Ice Bound Theory

[James Tennant]

This is the grounding theory on steroids.

The newly found hull pieces are intact except for a slight downward deformation. This deformation could have been caused by pressure on the hull as Titanic plowed through the underwater ice of the iceberg. In order to remain intact however, the hull must now sheer in three places.

Suppose the Titanic is plowing its way through the underwater ice with its bilge keel cutting nice grooves. Just as it is about to clear the ice, the propeller shafts and rudder hit the underwater ice and pry up on the hull. At this point the Titanic wedges into the ice (at B,C,D below)and breaks off the underwater portion of the iceberg. (This is the 'shudder' or 'lurch' felt by all on board.) The prop shafts are bent upward and outward by this collision.

A....................B...C...D.......E

With B,C,D firmly pinned in the ice - AB filling with water sheers at B resulting in the flooding in the boiler room above the sheer. The bow is now only connected to the stern by the side plates and decks above the sheer.

As the bow fills with water B,C,D becomes a fulcrum. The whole ship and the underwater ice it's pinned in rotates. The stern becomes the short end of the fulcrum and is leveraged into a steep angle by the area of hull pinned in and supported by the ice. This angle becomes too severe for the hull and it sheers at point D.

The only things holding the Titanic together at this point are the decks above B,C,D. This area (although now rotated downward)is still supported by the underwater ice.

With only the decks supporting the bows weight as it rotates downward at point B, it causes the extreme downward bending of the decks at the rear now seen underwater. The area B,C is being torn to pieces.

At this point the stress joint tears downward splitting the Titanic and the underwater ice at point C. The stern, which had been pulled underwater by the rotation of the fulcrum and weight of the bow, pops back up and settles in the water.

The area C,D is now the only area supported by the underwater ice. The underwater ice has now been shattered and the stern - no longer attached to the double hull pinned in the ice - pulls this area apart and sinks. It is probable that during the rotation above the ice and its subsequent splitting apart, a great deal of ice entered the stern's open areas. As the stern sank parts of the hull containing air imploded, however, the ice in these compartments crushed at a different rate and thus the stern sits severely deformed on the bottom.

The underwater ice with the double hull pieces still pinned inside drifts South and East until the weight of the metal capsizes the ice and the hull sections fall - upside down - to the ocean floor a great distance from the wreck site.

Could being ice bound have kept the Titanic from listing and rolling over? Did the buoyancy of the ice actually slow the sinking? It would be ironic if the iceberg the Titanic hit actually was responsible for allowing more time than she should have had to save the passengers.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>Suppose the Titanic is plowing its way through the underwater ice with its bilge keel cutting nice grooves.<<

The problem with that is that the sections of bilge keel which have been observed show no evidence of any such damage.

>>The prop shafts are bent upward and outward by this collision.<<

If that was the case, the ship would not have been able to make way after the accident. The fact is that she did.

In point of fact, the Titanic was not ice bound at any point. At least not in the sense that you appear to think it is. She kept on going without even breaking stride.

 

[James Tennant]

Thanks Mike,

Ok, I pictured the bilge keel as doing a sled runner type deal through the ice not banging side to side. Other than maybe some paint removal there wouldn't have been much damage.

The prop shafts may have been knocked out of alignment but they would have still worked. I understand that the ship went to 'Stop' after the collision and was only underway for 2 to 10 minutes after that. I can find no reason why she started again except rumors that Ismay instigated it and no reason for the second 'Stop' other than moving a damaged ship is not usually a good idea. Not being able to go forward wasn't their big concern and none of the engineers lived to tell of shaft vibrations.

Ice bound was not meant to imply she was stopped by the ice. Only that the ice was locked onto the double hull. If this wasn't the case. Why is the newly found section of double hull bowed downward? It would take enormous pressure from 'both' sides to bow the double hull - where did this pressure come from - if not the ice?

How did the double hull get so far from the wreck and why is it upside down if it wasn't locked in ice and drifted there?

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>The prop shafts may have been knocked out of alignment but they would have still worked.<<

Not bent up the way you described it they wouldn't.

>>Not being able to go forward wasn't their big concern and none of the engineers lived to tell of shaft vibrations.<<

Dillon and Scott would be most amused to hear that. They were in the engine room, they survived, and they made no mention whatever of any shaft vibrations.

