In the days before the Titan vessel entered the ocean off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada, a 19-year-old university student accompanying his father on the expedition expressed hesitation about going, his aunt said in an interview Thursday.
Azmeh Dawood - the older sister of Pakistani businessman Shahzad Dawood - told NBC News that her nephew Suleman informed a relative that he was "not up to it" and felt "terrified" about the trip to explore the Titanic wreckage. .
But the 19-year-old ended up going aboard the 22-foot OceanGate submersible because the trip fell on Father's Day weekend and, according to Azmeh, he was eager to please his father, who was passionate about the Titanic tradition.
"I think of Suleman, who's 19 years old, just maybe gasping for breath... It's been crippling, to be honest," Azmeh said in a phone interview from the Amsterdam home she shares with her husband, Jonathan.
She was devastated on Thursday when OceanGate, the company behind the Titan expedition, confirmed that all five passengers on board were presumed dead. The US Coast Guard said debris in the search area was consistent with a "catastrophic implosion".
"I feel disbelief," Azmeh said through sobs. “It's a surreal situation.
The last four days were agonizing for Azmeh. She was glued to the TV coverage of the Titan hunt, desperate for updates on her brother and nephew—and fearing the worst.
"I feel like I was caught in a really bad countdown movie, but you didn't know what you were counting down to," she said. “Personally, thinking about them gives me a little trouble breathing.
"He was my little brother," she said tearfully and seemingly overcome with emotion. “I raised him when he was born.
In a statement, the parents of Azmeh and Shahzada asked people to "keep the departed souls and our family in your prayers" and thanked the search teams for their "tireless efforts".
"The outpouring of love and support we have received continues to help us bear this unimaginable loss," said Hussain and Kulsum Dawood.
Azmeh recalled that Shahzada was "absolutely obsessed" with Titanic from a young age. When they were children in Pakistan, the Dawood siblings constantly watched the 1958 film "A Night to Remember," a British drama about the sinking of a cruise ship.
She said that when Shahzada met her husband, he asked if they could sit down and watch a four-hour documentary about the Titanic. Shahzada also enjoyed going to museum exhibitions with artifacts recovered from the wreckage.
She wasn't surprised to learn that her brother had bought tickets to the OceanGate mission. It wasn't something she would ever do, she explained: "If you gave me a million dollars," she said, "I wouldn't get into Titan."
Marine scientists have described an implosion as the worst possible outcome of all scenarios envisaged during the desperate, ongoing search for the lost vessel.
Experts have warned that under extreme pressure at extreme depths, the Titan's hull could implode, resulting in the instant death of everyone on board.
Azmeh spent part of Thursday afternoon looking through old family photos, trying to make sense of the tragedy that befell her brother and nephew — and dealing with the emotional ripple effect around the world.
I feel very bad that the whole world had to go through so much trauma, so much tension,” she said.
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