RMS Titanic sinking

[Serafina]

A serious question (yes, i know that violates the rules of testing ):

Was the Titanic really that badly engineered?
Sure, it did not have enough lifeboats - but IIRC, the engineers were overruled on that one to make more room for luxurious upper decks.
But the compartments were not that different from modern designs, it did not sink due to anything failing...so really, why should it be badly engineered?


Furthermore, the Ark was not designed by Noah. It was built by him - but that's not the same thing.
Indeed, it was designed by god - and if you believe that he designed the universe, that's hardly an impressive feat.

[Crossroads Inc.]

As far as I know the only "Flaw" in the Titanic was that the Water tight chambers extended only a few decks up instead of all the way. If one chamber was filled or even two or three, the ship could float. But because several were filling up, the water would spill over into the next chamber as soon as it reached where the Water Tight doors ended.

And you, Captain was an idiot for doing what he did. its pretty much agreed upon that he could have taken virtually ANY other corse of action and had the Titanic remain afloat. Trying to do a sharp turn while the engines were going fore bore was what doomed it.

[Gramzamber]

A serious question (yes, i know that violates the rules of testing ):

Was the Titanic really that badly engineered?
Sure, it did not have enough lifeboats - but IIRC, the engineers were overruled on that one to make more room for luxurious upper decks.
But the compartments were not that different from modern designs, it did not sink due to anything failing...so really, why should it be badly engineered.

I think it comes from the myth that the Titanic was constantly touted as "unsinkable", I believe it's a myth as that phrase has only been found once in a newspaper.
Of course the Titanic had new safety features that were boasted about, but these usually are and those safety features just weren't designed to handle the multiple breaches the hull suffered.
Still after the fact everybody said that the Titanic was the unsinkable ship. But then it sank. Therefore it was badly engineered.

[The Spartan]

The steel* in the rivets and the hull had sulfur inclusions, if I'm remembering right, that gave it a high ductile to brittle transition temperature that was well above what the temperature in the Atlantic is. Which exacerbated the damage to it by not only letting in the water through the hole the iceberg tore, but by busting the seams between hull plates. Then there's the water tight doors not extending to the upper decks, as Crossroads noted, which would have slowed the flooding, but without that feature the sinking accelerated once the water started going over them. Properly designed, they still wouldn't have saved the ship, but they might have bought them enough time for rescuers to reach them. There were a few other things, but I don't remember them off the top of my head.

That's on top of the non-engineering failures like racing through the ice fields without properly equipped look-outs and not having enough lifeboats.

*To be fair, the steel was the best you could get at the time, or nearly so. I had to do a short report on the Titanic at UTA; it was like a perfect storm of fuck-ups.

[RedImperator]

Titanic's second sister, Britannic, was explicitly redesigned to survive the damage Titanic took--she could float with 5 compartments flooded instead of four (Olympic was similarly refit). So naturally, when she struck a mine in the Med, the watertight doors jammed and the lower deck portholes were open, and she sank anyway. Only lost 30, though, and most of the casualties were from lifeboats that were launched without orders and drifted into the propellers while the engines were still running.

[General Zod]

The steel* in the rivets and the hull had sulfur inclusions, if I'm remembering right, that gave it a high ductile to brittle transition temperature that was well above what the temperature in the Atlantic is. Which exacerbated the damage to it by not only letting in the water through the hole the iceberg tore, but by busting the seams between hull plates. Then there's the water tight doors not extending to the upper decks, as Crossroads noted, which would have slowed the flooding, but without that feature the sinking accelerated once the water started going over them. Properly designed, they still wouldn't have saved the ship, but they might have bought them enough time for rescuers to reach them. There were a few other things, but I don't remember them off the top of my head.

That's on top of the non-engineering failures like racing through the ice fields without properly equipped look-outs and not having enough lifeboats.

*To be fair, the steel was the best you could get at the time, or nearly so. I had to do a short report on the Titanic at UTA; it was like a perfect storm of fuck-ups.

The fact that they were dangerously short on lifeboats didn't help matters, though that's not really an engineering issue.

[The Spartan]

That's kind of why I mentioned it in that little sentence about non-engineering failures.

And they weren't dangerously short, that implies they might have enough if everything goes right. The had totally inadequate lifeboat space where people were going to die unless everything else went exactly right and maybe even then.

[General Zod]

That's kind of why I mentioned it in that little sentence about non-engineering failures.

Yeah but your post was tl;dr so I didn't see it.

[The Spartan]

Lazy ass punk.

[Questor]

"'The Titanic was built by 'Intellectuals'
The Ark was built by a Humble Farmer
Always question Learned Men"

There's a guy that posts on a professional mailing list of mine with this as his signature:

"The Titanic was built by professionals, the Ark was built by amateurs."

He likes to expound on the value of wikipedia as a resource.

I once responded. "So was the U.S.S. Iowa."