You can read their testimony at http://www.titanicinquiry.org/BOTInq/BOTInq05Dillon01.php for Dillon and http://www.titanicinquiry.org/BOTInq/BOTInq06Scott01.php for Scott.

>>where did this pressure come from - if not the ice?<<

The bending moment on the hull. As the bow tips down and the stern rises out of the water, the stern is less and less supported by the water and this imposes enormous bending loads on the steel.

>>How did the double hull get so far from the wreck and why is it upside down if it wasn't locked in ice and drifted there?<<

After breaking away from the hull, they would have drifted along with any prevailing currents as they fluttered on down. That they landed upside down I would attribute to no more then random chance. To do as you suggest, the sections would have to have been torn away from the hull from the start and the people in the boiler rooms in the effected areas would have noticed that from the gitgo. In point of fact, the after boiler rooms remained intact and dry until very late in the sinking.

 

[James Tennant]

Great testimony! Were these guys on the same ship? All they seem to know is that the order to Stop came and then either a Forward Slow or an Astern Slow or perhaps both before a final Stop was ordered. Neither agrees with the time going forward or astern. These engine room guys only knew that the engines were running and the shafts were turning. I see no testimony as to the speed obtained from these actions during the 2 or 10 minutes in whatever direction.

Some believe that Murdock gave the Stop order knowing he was going to hit the iceberg and didn't want to damage the props on the underwater ice. In the Ice Bound Theory this was the correct action to take because the shafts, rudder and props eventually hit the underwater ice.

Perhaps the present underwater condition of the prop shafts shows they weren't working but I read this was due to the impact on the ocean floor. Perhaps the initial deflection was much smaller and thus didn't interfere with their operation or the Slow speed settings didn't spin the shafts fast enough to set up any vibrations.

>>The bending moment on the hull. As the bow tips down and the stern rises out of the water, the stern is less and less supported by the water and this imposes enormous bending loads on the steel.<<

The Ice Bound Theory clearly states that the sections of double hull we're talking about were 'intact!' Not stressed - not bended, neither compressed or stretched. Bending wouldn't account for the lateral stress needed to bow the bottom 'downward.' Bending would generate bending and compressing of the bottom 'inward/upward.'

>>To do as you suggest, the sections would have to have been torn away from the hull from the start<<

They couldn't tear away because they were locked in the ice with the Titanic. The Titanic actually tore away from them as the bow and stern sank away from both ends of the ice. The ice actually added to the buoyancy of the stern and helped keep it 'dry' until it finally tore away from the double hull.

Your main thought seems to be that the Titanic could not move after it became stuck in the ice. While the ice would have slowed the Titanic down (if it had ever tried to get up to any significant speed), ice is capable of being pushed or shoved or towed if necessary. I believe there was once a plan to tow or push icebergs using tugboats to harvest the fresh water. Tugboats shove immense ships around quite easily. This is a moot point however, as the Titanic never made serious headway in any direction after the collision. (Actually being stuck in the ice may be why it didn't!)

>>drifted along with any prevailing currents as they fluttered on down. That they landed upside down I would attribute to no more then random chance.<<

I'm not sure of the weight of the double hull pieces but drifting isn't one of the descriptions that come to mind. The chance that two drifting pieces both end up upside down and next to each other instead of drifting apart or being right side up - my last job was Research Analyst and the statistics for this happening are not something I'd bet on! (Using a dice analogy - this would be close to rolling snake eyes!)

 

[Samuel Halpern]

It is so much fun coming up with theories like this. But Michael did a fine job in my opinion in summarizing why this particular theory is highly unlikely. Knowing a little about the construction of the prop shafts, a little bending out of shape would have rendered them all but useless. In addition the rudder would have been likely damaged as well, not to mention prop blades being stripped off, thus precluding the turn to starboard that was observed following the initial impact. Despite engine orders being given before initial ice contact, the props did not come to an initial stop until a minute or two afterward. You can verify that by several other accounts besides the two men that Michael referred to.

As far as moving the ship again following the initial collision, there is no evidence that Ismay had anything to do with it. He probably didn't know anything about it. The engines moving forward following the collision was mentioned by the two folks Michael mentioned, and the order given for that was seen by Olliver on the bridge. The reason is highly speculative, but the most likely reason I believe is to get the ship away from some nearby ice as they prepared to launch the boats. If Beesley's account is accurate, he notice that slow movement just before going off the boat deck when he also noticed an officer starting to uncover boat 16. They were not trying to make Halifax.

