Engines in reverse

[Rancor]

With higher RPMS on the main engines while making sternway, versus stopped, the pumps would discharge more water faster overboard.

The main engines were steam powered and did not require cooling jackets or water like a diesel engine.

What did require cooling seawater were the main and auxiliary condensers. The pumps for these could be run at full capacity even if the main engines were stopped. Not that it makes a difference as their bilge suction was at the wrong end of the ship to where the water was coming in.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

The angled water in the flooded compartments, and the vacuum on the outside of the hull breach.

{{{sigh}}} There is NO vacuum. Higher pressure (The water at two atmospheres 15 feet down and getting deeper as the bow goes down) on the outside WILL move in the direction of the lower pressure (thin air!) on the inside.

That's just how it works.

There is no vacuum and no suction.

 

[Rob Lawes]

I think some people may have got confused because some small sailing boats are fitted with self bailers that use the venturi effect to enable the hull to be bailed by the crafts own movement through the water. Of course these self bailers are specifically designed and shaped to use this effect and the principle does not apply to hull damage.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

Hydrodynamics. For a vessel moving in unrestricted waters, the vessel is accompanied by an increased pressure field at its bow and at its stern, and slightly reduced pressure fields along its sides. The strength of these pressure fields vary approximately as the square of the ship’s speed and fade out inversely with distance from the ship. A similar situation would result when going astern.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

 

[Rob Lawes]

So taking Sam's information one stage further, if the Titanic was making best speed astern in her damaged condition, the slight reduction in water pressure in the region of boiler rooms six and five would not be enough to overcome the water pressure forcing water into the hull. Furthermore in the regions further forward, number 1 hold for example, it would actually slightly increase the rate of flooding.

Staying still is the safest and only option.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

And rescue vessels will know where to find you if you are not moving.

 

[Jim Currie]

Yes, Sam but you must also factor-in turbulence around the trailing end including wake current. A perforated bow being dragged along will drag water with it and cause a great deal of turbulence which surely dissipates net pressure?

 

[David G. Brown]

It doesn't matter if going backwards would have drained everything including the whiskey from the bar. Sam nailed it this time. The best way to be rescued is to stay in one place and not go steaming around the Western Ocean.

-- David G. Brown

 

[coal eater]

why they could not stuff cargo holds with lots of items so water could flood less space?

 

[David G. Brown]

Reducing the permeability of a compartment is one of those good "on paper" theories. Reality is harsh. There simply was not the time nor the proper materials. Reality often thwarts the best of human endeavors. The best solution to Titanic's predicament would have been to avoid the iceberg altogether. That's not what happened.

-- David G. Brown

 

[Michael H. Standart]

why they could not stuff cargo holds with lots of items so water could flood less space?

Stuff it with exactly what and how do you get it there?

keep in mind that White Star didn't get to choose the cargo. The people shipping the cargo chose them, and whatever went into the holds was what the customer wanted to ship.

Also, do you have any idea how time consuming and manpower intensive such an evolution would be? On my first ship, filling up three modest storerooms.....NOT vast cargo holds....storerooms, was an all hands and all day evolution.

Titanic didn't have all day and a lot of free hands.

 

[Rob Lawes]

On my first ship, filling up three modest storerooms.....NOT vast cargo holds....storerooms, was an all hands and all day evolution.

That brings back memories of storing food in the midday sun in the Middle East. Bags of potatoes, fresh fruit and veg, frozen food etc etc, all being manually handed up from the jetty into the stores by every available member of the crew.

As you said Michael, it would take hours.

By the end of it, I'd be dripping with sweat, stinking and in need of a shower and a tin of beer.

 

[Mike Spooner]

I have a question. If the Titanic is been hard pulled over to port to avoid the berg. Wouldn't some of the passengers or crew members feel this side movement of the ship? I have notice there seem to be no comments on this fact. Or was just the case the steering gear was slow giving no sensation of side movement. As my experience on Atlantic crossings one can feel this type of side movement when ship is in a across wind or current situation and the ship is been corrected back on track.

Mike.

 

[Aaron_2016]

If the ship had turned hard left while speeding at 22 knots then she would certainly heel over to starboard (right) before and during the collision. However none of the survivors described that at all. In fact they felt the opposite occur as they felt the ship heel over to port (left) as she swung her stern away from the iceberg and turned hard right which caused her to heel over to port like this:


Example:

Lookout Fleet
"She listed to port right afterwards."

Mr. Sloper
"The boat seemed to shiver and keel over to port."

Lookout Lee
"The ship seemed to heel slightly over to port as she struck the berg....Very slightly over to port, as she struck along the starboard side."

Mr. Hyman
"There came a tearing sound and the boat listed a little to one side."

Mr. Taylor
"I felt the boat rise and it seemed to me that it was riding over the ice (heeling to port)."

Mr. Steffanson
"We seemed to slide up on it. (heeling to port)"


Since nobody felt the ship heel over to starboard before or during the collision we can safely deduce that the alleged order to turn the helm away before the collision very likely never happened and it was pure fiction to create the illusion (along with the full astern order) that they had time to see the iceberg, report the iceberg, reduce their speed, and turn the ship away before they struck the iceberg, and this would fully justify their speed at the Inquiry and avoid any allegations of negligence being made against them.


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