Coal loading

[Bob Godfrey]

Whatever cable young Frankie was swinging on would have been on the fore or after well deck or the poop deck, to which the 3rd Class had access. But for 1st and 2nd Class kids there were plenty of cables and machinery on their promenade areas of the boat deck too, so just as much opportunity to get dirty. I wouldn't assume, though, that the typical 3rd Class kid was unkempt or unclean. For the boat trip their parents would have dressed them in their best and expected them to 'behave themselves' (wishful thinking, probably!). Frankie's mother was horrified when she saw the state he'd got into and immediately set to work scrubbing him clean. He probably got a 'clip round the ear' too.

 

[Ben Lemmon]

I wasn't assuming they were dirty or unkempt. But then again, I'm not an officer or a person with authority on the Titanic. Do you think anyone in those positions may have made such a mistake?

The reason I want to know is because I would like to use it as a scene in a book. Is there any possible way for a Second class passenger to be mistaken as a Third class passenger?

 

[Bob Godfrey]

It was the rank & file crew (stewards especially) who would most likely be chasing young explorers back to their designated areas. They had enough experience to be pretty good at identifying the Class of passengers (as they often did in their testimonies as the disaster inquiries) according usually to the way they were dressed, their speech and mannerisms etc. But there wouldn't have been an enormous difference in the dress style of 3rd Class kids in their Sunday best and Cabin Class kids (boys especially). If your character kept his mouth shut he (or she) might well get away with it, but stewards on the lookout for mischief would keep a closer eye on an unaccompanied child.

 

[Alvin Dusaran]

i'm just curious about how the coal is being loaded on the titanic?

Is it loaded into the ship cargo hatch? How it is delivered to the ship, is it by wooden box or by machinery similar to carousel or baggage distribution used in airport? After loading the coal into the ship where they begin to distribute it? do they shovel it from g deck until it fall to bottom? Where are the passageway if they distribute it from the g deck?

Sorry for too much question and grammar, i'm just curious.

AlvinD

[Moderator's note: This post, originally posted in an unrelated topic has been moved to the pre-existing one, which is discussing the same subject. JDT]

 

[Michael H. Standart]

If you see any plans of the ship, notably the shell plan, you'll notice a destinct row of doors along the side very near the waterline. When coaling the ship, these doors would be swung down to the horizontal and the coal would have been dumped down these scuttles directly into the bunkers. The trimmers would see to evening it out once it was down there.

There was no moving it through passageways and no need, but what there was a need for was to clean the ship up afterwards. The cloud of fine coal dust produced by this evolution got into everything.

 

[hereward]

I have been reading G.J. Cooper’s “Titanic Captain;” He states that the Olympic needed 4000 tons of coal for her maiden voyage and this was supplied by the barges of R & G.H. Rea. The loading took 15 minutes a world record for 1911; I assume this was a misprint and should have read 15 hours. That is in excess of 266 tons per hour and the ship would have needed to be moved to allow loading from both sides. Looking round the net it seems elevators were used, if the usual one hundred weight (cwt/ 112lbs) bags were used that’s 80,000 bags. If the coal was loose that is still a lot of shovelling to get the coal on to the elevators.

The steam locomotives on the east coast travelling between London and Edinburgh had a tunnel in the tender for changing the crew because it was physically impossible for a fireman to keep up with the required stoking. There would be less than 10 tons of coal in the tender. I would regularly see a Bournemouth to Manchester steam train pass through at 60/70 mph. with the fireman shovelling furiously. Hard to grasp that 4000 tons of coal were loaded onto a steam ship.

There was a colliery near where I lived that had 30 feet thick coal seams, columns of coal were left to support the roof. The mine was notorious for underground fires in these columns due to spontaneous combustion caused by the coal being under pressure. I would say that this was the cause of the fire in the Titanic’s bunker; the reasons given, the coal being wet and containing iron, doesn’t make much sense to me. This was always a concern of my father when stacking up our coal shed, when I was a child.

 

[Doug Criner]

The total bunker capacity was 6,611 tons. Typical coaling of 4,000 tons took about 24 hrs. The ship was boomed out from the pier to allow coal barges or lighters to unload simultaneously to both sides - no need to turn around.

There are interesting photos of coaling of Olympic in New York in Titanic, The Ship Magnificent, vol. 1. Coal was hoisted in large buckets and dumped on temporary platforms alongside the coal ports. The platforms were tipped to dump the coal down the chutes.

To put this in perspective, a typical railroad coal car carries 100 tons.

 

[hereward]

Thanks for that Doug, that’s another book for my list. Guess you are in the USA, your coal wagons would, no doubt, have been very large, and probably are here now. In the days of steam the wooden coal wagons were marked 16 tons. They were unloaded with a grab; a bucket on steel ropes would open up and take a bite out of the load. The same was used to unload the narrow canal boats delivering to the coal fired power stations. My buddy in the 1950’s was friendly with a boat man we would cycle to the coal fields and hitch a ride back on his boat carrying coal to the local power station.

 

[Doug Criner]

Most coal in the U.S. is hauled by barge or by unit trains - composed of 100+ cars, usually pulled by at least three locomotives, maybe two at the head end and one pushing at the tail end.

One unit train can haul 10,000 tons. A single 15-barge river tow can carry 22,500 tons. Unloading a 100-car coal train with rotary couplers takes about an hour with a big rotary dumper - the cars are grabbed two at a time and turned upside down without uncoupling. Our tons are 2,000 lb.

 

[hereward]

I have looked on Amazon for a copy of "Titanic: The Ship Magnificent" vol. 1. Think I will need to make a mortgage application.

 

[Doug Criner]

Would there be any library that would have it, possibly through inter-library loan?

Vol. 1 has the technical details for the hull, electrical, propulsion, etc. Vol. 2 has the interior features - such as the décor of passenger staterooms. Vol. 2 has limited interest to me, but my wife might be more interested.

 

[hereward]

Hi Doug,
The local council libraries do not have a copy. I will ask for an inter- library search, they are doing one for the biography of Kathleen Scott for me at the moment, so I will wait a bit. Have you an author for that vol. 1; there seems to be more than one. – Many Thanks.

 

[Doug Criner]

The main author is Bruce Beveridge. Published by the historypress.co.uk and printed and bound in Great Britain; I'm not sure what this means, but the title page says: "A catalog record for this book is available from the British Library."

A Yankee trying to help you find the book is a bit like hauling coal to Newcastle

 

[hereward]

I think a copy of everything published, in the UK has, by law, to be given to the British Library, they are probably confirming this has been done. Haven’t heard that for years because they now have to send coal to Newcastle since all the collieries, in the north east, have closed down. Thanks for the info Doug.

 

[Doug Criner]

Haven’t heard that for years because they now have to send coal to Newcastle since all the collieries, in the north east, have closed down

The U.S. is perhaps a bit like Pitcairn Island - we still use English idioms and figures of speech that perhaps no modern Brit would readily recognize.