The best analogy I could think off for the way the double bottom pieces fell away from the rest of the ship is a leaf falling from a tree. Even on an extremely calm day, that leaf doesn't end up directly below the point it broke off from. And it is likely that both of those pieces were still somewhat attached to each other for most of the fluttering flight down to the sea bed.

 

[David G. Brown]

Sam is correct that coming up with wild-eyed new theories is fun. And, sometimes illuminating even when the ideas are shown for their real value. New ideas don't spring from old thinking. Still, I can't see how this particular theory fits into what we know or even what might be encompassed by what we know.

I do think that Ismay was well aware of the ship re-starting its engines. What he knew about that incident...or what he had to do with it...is unknowable. However, his appearance on the bridge seems to have come in time for him to have had some input in the re-start decision.

As to Halifax...well, uncovering lifeboats and trying to make Halifax would not have had anything to do each other. The first and automatic response to discovering damage to the ship is to prepare the lifesaving apparatus. That comes first, even if you plan on some sort of self-rescue attempt like steaming to Halifax. Removal of the covers only indicates Captain Smith's prudence in regard to having his lifeboats ready if they were needed.

Let us assume for a moment that Titanic was only slightly damaged and did, in fact, make Halifax and discharge everyone safely. My bet is that the whole way Smith would have kept his boats uncovered and swung out. He may even have lowered them to embarkation level and kept crew stationed ready to assist loading.

Let me assure you, as a captain I have had my passengers don their lifevests under conditions where danger existed, even though I was rather certain we would make in without incident. Prudence rules.

Back to restarting the engines. Captain Smith's other actions that night were rather prudent and, in some cases, rather modern in thought. Why would he have restarted Titanic before going on his inspection? The only possible agent to cause Smith to restart before inspecting was the appearance of Ismay on the bridge. I remain highly suspicious of that meeting.

-- David G. Brown

 

[James Tennant]

The plausibility of the theory does not depend on damage or lack thereof to the props or rudder or even subsequent movement of the ship. If the timing of the astern movement is correctly placed after the collision as in the testimony,they could have been trying to back away from the ice to prevent such damage.

The testimony also interestingly brought out a slight list to the port side. The underwater ice would be thicker on the starboard side and the buoyancy would roll the ship slightly to port. Another confirmation she was ice bound.

Gentlemen - please! If over 50 feet of the bottom hull 'fluttered' away - half a dozen boilers and such would have landed on top of it as the insides spilled out. There is no debris field at all around the sections of double hull nor is there a trail from these sections to the wreck site (which by the way is opposite the direction of the current so said current would have carried any other debris with it too!)

I didn't think this would be a popular theory. Ever since I saw the 'Night to Remember' as a kid I have wondered about the iceberg. I have never believed that such a large ship could hit an iceberg and not have the iceberg damaged.

I have read almost all of the theories proposed -'wild-eyed' - or not, and none address the condition of the iceberg after it was struck. All the theories I read are designed to assume the collision was a glancing blow and the iceberg and Titanic went on their merry way. Almost all these theories cause discussions as to why and how the ship sank. All these numerous theories seem to be needed because things didn't happen the way 'intelligent' or 'wild-eyed' people seemed to think they should.

This theory was presented - as are all theories -to attempt to answer unexplained facts. Does this theory explain why the rear of the bow is deformed downward - yes. Does it explain why the center section above the lost double hull was shredded - yes. Does it explain why the stern came back up and settled before it sank - yes. Does it explain why the stern is deformed as it sits - yes. Does it explain how the double hull got where it is - yes.

I know it's not pleasant to think the Titanic was being bent over a large chunk of ice and obviously hard for me to explain it. But being the 'wild eyed' Research Analyst I am, I think it would be nice if someone said the theory was impossible because 'steel don't bend that way' or ice can't grab a ship (icebreakers excepted.)

