Tragedy of the Titanic

The Titanic sadly sank on April 14, 1912. It landed on the ocean floor at 2:30 a.m when it only went completely under at 2:20a.m. It took ten minutes for the Titanic to hit the ocean floor. Out of 2,207 passengers, 705 lived and 1,502 died.
Many people have come to think that the iceberg that hit the Titanic ripped a huge gash into the side of the ship. This isn’t true! The iceberg only put little dot-like tears along part of the ship. The ship wouldn’t have sunk if the water tight bulkheads went higher than E deck. There was also too much sulfur in the steel used to produce the doomed beauty which made the steel very fragile. This was proved when a piece of steel was taken from the wreckage of Titanic and a piece of regular steel was used to under go some tests. After these tests, the Titanic’s steel broke like glass, while the other piece of steel had only a dent.
The Titanic had sixteen water tight compartments. Five of which flooded when Titanic hit the iceberg. Titanic could stay afloat with four compartments filled. But, because the bulkheads weren’t any higher than E deck, the water just kept spilling over them. This lead to more compartments getting flooded and the ship’s bow kept sinking further into the water, causing the stern to rise higher out of the water.
There are other reasons that the Titanic hit the iceberg. First of all, the lookouts didn’t have binoculars. Since they didn’t have binoculars, they couldn’t see the ice berg in time to warn the people on the bridge. Even when they tried to warn the people on the bridge, they couldn’t get through to them. They rang the bell in the crow’s nest three times and tried calling the bridge. This didn’t work. They did eventually get through, but still not in time. When they eventually got through, the ship was commanded “hard to starboard�. Another reason is the ship had too small a rudder. If the ship’s rudder was bigger, the chances of missing the berg would’ve been better. A fourth reason is that it was a clear, moonless night. There were no waves in the ocean, making it hard to spot the bergs because the waves break at the bottom of them. The last reason for Titanic hitting the berg is being that Titanic’s speed accelerated every day. If Titanic wasn’t going so fast, they might have missed the iceberg!
There were also ways to miss the iceberg. They did the right thing by turning to the starboard side, but in this case, it could’ve been wrong too. If they would’ve hit the berg head on, there would’ve only been one or two compartments flooded. Another thing they could’ve done to steer Titanic in the correct direction was to turn to starboard and to keep the engines going forward at full speed. They should’ve done this because ships turn faster this way. The last known thing is to keep one engine in reverse and one going forward at full speed, still turning to the starboard side. In real life, the officer at the wheel, Officer Moody, turned to starboard, but ordered both engines to be put into reverse.
At the time of the Titanic, people were put into classes, first class being the wealthiest, second class having an average amount of money, and third class being very poor. In first class, you had movie stars, department store owners, and other wealthy people. In second class, there were people like doctors and teachers and people of average pay. In steerage, you had all the poor people, who were on the Titanic for one reason only: to go to America to begin a new and better life. In first class, the stewards and everyone else knew your name. In steerage, your name didn’t matter because you barely had a penny to your name. The richer people were made aware of danger, before those that were poor. Many more people in steerage and second class died than in first class. Many people also wanted to bring their luggage with them before they left the ship. The thing with the classes all ended when the Titanic sank.
One person traveling in first class is a well-known woman named Mrs. Margaret Brown. Many know her as Molly Brown or the Unsinkable molly Brown. She grew up very poor as a child and always dreamed of being rich as a little girl. Her dreams came true when she fell in love with and married James Joseph Brown. They were poor in the beginning and after seven years of marriage were rich. They had struck gold in a silver mine. Molly survived the Titanic sinking, but died at age 65. She is still remembered as the heroine on the Titanic.
Another pretty well-known person aboard Titanic was Mr. John Jacob Astor. He was the richest man aboard the ship. He was traveling with his seventeen year old wife, Madeleine Astor. Mr. Astor died April 15, 1912 when a funnel hit him on the head. He was knocked unconscious and drowned. His wife later married. He was 48 years old when he died.
Co-owner of Macy’s department store, Isidor Straus and his wife Ida were aboard the Titanic when the ship went down. Mr. Straus also served as a Member of Congress in the United States. He was born on February 6, 1845 and died on April 15, 1912. He was 67 years old when he died. He had gained full ownership of Macy’s in 1896. On the fateful night of the Titanic collision, Ida wouldn’t get into a lifeboat. She said “We have been together for many years. Where you go, I go.� The officer loading the lifeboat offered to let Mr. Straus into the lifeboat with his wife, but Mr. Straus refused on behalf of the other men who couldn’t get in the boats. Instead he let their maid Ellen Bird on the lifeboats in their place. Ida also said in her place “We lived together, so we shall die together.� In the 1997 movie Titanic, Mr. and Mrs. Straus were shown in their flooding staterooms comforting each other as the ship went down. Mr. Straus’ body was found and was buried in the Woodlawn Cemetery in the Bronx. Mrs. Straus’ body was never found.
Mr. J. Bruce Ismay, managing director of the White Star Line, was aboard the Titanic on her maiden voyage. He jumped into a lifeboat on the fateful night instead of staying with his ship. He was known as a coward for the rest of his life. He was born on December 12, 1862 and died on October 15, 1937 at the age of 75. During the voyage, passengers claimed they heard him persuading Captain Edward J. Smith to make the ship go faster. He did this to arrive in New York ahead of schedule. You could sort of say that it was his fault the ship sank and kind of Captain Smith’s fault for listening to him.
