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You have already read and heard about the Titanic many times. The history of the creation and crash of the liner is overgrown with rumors and myths. For more than 100 years, the British steamship has been exciting the minds of people trying to find the answer - why did the Titanic sink?

The history of the legendary liner is interesting for three reasons:

• it was the largest ship in 1912;
• the number of victims turned the disaster into a global failure;
• finally, James Cameron, with his film, highlighted the history of the liner from general list maritime disasters, a.

We will tell you everything about the Titanic, as it happened in reality. About the length of the Titanic in meters, how long the Titanic sank, and who really was behind the large-scale disaster.

Where and where did the Titanic sail from?

From Cameron's film, we know that the liner was heading to New York. The American developing city was to become final stop. But not everyone knows exactly where the Titanic sailed from, believing that Starting point was London. The capital of Great Britain was not among the seaports, and therefore the ship could not depart from there.

The fatal flight began from Southampton, a major English port from where transatlantic flights operated. The Titanic's path on the map clearly shows the movement. Southampton is both a port and a city located in the southern part of England (Hampshire).

See the route of the Titanic on the map:

Dimensions of the Titanic in meters

To understand more about the Titanic, the causes of the disaster need to be revealed, starting with the dimensions of the ship.

How many meters is the Titanic in length and other dimensions:

• exact length – 299.1 m;
• width – 28.19 m;
• height from the keel - 53.3 m.

There is also the following question: how many decks did the Titanic have? There were 8 in total. Boats were located on top, which is why the upper deck was called the boat deck. The rest were distributed according to letter designation.

• A – 1st class deck. Its peculiarity is its limited size - it does not fit the entire length of the vessel;
• B - anchors were located in the front part of the deck and its dimensions were also shorter - 37 meters on deck C;
• C – deck with galley, crew mess and promenade for III class.
• D – walking area;
• E – cabins of I, II classes;
• F – cabins of II and III classes;
• G – deck with boiler rooms in the middle.

Finally, how much does the Titanic weigh? The displacement of the largest ship of the early 20th century is 52,310 tons.

Titanic: the story of the wreck

In what year did the Titanic sink? The famous disaster occurred on the night of April 14, 1912. This was the fifth day of the trip. Chronicles indicate that at 23:40 the liner survived a collision with an iceberg and after 2 hours 40 minutes (2:20 a.m.) it went under water.

Further investigations showed that the crew received 7 weather warnings, but this did not prevent the ship from reducing its maximum speed. The iceberg directly ahead was spotted too late to take precautions. The result is holes in the starboard side. Ice damaged 90 m of skin and 5 bow compartments. This was enough to sink the liner.

Tickets for the new liner were more expensive than for other ships. If a person was used to traveling in first class, then on the Titanic he would have to change to second class.

Edward Smith, the ship's captain, began the evacuation after midnight: a distress signal was sent, the attention of other ships was attracted by flares, and lifeboats were launched into the water. But the rescue was slow and uncoordinated - there was empty space in the lifeboats while the Titanic was sinking, the water temperature did not rise above two degrees below zero, and the first steamer arrived only half an hour after the disaster.

Titanic: how many people died and survived

How many people survived on the Titanic? No one will tell you the exact data, just as they could not say this on the fateful night. The list of Titanic passengers initially changed in practice, but not on paper: some canceled the trip at the moment of sailing and were not crossed off, others traveled anonymously under assumed names, and still others were listed as dead on the Titanic several times.

It is only possible to say approximately how many people drowned on the Titanic - about 1500 (minimum 1490 - maximum 1635). Among them was Edward Smith with some assistants, 8 musicians from the famous orchestra, large investors and businessmen.

Class was felt even after death - the bodies of the dead from the first class were embalmed and placed in coffins, the second and third classes received bags and boxes. When the embalming agents ran out, the bodies of unknown third-class passengers were simply thrown into the water (according to the rules, unembalmed corpses could not be brought to the port).

Bodies were found within a radius of 80 km from the crash site, and due to the Gulf Stream, many were scattered even further.

Initially, it was known how many passengers were on the Titanic, although not thoroughly:

• crew 900 people;
• 195 first class;
• 255 second class;
• 493 third class people.

Some passengers disembarked at intermediate ports, while others entered. It is believed that the liner set out on the fatal route with a crew of 1,317 people, of which 124 were children.

Titanic: sinking depth - 3750 m

The English ship could accommodate 2,566 people, of which 1,034 seats were for first class passengers. The airliner's half occupancy is explained by the fact that transatlantic flights were not popular in April. At that time, a coal miners' strike broke out, which disrupted coal supplies, schedules and changes in plans.

The question of how many people were saved from the Titanic was difficult to answer because the rescue operations took place from different ships, and slow communications did not provide fast data.

After the crash, only 2/3 of the delivered bodies were identified. Some were buried locally, the rest were sent home. For a long time, bodies in white vests were found in the area of ​​the disaster. Out of 1500 dead people Only 333 bodies were found.

At what depth does the Titanic lie?

When answering the question about the depth at which the Titanic sank, you need to remember about the pieces that were carried away by currents (by the way, they learned about this only in the 80s; before that it was believed that the liner sank to the bottom entirely). The wreckage of the liner on the night of the crash went to a depth of 3,750 m. The bow was thrown 600 m from the stern.

The place where the Titanic sank on the map:

In which ocean did the Titanic sink? - in the Atlantic.

The Titanic was raised from the bottom of the ocean

They wanted to raise the ship from the moment of the crash. Initiative plans were put forward by the relatives of the victims from the first class. But 1912 did not yet know the necessary technologies. The war, lack of knowledge and funds delayed the search for the sunken ship for a hundred years. Since 1985, 17 expeditions have been carried out, during which 5,000 objects and large hulls were brought to the surface, but the ship itself remained on the ocean floor.

What does the Titanic look like now?

In the time since the crash, the ship has become covered sea ​​life. Rust, the painstaking work of invertebrates and natural processes of decomposition have changed the structures beyond recognition. By this time, the bodies had already decomposed completely, and by the 22nd century, only the anchors and boilers - the most massive metal structures - would remain from the Titanic.

Already, the interiors of the decks have been destroyed, the cabins and halls have collapsed.

Titanic, Britannic and Olympic

All three ships were produced by the shipbuilding company Harland and Wolf. Before the Titanic, the world saw the Olympic. It is easy to see a fatal predisposition in the fate of the three ships. The first airliner crashed as a result of a collision with a cruiser. Not such a large-scale disaster, but still an impressive failure.

Then the story of the Titanic, which received wide resonance in the world, and, finally, Gigantic. They tried to make this ship especially durable, taking into account the mistakes of previous liners. It was even launched, but the First World War disrupted the plans. Gigantic became a hospital ship called Britannic.

He just managed to carry out 5 calm flights, and on the sixth there was a disaster. Having been blown up by a German mine, the Britannic quickly sank. The mistakes of the past and the captain’s preparedness made it possible to save maximum amount people - 1036 out of 1066.

Is it possible to talk about evil fate when remembering the Titanic? The history of the creation and crash of the liner was studied in detail, the facts were revealed, even through time. And yet the truth is only now being revealed. The reason why the Titanic attracts attention is to hide the true motive - the creation of a currency system and the destruction of opponents. Do you have any doubts? Then read.

To point 13.
Let me clarify: both the RMS Olympic and subsequent ships of the Titanic and Britannic series - transatlantic liners of the White Star Line had a unique design for their time: they could remain afloat if any 2 of the 16 waterproof compartments were flooded , any 3 of the first 5 compartments, or all 4 bow compartments in a row, starting from the forepeak.
Unfortunately, no one imagined that water would flow into six bow compartments at once and, as the trim on the bow increased, it would begin to overflow through the watertight bulkheads, because usually the above-mentioned ones do not reach the quarters of the masts and consistent flooding of the compartments would begin. It was not a warship...

To point 12.
And, for example: "Hans Hedtoft", January 7, 1959? SOS - January 7, 1959, around 02:00: "Encountered an iceberg. Position 59.5 north - 43.0 west." 02 "The engine room is flooded with water." 03 "We took a lot of water into the engine room." Approximately 05 "We are drowning and need immediate assistance." That's all... No one was rescued, no bodies or debris were found. 55 passengers and 39 crew members were killed.
For reference: "Hans Hedtoft": Danish cargo-passenger ship with a displacement of 3000 tons, second voyage on the line Greenland - continental ports. It was designed for navigation in ice (double the thickness of the sides in the ice belt, double bottom, 7 waterproof compartments, special reinforcement at the bow and stern ends).

