Table of Contents
Introduction.2The Unsinkable Ship...3The sink of the
Titanic4Passengers...5The Captain went down with the
ship6Wreckage.....7Survivors..8Lifeboat Capacity on the
Titanic..10Conclusion....11 Bibliography..12
1. Introduction
On the fateful night of April 14, 1912 there were 2,235 souls
crowded aboard theR.M.S. Titanic. There was no wind to speak of.
The frigid, dark sea was calm, like a plate glass mirror beneath
the star-spangled heavens.It was an hour before midnight on a
starry, moonless night.While the band played on beneath the decks
in the first class lounge, and while the night watch paced the
Bridge high above, the greatest maritime tragedy in the history of
sailing, stealthily, silently awaited them in the ice-strewn
midnight waters of the North Atlantic. Survivors recalled a gentle
shudder that briefly shook the 900 foot long vessel. It came and
went so quickly that nobody gave it much of a second thought.
Except for the occupants of the Bridgewho in the split seconds
before that collision, saw the towering iceberg ahead, floating in
their unlighted pathway. The helmsman swerved to miss the
icebergbut they would have been better off to have struck it head
on.In narrowly avoiding a head-on collision, they suffered an even
worse fate!I have chosen this topic because the Titanic have been
representing a major interest for me since I was young. I can say
that the movie, Titanic, have played a significant role in my
passion of the Titanic ship, as it was the source of where I found
out aboutit.
2. The Unsinkable ship
The Titanic was completed in 1912 at a cost of $7.5 million in
Belfast, Ireland. It took more than two years to build, and two
workers died during itsconstruction. The ship was 270 meters long,
or more than four city blocks, and more than 28 meters high. It
weighed an incredible 46,000 tons.The Titanic began its journey in
Southampton, England, and then sailed to Cherbourg, France, and
Queenstown, Ireland. It sped west toward New York on April 10. It
was carrying a total of 1,316 passengers and 885 crew members. The
people were a mixture of wealthy individuals as well as immigrants
from Ireland, Germany and elsewhere.On April 14, a nearby ship, the
Californian, sent a message at 10:55 p.m.: "Ice report: We are
stopped and surrounded by ice." But the captain of the Titanic,
Edward Smith, and First Officer William Murdoch did not heed these
warnings, steaming ahead near full-speed.The RMS Titanic was built
by the White Star line, which was a competitor to another
shipbuilding building the Lusitania and the Mauretania, which set
speed records crossing the Atlantic. To compete, White Star Line
decided to build several large vessels known for their comfort
instead of their speed,according to the Encyclopedia Britannica:
the Olympic, the Titanic and the Britannic.
3. The sink of the Titanic At 11:40 p.m. ship's time, watchmen
aboard the ship spotted an iceberg, and the ship made a sudden turn
to the left, causing it to sideswipe the iceberg. The ice punched
holes in the starboard of the boat, along a nearly 90 m stretch and
it began filling it with water. Six of the ship's 16 water-tight
compartments started filling. But this was enough to make the ship
begin to sink into the water, at which point the water flowed of
the top of these compartments and begin filling the other
compartments. Modern estimates suggest that the boat could have
possibly limped to shore with only four breached compartments.With
six compartments leaking, however, the Titanic's fate was sealed it
had lost too much buoyancy to remain afloat, and the fact that it
was a well-built and durable ship at this point made little
difference. That said, the ship didn't sink for almost three hours,
longer than Titanic's engineer gave it when he heard that six
compartments were leaking, he predicted it would only stay afloat
for 1 to 1.5 hours, saidTitanic expert Parks Stephenson. Contrary
to some studies that say theTitanic had weak rivets, it was
actually quite strong for its time, Stephenson said.As the front
filled with water and sunk into the ocean, the back of the ship
lifted out of the water, according to analysis by James Cameron and
eyewitness accounts. This placed tremendous pressure on the middle
of the boat. It eventually cracked and the front of the ship
crashed back into the ocean; the ship sank at 2:20 a.m. on April
15.4. Passengers
Of the 2,224 people on board, 1,514 lost their lives, while 710
survived. First-class passengers fared much better than those in
third class. For example, only 3 percent of first-class women died,
whereas 54 percent of third class women perished.Some of
theTitanic's passengerswere prominent people, including John Jacob
Astor IV, one of the wealthiest men in the world at that time. So
were Ida and Isidor Straus, who was the co-owner of Macy's
department store.
