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The sinking of the RMS Titanic resulted in the following changes in maritime policy.
Alexander Carlisle, Harland and Wolff's general manager and chairman of the managing directors, suggested that Titanic use a new, larger type of davit which could give the ship the potential to carry 48 lifeboats; this would have provided enough seats for everyone on board. However, the White Star Line decreed that only 20 lifeboats would be carried, which could accommodate about 38% of those on board when the ship was filled to capacity.[ citation needed ] At the time, the Board of Trade's regulations stated that British vessels over 10,000 tons (Titanic was just over 46,000) must carry 16 lifeboats with a capacity of 5,500 cubic feet (160 m3), plus enough capacity in rafts and floats for 75% (or 50% in case of a vessel with watertight bulkheads) of that in the lifeboats. Therefore, the White Star Line actually provided more lifeboat accommodation than was legally required. [1] The regulations made no extra provision for larger ships because they had not been changed since 1894, when the largest passenger ship under consideration was only 13,000 tons, and because of the expected difficulty in getting away more than 16 boats in any emergency. [2]
On the night of the sinking, Titanic's lifeboat complement was made up of three types of boats. The most numerous were the 14 standard wooden lifeboats, each 30 ft (9.1 m) long by 9 ft 1 in (2.77 m) wide, with a capacity of 65 persons each. Forward of them, one on each side of the ship, two smaller emergency boats, 25 ft (7.6 m) long, had a capacity of 40 persons each. Four Engelhardt collapsible lifeboats measuring 27 ft 5 in (8.36 m) long by 8 ft (2.4 m) wide had a capacity of 47 persons each; they had canvas sides, and could be stowed almost flat, taking up a comparatively small amount of deck space. Two were stowed port and starboard on the roof of the officers' quarters, at the foot of the first funnel, while the other two were stowed port and starboard alongside the emergency lifeboat cutters. [3]
After the Titanic disaster, recommendations were made by both the British and American Boards of Inquiry stating, in part, that ships would carry enough lifeboats for those aboard, mandated lifeboat drills would be implemented, lifeboat inspections would be conducted, etc. Many of these recommendations were incorporated into the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea passed in 1914.
Following the inquiries, United States government passed the Radio Act of 1912. This Act, along with the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea, stated that radio communications on passenger ships would be operated 24 hours along with a secondary power supply so as not to miss distress calls. Also, the Radio Act of 1912 required ships to maintain contact with vessels in their vicinity as well as coastal onshore radio stations. [4]
In addition, it was agreed in the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea that the firing of red rockets from a ship must be interpreted as a sign of the need for help. This decision was based on the fact that the rockets launched from the Titanic prior to sinking were interpreted with ambiguity by the freighter SS Californian. Officers on the deck of the Californian had seen rockets fired from an unknown liner yet surmised that they could possibly be "company" or identification signals, used to signal to other ships. At the time of the sinking, aside from distress situations, it was commonplace for ships without wireless radio to use a combination of rockets and Roman candles to identify themselves to other liners. Once the Radio Act of 1912 was passed it was agreed that rockets at sea would be interpreted as distress signals only, thus removing any possible misinterpretation from other ships. [4]
After the Titanic disaster, the U.S. Navy assigned the Scout Cruisers Chester and USS Birmingham (CL-2) to patrol the Grand Banks for the remainder of 1912. In 1913, the United States Navy could not spare ships for this purpose, so the Revenue Cutter Service (forerunner of the United States Coast Guard) assumed responsibility, assigning the Cutters Seneca and Miami to conduct the patrol.
The Titanic disaster led to the convening of the first International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS) in London, on 12 November 1913. On 30 January 1914, a treaty was signed by the conference that resulted in the formation and international funding of the International Ice Patrol, an agency of the United States Coast Guard that to the present day monitors and reports on the location of North Atlantic Ocean icebergs that could pose a threat to transatlantic sea traffic.
In the mid-20th century, ice patrol aircraft became the primary ice reconnaissance method with surface patrols phased out except during unusually heavy ice years or extended periods of reduced visibility. Use of the oceanographic vessel continued until 1982, when the Coast Guard's sole remaining oceanographic ship, USCGC Evergreen, was converted to a medium endurance cutter. The aircraft has distinct advantages for ice reconnaissance, providing much greater coverage in a shorter period of time.
