The Titanic—“The
Most Famous Ship in History”
APRIL
10, 1912:
The Titanic leaves Southampton, England, bound for New York, U.S.A.
APRIL 11:
After picking up passengers in Cherbourg, France, and in Queenstown (now called
Cobh), Ireland, the Titanic heads out into the Atlantic.
APRIL 14: At
about 11:40 p.m., the Titanic collides with an iceberg.
APRIL 15: At
2:20 a.m., the Titanic sinks, (2 hours and 40 minutes after impact)
resulting in the loss of some 1,500 lives.
WHAT kind
of ship was the Titanic? What caused it to sink?
According to Michael McCaughan, former
curator of the Folk and Transport Museum, the Titanic is “the most
famous ship in history.” But the Titanic was not unique. It was the
second of three huge vessels constructed in the shipbuilding yards of Harland
and Wolff in Belfast. The Titanic was one of the largest ships of its
day, measuring 882.8 feet (269 m) in length and 92.5 feet
(28 m) in width.
Titanic Tragedy
The captain of the Titanic,
E. J. Smith, knew the dangers posed by ice in the North Atlantic. He
had often sailed this route in the Olympic. Several warnings of icebergs
were sent by other ships, but some of these were overlooked or apparently not
received.
Suddenly the Titanic’s lookouts warned
of an iceberg ahead—but too late! The officer on duty managed to avoid a
head-on collision but could not prevent the Titanic from scraping along
the edge of the iceberg. That damaged the ship’s hull—and the sea flooded into
a number of its forward compartments. Captain Smith soon learned that his ship
was doomed. He sent out SOS messages and ordered that the lifeboats be lowered.
The Titanic had 16 lifeboats and four
other collapsible boats. At full capacity, they could hold about 1,170 people.
But there were some 2,200 passengers and crew on board! To make matters worse,
many of the boats pulled away before being fully loaded. And most of them made
no attempt to search for possible survivors who had leaped into the sea. In the
end, only 705 people were saved!
After the Titanic disaster, maritime
authorities enacted regulations that improved safety at sea. One such
regulation ensured that there would be enough lifeboats on future voyages for
everyone on board a ship.
For years people believed that the Titanic
sank so quickly because it sustained a huge gash in its hull at the time of its
ill-fated collision. In 1985, however, after the discovery of the Titanic
on the ocean floor, investigators reached a different conclusion—that the icy
waters had compromised the ship’s steel, causing it to become brittle and to
fracture. Less than three hours after the collision, the ship broke in two and
sank, earning its place as one of the greatest disasters in nautical history.
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