He had to be fleecing the private sponsor of the expedition. Even when he was making the sci-fi youtube circuit during the planning stages of it, particularly with Event Horizon, it seemed so absurd from the start. To pinpoint a location like that and find what you're looking for immediately at the bottom of the sea doesn't otherwise happen and he was absolutely confident in the anticipated result of a hypothesis with no basis. There was one conclusion right from the outset and that's so wildly divorced from how science works.

Hopefully it ruins his career.