[Captain Seafort]

That's on top of the non-engineering failures like racing through the ice fields

If that was a failure, then so was every ship crossing the Atlantic at the time - continuing at full speed unless there was a specific reason not to was standard procedure. Since the Mesaba's message warning of ice in the ship's path was never reported, there was no reason to slow down.

without properly equipped look-outs

True, but given that they saw the ice while it was still three or four miles away and didn't recognise it, inexperience was a bigger problem.

not having enough lifeboats.

Agree that it was a non-engineering fuckup, but it was made even worse because, IIRC, the Titanic had more than enough space on her davits to carry enough boats for the entire complement - they simply weren't carried because they'd have filled up the boat deck rather than leaving it free for afternoon strolls.

[The Spartan]

If that was a failure, then so was every ship crossing the Atlantic at the time - continuing at full speed unless there was a specific reason not to was standard procedure. Since the Mesaba's message warning of ice in the ship's path was never reported, there was no reason to slow down.

And I did point out that it was the best they could get. Though if they'd properly tested the steel, i.e. in North Atlantic conditions, they would have been able to better plan for it or design around it or both. I'm not sure they knew about the ductile to brittle transition at the time, but that's why you test in conditions your expecting to operate in: so that you can catch things you might not have expected. (Consider that scale model of San Francisco Bay that was built to test proposed changes and still operates today, decades later.)

True, but given that they saw the ice while it was still three or four miles away and didn't recognise it, inexperience was a bigger problem.

Yeah, but if they'd had field glasses they'd have been able to recognize it sooner than, "HOLY SHIT WE'RE GONNA HIT A BERG!" Even inexperienced lookouts can't deny that there's a really big fucking obstruction if they have an eyepiece filled with one.

Agree that it was a non-engineering fuckup, but it was made even worse because, IIRC, the Titanic had more than enough space on her davits to carry enough boats for the entire complement - they simply weren't carried because they'd have filled up the boat deck rather than leaving it free for afternoon strolls.

Yeah, they originally had enough boats, either stacked on top of one another or collapsible ones, but thought they cluttered the deck. I think they also assumed that if the ship was hit they'd have enough time to call for help and so didn't need them. Note that they were still carrying more boats than then required by law since, at the time, lifeboat capacity was based upon tonnage not crew/passenger compliment. Which doesn't work too bad for a relatively lightly manned cargo ship, but, as we see here, is fucking catastrophic for a passenger liner.

[Captain Seafort]

Yeah, but if they'd had field glasses they'd have been able to recognize it sooner than, "HOLY SHIT WE'RE GONNA HIT A BERG!" Even inexperienced lookouts can't deny that there's a really big fucking obstruction if they have an eyepiece filled with one.

If there had been an iceberg, probably. Given that there wasn't (and couldn't have been, given how slight the damage was) it doesn't really matter.

What the Titanic ran into was pack ice. The lookouts saw what they thought was haze on the horizon, not knowing what pack ice looked like from a distance, and that the weather conditions prohibited haze. When the ship came upon the pack, it would have been far more difficult to spot, given that it would have been lying very low in the water.

The correct solution for entering ice would be to do so at right angles, to take the impact on the stem bar, and as slowly as possible. By putting the helm over Murdoch caused the brunt of the impact to be taken on the starboard bow plates and hull, which gave way.

[Thanas]

The Titanic's rudder however was very badly designed.

BBC

Compared with the rudder design of the Cunarders, Titanic's was a fraction of the size. No account was made for advances in scale and little thought was given to how a ship, 852 feet in length, might turn in an emergency or avoid collision with an iceberg. This was Titanic's Achilles heel.

I guess nobody really thought that enlarging a rudder might be required for a larger ship. Unlike those at Cunard.

[Captain Seafort]

Ironically, her having a small rudder might have bought her complement more time to abandon ship - a larger runner would presumably have caused her to strike the pack at a shallower angle, causing the damage to extend further aft and therefore greater flooding.

[Thanas]

Ironically, her having a small rudder might have bought her complement more time to abandon ship - a larger runner would presumably have caused her to strike the pack at a shallower angle, causing the damage to extend further aft and therefore greater flooding.

Or it might have allowed her to survive it. If your ship can turn twice as fast, no chance of striking the iceberg.

[Captain Seafort]

Or it might have allowed her to survive it. If your ship can turn twice as fast, no chance of striking the iceberg.

That's my point - she didn't hit a berg. If you think about it (which I, admittedly, didn't until I picked up an interesting book on the subject) it's pretty obvious. Ships don't pivot about the rudder, but about a point within the ship (about the same point as the bridge in Titanic's case). Therefore, if the starboard bow grazes a berg with the helm to starboard (rudder to port), then the hull abaft the bridge should still be moving to starboard - a movement that will be exaggerated by the impact. The entire starboard side would have been ripped open, and the ship would have rolled over and sunk within minutes with no or very few survivors.

[Thanas]

Or it might have allowed her to survive it. If your ship can turn twice as fast, no chance of striking the iceberg.