I'm prejudiced here of course but I believe the Ice Bound Theory explains a lot about what actually happened. In the future could someone find an exploded boiler and say the double hull was blown off - sure! In the meantime, a theory that explains a lot of what happened should at least be considered and possibly de-bunked based on its merits! So as David puts it >>"new theories is fun. And, sometimes illuminating"<<

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>The plausibility of the theory does not depend on damage or lack thereof to the props or rudder or even subsequent movement of the ship.<<

Actually, it is. With the props damaged as you described, the movement which took place simply could not have happened.

In your initial post, you stated:

quote:

The underwater ice has now been shattered and the stern - no longer attached to the double hull pinned in the ice - pulls this area apart and sinks.

There's just no way that any sections of double bottom remained with the berg after the accident much less tore away from the start. Take a look at the photos. The sections show the tank top intact, and these are deckplates which any of the people in the boiler room affected could easily see by looking down through the grating. Tearing this away would have resulted in immidiate ingress of water into that part of the hull which would scarcely have been missed by anybody.

The fact is that the affected boiler room remained dry and intact until the floodwaters came in from elsewhere and inundated the space.​

 

[James Tennant]

The original premise of the Ice Bound Theory was that the Titanic was traveling on or through the underwater ice and at some point became wedged. My first assumption was that the prop shafts and rudder extended far enough down to contact the underwater ice. >>propeller shafts and rudder hit the underwater ice and pry up<<>>The prop shafts are bent upward and outward by this collision<< Poor choice of words - Deflected up - would have been better. Also I was referring to the housing around the prop shafts not the shafts themselves. I'm not used to the technical level you use here but I'm learning - fast! Prying up with a crowbar doesn't mean the crowbar was permanently bent but there may have been deflection. I don't think it's relevant because it was an assumption made on the Titanic's distance into the underwater ice. Even if this collision never happened the wedging into the ice would have.

>>the Titanic wedges into the ice (at B,C,D below)and breaks off the underwater portion of the iceberg<<

The double bottom hull is not left in the iceberg. It is not torn from the Titanic on impact. It is still attached to the Titanic until well into the sinking. It is the underwater ice that becomes attached to the Titanic.

Why is there always the 'impregnable' iceberg assumption? A 45,000 ton sharp piece of metal moving at 25 mph hits a fragment of a glacier - a glacier filled with cracks and crevices to start with - and this 'fragile' ice - soon to fall apart into an 'ice field' - doesn't move? It doesn't crack or split? There was no underwater ice shelf around this iceberg -as there usually is - and only the tip was hit?

I'm afraid mass and velocity do exist. If there was underwater ice, the Titanic had to hit it. The visible part of the iceberg is usually at its center. Ice fell on the Titanic's deck from this visible ice. The chance she hit the above water ice and missed the larger underwater part is - nil.

The question this theory raises is - What effect did the Titanic have on this underwater ice? Did it plow on through? Did it become wedged? Or as many here seem to believe - it did no damage to the ice and just kept going.

>>and breaks off the underwater portion of the iceberg<<

The mass and velocity of the Titanic could easily overcome the tensile strength of the ice and the part of the iceberg the Titanic is wedged in breaks off and continues on with the ship. This is quite simple physics. The double hull - with the ice attached - is still in one piece and the Titanic and the ice are moving forward at the same speed.

How far and how fast can the Titanic drag the ice? We won't ever know because within 10 minutes she stopped her engines permanently.

Only the weight of the bow taking water breaks the double hull - still in the ice so it doesn't tear - it sheers! When the expansion joint fails, the hull and the ice it's in both sheer. The stern sheers the double hull when it's lifted out of the water. Both the bow and stern sink leaving the double hull still encased in the ice. The double hull pieces never leave the Titanic - the Titanic leaves them! Nothing falls through the hull gap because there is solid ice beneath the double bottom well past when the bow and stern sink. Hence no debris field around the double hull pieces or trail of debris to them.

I fear that so much emphasis is placed by this board on the inside of the Titanic as she sinks that no outside forces are even considered. Everything must be explained by what the people and things on the Titanic did. Unfortunately all the previous theories using these devices don't explain several things that actually happened. I must sound heretical when I say that the Titanic was held up by a hunk of ice that eventually broke her in two. This means that the iceberg that sank her kept her afloat without a major list and slowed her sinking rate but that same buoyancy eventually crushed her bow and tore her stern apart. The ice obeyed simple physics and floated. The Titanic obeyed Archimedes' calculations and sank. Unfortunately the ice was under the Titanic at this time and she lost this elementary scientific battle!

