Who is most responsible for the sinking of the Titanic?

[Ioannis Georgiou]

Actions speak louder than testimony here.

Actually testimony speaks louder than your imagination!

 

[Samuel Halpern]

What a wonderful twist someone's imagination can have on reality. In your case David, its called imaginative wisdom.

You said: >>Based on the transfer of the ship during that turn, under the conventional claptrap story he must have turned left for an iceberg on the ship's port side.<<
Really, I don't see it that way.

You also said: >>If Murdoch did order a two-point emergency turn, then how could the ship be steaming straight ahead.<<
First, Murdoch didn't order a 2-point turn, he order the helm be put 'hard-astarboard.' The 2 points come from Hichens who said that ship had turned about 2 points when she struck. He was watching the compass. Fleet estimated between 1 and 2 points when she struck.

You said:>>Remember, Captain Smith was on deck and plotting ice.<<
Smith was not on deck, he was in his quarters at the time, and you have NO evidence to say that he was plotting ice, or anything else. He could have been lying down and asleep for all you or anyone else knows.

You said:>>The course alteration described by Hichens and confirmed by Boxhall was completed by the bridge team in conjunction with the every-half-hour compass evolutions.<<
Hichens described an emergency maneuver, not a course alteration. Boxhall confirmed nothing about a course alteration taking place, and you know it.

You said: >>Note that Boxhall got to a position abreast of the captain's quarters prior to Olliver's entry onto the open bridge. The close timings of their comings and goings are strong indicators the two men went to and came back from the same place.<<
Indicators of nothing. To be accurate, Olliver said that he entered the bridge just as the ship struck while Boxhall, according to Boxhall, was still approaching the Bridge abreast Smith's quarters.

 

[Daniel A. Soto]

I do have a hard time understanding how there could be possible damage to the very foremost portion of the bow, in the area of the cargo holds if the ship began an emergency turn before approaching the iceberg. Is it possible that the initial contact was a grounding of the forepeak, before the ship contacted the above water portion of the iceberg? She then slid on this underwater shelf into the upper portion of the berg.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

There's no barrier to "All of the above" as far as the nature of the damage goes. Icebergs don't float end on like you see in some fanciful illustrations but on their sides. With 10% exposed and the rest underwater, any wild shape is possible including the underwater ice shelves which would damage double bottom.

It's also possible to have rising faces which, depending on how the ship hits them, can do the side damage which we know sank the ship.

We seem to be assuming that irritating but non fatal grounding damage is something that excludes the possibility of the sort of side damage which we know for a fact killed the ship.

it doesn't.

 

[Daniel A. Soto]

I just can't quite understand how the damage could be so far forward, to include the cargo holds, if the bow of the ship was turned away from the berg. Now that damage very well could have been done by an underwater spur of ice, but at some point the ship contacted the portion of the berg out of the water, due to the ice deposited on the well deck.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

The bow in all likelihood was not turning away at all. Don't forget that in testimony, it was claimed that Murdoch attempted to port around the berg and I think he almost pulled it off. The damage cannot be handily explained by the bow turning away from the berg but it CAN be explained IF the bow was turning towards it at the tail end of the maneuver.

 

[Robert T. Paige]

>>Would more lifeboats have really prevented the massive loss of life? <<

That's a very good question and one which has been debated here on several occasions.

The problem wasn't just the lack of boats but the lack of trained seamen!

You can have all the boats and all the davits in the world but they are of little use when you run out of competant seamen to man and launch them long before you run out of boats.

Miichael -
One of the many things I like about this website is that there are those, such as yourself, who have had a lot of experience in a lot of nautical subjects to set those of us straight who haven't . We may have been in the navy, but we may have been in such a specialized "Specialty Rating" that we were totally ignorant about a lot of these nauticals terms and subjects of discussion on these forums, That is the reason some of our comments may look a bit stupid or foolish to you.