That's my point - she didn't hit a berg. If you think about it (which I, admittedly, didn't until I picked up an interesting book on the subject) it's pretty obvious. Ships don't pivot about the rudder, but about a point within the ship (about the same point as the bridge in Titanic's case). Therefore, if the starboard bow grazes a berg with the helm to starboard (rudder to port), then the hull abaft the bridge should still be moving to starboard - a movement that will be exaggerated by the impact. The entire starboard side would have been ripped open, and the ship would have rolled over and sunk within minutes with no or very few survivors.

This assumes she could not have turned away faster. They do not pivot about the rudder, but they turn faster and accelerate faster in another direction. Thus, I think they might just have survived it. Even if the stern had been hit, that would have been less catastrophic IMO.

But I'll ask my brother who studies this stuff tomorrow.

[Captain Seafort]

This assumes she could not have turned away faster. They do not pivot about the rudder, but they turn faster and accelerate faster in another direction. Thus, I think they might just have survived it. Even if the stern had been hit, that would have been less catastrophic IMO.

I've no dispute with the assertion that a big rudder would make it a lot easier to avoid a berg than a small one. My point is that it's irrelevant in the Titanic's case because she didn't hit an iceberg. She ran into a belt of pack ice spread across her path. The only way a smaller turning circle could have helped would be if she was able to tun through 90 degrees and steam parallel to the ice. Would a larger rudder have allowed her to do that in less than 500 yards?

[Thanas]

This assumes she could not have turned away faster. They do not pivot about the rudder, but they turn faster and accelerate faster in another direction. Thus, I think they might just have survived it. Even if the stern had been hit, that would have been less catastrophic IMO.

I've no dispute with the assertion that a big rudder would make it a lot easier to avoid a berg than a small one. My point is that it's irrelevant in the Titanic's case because she didn't hit an iceberg. She ran into a belt of pack ice spread across her path.

Titanic hit an iceberg which brushed near the ship, the underwater portion damaging the hull.

The only way a smaller turning circle could have helped would be if she was able to tun through 90 degrees and steam parallel to the ice. Would a larger rudder have allowed her to do that in less than 500 yards?

No idea, will ask my brother tomorrow. Also, what is the 500 yards distance? Where do you draw this from?

That said, a bigger rudder may have made the port-around maneuver more successful.

[Captain Seafort]

Titanic hit an iceberg which brushed near the ship, the underwater portion damaging the hull.

The helm was hard over when she struck - given that the ship would have been pivoting about the bridge, that means the ship abaft the bridge couldn't have avoided striking the berg. The entire hull would have been ripped open, and she'd have capsized and sunk within minutes.

On top of this we have the evidence of "haze" spotted by the lookouts several minutes before sighting the ice. Haze was impossible given the weather conditions on the night - that was probably a strip of pack ice a few miles directly ahead of the ship.

No idea, will ask my brother tomorrow. Also, what is the 500 yards distance? Where do you draw this from?

Collins, L M: The Sinking of the Titanic: The Mystery Solved, Souvenir Press, London, 2004, p 20

The book is the source I'm using to base my arguments that it wasn't an iceberg.

[Thanas]

No idea, will ask my brother tomorrow. Also, what is the 500 yards distance? Where do you draw this from?

Collins, L M: The Sinking of the Titanic: The Mystery Solved, Souvenir Press, London, 2004, p 20

The book is the source I'm using to base my arguments that it wasn't an iceberg.

Can you summarize those? The title alone reads like a cheap sensationalist book.

[Thanas]

Topic split from Testing.

[Captain Seafort]

Can you summarize those? The title alone reads like a cheap sensationalist book.

I know - when I first saw it I thought it was going to be another "it was an insurance scam with the Olympic" idiot, but it turned out to be a pretty good read. The author is a retired Newfoundland ice pilot.

As for the arguments:

1) The damage inflicted wasn't serious enough. As I mentioned above, if the ship had hit an iceberg with the helm hard over the length of the ship abaft the bridge would have continued swinging to starboard, and would have been rent open by the berg. (Collins, p23-27)

2) "Haze" spotted by the lookouts about ten minutes before impact. The weather was all wrong for haze to form. Collins asserts that what they saw was a strip of pack ice across the ship's path. (Collins, p16)

3) Descriptions of the "berg". The lookouts (in the crows' nest) said it was 60 feet high, Quartermaster Rowe (on the poop deck) said it was 100 feet high, and Fourth Officer Boxhall (near the bridge on the starboard side) said it was very low - only a few feet above the water. It's possible that they simply caught glimpses, and two or all of them were mistaken, but another possibility is an optical illusion caused by the very low temperature at the surface, causing objects to be magnified, and appear the same height as any illumination. In the case of the lookouts it appeared to be as high as the forecastle lights, and in Rowe's case the height of the passenger compartment windows. Boxhall saw it as it truly was because he was near the bridge - darkened to improve visibility and preserve night-vision. (Collins p17-19)

[Thanas]

How does he explain the iceberg spotted by a German liner in the vicinity with the paint at its base?

And how does he explain the eye-witness accounts of an iceberg sliding alongside the ship? And the deck littered with ice? Were those just imaginations as well?