RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic Ocean on 15 April 1912. The largest ocean liner in service at the time, Titanic was four days into her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City, United States, with over 2,200 people on board when she struck an iceberg at 23:40 (ship's time) on 14 April. She sank two hours and forty minutes later at 02:20 ship's time (05:18 GMT) on 15 April, resulting in the deaths of around 1,500 people (estimates vary), making it one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history.
Titanic's wireless operators received seven warnings of sea ice leading up to the night of 14 April, but was travelling at a speed of roughly 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph) when her lookouts sighted the iceberg. Unable to turn quickly enough, the ship suffered a glancing blow that buckled the steel plates covering her starboard side and opened six of her sixteen compartments to the sea. Titanic had been designed to stay afloat with up to four of her forward compartments flooded, and the crew used distress rockets and wireless messages to attract rescue vessels as the passengers were put into lifeboats.
In accordance with existing practice of the day, Titanic's lifeboat system was not designed to hold everyone on board simultaneously, but rather to ferry passengers to nearby rescue vessels; therefore, with the ship sinking rapidly and help still hours away, there was no safe refuge for many of the passengers and crew, as the ship was equipped with only twenty lifeboats, including four collapsible lifeboats. Lack of preparation for the evacuation, lack of time, and the difficulty in getting passengers to board the lifeboats meant many were launched before they were completely full, and two boats were not launched at all, instead floating off the ship and becoming a refuge for survivors in the water.
Titanic sank with around 1,500 passengers and crew still on board. Almost all of those who ended up in the water died within minutes due to the effects of cold shock and hypothermia, with only around 40 being eventually rescued by nearby lifeboats. RMS Carpathia arrived about an hour and a half after the sinking and rescued all of the 710 survivors by 09:15 on 15 April. The disaster shocked the world and caused widespread outrage over the shortage of lifeboats and lack of vigilance given to ice warnings the ship had received. Further outrage was aimed at SS Californian who, despite being the closest ship, missed the Titanic's distress calls due to having only one wireless operator aboard. Subsequent inquiries recommended sweeping changes to maritime regulations, including leading to the establishment of the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) in 1914 which still governs maritime safety today.
Background
At the time of her entry into service on 2 April 1912, the Titanic was the second of three Olympic-class ocean liners, and was the largest ship in the world. She and the earlier RMS Olympic were almost one and a half times the gross register tonnage of Cunard's RMS Lusitania and RMS Mauretania, the previous record holders, and were nearly 100 feet (30 m) longer. The Titanic could carry 3,547 people in speed and comfort, and was built on an unprecedented scale. Her reciprocating engines were the largest that had ever been built, standing 40 feet (12 m) high and with cylinders 9 feet (2.7 m) in diameter, requiring the burning of 600 long tons (610 t) of coal per day.
The passenger accommodation, especially the first-class section, was said to be "of unrivalled extent and magnificence", indicated by the fares that first-class accommodation commanded. The Parlour Suites (the most expensive and most luxurious suites on the ship) with private promenade cost over $4,350 (equivalent to $145,000 today) for a one-way transatlantic passage. Even third class, though considerably less luxurious than second and first classes, was unusually comfortable by contemporary standards and was supplied with plentiful quantities of good food, providing her passengers with better conditions than many of them had experienced at home.
The Titanic's maiden voyage began shortly after noon on 10 April 1912 when she left Southampton on the first leg of her journey to New York. An accident was narrowly averted only a few minutes later, as the Titanic passed the moored liners SS City of New York of the American Line and Oceanic of the White Star Line, the latter of which would have been her running mate on the service from Southampton. Her huge displacement caused both of the smaller ships to be lifted by a bulge of water and then dropped into a trough. New York's mooring cables could not take the sudden strain and snapped, swinging her around stern-first towards the Titanic. A nearby tugboat, Vulcan, came to the rescue by taking New York under tow, and Titanic's 62-year-old Captain Edward Smith, the most senior of the White Star Line's captains, ordered her engines to be put "full astern". The two ships avoided a collision by a distance of about 4 feet (1.2 m). The incident, as well as a subsequent stop to offload a few stragglers by tug, delayed the Titanic's departure by at most three-quarters of an hour, while the drifting New York was brought under control.
