Thread by @marinamaral2

RMS Titanic sank in the early morning of 15 April 1912 in the North Atlantic Ocean, four days into the ship's maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.

The largest passenger 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, which made it one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history.

Titanic received 6 warnings of sea ice on but was traveling near her max speed when her lookouts sighted the iceberg. Unable to turn quickly enough, the ship suffered a blow that buckled her starboard side and opened five of her sixteen "watertight compartments" to the sea.

Random fact: I've never watched "Titanic" and I don't feel bad about it

Titanic had been designed to stay afloat with four of her forward compartments flooded but no more, and the crew soon realized that the ship would sink. They used distress flares and radio (wireless) messages to attract help as the passengers were put into lifeboats.

In accordance with existing practice, Titanic's lifeboat system was designed to ferry passengers to nearby rescue vessels, not to hold everyone on board simultaneously;

... therefore, with the ship sinking rapidly and help still hours away, there was no safe refuge for many of the passengers and crew. Compounding this, poor management of the evacuation meant many boats were launched before they were completely full.

As a result, when Titanic sank, over a thousand passengers and crew were still on board. Almost all those who jumped or fell into the water either drowned or died within minutes due to the effects of cold water immersion.

RMS Carpathia arrived on the scene about an hour and a half after the sinking and rescued the last of the survivors by 09:15 on 15 April, some nine and a half hours after the collision.

The disaster shocked the world and caused widespread outrage over the lack of lifeboats, lax regulations, and the unequal treatment of the three passenger classes during the evacuation.

Subsequent inquiries recommended sweeping changes to maritime regulations, leading to the establishment in 1914 of the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), which still governs maritime safety today.

Annotated diagram of RMS Titanic showing the arrangement of the bulkheads. The areas of damage are shown in green. The compartments in the engineering area at the bottom of the ship are noted in blue.

Animation showing the sequence of RMS Titanic's sinking.

At 00:05 on 15 April, Captain Smith ordered the ship's lifeboats uncovered and the passengers mustered. He also ordered the radio operators to begin sending distress calls, which wrongly placed the ship on the west side of the ice belt and directed rescuers to a position...

that turned out to be inaccurate by about 15.5 mi / 25 km. Below decks, water was pouring into the lowest levels of the ship. As the mail room flooded, the mail sorters made an ultimately futile attempt to save the 400,000 items of mail being carried aboard Titanic.

Elsewhere, air could be heard being forced out by inrushing water. Above them, stewards went door to door, rousing sleeping passengers and crew – Titanic did not have a public address system – and told them to go to the Boat Deck.

The thoroughness of the muster was heavily dependent on the class of the passengers; the first-class stewards were in charge of only a few cabins, while those responsible for the second- and third-class passengers had to manage large numbers of people.

The first-class stewards provided hands-on assistance, helping their charges to get dressed and bringing them out onto the deck. With far more people to deal with, the second- and third-class stewards mostly confined their efforts to throwing open doors...

... and telling passengers to put on lifebelts and come up top. In third class, passengers were largely left to their own devices after being informed of the need to come on deck. Many passengers and crew were reluctant to comply either refusing to believe that...

... there was a problem or preferring the warmth of the ship's interior to the bitterly cold night air. The passengers were not told that the ship was sinking, though a few noticed that she was listing.

Around 00:15, the stewards began ordering the passengers to put on their lifebelts, though again, many passengers took the order as a joke. Some set about playing an impromptu game of association football with the ice chunks that were now strewn across the foredeck.

On the boat deck, as the crew began preparing the lifeboats, it was difficult to hear anything over the noise of high-pressure steam being vented from the boilers and escaping via the valves on the funnels above.

Captain Smith was an experienced seaman who had served for 40 years at sea, including 27 years in command. This was the first crisis of his career, and he would have known that even if all the boats were fully occupied, more than a thousand people would remain on the ship.

As Smith began to grasp the enormity of what was about to happen, he appears to have become paralyzed by indecision. He had ordered passengers and crew to muster, but from that point onward, he failed to order his officers to put the passengers into the lifeboats

he did not adequately organize the crew; he failed to convey crucial information to his officers and crew; he sometimes gave ambiguous or impractical orders and he never gave the command to abandon ship.

Even some of his bridge officers were unaware for some time after the collision that the ship was sinking; Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall did not find out until 01:15, barely an hour before the ship went down...

... while Quartermaster George Rowe was so unaware of the emergency that after the evacuation had started he phoned the bridge from his watch station to ask why he had just seen a lifeboat go past.

Smith did not inform his officers that the ship did not have enough lifeboats to save everyone. He did not supervise the loading of the lifeboats and seemingly made no effort to find out if his orders were being followed.

The crew was likewise unprepared for the emergency, as lifeboat training had been minimal. Lists had been posted on the ship assigning crew members to specific lifeboat stations, but few appeared to have known what they were supposed to do.

Most of the crew were not seamen, and even some of those had no prior experience of rowing a boat. They were now faced with the complex task of coordinating the lowering of 20 boats carrying a possible total of 1,100 people 70 feet (21 m) down the sides of the ship.

