Indirect Steering System

[Samuel Halpern]

Hichens received the order, "Hard-astarboard" which means to put the ship's tiller to the right thereby turning the ship's head to the left. If you have ever sail in a boat with a tiller you would know that if you put the tiller to the right, the boat turns left.

With a boat equipped with a wheel, to put the tiller to the right (as shown above), you would have to turn the wheel counter-clockwise (from right to left).

The term to port around has to do with getting around an object that is ahead of you by having your vessel swing around it while keeping your tiller to port, thus swinging around the object turning to the right. To do that, you first have to go to the left, then swing around going to the right, then back to the left to go back on your original course. Yeh, it's a bit confusing.

By the way, the only person who said anything about Murdoch's intentions was 4/O Joseph Boxhall. Boxhall claimed that he heard Murdoch tell Smith what he was trying to do after Smith arrived on the bridge. The other two eyewitness as to what was said by Murdoch to Smith were QM Robert Hichens and QM Alfred Olliver. Neither of them said anything about Murdoch telling Smith what his intentions were. Both Hichens and Olliver said that Murdoch told Smith they they had hit an iceberg, and that Smith told him to close the WTDs, which Murdoch had already done.

 

[Georges Guay]

Samuel, Hawke and Olympic were proceeding in a «natural» channel at approx 15 knots and 19 knots respectively. The interaction between these vessels would’ve been quite the same if they would’ve proceeded in a «narrow» channel at approx 10 knots and 14 knots respectively. Furthermore, the interaction between them would’ve been in the same scale if they would’ve steamed in a «restricted» channel at approx 6 knots and 10 knots respectively. Everything is in proportion.

Natural channel: initiation of water restriction,
Narrow channel: intermediate water restriction mainly vertical (squat effect),
Restricted channel: severe horizontal and vertical water restriction (squat and bank effect). Ex. Ever Given in the Suez Canal.

Again, I don’t think that interaction in a «natural channel» could have generated such tremendous forces, which would cause an overtaken vessel to sheer up to 67°. When a collision happen during an overtaking maneuver, the vessels collide commonly in parallel and the damages are usually made of long and shallow dent scratches.

Captain Blunt shouted; «What are you doing with your helm? Port, hard aport !!!» for the reason that Hawke was turning so rapidly and sharply toward the Olympic that the only reason captain Blunt could come up with, was that her Edgar-class protected cruiser was responding to a wheel turned in the wrong direction.

Laing stated; «theory is one thing, practice is another», and I stand toward the practice…

 

[Samuel Halpern]

If there was a misinterpretation of a helm order on Hawke leading up to that collision, then there had to be a conspiracy to hide the truth by quite a large number of Hawke officers and bluejackets in the days that followed.

 

[Georges Guay]

Samuel, I think you are knowledgeable enough to know that the testimonies of these officers were full of libels and expertly aided by their lawyers to do so. We can’t take these testimonials at face value (for granted), but be cunning enough to interpret them. Even with VDR's smoking gun proofs, they are still lying (Schettino / Costa Concordia) ...

 

[Georges Guay]

Among hundreds of stories I could recount about the wheel being turned on the wrong side, here's two;

I am about to dock starboard alongside, a small 650ft general cargo vessel. I am standing on the starboard wing with the Old Man. The only control and indicator available on the wing is for the engine. The chief mate is standing inside the bridge, right beside the wheelsman and in front of the rudder indicator. The ship is dead over the ground on its inertia, all stop, pointing toward the upper dock a hundred feet away. The current is drifting gently the vessel toward the mooring station.

The leading linesman ashore shouted that they needed the vessel to be moored one ships length astern. Fine. I then ordered the rudder hard-a-port, the engine dead slow ahead, to bring the vessel parallel to the quay before letting her drift astern. Suddenly, the vessel sheers dangerously to starboard! I ordered the engine immediately to stop and stepped back to verify myself the rudder indicator; «the rudder is hard-a-starboard»!!! Rudder amidship and Full Astern I shouted loudly. We missed the concrete by 1/64th of an inch!

The pilot ordered the rudder hard-a-port, but neither the captain nor the chief mate standing right beside the wheelsman and in front of the rudder indicator made the least effort to make sure that the wheel was turned in the proper direction. From where I was standing on the upper corner of the bridge wing, it was just impossible for me to verify the rudder indicator. A blunder like that is common and nothing to worry about it!

Second story. I am downbound on board a similar rust bucket, in the most treacherous part of the narrow channel and at full harbor speed. I ordered a new course to starboard, but the wheelsman turned the wheel to port. I ordered him the wheel to starboard, but he responded by turning the wheel «hard over to port»! I jump off the master’s chair; I kind of pushed him away and turned the wheel myself to hard-a-starboard. I can assure you that the propeller was feet away to chop the bank. I had then no other choice but to steer myself through the next couple channel curves, until the vessel was steadied down on a straight leg and the wheelman stop shuddering. I never knew where the officer of the watch was standing or doing. Another common mistake that there’s nothing to report about!

In both cases, how could I prove that the wheel was turned in the wrong direction as there was no VDR in those years? There is no doubt that if an accident had happened, they would’ve ‘all’ try hard to blame me... ;-)

 

[Samuel Halpern]

Samuel, I think you are knowledgeable enough to know that the testimonies of these officers were full of libels and expertly aided by their lawyers to do so. We can’t take these testimonials at face value (for granted), but be cunning enough to interpret them. Even with VDR's smoking gun proofs, they are still lying (Schettino / Costa Concordia) ...

Sadly, I have to agree with you. In the Olympic/Hawke collision trial, the Olympic's officers, as I pointed out in The Sting of the Hawke, all told the same story that was so similar that President of the Court even remarked:

It was very apparent that Olympic's witness who were called to testify were well coached by the lawyers for the WSL.

