"The iceberg risk in the Titanic year of 1912: Was it exceptional?"

Adam, there is no mention about how long the red "paint" is running along the iceberg. So I do not know how you came to the conclusion that it is all along the waterline. Also how do you know that if this one is the iceberg it is showing exactly the side with which the ship collide? It does not look like the "sailing ship" as described by Rowe.

This was photographed on the actual wreck position (where the wreck is actually) so there is no way that it stay there for 2 day in position only to be photographed.

Also I would like to see any real PROOF which speaks about red paint. All I have seen up today is that this claim came from ANTR together with the wrong date that it was photographed on April 15 in the morning. The ships log books show that they met the first ice on April 16. And if it was on April 15 in the same area why was there no reports about lifeboats, wreckage, Carpathia etc.?

I think this iceberg photo is again one of the legends build up by ANTR which is taken as the truth.
 
how do you know that was the same berg that Titanic struck? Do you know that for certain Jim? Titanic did not come to an immediate stop when she struck the berg.About 5 minutes later she was still making about 4 to 6 knots according to Lightoller

I don't know anything 'for certain' Sam. I'm simply applying common sense which tells me/ us:

A: That the iceberg which sank Titanic had to be close-by to the south-east of where Boxhall and the survivors in boat 2 were located as dawn broke.
B: That Carpathia approached boat 4 from a southeasterly direction
C. That although Titanic did not come to a shuddering halt when she hit the iceberg, she turned at full speed to the southward while her engines were stopping
C: That a large ship such as Titanic being handled in the way she was being handled, would not have moved much more than 3/4 of a mile in an arc of 180 degrees ahead and to the north or south of where she started her turn before she came to a final halt.
D: That because of C, Titanic could not have sunk much more than 3/4 mile from the iceberg she hit.

As to your analysis of the evidence of Lightholler; 5 minutes? Look again Sam. While doing so, compare it with the evidence of Trimmer Dillon in the engine room. I remind you....

"Mr. LIGHTOLLER :previous to that I had seen him [Capt. Smith] on the bridge....About three minutes after the impact.
And ....
" I lay there for a few moments, it might have been a few minutes, and then feeling the engines had stopped I got up......- I could not exactly say what the engines were doing after once I got up. It was when I was lying still in my bunk I could feel the engines were stopped..... I then walked across to the [port]side, and saw the ship had slowed down, that is to say, was proceeding slowly through the water.(She was proceeding slowly, a matter of perhaps six knots or ....four to six knots....something like that. I did not stay there long...After looking over the [port]side and seeing the bridge I went back to the quarters and crossed over to the starboard side. I looked out of the starboard door and I could see the Commander standing on the bridge in just the same manner as I had seen Mr. Murdoch, just the outline; I could not see which was which in the dark. I did not go out on the deck again on the starboard side. It was pretty cold and I went back to my bunk and turned in.

Now for Trimmer Dillon:

" They [engines]stopped..... About a minute and a half[ after you felt the shock].
About half a minute.[after they stopped]..They went slow astern..for...About two minutes.
they stop again?..- Yes.
They went ahead again....- For about two minutes....Then they stop the boat after that?..- Yes."


Now compare the two Sam.

Lightoller got out of his bunk when he knew the engines had stopped. According to Dillon that was a minute and a half after impact. It is perfectly feasible that half a minute later Lightoller would be looking over the side. That would be 2 minutes after impact. At that time and thought the ship was making between 4 to 6 knots. She would be slowing rapidly.
According to Dillon, 4 minutes after impact the engines were stopped once again after running astern for 2 minutes. This tells us that all forward motion of Titanic had stopped. It is confirmed by the next and last brief engine movement which was Slow Ahead.

Another part of Lightoller's evidence tells a professional that something specific was going on at that time. There would be but one reason why Smith was on one bridge wing and Murdoch was on the other... they were on the lookout for something while the ship was turning. But remember; she was also stopping Sam!
By the same token, the evidence of Dillon tells us that the Captain was bringing his ship to a complete standstill... hence the brief uses of engine power astern then ahead then STOP for the final time. In layman's terms, the position of that ship was being adjusted slightly - more or less - on the same spot by use of her engines. It confirms my belief that if the iceberg was 3/4 of a mile astern of her, it was more or less 3/4 a mile astern of her when she finally stopped and eventually sank.
As to the use of the engines...don't take my word for it Sam or the word of the witnesses. Ask Charlie Weeks or any other professional who has done exactly the same thing on many occasions.


If the berg Titanic struck was only 25-30 ft high, then how do you explain how ice could have been deposited into the forward well deck as so any reported? Why do you choose to ignore the evidence of Lee, Olliver, Crawford and Omont [who was in the Café Parisien]? A height of 25-30 ft would not have even reached C deck.

I don't ignore any evidence Sam; I just do not jump to conclusions. Rather, I prefer to examine all possibilities and hopefully sort the 'wheat from the chaff'.

The evidence of iceberg height came from two sources..

A: Those on board Titanic who used reference points of known height above sea level.
B: Those who did not have the benefit of reference points with known heights above sea level.