Following the Titanic disaster, ships were refitted for increased safety. For example, the double bottoms of many existing ships, including the RMS Olympic, [5] were extended up the sides of their hulls, their waterlines, to give them double hulls. Another refit that many ships underwent were changes to the height of the bulkheads. The bulkheads on Titanic extended 10 feet (3 m) above the water line. After the Titanic sank, the bulkheads on other ships were extended higher to make the compartments fully watertight.
Stanley Phillip Lord was captain of the SS Californian, the nearest ship to the Titanic on the night it sank on 15 April 1912, and, depending on which sources are believed, likely the only ship to see the Titanic, or at least its rockets, during the sinking. Lord, and the Californian more generally, have been criticized for the fact that the Californian did not render timely assistance to the Titanic despite being only 20 miles away and the only ship that could have reached Titanic before she sank. Two official inquiries were critical of Lord, but did not recommend criminal charges. Subsequent authors have offered differing opinions on Lord's actions, with some defending, and others criticizing him. The passion among the two factions has resulted in the labels of "Lordites" and "Anti-Lordites" being applied to the two camps. Central points of debate typically include the appropriateness of Lord's response to the rockets, whether the Californian and Titanic were in fact visible to one another, the possible presence of one or more "Mystery Ships" that may have been the ships seen by either the Titanic or Californian, and whether or not the Californian could have saved any additional lives had it attempted to render assistance more quickly.
RMS Olympic was a British ocean liner and the lead ship of the White Star Line's trio of Olympic-class liners. Unlike the other ships in the class, Olympic had a long career spanning 24 years from 1911 to 1935. This included service as a troopship during the First World War, which gained her the nickname "Old Reliable". She returned to civilian service after the war, and served successfully as an ocean liner throughout the 1920s and into the first half of the 1930s, although increased competition, and the slump in trade during the Great Depression after 1930, made her operation increasingly unprofitable.
HMHSBritannic was the third vessel of the White Star Line's Olympic class of steamships and the second White Star ship to bear the name Britannic. She was the fleet mate of both the RMS Olympic and the RMS Titanic and was intended to enter service as a transatlantic passenger liner.
SS Californian was a British Leyland Line steamship that is best known for its inaction during the sinking of the RMS Titanic on 15 April 1912, despite being the closest ship in the area. The United States Senate inquiry and British Wreck Commissioner's inquiry into the sinking both concluded that the Californian could have saved many or all of the lives that were lost, had a prompt response been mounted to the Titanic's distress rockets. The U.S. Senate inquiry was particularly critical of the vessel's Captain, Stanley Lord, calling his inaction during the disaster "reprehensible".
RMS Empress of Ireland was an ocean liner that sank near the mouth of the Saint Lawrence River following a collision in thick fog with the Norwegian collier SS Storstad in the early hours of 29 May 1914. Although the ship was equipped with watertight compartments and, in the aftermath of the Titanic disaster two years earlier, carried more than enough lifeboats for all onboard, she foundered in only 14 minutes. Of the 1,477 people on board, 1,012 died, making it the worst peacetime marine disaster in Canadian history.
The sinking of the RMS Titanic in 1912 shocked the world, and attracted so much controversy that a number of conspiracy theories have been put forward regarding the disaster.
The International Ice Patrol is an organization with the purpose of monitoring the presence of icebergs in the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans and reporting their movements for safety purposes. It is operated by United States Coast Guard but is funded by the 13 nations interested in trans-Atlantic navigation. As of 2011 the governments contributing to the International Ice Patrol include Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands, Norway, Panama, Poland, Spain, Sweden, the United Kingdom, and the United States.
Commander Harold Godfrey Lowe RD, RNR was the fifth officer of the RMS Titanic.
Eva Miriam Hart MBE was a survivor of the sinking of the RMS Titanic on 15 April 1912.
