How the break-up occurred

[Michael H. Standart]

The problem is that a number of survivors stated the ship rose high out of the water before breaking apart, some even specifying that it sank as far as the after funnel. Of course, it is likely that they exaggerated the angle, but nobody would confuse 15° for 60°.

In broad daylight, that would be true. In the near inky darkness of the night where everything is confusing and what you think you see is NOT what you really get, you would be amazed at how easy it is to make a mistake like that.

Even if you're a trained observer...and most of these people weren't...it's very possible.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

The problem is that the bending moment reaches a maximum somewhere between 10 and 20 degrees and after that it progressively gets less. If the ship doesn't break when the stress is at its greatest why should it break when the stress is easing off.

I still think @Samuel Halpern's graph on p119 of his Centennial Reappraisal book and the related article Why A Low Angle Break? describe the break-up most convincingly. Survivor statements like a "high angle" or "second funnel" etc are unreliable given the darkness and comparisons between such statements from different survivors would have the "vantage point" error factor built in. To a survivor still quite close to the ship just before break-up, the stern would have appeared to have reached a much higher angle than it actually did because of the optical illusion, to which we humans are quite susceptible.

As Sam showed with his calculations, the bending stress on the keel and deck plates reached its maximum when the stern reached an angle of around 11 to 12 degrees. It is very likely that was the point when the physical break-up of the Titanic started, but it would not have been immediately obvious to onlookers. It was not as though it was a sudden "snap!" type of break; the failure of the keel and separation of deck plates would have continued over the next 2 minutes or so but towards the end of that timeframe, something else happened - the flooded bow completely lost its buoyancy and the Titanic suddenly lost its longitudinal stability. The result of that would have been a sudden dip of the bow (the so-called "lurch") resulting in displacement of a large volume of water that washed sternwards (the "wave"). Also, though already failing, the stern section would still have been attached to the bow at that point and so the lurch at the bow would have pitched the stern quickly to a higher angle, perhaps as much as 25-degrees before the widely reported final catastrophic break occurred.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

The problem is that a number of survivors stated the ship rose high out of the water before breaking apart, some even specifying that it sank as far as the after funnel. Of course, it is likely that they exaggerated the angle, but nobody would confuse 15° for 60°.

That is true even allowing for the darkness if the survivor was close enough. But there is another aspect to it - what exactly was the person seeing rise to a high angle? The flooded bow was already underwater, not therefore visible to the onlookers and sank after the final break-up. Thereafter the stern. with its deck spaces now exposed and flooding rapidly, performed those falling-rising-turning-sinking maneuvers that have been extensively discussed elsewhere. Depending on the vantage point of the reporting survivor, events just before, during and after the break would have appeared very different; when statements from different survivors were later collated, a near-accurate reconstruction would therefore have been very difficult and it would seem that there were too many contrasting observations that could not all have been true.

IMO, most of those who reported a very high angle - including a few 'near-perpendicular' statements - were watching the already separated stern go through its maneuvers.

 

[Mike Bull2019]

I've seen that 'hot tub' video, and balancing bits of naturally flexible wood and messing about with pre-cut plastic models in an effort to illustrate hull movements can in no way equate for the material properties and complete structure of the real ship and how it failed. It reminded me of James Cameron trying every which way to make a sinking model visually match his theory, which proved absolutely nothing.

That's not to say that I disagree with everything Bill proposes, but I certainly do with some of it. But I have also already seen the previous lengthy exchanges in similar threads between Bill and folk like @Samuel Halpern , so it's nothing new to me.

 

[Bill Vanek]

I still think @Samuel Halpern's graph on p119 of his Centennial Reappraisal book and the related article Why A Low Angle Break? describe the break-up most convincingly. Survivor statements like a "high angle" or "second funnel" etc are unreliable given the darkness and comparisons between such statements from different survivors would have the "vantage point" error factor built in. To a survivor still quite close to the ship just before break-up, the stern would have appeared to have reached a much higher angle than it actually did because of the optical illusion, to which we humans are quite susceptible.

As Sam showed with his calculations, the bending stress on the keel and deck plates reached its maximum when the stern reached an angle of around 11 to 12 degrees. It is very likely that was the point when the physical break-up of the Titanic started, but it would not have been immediately obvious to onlookers. It was not as though it was a sudden "snap!" type of break; the failure of the keel and separation of deck plates would have continued over the next 2 minutes or so but towards the end of that timeframe, something else happened - the flooded bow completely lost its buoyancy and the Titanic suddenly lost its longitudinal stability. The result of that would have been a sudden dip of the bow (the so-called "lurch") resulting in displacement of a large volume of water that washed sternwards (the "wave"). Also, though already failing, the stern section would still have been attached to the bow at that point and so the lurch at the bow would have pitched the stern quickly to a higher angle, perhaps as much as 25-degrees before the widely reported final catastrophic break occurred.

