Hello readers! Tomorrow, April 15, 2018, marks 106 years since the sinking of the ocean liner the RMS Titanic, so I thought I would take the time to write a special post about the history of the Titanic.
On April 10, 1912, the ocean liner the RMS Titanic, one of the largest in its class, left Southampton, England on its maiden voyage across the Atlantic Ocean. The Titanic was designed by Irish shipbuilder William Pirrie and was considered unsinkable due to having 16 watertight compartments, four of which could fill with water without the ship losing buoyancy. On its maiden voyage, the ship carried 2,200 passengers and crew.
Apart from England, the RMS Titanic also picked up passengers from Cherbourg, France and Queenstown, Ireland before heading full-speed towards its destination of New York City.
Just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the Titanic was unable to be steered away from a sizeable iceberg and scrapped its side, which caused five of the 16 watertight compartments in the ship's hull to take on water. Distress signals sent from the Titanic were not picked up by other ships because other ships in its vicinity did not have a telegraph operator on duty at the time. As the compartments filled with water they pulled down the bow (front) of the ship; other compartments began to fill with water because they were not capped at the top, which caused the bow to sink and the stern (back) to be raised vertically out of the water. Around 2:20am on April 15th, the Titanic broke in half and sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean about 400 miles south of Newfoundland, Canada.
Of the 2,200 passengers and crew of the ship only about 700 people, mostly women and children, survived. The 1,500 who passed did so due to a lack of lifeboats necessary for the number of people on the ship, a lack of proper emergency procedures, and due to freezing/hypothermia from the icy waters of the Northern Atlantic. A number of notable individuals died during the sinking of the Titanic, including the heirs of the Astor, Guggenheim, and Straus fortunes.
More than an hour after the sinking, the liner Carpathia arrived and would rescue the people in the lifeboats and would pull several survivors out of the water.
As a result of the sinking, rules were adopted requiring every ship have enough lifeboat space for everyone aboard, that lifeboat drills be held so everyone aboard would know what to do in the case of an emergency, that ships maintain a 24-hour security watch, and the establishment of an Internation Ice Patrol to monitor icebergs in the North Atlantic shipping lines.
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| Photo by Bill Cannon, www.fineartamerica.com |
Apart from England, the RMS Titanic also picked up passengers from Cherbourg, France and Queenstown, Ireland before heading full-speed towards its destination of New York City.
Just before midnight on April 14, 1912, the Titanic was unable to be steered away from a sizeable iceberg and scrapped its side, which caused five of the 16 watertight compartments in the ship's hull to take on water. Distress signals sent from the Titanic were not picked up by other ships because other ships in its vicinity did not have a telegraph operator on duty at the time. As the compartments filled with water they pulled down the bow (front) of the ship; other compartments began to fill with water because they were not capped at the top, which caused the bow to sink and the stern (back) to be raised vertically out of the water. Around 2:20am on April 15th, the Titanic broke in half and sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean about 400 miles south of Newfoundland, Canada.
Of the 2,200 passengers and crew of the ship only about 700 people, mostly women and children, survived. The 1,500 who passed did so due to a lack of lifeboats necessary for the number of people on the ship, a lack of proper emergency procedures, and due to freezing/hypothermia from the icy waters of the Northern Atlantic. A number of notable individuals died during the sinking of the Titanic, including the heirs of the Astor, Guggenheim, and Straus fortunes.
More than an hour after the sinking, the liner Carpathia arrived and would rescue the people in the lifeboats and would pull several survivors out of the water.
As a result of the sinking, rules were adopted requiring every ship have enough lifeboat space for everyone aboard, that lifeboat drills be held so everyone aboard would know what to do in the case of an emergency, that ships maintain a 24-hour security watch, and the establishment of an Internation Ice Patrol to monitor icebergs in the North Atlantic shipping lines.
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