The RMS Titanic sank in the early morning hours of 15 April 1912 in the North Atlantic Ocean, four days into the ship's maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City. The largest ocean liner in service at the time, Titanic had an estimated 2,224 people on board when she struck an iceberg at around 23:40 on Sunday, 14 April 1912. Her sinking two hours and forty minutes later at 02:20 on Monday, 15 April, resulted in the deaths of more than 1,500 people, making it one of the deadliest peacetime marine disasters in history.
The Olympic-class ocean liners were a trio of British ocean liners built by the Harland & Wolff shipyard for the White Star Line during the early 20th century. They were Olympic (1911), Titanic (1912), and Britannic (1915). All three were designed to be the largest and most luxurious passenger ships in the world, designed to give White Star an advantage in the transatlantic passenger trade.
The RMS Carpathia was a Cunard Line transatlantic passenger steamship built by Swan Hunter & Wigham Richardson in their shipyard in Newcastle upon Tyne, England.
USCGC Seneca, or before 1915 USRC Seneca, was a United States Coast Guard cutter built and commissioned as a "derelict destroyer" with the specific mission of locating and then destroying abandoned shipwrecks that were still afloat and were a menace to navigation. She was designed with excellent sea-keeping qualities, a long cruising range, good towing capabilities, and by necessity the capacity to store a large amount of munitions. She was one of five Coast Guard cutters serving with the U.S. Navy in European waters during World War I.
A lifeboat or life raft is a small, rigid or inflatable boat carried for emergency evacuation in the event of a disaster aboard a ship. Lifeboat drills are required by law on larger commercial ships. Rafts (liferafts) are also used. In the military, a lifeboat may double as a whaleboat, dinghy, or gig. The ship's tenders of cruise ships often double as lifeboats. Recreational sailors usually carry inflatable life rafts, though a few prefer small proactive lifeboats that are harder to sink and can be sailed to safety.
RMS Titanic was a British passenger liner operated by the White Star Line that sank in the North Atlantic Ocean in the early morning hours of 15 April 1912, after striking an iceberg during her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City. Of the estimated 2,224 passengers and crew aboard, more than 1,500 died, making the sinking one of modern history's deadliest peacetime commercial marine disasters. RMS Titanic was the largest ship afloat at the time she entered service and was the second of three Olympic-class ocean liners operated by the White Star Line. She was built by the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast. Thomas Andrews, chief naval architect of the shipyard at the time, died in the disaster.
There have been several legends and myths surrounding the RMS Titanic over the years. These have ranged from the myth about the ship being unsinkable, to the myth concerning the final song played by the ship's orchestra.
"The captain goes down with the ship" is a maritime tradition that a sea captain holds ultimate responsibility for both his ship and everyone embarked on it, and that in an emergency, he will either save them or die trying. Although often connected to the sinking of RMS Titanic in 1912 and its captain, Edward J. Smith, the tradition precedes Titanic by at least 11 years. In most instances, the captain forgoes his own rapid departure of a ship in distress, and concentrates instead on saving other people. It often results in either the death or belated rescue of the captain as the last person on board.
The lifeboats of the RMS Titanic played a crucial role in the disaster of 14–15 April 1912. One of the ship's legacies was that she had 20 lifeboats that in total could only accommodate 1,178 people, despite the fact that there were approximately 2,208 on board. RMS Titanic had a maximum capacity of 3,547 passengers and crew.
The sinking of the RMS Titanic on April 14, 1912 resulted in an inquiry by the United States Senate. Chaired by Senator William Alden Smith, the inquiry was a subcommittee of the Senate's Commerce Committee. The hearings began in New York on April 19, 1912, later moving to Washington, D.C., concluding on May 25, 1912 with a return visit to New York.
USCGC Point Glass (WPB-82336) was an 82-foot (25 m) Point class cutter constructed at the Coast Guard Yard at Curtis Bay, Maryland in 1962 for use as a law enforcement and search and rescue patrol boat. Since the Coast Guard policy in 1962 was not to name cutters under 100 feet (30 m) in length, it was designated as WPB-82336 when commissioned and acquired the name Point Glass in January 1964 when the Coast Guard started naming all cutters longer than 65 feet (20 m).
Following the Titanic disaster, the Olympic spent six months at Harland and Wolff undergoing an extensive refit that extended the double bottom up the sides of the vessel to give her a "double skin"....