You're right on a lot of your observations!! There was a low-angle break when the ship went beyond 10 degrees pitch. The break wasn't well-understood by onlookers because it was the keel and hull under water, along with just the superstructure forward of the 3rd funnel. The ship was not parted at that time. The failure was not a quick breaking (full parting) in just a few seconds, like the 1997 movie. And the catastrophic break was a minute later.

But the first break came during the first plunge, not before it. The first plunge is what made the ship exceed 10 degrees down; the bow had already lost its buoyancy sufficiently to start the plunge/dip/lurch; and that's what started the "wave" going along the starboard Boat Deck. That break lasted long enough for Jack Thayer to have heard it at the beginning of the first plunge (in the seconds before he jumped), and also after he had swam under water and come up, some more seconds later.

Here's the main point: the stern sagging relative to the bow's angle would have raised the bow at that time, not raised the stern. The mass of the stern was the same as the mass of the bow, but the stern had kinetic energy that the bow did not have, so the balance tipped in favor of the stern for the duration of the first breaking.

As soon as the small raising of the bow ended, the plunge would re-start (but now it's the 2nd plunge--separate, due to the interlude of the raising of the bow), and would continue on...including the funnels falling, the lights going out, and the rise to a high angle (meaning something over 45 degrees). Many people saw it; it was not an optical illusion. And it was the further that people were away that caused the lack of clarity in the observations. A good example is Lawrence Beesley, a mile away, who proclaimed that the ship stood up for five solid minutes. Those who were close said that they could see it quite plainly.

So the answer is that both were true: the breaking started at a low angle, but the ship still plunged to the 4th funnel at a high angle before the final, catastrophic parting.

 

[Bill Vanek]

I've seen that 'hot tub' video, and balancing bits of naturally flexible wood and messing about with pre-cut plastic models in an effort to illustrate hull movements can in no way equate for the material properties and complete structure of the real ship and how it failed. It reminded me of James Cameron trying every which way to make a sinking model visually match his theory, which proved absolutely nothing.

That's not to say that I disagree with everything Bill proposes, but I certainly do with some of it. But I have also already seen the previous lengthy exchanges in similar threads between Bill and folk like @Samuel Halpern , so it's nothing new to me.

I was fully aware of Cameron's rigging of his tests to get his desired outcome, so I was quite careful to avoid that mistake. If you focused on my iterations (stated for full disclosure, so that I was not hiding anything), you missed the point. My iterations were done to make the conditions as close to the real ship's conditions as I could--knowing that it wouldn't happen on the first try, and knowing that I could never perfectly duplicate a flooding Titanic. It had too many compartments and passageways that would affect the speed and pattern of flooding versus residual buoyancy, so I could only put buoyancy in those locations to approximate the real situation. Attaining accuracy of the models is not the same as 'rigging' the experiments. I have a lot of experience in doing testing, from my time in chemical plants, a refinery, and a pharma plant, and I learned that the goal is to make the test as valid and truthful as possible, and not to focus on achieving select results. I had to tell my inspectors that maxim numerous times to make sure I received reliable test results, and that I would deal with the positivity or negativity of the results afterward.

Model tests illustrate principles. The principles of inertia, momentum, friction, and tensile stress were clearly presented in my tests. There were not other principles present that disqualified the tests.

And my exchanges with Mr. Halpern and others were to help them see what they were missing. For example, Mr. Halpern's arguments about the ship's bow not being able to rise were based on static calculations of buoyancy. My argument was not based on statics, but dynamics--the potential energy being converted to kinetic energy, and thus doing work in a squishy, fluid environment. In my training as a mechanical engineer, I did well in my physics, statics, dynamics, and strength of materials classes, and then used that knowledge over three decades in real-world design, failure analysis, and testing--and I'm quite cognizant that others don't have that knowledge and experience.

 

[Mike Bull2019]

'I'm quite cognizant that others don't have the knowledge and experience'.

Without wishing to create conflict or upset the mods, may I gently suggest that your replies are a little patronizing- you in fact have no idea about the 'knowledge and experience' of others.