To point 9.
According to the investigation, 37.5 seconds passed between the call from lookout Frederick Fleet (10/15/1887 - 01/10/1965) and the moment the iceberg touched down. During this time, the airliner traveled 1,316 feet and deviated from course by 23 degrees (109 feet/33.22 meters to the left of the original trajectory).
By the way. Frederick Fleet was found hanged on January 10, 1965, in his Norman Street garden. The coroner's report indicated that he was mentally confused, but acquaintances believed that it was all due to his depressed state, which began after the death of his wife, and was partly caused by the fact that Fleet never got rid of the feeling of guilt for the deaths of passengers. He was buried without any honors in a pauper's grave in Hollybrook Cemetery, Southampton. There was not even a tombstone on his grave, and only in 1993 the Titanic Historical Society Inc. Using money from private donations, a memorial plaque with an engraving depicting the Titanic was installed. Another victim of the disaster, isn't it?

To point 8.
There was no "mirage". There was a “black” iceberg: when it turns over, the part that was previously in the water does not differ in color from the water. Especially on a moonless night. There was no rough sea at all, so there was no white strip of foam at the “waterline” of the iceberg either. And the lookouts didn’t have binoculars - historical fact. They just didn't see him...

To point 3.
Incorrect photo. It should have been signed like this: “The boats of the Titanic. In total, thirteen of them were found. And here they are at the 13th pier in New York, where this magnificent liner was supposed to arrive.”
...
This is a bit of a hobby of mine, in any case, I have collected a normal library in different languages ​​and am familiar with the documents of the official investigation. To begin with, I recommend: www.titanicinquiry.org - complete breakdowns of investigations in the States and Britain ( English language).

Therefore, let me make a value judgment that the Titanic was destroyed by the command “Stop the car - full reverse” (movement of McMaster Murdoch’s hand), which could not be carried out.

Alas, it only took more than 15 minutes to completely reverse the machines “from full forward to full reverse” (an investigative experiment at the Olympic and I won’t describe the features of steam engines) - while the airliner went through about 2 miles - about 3.7 km. In addition, it is necessary to take into account the features of the rudder group. Three propellers, one rudder blade. The right and left propellers were driven by steam engines (reversible), the middle one - by a turbine (non-reversible). After the command "stop" "The airliner actually lost control and, instead of circulating (in a circle with a diameter of 3850 feet), began to move in a spiral with an increasing radius tending to infinity. At the same time, if the command “Full speed ahead, full steam forward” had been given, then the on the turn course of 23 degrees, he would have been 8 seconds earlier and by the time of "37.5" he would have gone 92.6 meters to the left. True, there were nuances, like the rolling of the stern, usually solved by the "coordinate" maneuver (Vicki?), but that's a completely different story...

Meanwhile. It has been documented that closer to midnight on April 14, 1912, there were only two oilers at the control post of the Titanic’s engines (according to the table of ranks, they were at the level of ordinary stokers, only those were trained to use a shovel, and these were trained to use an oil can). This is not surprising - after all, the previous command from the bridge was received more than three days ago...

Sorry, it was long, but I haven’t said everything yet...

Construction

Construction and equipment

Specifications

Bulkheads

The Titanic was built so that it could remain afloat if any 2 of its 16 watertight compartments, any 3 of the first 5 compartments, or all of the first 4 compartments were flooded.

The first 2 bulkheads in the bow and the last one in the stern were solid; all the rest had sealed doors that allowed the crew and passengers to move between compartments. On the flooring of the second bottom, in bulkhead “K,” there were only doors that led to the refrigerator compartment. On decks “F” and “E”, almost all bulkheads had hermetic doors connecting the rooms used by passengers; all of them could be sealed either remotely or manually, using a device located directly on the door and from the deck to which it reached bulkhead. To bolt such doors on passenger decks, a special key was required, which was available only to the chief stewards. But on G deck there were no doors in the bulkheads.

In the bulkheads “D” - “O”, directly above the second bottom in the compartments where the machines and boilers were located, there were 12 vertically closed doors; they were controlled using an electric drive from the navigation bridge. In case of danger or accident, or when the captain or watch officer considered it necessary, electromagnets, upon a signal from the bridge, released the latches, and all 12 doors were lowered under the influence of their own gravity and the space behind them was hermetically sealed. If the doors were closed by an electric signal from the bridge, then they could only be opened after removing the voltage from the electric drive.

Deck "G" covered only the bow and stern, between which the boiler rooms were located. The bow part of the deck, 58 m long, was 2 m above the waterline; towards the center of the liner it gradually lowered and at the opposite end was already at the waterline level. There were 26 cabins for 106 third-class passengers, the rest of the area was occupied by the luggage compartment for first-class passengers, the ship's mailroom and the ballroom. Behind the bow of the deck there were bunkers with coal, which occupied 6 waterproof compartments around the chimneys, followed by 2 compartments with steam lines for piston steam engines and a turbine compartment. Next came the aft deck, 64 m long, with warehouses, storerooms and 60 cabins for 186 third-class passengers, which was already below the waterline.

Masts

One was at the stern, the other on the forecastle, each was steel with top part from teak. On the front, at an altitude of 29 m from the waterline, there was a top platform (“crow’s nest”), which could be reached via an internal metal ladder.

Office premises

In the front part of the boat deck there was a navigation bridge, 58 m away from the bow. On the bridge there was a pilothouse with a steering wheel and a compass, immediately behind it was a room where navigation charts were stored. To the right of the wheelhouse were the charthouse, the captain's cabin and part of the officers' cabins, to the left were the remaining officers' cabins. Behind them, behind the forward funnel, was the radiotelegraph cabin and the radio operator's cabin. At the front of Deck D there were living quarters for 108 stokers; a special spiral ladder connected this deck directly to the boiler rooms, so that stokers could go to work and return without passing by cabins or passenger lounges. At the front of E deck were living quarters for 72 stevedores and 44 sailors. In the first part of deck “F” there were quarters of 53 stokers of the third shift. On deck "G" there were quarters for 45 stokers and oilers. The RMS in the name stands for Royal Mail Ship. The ship had a post office and warehouse on decks "F" and "G", where 5 postal workers worked.

Second bottom

The second bottom was located approximately one and a half meters above the keel and occupied 9/10 of the length of the vessel, excluding only small areas in the bow and stern. On the second bottom, boilers, reciprocating steam engines, a steam turbine and electric generators were installed, all of which were firmly mounted on steel plates, the remaining space was used for cargo, coal and drinking water tanks. In the engine room section, the second bottom rose 2.1 m above the keel, which increased the protection of the liner in case of damage to the outer skin.

Power point

The Titanic's propellers before the ship's launch

The registered power of steam engines and turbines was 50 thousand liters. With. (actually 55 thousand hp). The turbine was located in the fifth waterproof compartment in the aft part of the liner, in the next compartment, closer to the bow, steam engines were located, the other 6 compartments were occupied by twenty-four double-flow and five single-flow boilers that produced steam for the main engines, turbines, generators and auxiliary mechanisms. The diameter of each boiler was 4.79 m, the length of the double-flow boiler was 6.08 m, the single-flow boiler was 3.57 m. Each double-flow boiler had 6 fireboxes, and the single-flow boiler had 3. In addition, the Titanic was equipped with four auxiliary machines with generators, each with a capacity of 400 kilowatts, producing electricity at 100 volts. Next to them were two more 30-kilowatt generators. High-pressure steam from the boilers went to 2 triple expansion steam engines, which rotated the side screws. From the machines, steam then entered a low-pressure turbine, which drove the middle propeller. From the turbine, the exhaust steam entered the condensers, from where fresh water went back to the boilers in a closed cycle. The Titanic developed a decent speed for its time, although it was inferior to the turboprops of its competitor, the Cunard Line.

Pipes

The liner had 4 pipes, the diameter of each of which was 7.3 m, height - 18.5 m. The first three removed smoke from the boiler fireboxes, the fourth, located above the turbine compartment, served as an exhaust fan, and a chimney for the ship's kitchens was connected to it . A longitudinal section of the ship is shown in its model exhibited at the Deutsches Museum Munich, where it is clearly seen that the last chimney was not connected to the fireboxes. The fourth pipe was purely cosmetic to make the ship appear more powerful.