A few hours later, the Titanic called at Cherbourg Harbour in north-western France, a journey of 80 nautical miles (148 km; 92 mi), where she took on passengers. Her next port of call was Queenstown (now Cobh) in Ireland, which she reached around midday on 11 April. She left in the afternoon after taking on more passengers and stores. During that call, a fireman named John Coffey, a Queenstown native, deserted the ship by sneaking onto one of the tenders and hiding under mail bags being transported to shore.
By the time the Titanic departed westwards across the Atlantic, per Board of Trade surveyor and emigration officer Eber Sharpe, the Titanic had 2,207 people on board, 1,316 passengers and 891 crew. Due to a national coal miners' strike, UK shipping had been disrupted and many crossings cancelled. As such, people scheduled to sail on other liners were transferred to the Titanic. Her passengers were a cross-section of Edwardian society, from millionaires such as John Jacob Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim, to poor emigrants from countries as disparate as Armenia, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Syria and Russia seeking a new life in the United States.
Captain Smith had four decades of seafaring experience and had served as captain of RMS Olympic, from which he was transferred to command the Titanic. The vast majority of the crew who served under him were not trained sailors, but were either engineers, firemen, or stokers, responsible for looking after the engines; or stewards and galley staff, responsible for the passengers. The seven watch officers – three senior and four junior – and 39 able seamen constituted only around five percent of the crew, with the majority having been taken on at Southampton, and as a result lacked the time to familiarise themselves with the ship.
A fire had begun in one of the Titanic's coal bins approximately 10 days before the ship's departure and continued to burn for several days into the voyage, but it was extinguished on 13 April. The weather improved significantly during the day, from brisk winds and moderate seas in the morning to a crystal-clear calm by evening, as the ship's path took her beneath an arctic high-pressure system.
Ice warnings
The Titanic's wireless operators received seven messages from other ships warning of drifting ice. The ice conditions in the North Atlantic were the worst of any April in the previous 50 years (which was the reason why the lookouts were unaware that they were about to steam into a line of drifting ice several miles wide and many miles long). These conditions were attributed to a mild winter that caused large numbers of icebergs to shift off the west coast of Greenland.
The first warning came on 12 April from SS La Touraine, a French liner, at 17:46. The message reported two separate ice fields and two icebergs as well as dense fog and "derelicts." Captain Smith acknowledged the receipt of this message.
On 14 April, an ice report came at 09:12 from the RMS Caronia reporting "bergs, growlers and field ice". Captain Smith acknowledged receipt of the message. At 10:28, the Caronia also forwarded an ice report from the SS Noordam which stated that "much ice" was reported to them. Smith also acknowledged this message.
At 13:54, RMS Baltic relayed a report from the Greek ship Athenia that she had been "passing icebergs and large quantities of field ice". Smith also acknowledged this report, and showed it to White Star Line chairman J. Bruce Ismay, aboard Titanic for her maiden voyage, who later showed it to a few passengers before returning it to Smith after the Captain asked for it back a few hours later. Smith ordered a new course to be set, which would take the ship further south.
At 13:49, the German ship SS Amerika, which was a short distance to the south, reported she had "passed two large icebergs" and asked the Titanic to forward the message to the Hydrographic Office in Washington, D.C.. There is no evidence as to whether or not this message reached Captain Smith or to the bridge but it was acknowledged by the wireless operator aboard Titanic and forwarded to Washington via Cape Race wireless station, Newfoundland at 21:32.
At 19:37, the SS Californian reported "three large bergs" to the SS Antillian, a message which was intercepted by junior wireless operator Harold Bride who took it to the bridge and later acknowledged its receipt to the Californian. At 21:52, the steamship SS Mesaba reported: "Saw much heavy pack ice and great number large icebergs. Also field ice." It is unclear whether or not this message left the Titanic's radio room as Jack Phillips, the radio operator on watch at the time, did not survive. He acknowledged the message, as per Mesaba's wireless officer Stanley Adams, but the surviving officers could not recall seeing it later.
