Teen on doomed Titanic sub couldn't wait for chance to set Rubik's Cube record during trip, his mother says
London — The father and son who were among the five people who died on the OceanGate Titan submersible as it dived to tour the Titanic wreckage couldn't wait for the excursion — and the teen had his eye on setting a world record, according to the wife and mother of the victims. Christine Dawood told CBS News' partner network BBC News that she was originally meant to be on the small submersible with her husband, Shahzada, but gave the spot to her 19-year-old son Suleman after seeing how excited he was about the prospect of seeing the Titanic.
"I was really happy for them because, both of them, they were really, really wanted to do that for a very long time," she said.
According to Dawood, Suleman brought his Rubik's Cube on the submersible and planned to set the Guinness World Record for the deepest-ever completion of the puzzle once they reached the famous shipwreck. He could solve the three-dimensional puzzle in 12 seconds, she told BBC, and took it with him everywhere.
Dawood described her husband's excitement ahead of the dive as almost childlike, calling it a lifelong dream of his to see the wreckage of the Titanic two-and-a-half miles below the surface of the North Atlantic.
"His enthusiasm brought the best out of me," she said.
The grieving wife and mother said her husband and son were both passionate about learning history and science, and that the family would watch documentaries together every night.
Christine Dawood said she was with her 17-year-old daughter, below deck on the Titan's support ship, the Polar Prince, when she first found out that contact had been lost with the submersible on June 18.
"I was sitting with people talking, and then somebody came down and said we lost comms," she told the BBC. "I think I didn't comprehend at that moment what that meant."
After they lost communication, Dawood said she remained hopeful that her husband and son would be rescued until the 96th hour of the search, when officials had said the oxygen supply on the sub would likely have run out.
After that, she said she had "tried really hard not to show" her daughter that she'd lost hope, as they both wished for a call from the U.S. Coast Guard, which was leading the search effort.
Asked how she would cope with the loss of her husband and son, Dawood responded: "Is there such a thing? I don't know."
She said she and her daughter Alina would continue working on projects that Shahzada had been involved in and was passionate about.
Dawood said in honor of her son, she and Alina would rewatch all the movies he loved and learn to solve the Rubik's Cube, even though they're both "really bad at it."