Electricity supply

10 thousand light bulbs, 562 electric heaters, mainly in first class cabins, 153 electric motors, including electric drives for eight cranes with a total lifting capacity of 18 tons, 4 cargo winches with a lifting capacity of 750 kg, 4 elevators, each for 12 people, were connected to the distribution network. In addition, electricity was consumed by the telephone exchange and radio communications, fans in the boiler and engine rooms, apparatus in the gymnasium, dozens of machines and appliances in the kitchens, including refrigerators.

Connection

The telephone switch served 50 lines. The radio equipment on the liner was the most modern, the power of the main transmitter was 5 kilowatts, power came from an electric generator. The second, an emergency transmitter, was battery-powered. 4 antennas were stretched between the two masts, some up to 75 m long. The guaranteed range of the radio signal was 250 miles. During the day favorable conditions Communication was possible at a distance of up to 400 miles, and at night - up to 2000.

The radio equipment arrived on board on April 2 from the Marconi company, which by this time monopolized the radio industry in Italy and England. Two young radio officers spent the entire day assembling and installing the station, and a test connection was immediately made with the coast station at Malin Head for verification ( English), on the north coast of Ireland, and with Liverpool. On April 3, the radio equipment worked like clockwork; on this day, communication was established with the island of Tenerife at a distance of 2000 miles and with Port Said in Egypt (3000 miles). In January 1912, the Titanic was assigned the radio call sign " MUC", then they were replaced by " MGY", previously owned by the American ship Yale. As the dominant radio company, Marconi introduced its own radio call signs, most of which began with the letter "M", regardless of its location and the home country of the ship on which it was installed.

Sailing and wrecking

Many celebrities of the time took part in the first voyage of the liner, including millionaire and major industrialist John Jacob Astor IV and his wife Madeleine Astor, businessman Benjamin Guggenheim, owner of the Macy's department store Isidor Strauss and his wife Ida, eccentric millionaire Margaret Molly Brown, who received the nickname “Unsinkable” after the death of the ship, Sir Cosma Duff Gordon and his wife, fashion designer Lady Lucy Duff Gordon, popular at the beginning of the century, businessman and cricketer John Thayer, British journalist William Thomas Steed, Countess of Rotskaya, military assistant to US President Archibald Butt , film actress Dorothy Gibson and many others.

Northern and Southern transatlantic routes. Ice conditions

A threat to shipping in the North Atlantic is represented by icebergs breaking off from glaciers in western Greenland and drifting under the influence of currents. Ice fields originating in the Arctic Basin, as well as off the coast of Labrador, Newfoundland and in the Strait of St. Lawrence, and drifting under the influence of winds and currents.

Shortest route from northern Europe in the USA it lies next to the coast of Newfoundland, directly through the zone of fog and icebergs. In order to streamline navigation in the North Atlantic, in 1898, shipping companies entered into an agreement establishing 2 transatlantic routes, passing much further south. For each route, separate routes were determined for steamships moving west and east, spaced up to 50 miles from each other. From mid-January to mid-August, during the season of greatest ice danger, ships moved along the Southern Route. During the rest of the year, the Northern Route was used. This order usually made it possible to minimize the likelihood of encountering drifting ice. But 1912 turned out to be unusual. From the Southern Highway, along the western route of which the Titanic also moved, reports of icebergs came one after another. In this regard, the US Hydrological Service raised the issue of moving the route to the south, but the corresponding decisions were made belatedly, after the disaster.

Chronology

• Wednesday 10 April 1912
  • 12:00 - The Titanic departs from the quay wall of the port of Southampton and narrowly avoids a collision with the American liner New York. There are 922 passengers on board the Titanic.
  • 19:00 - stop in Cherbourg (France) to take on board 274 passengers and mail.
  • 21:00 - The Titanic left Cherbourg and headed for Queenstown (Ireland).

• Sunday, April 14, 1912
  • 09:00 - "Caronia" reports ice in the area of ​​42° north latitude, 49-51° west longitude.
  • 13:42 - Baltic reports the presence of ice in the area of ​​41°51′ north latitude, 49°52′ west longitude.
  • 13:45 - "America" ​​reports ice in the area of ​​41°27′ north latitude, 50°8′ west longitude.
  • 19:00 - air temperature 43° Fahrenheit (6 °C).
  • 19:30 - air temperature 39° Fahrenheit (3.9 ° C).
  • 19:30 - Californian reports ice in the area of ​​42°3′ north latitude, 49°9′ west longitude.
  • 21:00 - air temperature 33° Fahrenheit (0.6 ° C).
  • 21:30 - Second Mate Lightoller warns the ship's carpenter and the watch in the engine room to monitor the system fresh water- water in pipelines may freeze; he tells the lookout to watch for the appearance of ice.
  • 21:40 - Mesaba reports ice in the area of ​​42°-41°25′ north latitude, 49°-50°30′ west longitude.
  • 22:00 - air temperature 32° Fahrenheit (0 °C).
  • 22:30 - sea water temperature dropped to 31° Fahrenheit (−0.56 °C).
  • 23:00 - The Californian warns of the presence of ice, but the Titanic's radio operator interrupts the radio exchange before the Californian manages to report the coordinates of the area.
  • 23:39 - At a point with coordinates 41°46′ north latitude, 50°14′ west longitude (later it turned out that these coordinates were calculated incorrectly), an iceberg was spotted at a distance of about 650 meters straight ahead.
  • 23:40 - Despite the maneuver, after 39 seconds the underwater part of the vessel touched down, the hull received numerous small holes over a length of about 100 meters. Of the ship's 16 watertight compartments, 6 were cut through (the leak in the sixth was extremely insignificant).

Stages of the sinking of the Titanic

• Monday, April 15, 1912
  • 00:05 - The trim on the bow became noticeable. The order was given to uncover the lifeboats and call crew members and passengers to their assembly points.
  • 00:15 - the first radiotelegraph signal for help was transmitted from the Titanic.
  • 00:45 - the first flare is fired and the first lifeboat (No. 7) is launched. The bow deck goes under water.
  • 01:15 - 3rd class passengers are allowed on deck.
  • 01:40 - the last flare is fired.
  • 02:05 - the last lifeboat (collapsible lifeboat D) is lowered. The bow of the boat deck goes under water.
  • 02:08 - The Titanic shudders sharply and moves forward. A wave rolls across the deck and floods the bridge, washing passengers and crew members into the water.
  • 02:10 - the last radiotelegraph signals were transmitted.
  • 02:15 - The Titanic lifts its stern high, exposing the rudder and propellers.
  • 02:17 - the electric lights go out.
  • 02:18 - The Titanic, rapidly sinking, breaks into two parts.
  • 02:20 - Titanic sank.
  • 02:29 - At a speed of about 13 miles per hour, the bow of the Titanic crashes into ocean floor at a depth of 3750 meters, burrowing into the sedimentary rocks of the bottom.
  • 03:30 - signal flares fired from the Carpathia are noticed from the lifeboats.
  • 04:10 - Carpathia picked up the first boat from the Titanic (boat No. 2).
  • 08:30 - Carpathia picked up the last (No. 12) boat from the Titanic.
  • 08:50 - Carpathia, taking on board 710 people who escaped from the Titanic, heads for New York.
• Thursday 18 April 1912
  • Carpathia arrives in New York

Collision

Photo of an iceberg taken by the chief steward of a German ship " Prince Adalbert"On the morning of April 16, 1912. The steward did not know about the disaster at the time, but the iceberg attracted his attention because it had a brown streak at its base, indicating that the iceberg had collided with something less than 12 hours earlier. It is assumed that this is what the Titanic collided with.

Recognizing an iceberg in the light haze, the lookout Fleet warned “there is ice in front of us” and rang the bell three times, which meant an obstacle straight ahead, after which he rushed to the telephone that connected the “crow’s nest” to the bridge. Sixth Officer Moody, who was on the bridge, responded almost instantly and heard the cry of “ice right on the nose!!!” (“ice right ahead!!!”) After politely thanking him, Moody turned to the officer of the watch, Murdoch, and repeated the warning. He rushed to the telegraph, put its handle on “stop” and shouted “starboard”, at the same time transmitting the order “full back” to the engine room, and pressed the lever that turned on the closing of the watertight doors in the bulkheads of the boiler room and the engine room.