In this subject, I would just base my opinion that the question is problematical whether more persons would have been saved if there had been more lifeboats would have also depended on how many trained persons there were to load those lifeboats, in particular if they were expert enough to know just the maximum number of persons who could have been loaded in each lifeboat......Just basing this on what I have read so far.

 

[Robert T. Paige]

>>The business with the Californian might well have been avoided had their radio man prefaced the message as a Master Service Message, which would have given it priority over other traffic. He didn't do that and just about blew Phillips eardrums out.<<

Michael, you can't put all the blame there on Evans. He did his job by sending the message to Phillips, and I believe only 'blew his ears off' because of the close vicinity of the two ships.

About the proper procedure, possibly. But I think Evans' problem might have been that his receiver wasn't picking up Cape Race. He didn't hear Cape Race and thought the frequecy was clear and that was the reason he burst in and "blew the earths off Phillips." But I also think Phillips should have taken a break from the Cape Race traffic, asked Evans if he was hearing Cape Race, and asked Evans for his position since they were so obviously close to each other. Of course Evans would have shut down soon anyway and , that wouldn't have made any difference and he would not have heard the CQD. Carpathia would still have been the best bet as far as wireless communication was concerned.....IMHO

 

[David G. Brown]

Sam, let me remind you that "on deck" is a phrase describing "on duty." It does not mean physically standing next to Murdoch or Boxhall. During his U.S. testimony Fourth Officer Boxhall certainly knew the captain was on deck that night. He said, "I did not know that the captain was anywhere away from the bridge the whole watch. I mean to say from the bridge taking the whole bridge together; all the chart rooms, and the open bridge. They are all practically on one square, and I do not think the captain was away from that altogether."

Boxhall did get forward ahead of Olliver. Recall that Boxhall heard bells when he was abreast of the captain's quarters while Olliver did not hear any such sounds. This means the bells Boxhall heard -- no matter their origin -- must have taken place before Olliver got to a similar location on the boat deck where the Fourth Officer herd the sounds. Those bells could not have sounded after Olliver got there or while he was on the bridge or he would have reported hearing them. Get the arrow of time in the right direction and there is no confusion.

Hitchens described a maneuver. Conventional wisdom has turned it into a pall-mall attempt to dodge the iceberg. It was to dodge ice, yes, but there is no evidence it was to dodge The Iceberg. Hichens may well have heard the officers discussions about ice and he may even have assumed it was to dodge the fatal berg, but he could not have known it's true intent nor where the iceberg lay relative to Titanic. He was in a blacked out wooden box called the wheelhouse and could see nothing ahead or around the ship. I view his specificity of 2 points as a strong indicator of a course change simply because it was so precise. Even if he had been (as Jim suggests) calling off the numbers as they went by on the compass he would not have known the exact amount of the turn as the impact was not a single sharp event like a hammer blow, but more of a subtle sliding onto a shingle beach. The best he could have done with accuracy is give the approximate range of degrees of the turn.

As to what Fleet and Lee saw...they had no reference point to judge the amount of the turn. They guessed and did so after the fact. Perhaps they were right. Perhaps not. But, there are many reasons for Titanic's bow to appear to fall to port just at impact. One is apparent motion of the bow and berg viewed from above. Any Great Lakes sailor who has steered up the St. Clair River has plenty of stories about "bow cushion" pushing his vessel's bow away from the Canadian shore. Even so, why did Fleet claim he described the berg as "right ahead" if the the ship was turning to its left? The obvious reason was that the berg was straight, which means not turning to either port or starboard.

But there is one even more glaring reason why the two-point turn was completed before impact. That's Murdoch's "hard a port" helm order heard by Olliver just as he felt the bow striking on the berg. Olliver then entered the wheelhouse to hear "the man there" (obviously Hichens) sing out that the wheel was hard over. If the two point turn had been to avoid the berg, then why was the order rescinded during the emergency? What happened to change Murdoch's mind?