And of course, there was "Unsinkable" Molly Brown, a socialite
who became famous when she exhorted her lifeboat to return to look
for survivors, and ultimately survived the ordeal herself.
Astor didn't survive, as he didn't take seriously the reports
that the ship was sinking, and later wasn't allowed onto a lifeboat
due to a "women and children first" policy. Ida Straus initially
boarded a lifeboat but returned to her husband. "Where you go, I
go," she reportedly said. The couple would die together.5. The
Captain went down with the ship
In 1912, Smith became the captain for theTitanic. He was in
Belfast on April 2, 1912, for the vessels first sea trials. Two
days later, the ship docked in Southampton and was prepared for its
maiden voyage across the North Atlantic. It was heralded as one of
the biggest and most luxurious ships of the time. Unprepared for
such an event, theTitanicdid not have enough lifeboats to carry all
of its passengers to safety. Smith tried to manage the situation
the best that he could, helping with the loading of the boats and
managing the transmission of distress calls. He was last seen
headed for the bridge.After 2 a.m. the next morning,
theTitanicfully slipped into the dark cold waters of the North
Atlantic, taking its captain with it. Several stories emerged about
how his life ended. There were reports that he had shot himself on
the bridge. Another had him in the water, swimming with an infant
in tow and putting the child on a lifeboat before slipping beneath
the water. It is commonly held, however, that Smith followed the
marine tradition of remaining aboard his doomed vessel.There were
several investigations into theTitanicdisaster in the United States
and England. With all of the warnings, many wondered why Smith
chose not to slow down or turn south in response to the threat of
icebergs. He was not found to be responsible for the shipwreck.
6. Wreckage
Thewreck of theRMSTitanicis located about 600km south-southeast
of the coast ofNewfoundland, lying at a depth of about 3,800m.Until
1985, the location of the wreck was unknown. Numerous expeditions
tried usingsonarto map the sea bed in the hope of spotting the
wreck, but failed due to a combination of bad weather,
technological difficulties and poor search strategy. The wreck was
finally located, 21.2km from the inaccurate position transmitted
byTitanic's crew while the ship was sinking, by a joint
French-American expedition led byJean-Louis
MichelofIFREMERandRobert Ballardof theWoods Hole Oceanographic
Institution. The key to its discovery was an innovative remotely
controlled deep-sea vehicle calledArgo, which could be towed above
the sea bed while its cameras transmitted pictures back to a mother
ship.The wreck lies in two main pieces about a third of a mile
apart. Thebowis still largely recognizable, in spite of its
deterioration and the damage it suffered hitting the sea floor, and
has a great deal of preserved interiors. The stern is completely
ruined due to the damage it suffered while sinking 3,700m and
hitting the ocean floor, and is now just a heap of twisted metal,
which may explain why it has barely been explored during
expeditions to theTitanicwreck. A substantial section of the middle
of the ship broke apart and is scattered in chunks across the sea
bed. A debris field covering about 5 by 3 miles around the wreck
contains hundreds of thousands of items spilled from ship as she
sank, ranging from passengers' personal effects to machinery,
furniture, utensils and coal, as well as fragments of the ship
herself. The bodies of the passengers and crew once also lay in the
debris field, but have since been entirely consumed by sea
creatures, leaving only their shoes lying together in the mud.7.
Survirvors
In the 50 or 60 years after the sinking, a vast number of
theTitanicssurviving passengers died. By September 1973, only
100Titanicsurvivors were still living. Here is a list of a few of
the more famous of the last 100 survivors.Edith (Rosenbaum)
Russell, died 1975After surviving the sinking of theTitanicat age
34, Edith Russell tried unsuccessfully to find a publisher for her
account of the sinking. She served during World War I as perhaps
the first female war correspondent. She never married, and her
final years were spent as a recluse living in a hotel in London.