Photo of an iceberg taken from a cable-laying ship " Mine", which was one of the first ships to discover the corpses of passengers and the wreckage of the ship. Presumably, the Titanic could have collided with this particular iceberg, since, according to the crew, “ Mines", this was the only iceberg near the disaster site.

According to the terminology of 1912, the command “starboard” meant turning the stern of the ship to the right, and the bow to the left (on Russian ships, since 1909, natural commands were already used, for example: “left rudder”). Helmsman Robert Hitchens ( English) put his weight on the handle of the steering wheel and quickly turned it counterclockwise until it stops, after which Murdoch was told, “The steering wheel is right, sir!” At that moment, the helmsman on duty, Alfred Oliver, and Boxhall, who was in the chart room, came running to the bridge when the bell rang out in the crow’s nest. A. Oliver, in his testimony in the US Senate, however, definitely stated that upon entering the bridge he heard the command “left rudder” (corresponding to a turn to the right), and this command was carried out. According to Boxhall (British Inquiry, question 15355), Murdoch reported to Captain Smith: "I turned left and reversed, and was about to turn right to get around him, but he was too close."

It is known that the Titanic did not use binoculars for lookouts because the key to the safe with binoculars was missing. He was picked up by Second Mate Blair when the captain kicked him off the team, taking on board a crew member from Olympic. It is possible that the lack of binoculars was one of the reasons for the crash of the liner. However, the existence of binoculars became known only 95 years after the shipwreck, when one of them was exhibited at the Henry Eldridge and Sons auction house in Devizes, Wiltshire. David Blair was to become the second mate of the Titanic, for which he arrived on April 3, 1912 from Belfast to Southampton. However, the management of the White Star Line replaced him at the last moment with Henry Wild, the first mate from the similar ship Olympic, since he had experience in handling such large liners, as a result of which Blair, in his haste, forgot to hand over the key to the man who came to his place . However, many historians agree that the presence of binoculars would not have helped prevent the disaster. This is also confirmed by the fact that the lookouts in the “crow’s nest” noticed the iceberg earlier than those on the bridge, who had binoculars with them.

Titanic is sinking

Lifeboats

There were 2,224 people on board the Titanic, but the total lifeboat capacity was only 1,178. The reason was that, according to the rules in force at that time, the total capacity of lifeboats depended on the tonnage of the ship, and not on the number of passengers and crew members. The rules were drawn up in 1894, when the largest ships had a displacement of about 10,000 tons. The displacement of the Titanic was 46,328 tons.

But these boats were only partially filled. Captain Smith gave the order or instruction "women and children first." Officers interpreted this order in different ways. Second Mate Lightoller, who commanded the launch of the boats on the port side, allowed men to occupy places in the boats only if oarsmen were needed and under no other circumstances. First Officer Murdoch, who commanded the launch of the boats on the starboard side, allowed men to go down if there were no women and children. Thus, in boat number 1, only 12 of the 65 seats were occupied. In addition, at first many passengers did not want to take seats in the boats, because the Titanic, which had no external damage, seemed safer to them. The last boats were filled better because it was already obvious to the passengers that the Titanic would sink. In the very last boat, 44 of the 65 seats were occupied. But in the sixteenth boat that departed from the side there were many empty seats; 1st class passengers were saved in it.

The crew did not even have time to lower all the boats that were on board. The twentieth boat was washed overboard when the front of the steamer went under water, and she floated upside down.

The British commission's report on the results of the investigation into the sinking of the Titanic states that "if the boats had been delayed a little longer before launching, or if the passage doors had been opened for passengers, larger number some of them could get onto the boats." The reason for the low survival rate of 3rd class passengers can most likely be attributed to the obstacles caused by the crew to allow passengers to get onto the deck and the closing of the passage doors. People in boats, as a rule, did not save those in the water. On the contrary, they tried to sail as far as possible from the site of the wreck, fearing that their boats in the water would capsize or that they would be sucked into the crater of the sinking ship. Only 6 people were picked up alive from the water.

Failure to provide assistance by the Californian

"Californian"

Serious criticism fell on the crew of the SS Californian and personally on the ship's captain, Stanley Lord. The ship was only a few miles from the Titanic, but did not respond to its distress calls and missile signals. The Californian warned the Titanic by radio about ice accumulation, which caused the Californian to stop for the night, but the warnings were condemned by the Titanic's senior wireless operator Jack Phillips.

Evidence from the British investigation showed that at 10:10 pm, the Californian observed the lights of a ship to the south. Captain Stanley Lord and third officer S. W. Groves (who was released by Lord at 11:10 pm) later decided that it was a passenger liner. At 11:50 p.m., the officer saw the ship's lights flash as if they were turned off or turned sharply, and that a port light appeared. On Lord's orders, Morse light signals were sent to the ship between 11:30 pm and 1:00 am, but they were not received.

Captain Lord retired to his cabin at 11:00 pm to spend the night, however, Second Officer Herbert Stone, while on duty, notified Lord at 1:10 that the ship had fired 5 missiles. Lord wanted to know if these were company signals, that is, colored flashes used for identification. Stone replied that he did not know and that the missiles were white. Captain Lord instructed the crew to continue signaling the ship with a Morse lamp, and went to bed. Three more missiles were spotted at 1:50 a.m. and Stone noted that the ship looked strange in the water, as if it was tilted. At 2:15 am, Lord was notified that the ship was no longer visible. The Lord asked again if the lights were of any color and was informed that they were all white.

The Californian eventually responded. At approximately 5:30 a.m., Chief Officer George Stewart awakened wireless operator Cyril Farmstone Evans and informed him that missiles had been sighted during the night and asked him to contact the ship. He received news of the sinking of the Titanic, Captain Lord was notified and the ship set out to provide assistance. It arrived long after the Carpathia, which had already picked up the survivors.

Upon investigation, it was discovered that the ship seen by the Californian was actually the Titanic, and that the Californian could have come to its aid, so Captain Lord acted inappropriately by not doing so. However, Lord maintained his innocence for the rest of his life, and many researchers argue that the famous positions of the Titanic and Californian make it impossible that the former was the infamous "Mystery Ship", a topic that "has generated...millions of words and ... hours of heated debate,” and continues to do so [ unreputable source?] .

Composition of the dead and survivors

Almost all the women and children from the 1st and 2nd class cabins were saved. More than half of the women and children from the 3rd class cabins died because they had difficulty finding their way up through the labyrinth of narrow corridors. Almost all the men also died. The tragedy of the Paulson family claimed the lives of Alma's mother and all her four young children, for whom father Nils waited in vain in New York.

338 men (20% of all adult men) and 316 women (74% of all adult women) survived, including Violet Jessop, Dorothy Gibson, Molly Brown, Lucy Duff Gordon, Countess of Rothe and others. Of the children, 56 survived (slightly more than half of all children).

The last of the Titanic passengers, Millvina Dean, who was two and a half months old at the time of the sinking of the liner, died on May 31, 2009 at the age of 97 years. Her ashes were scattered to the wind on October 24, 2009 in the port of Southampton, where the Titanic began its only voyage.

A unique record belongs to Jessop's maid, Violet, who survived accidents on all 3 Olympic-class ships. She was working on the Olympic when it collided with the cruiser Hawk; escaped from the Titanic and subsequently survived the sinking of the Britannic by a mine during the First World War.

The death of the Titanic is one of the largest maritime disasters

Among disasters that occurred outside of hostilities, the Titanic ranks third in terms of the number of victims. The sad leadership is behind the Dona Paz ferry, which collided with an oil tanker in 1987. More than 4 thousand people died in the collision and subsequent fire. Second place is held by the wooden paddle steamer Sultana, which sank on April 27, 1865 on the Mississippi River near Memphis due to a steam boiler explosion and fire. The total number of deaths on the ship exceeded 1,700 people, this is the worst disaster on river vessels.

Theories about the causes of the accident

Sheathing

On the other hand, this test only proves that modern steel is much better than what was used at the beginning of the 20th century. It does not prove that the steel used to build the Titanic was of poor quality (or not the best) for its time.

In the first years of the 21st century, a number of media outlets, with reference to the latest research of the ship's hull by deep-sea submersibles, expressed the opinion that when it collided with an iceberg, the ship was not holed, and its hull withstood the impact. The cause of death was that the hull rivets could not prevent the divergence of its sheets, and sea water began to flow into the long gap that formed.