Only one person in group A... Boxhall... gave a height of under 70 feet. he said about 30 feet. He was also using a reference point... the aft ell-deck side rail which was 30 feet above sea level. However, when he was making his reference, the iceberg was probably just within sight and well astern (1/5 miles?) of the ship. I'm sure that you would be able to work out just how far away 70 feet high iceberg was from an individual with a height of eye of 75 feet if the iceberg seemed to him to be 30 feet above sea level?

Captain Rostron on Carpathia was also at a disadvantage since he too had no way of knowing the height of an iceberg unless it was alongside his ship.

I firmly believe that the berg seen by Rostron was the culprit and challenge all the other fanciful stories about Gibraltar giants and paint streaks. I do so for three simple reasons Sam. The berg seen by Rostron

1. Was in the right place; the place where evidence suggests it should have been.

2. Was not an enormous Arctic giant but appeared small to him... "about the size of two tables"?

3, There was not another Gibraltar-shaped giant or any other suitable berg in the immediate vicinity which might have been an alternative candidate.

Jim C.
 
Ioannis,

I shall have to search around as i'm sure I have seen more detailed photographs of the iceberg with the red paint, and it is described as a streak running parallel to the waterline - it probably would have extended below the waterline as well. If it was not a continuous streak, wouldn't it make sense that it was because the ship had broken chunks of ice off when it struck? We know that it was the case that the collision caused massive chunks of ice to break off, some of which fell onto the decks of the ship.

Are you saying that the position of the iceberg with the red paint was exactly over the point where Titanic lies today? If so, i've never heard of that and wouldn't place much faith in it either. Icebergs travel very slowly. Indeed the one the Titanic struck had been on the move for a considerable period of time. It would not have moved far at all in the space of two days, if the positions of the ships were out even by a couple of kilometres then it could easily be the same iceberg.

Cheers,
Adam.
 
Jim,

You are obviously entitled to your opinion. As for me, I'll take the word of Lee, Olliver, Crawford and Omont as for the height of the berg as they saw it from relatively close by, rather than Boxhall who was not even sure about seeing it. Oh, I'd also add the word of Rowe to that list. He was standing out on the poop and he thought that the berg was 100 ft.

Adam,

As far as that red paint business, the damage to the ship was about 25 ft below the waterline, so how does that produce a red steak on the side of the berg that appears above the waterline? And how would paint be scraped off by ice which is anything but abrasive?
 
The eyewitness accounts are fairly consistent about the berg being just a bit taller than the boat deck. That would be a huge chunk o' ice if it plopped down in your front yard, but is not a huge iceberg. Even so, it was big enough.

My experience with bottom paint of the 1950s is that it was relatively soft and likely to brush off on contact. In fact, all old-fashioned oil based paints were fairly soft coatings compared to what we use today. This was especially true of many exterior paints. House paint was deliberately designed to "chalk" so that a fresh layer of white pigment would be exposed by each passing rainstorm. But, you could get a white "kiss" of paint on your clothes if you brushed to hard against a house in the 1940s and 50s. (Done it!) So, I find it completely possible that grinding over ice could cause some of that old-fashioned paint to come off and stain the berg.

As far as the stain being along the waterline of the berg, that's one of those improbable possibilities. As Sam pointed out, any paint smear would have been laid down well below the waterline of the berg. Of course, it is possible that ice tipped or rolled enough to expose the stain. It is possible even if it's not probable that the exposed color would happen to wind up just on the berg's waterline.

-- David G. Brown
 
Sam,

Why does the red streak of paint need to be exactly where the damage was sustained? Let's remember that the ship was damaged over a considerable length. It's well known that the vast majority of icebergs are underwater, so why is it unreasonable to suggest that the waterline of the Titanic made enough contact with the iceberg to rub off some of the paint whereas the fatal damage was caused by larger outcrops of the iceberg which were hidden underwater?

For the record, I have no real opinion either way as to how the paint came to be there or whether it is genuine, but I see no reason why it can't be and don't know why some people find it so difficult to believe - when two objects collide, especially two objects like a ship and an iceberg, there is bound to be physical evidence of it.

David,

Good and interesting post, i'm in agreement with you.

Cheers,
Adam.
 
Adam,

Ice is ice. I agree that the berg was physically damaged as well as the ship, but I questioned whether ice is even capable of scraping off bottom paint from a vessel and then have that paint adhere to the remaining part of the berg itself. I do know for a fact that ice itself has very low coefficient of friction, and that the damage sustained by the ship was caused by the tremendous pressure between the two during the time of contact causing riveted seams to open up. But even if paint somehow came off the ship during the contact, why then would it adhere to the berg? If that is at all possible, then it should be easy to show by simple experiment.

As far as part of the iceberg rubbing up against the ship's side at the waterline, that certainly is possible especially since it was reported that some small amounts of ice came in through a number of open portholes down on F deck I believe. But above the waterline the paint was black not red. What rubbing occurred above the waterline did not produce visible damage to the side of the vessel there; at least nothing that can be seen on the bow section of the wreck.