A final message was received around 22:07 from operator Cyril Evans of Californian, who signalled, "Say, old man, we are stopped and surrounded by ice." Phillips signalled back to Evans to stop transmitting, as the ship's stronger signal was interfering with the fainter one from Cape Race. He was preoccupied with transmitting messages for passengers via the relay station at Cape Race; as the radio set had broken down the day before, there was a backlog of messages that Phillips was trying to clear and the informal-sounding message by Evans was not sent with an official mark of "MSG" and also lacked coordinates.
Response to ice reports
Although Captain Smith was aware of ice in the vicinity, he did not reduce the ship's speed, and continued to steam at 22 knots (41 km/h; 25 mph). Titanic's high speed in waters where ice had been reported was later criticised as reckless, but it reflected standard maritime practice at the time, as well as in the later testimonies of merchant navy captains collected at the British inquiry, many of whom stated that, in clear weather conditions, they would maintain speed even if ice was nearby until it had been spotted.
Additionally, ships treated hazard warnings as advisories rather than calls to action. It was widely believed that ice posed little risk; close calls were not uncommon, and previous collisions had not been disastrous. On 8 July 1907, the German liner SS Kronprinz Wilhelm struck an iceberg around 12:20 AM off the banks of Newfoundland. The captain immediately ordered the helm swung to port so the ship struck a glancing blow. The watertight doors were closed immediately; the bow was dented and paint scraped off the liner's starboard bow but liner was not damaged below the water line and resumed her voyage fifteen minutes after the collision. Similarly, on 10 April 1912, the French liner SS Niagara struck an icefield not far from where Titanic would a few days later, but managed to steam under her own power to New York.
The North Atlantic liners prioritised time-keeping above all other considerations, sticking rigidly to a schedule that would guarantee their arrival at an advertised time. They were frequently operated at close to their full speed, especially after development of improved safety practices. In one interview, in 1907, Captain Smith declared that he could not "imagine any condition which would cause a ship to founder. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that."
14 April 1912
Titanic enters Iceberg Alley
As the Titanic approached her fatal collision, most passengers had gone to bed, and command of the bridge had passed from Second Officer Charles Lightoller to First Officer William Murdoch. Lookouts Frederick Fleet and Reginald Lee were in the crow's nest, 29 metres (95 ft) above the deck. The air temperature had fallen to near freezing, and the ocean was completely calm. Colonel Archibald Gracie, one of the survivors of the disaster, later wrote that "the sea was like glass, so smooth that the stars were clearly reflected." It is now known that such exceptionally calm water is a sign of nearby pack ice.
Although the air was clear, there was no moon, and with the sea so calm, there was nothing to give away the position of the nearby icebergs; had the sea been rougher, waves breaking against the icebergs would have made them more visible. Because of a mix-up at Southampton, the lookouts had no binoculars; however, binoculars reportedly would not have been effective in the darkness, which was total except for starlight and the ship's own lights. The lookouts were nonetheless well aware of the ice hazard, as Lightoller had ordered them and other crew members to "keep a sharp look-out for ice, particularly small ice and growlers".
At the inquiries, Lee claimed he saw a haze on the horizon ahead of them, and that Fleet told him, "Well, if we can see through that we will be lucky." However, Fleet did not back Lee up on the matter, instead saying that there was a slight haze but "it was nothing to talk about." Both men were also contradicted by several other eyewitnesses who said the sea and weather was clear and calm, including Second Officer Lightoller who reported there was no haze when he went off watch that night. Nor was it reported by any ships near by. Stanley Lord, captain of the nearby SS Californian, noted there was a "soft horizon" where the sky and sea mixed together, making it hard to see where the two separated. It is likely that this is what Fleet and Lee saw, rather than any haze as they entered Iceberg Alley.