Radio operators

The internal communication system of the liner was extremely unsatisfactory; there was no direct communication with the captain - all messages had to be reported to him orally. The reason was that a radiotelegraph station was considered a luxury, and the main task of telegraph operators was to serve especially wealthy passengers - it is known that in just 36 hours of work, radio operators transmitted more than 250 telegrams. Payment for telegraph services was made on the spot, in the radio room, and at that time it was very expensive, tips were received in large quantities.

The radio log from the Titanic did not survive, but based on the surviving recordings from various ships that had contact with the liner, it was possible to more or less restore a picture of the work of the radio operators. Reports of drifting ice and icebergs began to arrive on the morning of the fateful date - April 14, and the exact coordinates of the high-risk zone were indicated. The Titanic continued to sail further, without turning off course or slowing down. At 19:30, a telegram came from the transport ship Mesaba: “I report ice from 42 degrees to 41 degrees 25 minutes north latitude and from 49 degrees to 50 degrees 30 minutes west longitude. Saw a large number of icebergs, ice fields." At this time, the Titanic's senior communications officer Jack Phillips was working for the benefit of passengers, transmitting an inexhaustible stream of messages to the Cape Ras station, while the most important message never reached the captain, getting lost in a heap of paper - the Mesaba radio operator forgot to mark the message as "Ice Report" with prefix MSG, which meant “personally to the captain.” This small detail overshadowed Phillips' dedication.

On the other hand, on April 14, in addition to this message, several more warnings about icebergs were received from other ships. The captain took certain measures, in particular, the officers were warned verbally and in writing about the danger, and those looking ahead were ordered to look for the presence of icebergs. Therefore, it cannot be said that Captain Smith did not know about them.

Iceberg

The news about the lack of binoculars from the lookout was received with criticism (according to many testimony, the binoculars were only on the Belfast-Southampton section; after this stop, Hogg, on the captain’s orders, for some reason put them in his cabin). There is an opinion that if you had binoculars looking ahead, despite the moonless night, you would notice the iceberg not a quarter of a mile (450 m) away, but 2 or 3 miles (4-6 km) away. On the other hand, binoculars narrow the field of view, so they are used only after after the lookout noticed something. Lookouts without binoculars spotted the iceberg before the watch officer with binoculars.

If there had been even a slight disturbance or swell in the ocean, he would have seen white caps at the “waterline” of the iceberg. As it later became known, the Titanic collided with a “black” iceberg, that is, one that had recently capsized in the water. The side facing the liner was dark blue, because of this there was no reflection (an ordinary white iceberg under such conditions could be seen a mile away).

The question of what prevented First Officer W. Murdoch from discovering the iceberg in a timely manner remains open. Captain Rostron of the Carpathia said that 75% of objects in the sea are detected from the bridge earlier than from the crow's nest. When his ship sailed at night to the site of the Titanic accident, all the icebergs on their way were noticed from the bridge before the lookouts discovered them (British investigation, questions 25431-25449).

Maneuvering

There is an opinion that if Murdoch had not given the order to reverse immediately after the command to "left rudder", the Titanic would probably have avoided the collision, since reverse negatively affects the efficiency of the steering wheel. In this case, however, the time required to execute the command is ignored. This takes at least 30 seconds and the command was probably received with a delay; - commands for the engine room along the route of the liner are rarely given (the last one was given three days before), so no one is standing at the engine telegraph. The command simply did not have time to be carried out, otherwise the Titanic would have experienced strong vibration, but no one mentions it. According to the testimony of survivors, the cars stopped and reversed after the collision, so this command had no practical significance.

There is also an opinion that the best decision would be to put only the left car into reverse. Working the propellers against each other would help speed up the turn and reduce the speed. The middle propeller was driven by a steam turbine that ran on residual steam from the onboard engines; this turbine had no reverse gear. Thus, a stopped propeller, behind which there was a single rudder of a very small area, created a turbulent flow, in which the already ineffective rudder almost completely lost its effectiveness. Perhaps even in order to avoid a collision, it would be necessary, on the contrary, to increase the speed of the middle propeller to increase the efficiency of the steering. Moreover, performing the reverse takes considerable time, and, therefore, there was practically no chance to quickly reduce the speed.

Attention should be paid to the fact that the disaster occurred on the first voyage. The navigators had no experience in operating this vessel, which explains the untimely and ineffective attempts to maneuver. At the same time, Captain Smith, First Mate Wild, and First Officer Murdoch, who was on watch during the accident, had experience working on a similar project"Olympic". In 1903 in critical situation Murdoch, with his timely and decisive actions, overruling the command of his superiors, saved the Arabic steamer from a collision.

There are also suggestions that the Titanic would have remained afloat if the rudder had not been shifted and the ship would have “rammed” the iceberg, taking the blow on the stem. The design of the partitions was precisely aimed at the “survival” of the ship in a head-on collision, but the sides of the ship were not protected. “Wilding, a shipbuilder from Belfast, calculated that the bow of the ship would have been dented by 25-30 meters, but the ship would not have died. It would be instant death for those who were in the bow of the ship at that time, but the loss of inertia would be quite slow, comparable to a car traveling at that speed, whose brakes were instantly pulled all the way,” Barnaby reports. However, Murdoch is justified by the fact that he did not have the opportunity to measure the distance to the iceberg and could not know that the maneuver he had undertaken would not succeed. Therefore, one can hardly blame him for not giving a command that would obviously kill people.

Buoyancy

The liner was not designed to flood all of the first five compartments. Although such a design is possible, it is extremely expensive - the only ship built this way, the Great Eastern, was unprofitable. The unprofitability of this gigantic ship is confirmed by the fact that it was not found possible to use it for its intended purpose, and it went down in history as a cable ship used in laying the transatlantic telegraph cable. The likelihood of risk cannot be ignored either. After all, except for the Titanic, no ship suffered such damage in peacetime.

Reducing speed or avoiding an iceberg field

Despite warnings about icebergs, the captain of the Titanic did not slow down or change the route. But this was standard practice in those days. Thus, during the investigation into the circumstances of the death of the Titanic, Captain Gerard C. Affeld, who commanded 5 transatlantic ships, testified that, having received warnings about icebergs, he never changed the route and reduced speed only in case of fog or bad weather. He studied ship's logs ships entrusted to him. According to these logs, other captains, having received warnings about icebergs, also did not change their route and, as a rule, did not reduce speed. On the other hand, not everyone followed this practice: the ship closest to the Titanic, the Californian, having reached the iceberg field, stopped at its border (and gave the Titanic a warning, which was ignored).

Late reaction on the bridge

Lookout Reginald Lee testified that he spotted the iceberg from a distance of "half a mile, maybe more, maybe less." The Titanic would have covered half a mile in 80 seconds. Helmsman Hichens testified that by the time of the collision the ship had turned 2 points. Since the wheelhouse windows were completely darkened so that light would not interfere with observation from the bridge, Hichens did not see the iceberg. An experiment on the twin steamer Olympic showed that a turn of 2 points would take 37 seconds, counting from the moment the command was given. The authors of the book Report into the Loss of the SS Titanic: A Centennial Reappraisal, published on the centenary of the shipwreck, restore the timing of the accident, and put forward a version of the “lost 30 seconds” after the signal from the lookouts, who left Murdoch for then to visually detect an iceberg, assess the situation and make a decision.

Causes of the tragedy

Subjective reasons

The main subjective reason for the loss of life was the outdated rules of the British Merchant Shipping Code, which made the number of lifeboats dependent on the tonnage of the ship, and not on the number of passengers. The rules were established in 1894, when the tonnage of passenger ships did not exceed 12,952 tons, and all ships of 10,000 tons and above fell into the same category. For such ships, the rules required that the lifeboats have enough space for 962 people. The Titanic's tonnage was 46,328 tons.

The owners of the Titanic, having formally followed the instructions (and even slightly exceeded them, since the Titanic's boats had 1,178 seats, not 962), supplied the ship with an insufficient number of boats. Despite the fact that there were enough lifeboats to land 1,178 people, only 704 were saved. There were certain subjective reasons for this. For example, Second Mate Charles Lightoller, who commanded the launch of the boats on the port side, carried out Captain Smith's order “women and children first” literally: he allowed men to occupy places in the boats only if oarsmen were needed and under no other circumstances.