"When you eliminate the impossible, whatever is left - however improbable - is what happened" -Sherlock Holmes

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>The original premise of the Ice Bound Theory was that the Titanic was traveling on or through the underwater ice and at some point became wedged.<<

But they didn't become wedged. Not in the sense you appear to understand. She may well have cut a groove in the ice but this was a continuous event where the ship didn't break stride. to do as you describe would inflict way more damage on the hull then can be shown to have happened.

>>Poor choice of words - Deflected up - would have been better. Also I was referring to the housing around the prop shafts not the shafts themselves.<<

But they were not deflected up. And you can't defelect the housings/wings/bossings up in the way that you suppose and still have a ship capable of moving under her own power, because the shafts would go right up with them.

>>The double bottom hull is not left in the iceberg. It is not torn from the Titanic on impact. It is still attached to the Titanic until well into the sinking. It is the underwater ice that becomes attached to the Titanic.<<

The problem with that is that the double bottom shows absolutely zero evidence of any such contact.

>>Why is there always the 'impregnable' iceberg assumption?<<

You need to take more time to get to know some of us because we're not making any such assumption. Ice at it's hardest has only 10% of the tinsile strength of steel. We know that much and understand it's implications.

>>The double hull - with the ice attached - is still in one piece and the Titanic and the ice are moving forward at the same speed.<<

Attached how? How would it continue to cling to the hull?

>>How far and how fast can the Titanic drag the ice? We won't ever know because within 10 minutes she stopped her engines permanently.<<

That assumes that she dragged the ice. There is no physical evidence that she did any such thing.

>>Only the weight of the bow taking water breaks the double hull <<

No it does not. The bow is, for all practical intents and purposes, weightless once it's immersed. This may sound outrageous but bear with me.

The structure of a ship gets a signifigant amount of support along her length from the water she's afloat in. If you've seen photos of ships in drydock, you'll notice that blocks are placed at extremely short intervals along the length of her keel and along side that even to the point of being made to conform to her curves by the turn of the bilge. You may also have noticed that with some older vessels, there were supports wedged in along the side of the drydock to support the side of the vessel. The reason for all of that is to brace up the hull in the absence of the very medium that would be doing the job, namely that water itself.

In Titanic's case, it's not the bow being weighted down which is imposing the literally back breaking bending loads on the keel, it's the unsupported length of the ship which is being lifted out of the water which is doing that.

>>I fear that so much emphasis is placed by this board on the inside of the Titanic as she sinks that no outside forces are even considered. <<

Again, you need to take more time to get to know us and read what we've written. Among us "techies" outside as well as inside forces are foremost on our minds.

>>"When you eliminate the impossible, whatever is left - however improbable - is what happened" -Sherlock Holmes<<

An interesting if misleading half truth there. One that assumes all the possibilities are known, and that if the others can't be supported that your's is the de facto choice.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

quote:

That assumes that she dragged the ice. There is no physical evidence that she did any such thing.

Not only no physical evidence for that but no eyewitness descriptions that would support that assumption either.

Again, nice summary Michael. The one thing I would say however is the submerged bow section was not exactly weightless, but it's submerged weight full of water would have been quite a bit less than its empty weight on dry land. But the point you were getting at is correct.​

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>The one thing I would say however is the submerged bow section was not exactly weightless,<<

That's why I said "for all practical intents and purposes." Obviously, it's not weightless, but the dynamic at work was the massively heavy portion of the ship supported by nothing other then air that was lifted up when the bow was submerged.

Perhaps you can expand on what I wrote from an engineering perspective and cover some of the ground I missed.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

I think you did a fine enough job Michael without having to get into the nitty gritty and sometimes boring engineering details. Just wanted to make sure that somebody didn't misinterpret what you were saying. Have good weekend. I'm off to hear a lecture by Charlie Haas in northern NJ. Bye.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

>>I think you did a fine enough job Michael without having to get into the nitty gritty and sometimes boring engineering details.<<

Perhaps when you have the chance, some of your fine drawings and diagrams can help things out.

>>I'm off to hear a lecture by Charlie Haas in northern NJ. Bye.<<

Way cool. Have a good time!