 

[Bill Vanek]

Without wishing to create conflict or upset the mods, may I gently suggest that your replies are a little patronizing- you in fact have no idea about the 'knowledge and experience' of others.

I can tell when others don't understand things. When they say stuff like 'The spinning stern flung the debris' or 'There was no external weight placed on the stern of the ship', it's clear that they don't understand. That may come across as patronizing, or even arrogant, but it is not my intention; my purpose is to explain truths and principles. If my confidence sounds like arrogance, look past that, and focus on the truth of what I'm saying.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

But the first break came during the first plunge, not before it. The first plunge is what made the ship exceed 10 degrees down; the bow had already lost its buoyancy sufficiently to start the plunge/dip/lurch.

I respectfully disagree that the keel was still completely intact at the time of the 'lurch'. I completely agree with the opinion in @Samuel Halpern's Centennial Reappraisal book on p118 which states that around 02:15am the bow had trimmed down to about 10-degrees, at which time the bending force on the keel reached its zenith. Sam further states that it was about a "minute or two later" that the Titanic lost its longitudinal stability and started to tip over - the so-called 'lurch'. Even if we go to the middle ground of 90 seconds, I believe that the keel and deck pates continued to fail in that timeframe but the ship had still not parted by then, which is why people saw the stern rise higher, probably up to 25 degrees before the final catastrophic break.

Mr. Halpern's arguments about the ship's bow not being able to rise were based on static calculations of buoyancy. My argument was not based on statics, but dynamics--the potential energy being converted to kinetic energy, and thus doing work in a squishy, fluid environment. In my training as a mechanical engineer, I did well in my physics, statics, dynamics, and strength of materials classes, and then used that knowledge over three decades in real-world design, failure analysis, and testing--and I'm quite cognizant that others don't have that knowledge and experience.

That opinion is your privilege sir, but once again I respectfully submit that like @Samuel Halpern, I do NOT believe and never will that there was any rise of the bow section during the break-up.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

Without wishing to create conflict or upset the mods, may I gently suggest that your replies are a little patronizing- you in fact have no idea about the 'knowledge and experience' of others.

Very diplomatically worded and I more than agree with you. Thanks.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

"Her foremost lights had disappeared [under the water], and her starboard sidelight left burning was the only light, barring the masthead light, on that side of the bridge that I could see...You could not see her keel...You could just see the propellers...A little while after that we pulled a little way and lay on the oars again. The other boats were around us by that time, and some were pulling further away from us. I stood and watched it till I heard two sharp explosions in the ship. What they were I could not say. Then she suddenly took a top cant, her stern came well out of the water then...She took a heavy cant and her bow went down clear...Head down, and that is the time when I saw her lights go out, all her lights. The next thing I saw was her poop. As she went down like that so her poop righted itself and I thought to myself, ‘The poop is going to float.’ It could not have been more than two or three minutes after that that her poop went up as straight as anything; there was a sound like steady thunder as you hear on an ordinary night at a distance, and soon she disappeared from view."
Asked to explain some of this further, Symons said: "Her head was going well down...her stern was well out of the water...It righted itself without the bow; in my estimation she must have broken in half...I should think myself it was abaft the after expansion plate...I should say it would be about abeam of the after funnel, or a little forward...I saw the poop right itself...then it went up and disappeared from view."

 

[Bill Vanek]

Although many people described that the first thing that they noticed was the loud 'explosion' sound, and while others focused only on the first plunge, some people put the two together:

"There seemed to be a tremble run through the whole of the ship and the next thing we heard were loud reports inside which I think were the water-tight doors giving way and before you could say Jack Robinson there seemed to be mountains of water rushing through the doors, and I was swept away from where I was right against the collapsible boat, and I simply clung on for all I was worth; whilst all this was going on she was going under water..."

"Now, without warning, she seemed to start forward, moving forward and into the water at an angle of about 15 degrees. This movement, with the water rushing up toward us, was accompanied by a rumbling roar, mixed with more muffled explosions. It was like standing under a steel railway bridge while an express train passes overhead, mingled with the noise of a pressed steel factory and wholesale breakage of china."

"I stood on the deck, awaiting my fate, fearing to jump from the ship. Then came a grinding noise, followed by two others, and I was hurled into the deep. Great waves engulfed me."

"the boat's stern lifted in the air and there was a tremendous explosion"


The stern then bent downward...

"the boat's stern lifted in the air and there was a tremendous explosion. After this the Titanic dropped back again."