Based on the stories of Charles Lightoller, his granddaughter Lady Patten put forward a new version of the death of the transatlantic liner. According to the writer, the Titanic sank not because it sailed too fast, which is why it simply did not have time to avoid a collision with an iceberg. There was plenty of time to avoid the ice block, but helmsman Robert Hitchens panicked and turned the wheel in the wrong direction. The ship received a hole, due to which it eventually sank. However, passengers and crew could have been saved if the Titanic had stopped immediately after the collision. Moreover, the nearest ship was only a few miles from the liner. The manager of the company that owned the huge ship, Joseph Bruce Ismay, convinced the captain to continue sailing, fearing that the incident could cause him considerable material damage. He wanted to save the Titanic, but thought exclusively about the financial side of the matter. The rate of water entering the liner's holds increased exponentially. Water entered the housing at a rate of approximately 400 tons per minute. As a result, the ship sank in a matter of hours. Lightoller told only his family about why the liner sank. According to Patten, her relatives feared for their reputation and therefore did not want to divulge the true causes of the 1912 disaster. “My relatives died a long time ago, and I realized that I was the only one in the world who knew about the true cause of the death of the Titanic,” said the writer.

Objective reasons

The cause of the collision and death of the vessel was a combination of unfavorable factors:

• The iceberg belonged to a rare type of so-called. “black icebergs” (overturned so that their dark underwater part reaches the surface), which is why it was noticed too late.
• The night was windless and moonless, otherwise the lookouts would have noticed “lambs” around the iceberg.
• The speed of the ship was too high, due to which the iceberg hit the hull with maximum force. If the captain had ordered the ship’s speed to be reduced in advance when entering the iceberg belt, then perhaps the force of the impact on the iceberg would not have been enough to break through the Titanic’s hull.
• The failure to transmit several telegrams from neighboring ships by members of the radio room, busy sending private telegrams to wealthy passengers for money, about the dangerous proximity of icebergs to Captain Smith, which reduced his vigilance.
• The best steel of the time, from which the Titanic was made, became brittle at low temperatures. The water temperature that night was +2…+4 °C, which made the ship’s hull very vulnerable.
• The quality of the rivets that were used to connect the sheets of the ship’s side plating was poor; when an iceberg hit, the heads of the forged iron rivets, which replaced the originally provided steel ones, crumbled due to their “porosity” due to the inclusion of foreign impurities in them.
• The construction of partitions between the compartments was made with the expectation of a frontal impact, and the doors between the partitions simply could not withstand the pressure of water and broke under its pressure.

Flood depth

On September 1, 1985, an expedition led by the director of the Institute of Oceanology in Woods Hall, Massachusetts, Dr. Robert D. Ballard, discovered the site of the Titanic at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean at a depth of 3,750 meters.

The distance between the remains of the bow and stern of the Titanic is about 600 meters.

The remains of the ship were discovered 13 miles west of the coordinates that the Titanic transmitted in its SOS signal.

In April 2012, one hundred years after the shipwreck, the ship's remains gained protection under the 2001 UNESCO Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage. From now on, states parties to the Convention have the right to prevent the destruction, looting, sale and unauthorized distribution of objects found at the shipwreck site. They can take all necessary measures to protect the wreck and ensure proper treatment of the human remains contained therein.

Conspiracy theory

Reflection of the Titanic in art

The crash of the airliner became one of the most famous disasters in human history. To some extent, the image of the Titanic became a symbol of the death of something that seemed powerful and unsinkable, a symbol of the weakness of human technogenic civilization in front of the forces of nature. The disaster was widely reflected in art, especially mass art. The first film dedicated to the disaster - “Rescue from the Titanic” - appeared in May 1912, a month after the crash. Also in 1912, but before the disaster occurred, Morgan Robertson's book "Futility, Or the Wreck of the Titan" was published, the action of which took place on board a passenger ship " Titan", similar in description and displacement to the Titanic. In this book, the Titan succumbs to an iceberg in the fog while sailing from New York to Great Britain. As a result, a legend appeared about Morgan Robertson’s “prediction” of the Titanic disaster. This fact is reinforced by the fact that despite the book being published in 1912, it was written in 1898.

The film “Titanic”, released in 1997, was the leader in box office receipts at the global box office for 13 years ($1,845,034,188, of which $600,788,188 in the USA), but in 2010, the record for “Titanic” was broken by the film “Avatar”, released by the same director; In April 2012, on the centenary of the disaster, Cameron released his old film, but in 3D format.

Many songs by performers and groups playing in different genres were dedicated to the death of the ship. In particular, in the song of the same name by the Austrian performer Falco (1992), the Titanic is seen as a symbol of decadence, the end of an era, in the song Russian group“Nautilus Pompilius” from the album of the same name “Titanic” (1994), the sailing ship appears as a symbol of death and doom.

see also

• Titanic Belfast (museum)

Notes

1. About the fate of the White Star Line superliners (Retrieved April 8, 2012)
2. Did you know | RU
3. Titanic Belfast Museum

105 years ago, on April 15, 1912, the “unsinkable ship,” “the largest and most luxurious ocean liner,” crashed into an iceberg on its first voyage and took more than one and a half thousand passengers with it to the bottom of the ocean. It would seem that for many decades there are no more mysteries and secrets about this terrible catastrophe. And yet, let's remember how it was.

First official version

Two government investigations that followed the disaster determined that it was the iceberg, and not the ship's defects, that caused the death of the liner. Both commissions of inquiry concluded that the Titanic sank not in parts, but as a whole - there were no major faults.

The blame for this tragedy was placed entirely on the shoulders of the ship's captain, Edward Smith, who died along with his crew and passengers of the Atlantic liner. Experts reproached Smith for the fact that the ship was traveling at a speed of 22 knots (41 km) through a dangerous ice field - in dark waters, off the coast of Newfoundland.

Robert Ballard's discovery

In 1985, oceanographer Robert Ballard, after a long unsuccessful search, finally managed to find the remains of a ship at a depth of about four kilometers on the ocean floor. It was then that he discovered that the Titanic had actually split in half before sinking.

A couple of years later, the wreckage of the ship was brought to the surface for the first time, and a new hypothesis immediately appeared - low-grade steel was used to build an “unsinkable ship.” However, according to experts, it was not the steel that turned out to be of low quality, but the rivets - the most important metal pins that tie together the steel plates of the airliner's hull. And the found wreckage of the Titanic does indicate that the stern of the ship did not rise high into the air, as many believed. It is believed that the Titanic split into parts while relatively level on the surface of the ocean - this is a clear sign of miscalculations in the design of the ship, which were hidden after the disaster.

Design miscalculations

The Titanic was built in a short time - in response to the production of a new generation of high-speed liners by competitors.

The Titanic could stay afloat even if 4 of its 16 watertight compartments were flooded - this is amazing for a ship of such gigantic size.

However, on the night of April 14-15, 1912, just a few days into the liner’s debut voyage, its Achilles’ heel was revealed. The ship, due to its size, was not agile enough to avoid a collision with the iceberg, which the watchmen had been shouting about for the last minute. The Titanic did not collide with the fatal iceberg head-on, but drove along it on its right side - the ice punched holes in the steel plates, flooding six “watertight” compartments. And after a couple of hours the ship was completely filled with water and sank.

According to experts studying the potential weak point of the Titanic - the rivets, they found that due to the fact that time was running out, builders began to use low-grade material. When the liner hit an iceberg, the weak steel rods in the bow of the ship cracked. It is believed that it was no coincidence that the water, having flooded six compartments held together by low-grade steel rods, stopped exactly where the high-quality steel rivets began.

In 2005, another expedition studying the crash site was able to establish from the wreckage of the bottom that during the crash the ship tilted only about 11 degrees, and not 45, as had long been believed.

Memories of Passengers

Because the ship tilted only slightly, passengers and crew were lulled into a false sense of security—many of them did not understand the gravity of the situation. When the water sufficiently flooded the bow of the hull, the ship, while remaining afloat, split in two and sank in minutes.

Charlie Jugin, the Titanic's chef, was standing near the stern when the ship sank and did not notice any signs of hull fracture. Nor did he notice the suction funnel or the colossal splash. According to his information, he calmly sailed away from the ship, without even getting his hair wet.