Like I showed in the book, it was quite easy to prove that the claims made by Olympic's witnesses as to the positions and actions of Hawke after Olympic completed her turn around the W. Bramble buoy does not hold up to vigorous analysis. The court also came to the same conclusion. But to prove that Hawke's eyewitness purposely left out an important detail such as the wheel being turned the wrong way, is much harder to do. Usually, someone slips up somewhere in keeping a story straight.

The fun thing for me is that you have me looking over all the primary source evidence again, not only from the court trial, but also from the Admiralty hearings that took place in Portsmouth the day after the accident.

 

[Georges Guay]

Therefore, you should happily be to agree with me!

Normally, the tactical diameter is around 4LBP for a single prop vessel turning on a steady hard over rudder. For a double prop with a single rudder stuck in between, I would certainly vote for 5LBP at hard over. Was Hawke rudder even reached a hard over rudder? I don’t think so! Therefore, her turning circle must have been larger than 5LBP. If you calculate the distance off Hawke would’ve been on a 5+LBP at 67° or so, it is more than likely that within a natural channel, interaction was about negligible.

As a rule of thumb, we consider that interaction begins in a narrow channel when the distance between vessels are close to their beam summation, when they steam at over 10 knots and at a relative speed difference of more than 4 knots when they overtake. That distance varies as well upon their block coefficient Cb; the lower the Cb the closer you can get before being trapped in interaction.

Further than their distances off, both vessels had low Cb and were steaming fast but in a natural channel where compressed water had all the room needed to expand…

 

[Samuel Halpern]

>>Therefore, you should happily be to agree with me! <<

Not so fast.

Anyway, FYI:
Hawke's tactical diameter was 1764 ft. To turn about 67° and then strike, the separation between vessels would be about 580 ft, or close to 1 cable. Also, Olympic's block coefficient was 0.684.

I'll also PM you with an interesting article written by an E S Bellasis in Dec1911 that I found in early 2022.

 

[Georges Guay]

Samuel, the E S Bellasis thesis dated Dec1911 is an early interesting tentative steps to understand and describe ships interaction. But by today’s standard, the least that I can say is that it is rather outdated!

By 21st Century principles, these two low Cb vessels steaming into The Solent open water natural channel while being separated by say a cable off, the Venturi/Bernouilli hydrodynamic effect would have all the horizontal and vertical water room as well as low coastal slope needed to dissipate, and would therefore induced tiny if not zilch ship’s interaction effects. They were steaming very far from a narrow channel or a submarine cliff that could have engendered a bank effect sheer to port, and their distance from each other was like 4 times greater than the one who would affect them. At a shorter distance, Hawke would simply not have the space required to make a 67° turn.

Do you know what Hawke officers might have probably been doing instead of watching the steersman or the rudder indicator? They were sightseeing the WSL Marvel coming up full on their port quarter under intrepid Bowyer conning. But that must be a fabrication since it could never had happened to royal navy men in uniform, isn’t it! By experience, when you pilot a vessel of any type during a cruise ship meeting in a narrow channel, nobody is watching anything else than love boat. I can understand their dream when they have been captive for months!

Hawke rudder was most probably mistakenly turned to port, corrected to starboard following Blunt astonishment, before jamming. The vessel turning lever inertia to port could just not be overcome by a mere rudder jammed at 15° to starboard. If the vessels had collided bodily or parallel, I could consider. But at an angle of some 67°, sorry but no chance!

 

[Samuel Halpern]

Interesting premise Georges. What do you think about the helmsman being detracted by this massive vessel suddenly appearing off to port that he unknowingly started to turn his wheel in the direction that he was looking at thus causing his ship's head to turn toward this looming vessel?

 

[Georges Guay]

Samuel, please read back post #20. What do think about the wheelsman that turned the wheel erroneously toward the quay while being supervised by the chief mate! What about the other wheelsman that turned the wheel wrongly to port and even after being verbally corrected; he turned the wheel even further to port! Wheel orders being answered back the wrong way around is a common concern among pilots. I even had to take the wheel myself a few times or fired off a few cerebral ones out of the wheel!

I am working on the Titanic – New York affair. The question I’m asking to myself is; “How on earth could Titanic be steaming at 10 knots during that critical manoeuvring phase and if she was not, how could she sucked a 17,000 tons displacement moored vessel and snapped her line like the crack of a gun?”

 

[Samuel Halpern]

I am working on the Titanic – New York affair.

Good luck. I'd be most interested in what you find.

 

[Georges Guay]

While searching on the subject of ships interaction, I found that interesting photo. We see an aircraft carrier being replenished with fuel by a tanker. They are fairly large vessels, proceeding at rather a high speed and at short distance. Interaction between these vessels should’ve been tremendous, no? I wonder how they could maintain their distance without running into each other and if they did, how would then be possible to do so against an angle of 67°?

Like I mentioned previously, interaction becomes noticeable during an overtaking maneuver when the separation distance is less than the ships respective beams additions. On the contrary of deep sea water where interaction effect has all the room to dissipate, that same distance could only be kept in a narrow channel at slow speed as the adverse effect is naturally amplified by the confined waters. In either case, a collision would obviously happen bodily or parallel, and damages limited to scratches or shallow dents.

The location of Hawke-Olympic collision happened in a wide buoyed natural channel surrounded by deep water where adverse interaction effect had all the room needed to dissipate. Unless these vessels were proceeding at very close proximity, interaction effect was negligible and a collision at large angle was just not possible. Thousands of vessels completed nearby overtaking maneuvers in that area without any problems. Consequently, the only contributing factor for that collision I can come up with is that Hawke made a steering mistake, had a steering gear malfunction or both.

Titanic-New York occurrence is a completely different matter. Coming soon …