She was 98 when she died.Frank Prentice, died 1982Frank Prentice
was a 22-year-old storekeeper on theTitanicvictualling crew. As the
ship was foundering, he talked about jumping overboard and swimming
to Lifeboat 4. He ultimately did end up in the freezing water and
was rescued by Lifeboat 4. Shortly before he died at the age of 92
in May 1982, Prentice appeared in the documentaryTitanic: A
Question of Murderin that same year.Edwina Troutt, died 1984Edwina
Troutt, who was 27 years old when she survived theTitanicsinking,
was a beloved guest atTitanicconventions and continued to attend
even into her late 90s. She died in California at the age of 100.
Edwina never let the Titanicsinking spook her: She made several
Atlantic crossings throughout her life.
Eva Hart, died 1996Eva Hart was one of the most outspoken of all
theTitanicsurvivors. She routinely talked about the negligence of
having too few lifeboats, and she went on record as being an avid
antisalvage advocate. She felt theTitanicwas a gravesite, and she
didnt believe anything should be taken from the ship or the debris
field. She died in 1996 at the age of 91. The Eva Hart pub in
Essex, England, is named in her honor.
Lillian Asplund, died 2006Lillian Asplund was the
lastTitanicsurvivor with actual memories of the sinking. She
remembered being passed through a window of the Promenade deck to a
lifeboat and looking up and seeing the faces of her father and her
three brothers. She was 5 years old at the time. She said that
memory haunted her for her entire life. She died in Massachusetts
in 2006 at the age of 100.
Elizabeth Gladys Millvina Dean, died 2009Millvina Dean was one
of the most belovedTitanicsurvivors to die. She died in 2009 at the
age of 97. She was only 10 weeks old when she sailed on the
Titanic,and she didnt learn that she had been on the ship until she
was 8 years old. She attended manyTitanicsociety conventions until
poor health prevented her from traveling.8. Lifeboat Capacity on
the Titanic
20 was about the number of lifeboats on the Titanic, or enough
to save about 1/3 of the crew and passengers on board the boat. It
was originally designed to carry 32 boats, but the number was
reduced because designers felt that the deck would be excessively
cluttered. The ship actually had enough davits, or lifeboat
supports, to carry 64 lifeboats, but most of them remained
unfilled.Most of these boats could handle about 65 people each, but
there were also a small number of 47-passenger collapsible
lifeboats and two emergency cutters capable of carrying 40 people.
The UK had not upgraded the lifeboat requirements for passenger
ships since 1896, stating that ships were safer and less likely to
require lifeboats, making an update to the rules unnecessary. After
the disaster, laws regarding safety requirements were changed
significantly.Because of this inconsistency in safety precautions,
combined with a women and children first policy, most of the ship's
men were left to drown or freeze. About 90 percent of these men
were second class passengers. Interestingly, Sir Alfred Chalmers
stated that if the Titanic had carried fewer lifeboats, more people
might have been saved, since the existing boats would have been
filled to capacity instead of partially empty when the ship
sank.
9. Conclusion
From my point of view, the sinking of the Titanic is still among
the many great and tragic accidents to occur at sea in our history.
Not only was it the largest and most luxurious liner at the time,
it was also the most ill-fated cruise ship as it sailed off on its
first and last voyage. Along with its sinking, more than half of
its passengers would be buried at sea. Its sinking later introduced
a new era of realism where people began to understand even the
greatest technology was not perfect, and there was certainly no
such thing as an unsinkable ship. Its rediscovery many years later
would reawaken the desire to know all that happened on that
historic night. I believe that the Titanic will most likely
continue to lure people for generations to come, since every
generation is able to take something different from its historic
tragedy.
Bibliography :
http://www.livescience.com/38102-titanic-facts.html
http://www.biography.com/people/edward-j-smith-283822#death-at-sea
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wreck_of_the_RMS_Titanic
http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/some-of-the-last-surviving-titanic-passengers.html
www.bournemouthecho.co.uk
http://www.historyofthetitanic.org/titanic-lifeboats.html
12