However, some passengers sitting in lifeboats claimed to have seen the stern of the Titanic raised high in the air. However, this could only be an optical illusion. With a tilt of 11 degrees, propellers sticking out in the air, the Titanic, the height of a 20-story building, seemed even taller, and its roll into the water even greater.

How the Titanic sank: a real-time model

The menu for the last dinner on the Titanic, which sank in 1912, has been sold in New York. The price for it was 88 thousand dollars (about 1.9 million hryvnia).

Blue Star Line announced the construction of Titanic 2. According to the designers, the ship will be an exact copy of the famous liner that sank in 1912. However, the liner will be equipped with modern safety equipment. Australian mining magnate Clive Palmer undertook to finance the project.

Now this 105-year-old cracker is considered the most expensive in the world.

It turns out that a cracker made by Spillers and Bakers called "Pilot" was included in the survival kit that was placed on each lifeboat. Later, one of these products went to a man who kept it as a souvenir. It was James Fenwick, a passenger on the ship Carpathia, which was picking up shipwreck survivors.

REFERENCE

On the night of April 15, 1912, the Titanic collided with an iceberg and sank. He sailed in the Atlantic Ocean on his way from Southampton (England) to New York. About 1.5 thousand people died then, mostly third class passengers. In total there were more than 2.2 thousand people there.

"Titanic" (eng. Titanic) is a British transatlantic steamer, the second liner of the Olympic class. Built in Belfast at the Harland and Wolfe shipyard from 1909 to 1912 for the White Star Line shipping company.

At the time of commissioning it was the largest ship in the world.

On the night of April 14-15, 1912, during her maiden voyage, she crashed in the North Atlantic, colliding with an iceberg.

Vessel information

The Titanic was equipped with two four-cylinder steam engines and a steam turbine.

• The entire power plant had a capacity of 55,000 hp. With.
• The ship could reach speeds of up to 23 knots (42 km/h).
• Its displacement, which exceeded the twin ship Olympic by 243 tons, was 52,310 tons.
• The ship's hull was made of steel.
• The hold and lower decks were divided into 16 compartments by bulkheads with sealed doors.
• If the bottom was damaged, the double bottom prevented water from entering the compartments.

Shipbuilder magazine called the Titanic virtually unsinkable, a statement that was widely circulated in the press and among the public.

In accordance with outdated rules, the Titanic was equipped with 20 lifeboats, with a total capacity of 1178 people, which was only a third of the maximum load of the ship.

The cabins and public areas of the Titanic were divided into three classes.

First class passengers were provided with a swimming pool, a squash court, an A la carte restaurant, two cafes, and a gym. All classes had dining and smoking lounges, open and closed promenades. The most luxurious and sophisticated were the first class interiors, made in various artistic styles using expensive materials such as mahogany, gilding, stained glass, silk and others. The cabins and salons of the third class were decorated as simply as possible: the steel walls were painted in White color or covered with wooden panels.

1 On April 0, 1912, the Titanic set sail from Southampton on its first and only voyage. After making stops in Cherbourg, France, and Queenstown, Ireland, the ship entered the Atlantic Ocean with 1,317 passengers and 908 crew members on board. The ship was commanded by Captain Edward Smith. On April 14, the Titanic's radio station received seven ice warnings, but the liner continued to move almost at top speed. To avoid encountering floating ice, the captain ordered to go slightly south of the usual route.

• At 23:39 on April 14, the lookout reported to the captain's bridge about an iceberg directly ahead. Less than a minute later there was a collision. Having received several holes, the ship began to sink. Women and children were put on the boats first.
• At 2:20 on April 15, the Titanic sank, breaking into two parts, killing 1,496 people. 712 survivors were picked up by the steamship Carpathia.

The wreckage of the Titanic rests at a depth of 3,750 m. They were first discovered by Robert Ballard's expedition in 1985. Subsequent expeditions recovered thousands of artifacts from the bottom. The bow and stern parts are deeply buried in the bottom silt and are in a deplorable condition; raising them to the surface intact is not possible.

The wreck of the Titanic

The disaster claimed the lives, according to various sources, from 1,495 to 1,635 people. Until December 20, 1987, when the Philippine ferry Dona Paz sank, killing more than 4,000 people, the sinking of the Titanic remained the deadliest peacetime maritime disaster. Informally, it is the most famous disaster of the 20th century.

Alternative versions of the ship's death

And now - alternative versions, each of which has its adherents in world club lovers of secrets.

Fire

A fire in the coal compartment that broke out before sailing and provoked first an explosion and then a collision with an iceberg. The ship's owners knew about the fire and tried to hide it from passengers. This version was put forward by British journalist Shanan Moloney, writes The Independent. Moloney has been researching the causes of the Titanic's sinking for more than 30 years.

In particular, he studied photographs taken before the ship left the Belfast shipyard. The journalist saw black marks along the right side of the ship's hull - exactly where the iceberg hit it. Experts subsequently confirmed that the marks were likely caused by a fire that started in a fuel storage facility. “We looked at the exact location where the iceberg was stuck and it appears that part of the hull was very vulnerable at that location, and that was before it even left the Belfast shipyard,” Moloney says. A team of 12 tried to put out the flames, but they were too big to bring under control quickly. It could reach temperatures of up to 1000 degrees Celsius, making the Titanic's hull very vulnerable in this area. And when it hit the ice, experts say, it immediately broke. The publication also added that the liner's management prohibited passengers from talking about the fire. “This is a perfect confluence of unusual factors: fire, ice and criminal negligence. No one had investigated these marks before. It changes the story completely,” says Moloney.

CONSPIRACY

Conspiracy theory: this is not the Titanic at all! This version was put forward by experts who studied the causes of the death of the ship, Robin Gardiner and Dan Van Der Watt, published in the book “The Mystery of the Titanic.” According to this theory, the sunken ship is not the Titanic at all, but its twin brother, the Olympic. These ships looked practically no different from each other. On September 20, 1911, the Olympic collided with the British Navy cruiser Hawk, causing both ships to be seriously damaged. The owners of "Olympic" suffered heavy losses, since the damage that was caused to "Olympic" was not enough for an insurance payment.

The theory is based on the assumption of possible fraud in order for the owners of the Titanic to receive insurance payments. According to this version, the owners of the Titanic intentionally sent the Olympic to an area of ​​possible ice formation and at the same time convinced the captain not to slow down so that the ship would suffer serious damage when colliding with a block of ice. This version was initially supported by the fact that a fairly large number of objects were raised from the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean, where the Titanic lies, but nothing was found that bore the name “Titanic.” This theory was refuted after parts were brought to the surface, on which the Titanic’s side (construction) number was stamped - 401. The Olympic had a side number of 400. In addition, the minted side number of the Titanic was discovered and on the propeller of a sunken ship. And even despite this, the conspiracy theory still has a number of followers.

German attack

1912 With the First World War two years away, the prospect of armed conflict between Germany and Great Britain is becoming increasingly likely. Germany owns several dozen submarines, which during the war will launch a merciless hunt for enemy ships trying to cross the ocean. For example, the reason for America’s entry into the war will be the fact that the U-20 submarine will sink the Lusitania in 1915, a twin of the same Mauritania that set the speed record and won the Atlantic Blue Ribbon - remember?

Based on these facts, some Western publications proposed their own version of the death of the Titanic in the mid-nineties: a torpedo attack by a German submarine secretly accompanying the liner. The purpose of the attack was to discredit the British fleet, famous for its power throughout the world. In accordance with this theory, the Titanic either did not collide with the iceberg at all, or received very minor damage in the collision and would have remained afloat if the Germans had not finished off the ship with a torpedo.

What speaks in favor of this version? Honestly, nothing.

There was a collision with an iceberg - this is beyond doubt. The deck of the ship was even covered with snow and ice chips. Cheerful passengers started playing football with ice cubes - it would become clear later that the ship was doomed. The collision itself was surprisingly quiet - almost none of the passengers felt it. The torpedo, you must admit, could hardly have exploded completely silently (especially since some claim that the submarine fired as many as six torpedoes at the ship!).

Supporters of the theory of the German attack claim, however, that people in the boats heard a terrible roar just before the Titanic sank - well, this was two and a half hours later, when only the stern raised into the sky remained above the water and the death of the ship did not raise any doubts. It’s unlikely that the Germans would have fired a torpedo at an almost sunken ship, would it? And the roar that the survivors heard was explained by the fact that the stern of the Titanic rose almost vertically and huge steam boilers fell from their places. Also, do not forget that at about the same minutes the Titanic broke in half - the keel could not withstand the weight of the rising stern (however, they will learn about this only after the liner is discovered at the bottom: the break occurred below the water level), and this, too, is unlikely to have happened silently . And why would the Germans suddenly start sinking a passenger liner two years before the start of the war? This seems dubious, to put it mildly. And to put it bluntly, it’s absurd.

