Titan began its voyage to the Titanic shipwreck in the ocean’s depths on June 18, which is Father’s Day in the UK, US, and Canada. Suleman Dawood, a Pakistani teenager, joined the expedition as a Father’s Day present for his father, Shahzada Dawood, therefore it was a great day for him.
This information was revealed by Azmeh Dawood, the older sister of Pakistani-British businessman Shahzada, and it gave a heartbreaking touch to the awful news of the Titanic sub’s ‘catastrophic collapse’ in which all five of its passengers perished.
Azmeh told NBC in a video interview on Friday (UAE time) that her nephew, Suleman, “informed a relative that he wasn’t very up for it and felt ‘terrified’ about the trip to explore the wreckage of the Titanic.”
“But the 19-year old ended up going aboard OceanGate’s 22-foot submersible because the trip fell over Father’s Day weekend and he was eager to please his dad, who was passionate about the lore of the Titanic,” NBC wrote as told to them by Azmeh.
Azmeh told NBC that her “baby brother” was “absolutely obsessed with the Titanic from a young age.” In fact, when they were kids in Pakistan, the Dawood siblings – who are scions of one of the most prominent corporate dynasties in the South Asian country – would constantly watch ‘A Night to Remember’, a 1958 British historical film recounting the final night of RMS Titanic that sank on her maiden voyage in 1912.
The Dawood family also said in a separate interview that Shahzada was interested in “exploring different natural habitats”, and had previously spoken at both the United Nations and Oxford Union.
It’s worth mentioning that the 19-year-old Suleman was a student at University of Strathclyde, Glasgow. He had just finished his first year at Strathclyde Business School.
Professor Sir Jim McDonald, principal and vice-chancellor at University of Strathclyde, earlier wrote to the Strathclyde Community: “I write to you with a heavy heart to share the news that one of our students, Suleman Dawood, is a passenger on board the submersible that is missing in the North Atlantic.”
