadequate Monitoring: The real-time hull condition monitoring system failed to reflect critical changes. Data suggests that when the hull started to delaminate or buckle, these early warning signals were either misinterpreted or ignored.