Mr. Edward J. Smith was captain of the Titanic. He worked with the White Star Line for many years. Titanic was the last ship that he was to be captain of. He was supposed to retire when they came in to New York. He instead went down with his ship, unlike Mr. Ismay. Some people said that he committed suicide before the ship went down. In the 1997 movie Titanic, he died in the steering room, clutching the wheel. There was one man who claimed that Captain Smith never died. The man said he’s known Captain Smith very well. He said he’d know him even without his beard. He later saw a doctor and was proven to be insane. Others said they saw him floating in the frigid North Atlantic Ocean. Some said they tried to help on an overturned lifeboat in the water, but he kept falling off. Finally, they just let him go. No one really knows what happened to Mr. Smith.
Mr. Thomas Andrews designed Titanic. He knew every rivet in his wonderful ship. He studied the blue prints of it everyday in his first class stateroom. He was 39 when he died. He wasn’t really supposed to be on Titanic. Someone else gave him the ticket when they got sick and couldn’t go. Mr. Andrews and Mr. Ismay argued over who’s ship Titanic really was. Many people knew Mr. Andrews. He went down with his gorgeous ship.
Many people cancelled their trip on the Titanic just days before she left Southampton, England. They were either sick or got bad vibes about the ship. Normally on a ship, there’s a ship’s cat. Cats were supposed to bring good luck to ships on their maiden voyage. Titanic had a cat and the cat had a litter of kittens. She supposedly walked off the ship with all her kittens. The crew spent days looking for the cat, but never found it. It’s said that the cat, too, got bad vibes from the ship. Even some of the crew abandoned the ship. They either did this or they showed up late and weren’t allowed on the ship.
There was also a book written and published before Titanic even set sail. It was called The Wreck of the Titan. It’s also known as Futility. It was written by Morgan Robertson in the late 1890’s. It was also supposedly published in 1912 after the Titanic sank. The reason to bring this book up is because the same things happened to the Titan as happened to Titanic. This is very unusual, since the author, in a way, predicted the future.
Titanic was rediscovered in 1985 by Dr. Robert Ballard. Titanic was two miles below the water on the ocean floor. It took a few hours to get to the ship. While looking around, a doll head was discovered. It’s believed that the doll belonged to the only first class girl to die on the Titanic. It was also discovered that Titanic did split in half while flooding with water. The ship’s halves are a little less than a mile apart. There were shoes, in fairly descent condition, lying where the people who owned them died. There are also wine bottles, that haven’t been opened, lying on the ocean floor. It’s remarkable how the bow of the ship is in perfect condition and the stern is almost in pieces.
On the ship in third class, there were twin boys. They were kidnapped from their mother by their father! They were traveling under the name of Hoffman. The boys’ real names are Edmund and Michel Natravil. Their father put them into a lifeboat at almost the last minute before the lifeboats could no longer be loaded. The boys were later reunited with their mother.
There were 20 lifeboats, 16 regular ones and 4 collapsible. When leaving Titanic, all the lifeboats carried only half or less than half of their capacity. Two of the collapsible lifeboats never got filled because 1) there wasn’t enough time to fill them and 2) they both flipped over, making it impossible to fill them. These lifeboats were later used to keep people out of the water.
There was a ship not far from Titanic. It was about five to eight miles away from her. This ship only miles away was the Californian. The Californian was surrounded by ice and therefore stopped the ship. The crew on the Californian saw the Titanic. Of course, they didn’t know what ship it was, but they did know that it was a luxury liner. They also telegraphed the Titanic, before actually seeing her, warning that there was ice ahead. The wireless operator on the Titanic was very busy, tired, and frustrated from sending all the telegraphs from the passengers. So when the Californian telegraphed them, they got a nasty reply saying “Keep out Shut up I’m working Cape Race�. Once the operators on Californian got this reply they decided to turn off the machines and head to bed. After they went to bed, the lookouts and a few other crew aboard the Californian saw a mystery ship. They turned away for awhile and looked back again in the direction of the ship and didn’t see it anymore. Awhile after, they saw what looked like fireworks and thought that the mystery ship had stopped and was putting on a firework show for their passengers. These “fireworks� were really distress flares. Aboard Titanic, the crew was setting off the flares because they were sinking. They, later, tried to telegraph the Californian and couldn’t get through to them. On the Californian, Captain Rostron told the crew to ignore the “fireworks�. The crew still looked at the ship. They could see that something was odd about the way the ship looked. Her lights were crooked. The whole ship was crooked really. In the morning, they looked to see if the mystery ship was still there and she was gone. In a way, it was Californian’s fault that there was such a devastating loss of life on the Titanic. There might not have been a great loss of life if the Titanic wouldn’t have sent such a nasty reply to them too.
The ship to rescue the survivors of Titanic was the Carpathia. They got the telegraph from the Titanic and said they could be there in about four hours. They went full speed to get there. Since they went full speed, they had no heat. They used the coal to get more speed. They also had no hot water. Carpathia found the survivors in the lifeboats. They thought that they would get there in time, but they didn’t. It was very early in the morning when they found the survivors. Carpathia also took the survivors to New York. They had to change destination to do this too. Their passengers were behind schedule getting to their real destinations.
Many books and movies were made about the Titanic sinking. Some books are White Star, Last Dinner on the Titanic: Menus and Recipes from the Legacy Liner, The Discovery of the Titanic, Titanic: Signals of Disaster, and The Loss of Titanic. There are still many more, but these are just a few. Movies about the doomed ocean liner are Titanic (1997), Saved From the Titanic (1912), Titanic (AKA Nearer My God to Thee) (1933), A Night to Remember (1958), and Raise the Titanic (1980).
Many lives were lost when Titanic sank. The wonderful ship is still remembered by many.

plz give ideas and corrections if needed!