The Pros And Cons Of The RMS Titanic

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The RMS Titanic, known as the Ship of Dreams, collided with an iceberg and sunk in the early hours of April 15, 1912. The boat, which was the most luxurious of her time, was set to sail from Southampton, England to New York City. Out of the 2,240 passengers on the boat during her maiden voyage, approximately 1,500 survived on the 20 lifeboats available. a controversial topic that is still debated today is whether or not the disaster of the Titanic could have been avoided. There is considerable evidence to suggest that this statement is true, but to what extent is still being decided today.
The crew on the Titanic did not respond effectively to ice warnings and iceberg sightings. Numerous ships that were in the area radioed Captain Smith about …show more content…

However, the Titanic continued at 20 knots, which was almost her highest speed. This was because the ship had a very strict time schedule to maintain. Combined with the fact that it was a moonless night, it meant that when an iceberg was spotted, it did not have enough time to avoid the collision. About 15 minutes before the Titanic collided with the iceberg, A Ship named the Californian tried to warn Captain Smith that they were surrounded by Ice. The wireless operator of the Californian, Cyril F. Evans, called up the Titanic and said “We are stopped and surrounded by ice.” Captain Smith replied by saying “shut up, shut up, I am busy; I am working Cape Race” . The US senate found Smith at fault for the tragedy, “for taking the Titanic at such speeds is such treacherous conditions”. Once the iceberg had been spotted, the crew could have responded differently, thus saving the Titanic from her demise. The officer on watch, First Officer William Murdoch, ordered a “Full astern” after the iceberg was seen. At …show more content…

If the ship had been carrying enough lifeboats, everyone could have survived as there were two and a half hours between the moment when the Ship hit the iceberg and when it sunk, therefore allowing enough time for everyone to board the lifeboats. The ship only carried 20 lifeboats in total, which could only accommodate for 33% of the ships total passengers and crew . This was because the designers of the ship didn’t want to “clutter up the deck”. Somehow, this was legal at the time, as the law for the number of lifeboats was based on the gross tonnage, not the passenger capacity of the ship. Arthur Rostron, captain of the rescue vessel Carpathia, is quoted saying “If there had been sufficient boats that night...every soul aboard could have been saved.” As well as this, the limited number of lifeboats were not filled to their capacity. The lifeboats were designed to safely carry 65 people, yet some left with only 40 on board. The senior surviving officer, Charles Lightoller feared that a full life boat would break the mechanism that was lowering them. This was an unnecessary worry, as the lifeboats had previously been tested with 70 men in the boat, and the trial gave only the safest of results. The disaster of high fatalities could have been avoided if the Titanic had had a capable number of lifeboats and

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