"We had been in the water about fifteen minutes when the first explosion occurred….The stern came down after the first explosion."


...and the bow went up.

"when suddenly her (the forward) nose, on which I was, seemed to suddenly rise from underneath the water and I and a few more that were close by cut the ropes that held the boat to the falls (davits)."

"Great waves engulfed me....I went down with the bows, but when she rebounded..."

"Then, with explosions, the ship seemed to break...and the forward end bounded up again for an instant."

"Before I had swam more than ten feet I felt the deck come up under me and I found [that] we were high and dry."

"I believe, just at that time, the stern broke...for the bow suddenly began to rise out of the water at least until two of her decks were out of the water again."

"The next thing I remember was the ship suddenly dipping, and the waves rushing up and engulfing me. After ten seconds the Titanic again righted herself..."

"The Titanic gave a lurch downward and we were in the water up to our hips. She rose again slightly, and I succeeded in cutting the second rope which held her stern. Another lurch threw this boat and myself off and away from the ship into the water."


All of that happened in the first 20-odd seconds of quicker sinking--before the funnels fell, before the lights went out, and before the ship made its Big Plunge (keeled over forward; took a heavy cant; made a strong list; went up on end; bow went down clear; turning on its nose like a duck; an angle of 60 degrees; down to the 4th funnel; stern 250 feet into the sky, etc., as some of the witnesses described the "majestic sight" of the Big Plunge).

The people's stories corroborate well with one another.

 

[Arun Vajpey]

Trying to collate several observers' viewpoints for an event like the break-up and final plunge of the Titanic can often lead to erroneous reconstructions because of variations in the parallax effect depending on vantage points. For instance, to a survivor in a lifeboat relatively close to and at a very acute angle to the sinking Titanic as seen from the rear, even a 11 or 12-degree trim can create an illusion of the stern rising very high, with the propellers and part of the keel exposed. By contrast, to someone in a lifeboat slightly further away but looking at the sinking ship in profile, even a 25-degree angle can seem 'moderate' to the mind's eye. That is why I feel that carefully considering just a few reliable and detailed statements might give a better picture in this instance rather then confuse the whole issue with too many.

Lookout Symons was in charge of Lifeboat #1 that was launched at about 01:05am and, for various reasons that we won't discuss here, did not go back to pick-up more passengers afterwards. Therefore, during the final plunge of the Titanic, Symons was very likely looking at the scene from a moderate distance and mostly in profile. Though his account might seem a bit rambling to some at first glance, IMO it is quite useful in trying to reconstruct what actually could have happened.

[Symons] I stood and watched it till I heard two sharp explosions in the ship. What they were I could not say. Then she suddenly took a top cant, her stern came well out of the water then...She took a heavy cant and her bow went down clear...Head down, and that is the time when I saw her lights go out, all her lights. The next thing I saw was her poop. As she went down like that so her poop righted itself and I thought to myself, ‘The poop is going to float.’ It could not have been more than two or three minutes after that that her poop went up as straight as anything; there was a sound like steady thunder as you hear on an ordinary night at a distance, and soon she disappeared from view."
Asked to explain some of this further, Symons said: "Her head was going well down...her stern was well out of the water...It righted itself without the bow; in my estimation she must have broken in half...I should think myself it was abaft the after expansion plate...I should say it would be about abeam of the after funnel, or a little forward...I saw the poop right itself...then it went up and disappeared from view."

I believe that Symons had seen the stern emerge from water initially gradually and then heard the "two sharp explosions" which must have been the deck plates being sheared apart. IMO, at that stage the Titanic was nominally still in one piece......

...She took a heavy cant and her bow went down clear...Head down......Her head was going well down...her stern was well out of the water...

Here I believe that Symons was describing the sudden lurch due to loss of longitudinal stability that created the 'wave' and also caused the sharp increase in angle of trim. The still (just) attached stern rose out of the water at a higher angle.....

It righted itself without the bow; in my estimation she must have broken in half...I should think myself it was abaft the after expansion plate...I should say it would be about abeam of the after funnel, or a little forward...I saw the poop right itself...

Here I believe Symons was describing the final catastrophic break and what he saw immediately afterwards. 'Head going well down' refers IMO to the flooded bow separating and sinking and 'it [the stern] righted itself without the bow' to the falling back of the stern immediately after it separated from the bow.

...then it went up and disappeared from view."

That was the now rapidly flooding stern section rising again while doing that rotation maneuver before sinking from view.