A curse

Mystical version: curse of the pharaohs. It is known for certain that one of the historians, Lord Canterville, transported on the Titanic in a wooden box a perfectly preserved Egyptian mummy of a priestess - a soothsayer. Since the mummy had a fairly high historical and cultural value, it was not placed in the hold, but placed directly next to the captain's bridge. The essence of the theory is that the mummy influenced the mind of Captain Smith, who, despite numerous warnings about ice in the area where the Titanic was sailing, did not slow down and thereby doomed the ship to certain death. This version is supported by well-known cases of mysterious deaths of people who disturbed the peace of ancient burials, especially mummified Egyptian rulers. Moreover, the deaths were associated precisely with clouding of mind, as a result of which people committed inappropriate actions, and cases of suicide often occurred. Did the pharaohs have a hand in the sinking of the Titanic?

Steering error

One of latest versions The sinking of the Titanic deserves special attention. She appeared after the novel by the granddaughter of the second mate of the Titanic, Charles Lightoller, Lady Patten, “Worth Its Weight in Gold,” was published. According to Patten's book, the ship had enough time to avoid the obstacle, but helmsman Robert Hitchens panicked and turned the wheel the wrong way.

A catastrophic mistake led to the iceberg causing fatal damage to the ship. The truth about what really happened that fateful night was kept secret by the family of Lightoller, the oldest surviving officer of the Titanic and the only survivor who knew exactly what caused the ship's sinking. Lightoller hid this information out of fear that the White Star Line, which owned the ship, would go bankrupt and his colleagues would lose their jobs. The only person to whom Lightoller told the truth was his wife Sylvia, who conveyed her husband’s words to her granddaughter. In addition, according to Patten, such a large and reliable liner as the Titanic sank so quickly because after colliding with an ice block it was not immediately stopped, and the rate of water entering the holds increased hundreds of times. The liner was not immediately stopped because White Star Line manager Bruce Ismay convinced the captain to continue sailing. He feared that the incident could cause considerable material damage to the company he headed.

Chasing the Atlantic Blue Riband

There were and still are many supporters of this theory, especially among writers, since it appeared precisely in literary circles. The Atlantic Blue Ribbon is a prestigious shipping prize awarded to ocean liners for achieving record speeds across the North Atlantic.

At the time of the Titanic, this prize was awarded to the ship Mauritania of the Cunard company, which, by the way, was the founder of this award, as well as the main competitor of the White Star Line. In defense of this theory, it is argued that the president of the company that owned the Titanic, Ismay, encouraged the captain of the Titanic, Smith, to arrive in New York a day ahead of schedule and receive an honorary prize. This supposedly explains the ship's high speed in a dangerous area of ​​the Atlantic. But this theory can easily be refuted, because the Titanic simply physically could not have reached the speed of 26 knots at which the Cunard Mauritania set a record that, by the way, lasted for more than 10 years after the disaster in the Atlantic.

But what was it really like?

Sadly, when studying the history of the most famous maritime disaster, we have to admit that the Titanic owes its death to a long chain of fatal accidents. If at least one link of the ominous chain had been destroyed, the tragedy could have been avoided.

Perhaps the first link was successful start travel – yes, yes, that’s right. On the morning of April 10, during the departure of the Titanic from the quay wall of the port of Southampton, the superliner passed too close to the American ship New York, and a phenomenon known in navigation as ship suction arose: the New York began to be attracted to the one moving nearby. "Titanic". However, thanks to the skill of Captain Edward Smith, a collision was avoided.

Ironically, if the accident had happened, it would have saved one and a half thousand lives: if the Titanic had been delayed in port, the ill-fated encounter with the iceberg would not have happened.

This time. It should also be mentioned that the radio operators who received the message from the Mesaba ship about the ice fields of icebergs did not transmit it to Edward Smith: the telegram was not marked with a special prefix “personally to the captain”, and was lost in a heap of papers. That's two.

However, this message was not the only one, and the captain knew about the ice danger. Why didn't he slow down the ship? The pursuit of the Blue Ribbon is, of course, a matter of honor (and, more importantly, big business), but why did he risk the lives of passengers? It wasn't that much of a risk, really. In those years, captains of ocean liners often passed through areas dangerous with ice without slowing down: it was like crossing the road at a red light: it seems like you shouldn’t do that, but it always works out. Almost always.

To the credit of Captain Smith, it must be said that he remained faithful to maritime traditions and remained on the dying ship until the very end.

But why was the bulk of the iceberg not noticed? Here everything came together: a moonless, dark night, windless weather. If there were even small waves on the water surface, those looking ahead could see whitecaps at the foot of the iceberg. Calm and moonless night are two more links in the fatal chain.

As it turned out later, the chain was continued by the fact that the iceberg, shortly before the collision with the Titanic, turned over with its underwater, water-saturated, dark part upward, which is why it was practically invisible at night from afar (an ordinary, white iceberg would have been visible a mile away ). The watchman saw him only 450 meters away, and there was almost no time left for maneuver. Perhaps the iceberg would have been noticed earlier, but here another link in the fatal chain played a role - there were no binoculars in the “crow’s nest”. The box where they were kept was locked, and the key to it was hastily taken with him by the second mate, who had been removed from the ship just before departure.

After the lookout nevertheless saw the danger and reported the iceberg to the captain's bridge, there was a little more than half a minute left before the collision. Officer of the watch Murdoch, who was on watch, gave the order to the helmsman to turn left, while simultaneously transmitting the command “full astern” to the engine room. Thus, he made a grave mistake, adding another link in the chain that led the liner to death: even if the Titanic had crashed into an iceberg head-on, the tragedy would have been less. The bow of the ship would have been crushed, part of the crew and those passengers whose cabins were located in front would have died. But only two watertight compartments would have been flooded. With such damage, the liner would have remained afloat and could have waited for help from other ships.

And if Murdoch, having turned the ship to the left, had ordered an increase rather than a decrease in speed, the collision might not have happened at all. However, frankly speaking, the order to change the speed hardly plays a significant role here: in thirty seconds it was hardly executed in the engine room.

So, the collision happened. The iceberg damaged the ship's fragile hull along six compartments on the starboard side.

Looking ahead, let's say that only seven hundred and four managed to escape: the next link in the chain of failures was that some sailors took too literally the captain's order to put women and children in the boats, and did not allow men there, even if there were empty seats. However, at first no one was particularly eager to get into the boats. The passengers did not understand what was happening and did not want to leave the huge, comfortably lit, such a reliable liner, and it was unclear why they should go down in a small unstable boat down to the icy water. However, pretty soon anyone could notice that the deck was tilting forward more and more, and panic began.

But why was there such a monstrous discrepancy between the places on the lifeboats? The owners of the Titanic, praising the merits of the new ship, stated that they even exceeded the instructions of the code: instead of the required 962 life-saving seats on the ship, there were 1178. Unfortunately, they did not attach any importance to the discrepancy between this number and the number of passengers on board.

It is especially sad that another passenger steamer, the Californian, stood very close to the sinking Titanic, waiting out the ice danger. A few hours ago, he notified neighboring ships that he was locked in ice and was forced to stop so as not to accidentally run into an ice block. The radio operator from the Titanic, who was almost deafened by the Morse code from the Californian (the ships were very close, and the signal of one echoed too loudly in the headphones of the other), impolitely interrupted the warning: “Go to hell, you are interfering with my work!” What was the radio operator of the Titanic so busy with?

The fact is that in those years, radio communication on a ship was more of a luxury than an urgent necessity, and this miracle of technology aroused great interest among the wealthy public. From the very beginning of the voyage, the radio operators were literally inundated with private messages - and no one saw anything reprehensible in the fact that the Titanic’s radio operators paid such attention to rich passengers who wished to send a telegram to the ground directly from the liner. So at that moment, when colleagues from other ships reported about floating ice, the radio operator transmitted another message to the continent. Radio communication was more like expensive toy than a serious instrument: ships of that time did not even have a 24-hour watch at the radio station.