This brings up Hichens failure to mention how he had been holding starboard helm and was suddenly told to put the helm hard a port. Seems to me that such a cluster .... of events would have made a huge impression on the man steering, especially considering the disaster which occurred afterward. Why was he silent about suddenly being told to shift his helm in the middle of an ongoing accident?

I freely admit that my version of events may have errors in it. Perfection lies at a higher pay grade than: being, one each, human. But, conventional Titanic wisdom has more holes in it that a piece of Swiss cheese used as a clay pigeon at a trap shoot. If someone is interested in eating cheese that's mostly air and spitting out the occasional buckshot, they have my permission. But, I'd rather find new cheese without bits of steel. In other words, I'd rather make a mistake searching for the real truth that be satisfied repeating the same old tripe.

-- David G. Brown

 

[Aaron_2016]

I just can't quite understand how the damage could be so far forward, to include the cargo holds, if the bow of the ship was turned away from the berg. Now that damage very well could have been done by an underwater spur of ice, but at some point the ship contacted the portion of the berg out of the water, due to the ice deposited on the well deck.

Captain Moore of the Mount Temple believed the Titanic had struck a large spur under the water.

"In some cases you may get close to them; in others they have long spurs running underneath the water. In daytime in clear water you can see the spurs, because they show quite green under the water. Of course, my orders to my officers are to give them a wide berth; not take any chances whatever.......My theory would be that she was going along and touched one of those large spurs from an iceberg. There are spurs projecting out beneath the water, and they are very sharp and pointed. They are like a jagged rock. My idea is that she struck one of those on her bilge, and that she ran along that, and that opened up her plates, the lining of her plates, and the water came in."

The lookouts believed the iceberg had caused her helm to shift. It is possible that the iceberg shunted the bow over to the left. Hichens looked at his compass and saw the ship had turned 2 points to port. Perhaps this was a direct cause of the iceberg pushing the ship over to port.


.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

Miichael -
One of the many things I like about this website is that there are those, such as yourself, who have had a lot of experience in a lot of nautical subjects to set those of us straight who haven't . We may have been in the navy, but we may have been in such a specialized "Specialty Rating" that we were totally ignorant about a lot of these nauticals terms and subjects of discussion on these forums, That is the reason some of our comments may look a bit stupid or foolish to you.

In this subject, I would just base my opinion that the question is problematical whether more persons would have been saved if there had been more lifeboats would have also depended on how many trained persons there were to load those lifeboats, in particular if they were expert enough to know just the maximum number of persons who could have been loaded in each lifeboat......Just basing this on what I have read so far.

I think you'll find that another issue would have been the davits themselves, which were all handled manually. Rapid filling and launching which is possible with modern electrically powered davits, just wasn't a possibility. Welin davits are strictly mechanical with the electric winches that existed being used for recovery.

When you get down to the brass tacks, it's nothing short of astonishing that they got 18 of 20 away virtually without incident in the time that they had.

 

[Daniel A. Soto]

The bow in all likelihood was not turning away at all. Don't forget that in testimony, it was claimed that Murdoch attempted to port around the berg and I think he almost pulled it off. The damage cannot be handily explained by the bow turning away from the berg but it CAN be explained IF the bow was turning towards it at the tail end of the maneuver.

Thanks Michael. I have wondered if the collision actually occurred while the helm was placed hard to port. I just wasn't sure if I have a good enough argument to mention it.

 

[Harland Duzen]

I have wondered about that, because like you see in the 1997 film, surely the force of hitting the first compartment would have sheared off the chunk of protruding ice off the berg and the other compartments would have been okay.

Then again if the Titanic had turned into the berg, would't the damage have been really severe as the impact tore open major holes / large dents instead?

 

[Ioannis Georgiou]

Thanks Michael. I have wondered if the collision actually occurred while the helm was placed hard to port.

I have suggested that in one of my articles (Collision and sinking mysteries) a few years ago.

 

[Daniel A. Soto]

Id like to read this. Is there any place I can read your article?