I happen to agree with Ioannis that the berg photographed from Bremin was a more likely candidate. It also matches well with eyewitness descriptions of what the berg looked like, and was seen within a few miles of an area that included pieces of wreckage and bodies of more than a hundred victims floating on the water.
 
I have sailed through ice, and their colors varied, even within the same ice field. I don't remember seeing red, but certainly various shades of white, blue, green, and gray.
 
What I am still missing is any proof that it was red paint. All I have seen is the mention that it "looks like" and "might be" red paint and only going back as the 1950s with the publication of the book ANTR.

Let us say for a moment it was red paint. How does anybody know that it was from Titanic? In the days before the sinking several ships had encounter with the ice and got damaged, so it might have been from another ship.

However this iceberg was photographed on April 16 in the area of the wreck (the actual wreck and not the CQD position) so no way this is THE iceberg.
 
Sam:

As you say, it would be interesting to test just how much paint could be left on an iceberg in the event of such a collision. Somebody may test it one day, if they have not done so already. However, what I will say is that the iceberg was a very solid object, as was the Titanic - when they collided, there must be some physical evidence of that, and if it is in the form of a red streak of paint just above the waterline of the iceberg, then surely it must be more than just a strange coincidence.

There were reports of ice around a few parts of the ship, on deck especially. This just goes to show how rough the impact must have been, and the size of the iceberg relative to the Titanic.

The photographed iceberg from the Bremen might well be the more likely candidate, i'm not fussy about which one it was. Only that there must have been some evidence of the collision left behind apart from the Titanic being at the bottom of the ocean.

Doug:

Hobart, the capital city of my home state, Tasmania, hosts the headquarters for the Antartic exploration groups. As I said previously, we get to see plenty of ice. And i've never come across a red iceberg.

Ioannis:

Well it is made more difficult by the fact that the photographs are of poor quality, so that makes it difficult to make anything out properly beyond eyewitness accounts. Are there any reports of another ship making contact with an iceberg in the same vicinity as the Titanic?

And your argument about the wreck position makes little sense to me. It's unlikely that the Titanic just pin dropped straight to the bottom from where the sank - in fact there's good scientific evidence to show that it was otherwise. She may have gone down some distance away from both the position of the wreck and the CQD position. In fact she sailed on for some distance before coming to a complete stop as well - that too is documented. So I don't think we can be playing around with a couple of miles here and there to try and show that the iceberg couldn't possibly be the one, that makes no sense.

Cheers,
Adam.
 
Adam, the Titanic wreck is about 13.2 miles behind the so called "corrected" CQD position. As the iceberg was at the area of the wreck side, this would mean that it stay about 2 day at position to be the iceberg Titanic hit.
From the log book of the Prinz Adalbert we know that they arrived at that position on April 16th and meeting the ice there.

As you seem to think that this is the iceberg, maybe you can show a primary source that there is mention of red paint on it! All I have found yet is as far back as with the book ANTR and the wrong claim it was photographed on April 15th and that there was something which "might" be red paint. I find it interesting how this became into "it was red paint".

There were other ships who had "collision" with ice, the Rappahanock (if it is true), Corsican, Niagara, possible the Carmania (can not remember if she hit or missed it in the last moment) and a few others.
 
Titanic: The Ship Magnificent, vol. 1, has quite a bit of information on paints used for Titanic.

The hull was primed with red lead paint for corrosion resistance. Red lead paint that used to be widely used in marine environments, was, in my experience, reddish brown in color. From a distance, I think it would appear brown. (The raw pigment was more red or orange, but the dried paint, with its various binders and carriers, was more brown.)

The top coat on the hull, below the waterline, was an anti-fouling paint, also described as reddish brown.

The icebergs I've seen sometimes had dark streaks, reportedly from the glacier coming in contact with soil or perhaps the ice coming in contact with soil during the calving process. I have seen glaciers that were calving ice - typically, there was a mixed field of soil and ice between the edge of the glacier and the water's edge. I'm told that some icebergs come in contact with the seabed in shallows.
 
Ioannis,

If you re-read my posts, you'll see that i'm not particularly concerned with whether the iceberg was the one seen from the Bremen or some other iceberg, only that if a ship the size and speed of the Titanic had struck it with enough force to sink the boat, then there must in turn be some sort of physical evidence left behind on the iceberg as well.

Also once again, I don't see how you can place so much faith in the exact positions of the CQD, the wreck and the iceberg. There's any number of factors which might have caused that to be inaccurate.

Doug,

Is it possible that the marks seen on the iceberg could have been affected by some other factor such as light / reflection, or material which was floating in the ocean? While we're at it, we might as well consider all possibilities.

Cheers,
Adam.
 
There is nothing inaccurate about the position of the CQD or the wreck site. They are indeed about 13 miles apart. I don't follow your reasoning Adam. The iceberg that sank Titanic was on the east side of the pack ice. So too were all the lifeboats. The CQD was well west of it as some ships like Mount Temple and Californian discovered the next day.
 

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