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A two-day launch event was planned for September last year, to which various Panamanian dignitaries were invited, including the president Laurentino Cortizo. A group of enthusiasts and journalists were flown in from San Francisco, along with members of the architectural press. After the 2019 setback in Thailand and the abortive MS Satoshi venture, the SeaPod introduction promised to be a moment of genuine progress for seasteading. “All the best for your big day,” Steyn wrote Koch. “I really wish you all the very best on your future role as a pioneer in alternative lifestyles.”

On the first day, about 350 guests were welcomed by robotic dogs at a glitzy presentation in Panama City, where Ocean Builders chief executive Romundt declared: “My mission . . . is to share with you a vision for a positive future.” The next day, the entourage would move to Linton Bay, on the north shore, to see a pod for themselves. Meanwhile, without the knowledge of his co-founders, Koch had come up with elaborate plans for a parallel event in Phuket, which he described as a “false flag operation”.

The XLII had been impounded at the Phuket Deep Sea Port. Koch thought it would be a good idea if the pod was destroyed in a “barbecue” timed to follow the extravaganza in Panama. The arsonists would be kitted out to look like Thai sailors, suggesting they were following orders. The whole thing was to be framed as an act of retribution on the part of Thai authorities, supposedly enraged by Ocean Builders’ success. Perhaps Koch imagined himself, like Michael Corleone in The Godfather, baptising his family’s newest member while violently settling other scores.

Steyn was instructed to assemble a team in Phuket, outfitted with Thai navy uniforms from a supplier in Bangkok. Koch wired $40,000 to cover costs, such as bribing security at the port. Displaying his engineering acumen, he also provided guidance on what kind of accelerant to use, calculating how long it would take for the pod to become fully engulfed in flames: “Ordinary fuel burns out too quickly. I have a special cocktail that is sticky and not easily extinguishable . . . ”

He also provided the slogans the fake mob should chant as the pod burnt, including: “You have failed in Thailand and you will fail again in Panama . . . ” The slogans were to be spoken in Thai. With the back-to-back plans, Steyn enthused: “We will be national and international news. It will be massive.”

On the second day of the SeaPod launch, under a sunny Caribbean sky and with a calypso band playing in the background, Koch and Romundt clambered on to a stage at the Linton Bay Marina. They smiled and waved, then cut a long blue ribbon held by two hostesses dressed in short white yacht-chic dresses and matching shoes. The first SeaPod was christened Phoenix. Allan Baitel, a Panamanian native and the company’s spokesperson at the time, was busy providing quotes for journalists covering the event. “We have a Panamanian workforce here . . . that have been trained, that have learnt to build these structures . . . with the help of the engineers that we have brought from Germany, and from South Africa, and from the United States . . . We hope to duplicate this a hundred-fold,” he told AP.

Guests queued up to tour the structure, but by mid-afternoon so many of them had climbed aboard that the pod began to tilt towards the dock. Then it began to disappear. Ocean Builders rushed out a statement, blaming a “ballast tank and pumping system malfunction”. It insisted no one had been hurt and that there was no contamination of the surrounding water. But the reputational damage had been done. The SeaPod had sunk.