Thomas E. Bonsall, a historian of the disaster, has commented that the evacuation was so badly organized that "even if they had the number [of] lifeboats they needed, it is impossible to see how they could have launched them" given the lack of time and poor leadership.

By about 00:20, 40 minutes after the collision, the loading of the lifeboats was under way. Second Officer Lightoller recalled afterward that he noticed Smith standing near the bridge looking out at the ocean in a trance-like daze.

According to Lightoller, "I yelled at the top of my voice, 'Hadn't we better get the women and children into the boats, sir?' He heard me and nodded reply." Smith then ordered Lightoller and Murdoch to "put the women and children in and lower away".

Lightoller took charge of the boats on the port side and Murdoch took charge of those on the starboard side. The two officers interpreted the "women and children" evacuation order differently:

Murdoch took it to mean women and children first, while Lightoller took it to mean women and children only. Lightoller lowered lifeboats with empty seats if there were no women and children waiting to board, while Murdoch...

allowed a limited number of men to board if all the nearby women and children had embarked. Neither officer knew how many people could safely be carried in the boats as they were lowered and they both erred on the side of caution by not filling them.

They could have been lowered quite safely with their full complement of 68 people, especially with the highly favorable weather and sea conditions. Had this been done, an extra 500 people could have been saved; instead, hundreds of people were left on board...

as lifeboats were launched with many seats vacant. Few passengers were willing to board the lifeboats and the officers in charge of the evacuation found it difficult to persuade them. The millionaire John Jacob Astor declared: "We are safer here than in that little boat."

A trickle of women, couples and single men were persuaded to board starboard lifeboat No. 7, which became the first lifeboat to be lowered.

Meanwhile, other crewmen fought to maintain vital services as water continued to pour into the ship below decks. The engineers and firemen worked to vent steam from the boilers to prevent them from exploding on contact with the cold water.

They re-opened watertight doors in order to set up extra portable pumps in the forward compartments in a futile bid to reduce the torrent and kept the electrical generators running to maintain lights and power throughout the ship.

Steward F. Dent Ray narrowly avoided being swept away when a wooden wall between his quarters and the third-class accommodation on E deck collapsed, leaving him waist-deep in water.

Two engineers, Herbert Harvey and Jonathan Shepherd (who had just broken his left leg after falling into a manhole minutes earlier), died in boiler room No. 5 when, at around 00:45, the bunker door separating it from the flooded No. 6 boiler room collapsed...

... and they were swept away by "a wave of green foam" according to leading fireman Frederick Barrett. In boiler room No. 4, at around 01:20, water began flooding in from below, possibly indicating that the bottom of the ship had also been holed by the iceberg.

The flow of water soon overwhelmed the pumps and forced the firemen and trimmers to evacuate the forward boiler rooms. Further aft, Chief Engineer William Bell, his engineering colleagues, and a handful of volunteer firemen and greasers stayed behind...

in the unflooded No. 1, 2 and 3 boiler rooms and in the turbine and reciprocating engine rooms. They continued working on the boilers and the electrical generators in order to keep the ship's lights and pumps operable and to power the radio so that distress signals could be sent.

They remained at their posts until the very end, thus ensuring that Titanic's electrics functioned until the final minutes of the sinking. None of the ship's 35 engineers and electricians survived.

Photo: Chief Engineer William Bell.

Neither did any of the Titanic's five postal clerks, who were last seen struggling to save the mail bags they had rescued from the flooded mail room. They were caught by the rising water somewhere on D deck (photo).

Many of the third-class passengers were also confronted with the sight of water pouring into their quarters on E, F and G decks. Carl Jansson, one of the relatively small number of third-class survivors, later recalled:

"Then I run down to my cabin to bring my other clothes, watch and bag but only had time to take the watch and coat when water with enormous force came into the cabin and I had to rush up to the deck again where I found my friends standing with lifebelts on...

... and with terror painted on their faces. What should I do now, with no lifebelt and no shoes and no cap?"

The lifeboats were lowered every few minutes, but most of the boats were greatly under-filled. No. 5 left with 41 aboard, No. 3 had 32, No. 8 left with 39, No. 1 left with just 12 out of a capacity of 40.

The evacuation did not go smoothly and passengers suffered accidents and injuries as it progressed. One woman fell between lifeboat No. 10 and the side of the ship but someone caught her by the ankle and hauled her back onto the promenade deck..

... where she made a second successful attempt at boarding. First-class passenger Annie Stengel broke several ribs when an overweight German-American doctor and his brother jumped into No. 5, squashing her and knocking her unconscious.

No. 6 was nearly flooded during the descent by water discharging out of the ship's side but successfully made it away from the ship. No. 3 came close to disaster when one of the davits jammed, threatening to pitch the passengers out of the lifeboat and into the sea.

By 01:20, the seriousness of the situation was now apparent to the passengers above decks, who began saying their goodbyes, with husbands escorting their wives and children to the lifeboats. Distress flares were fired every few minutes to attract the attention of any ships nearby

... and the radio operators repeatedly sent the distress signal CQD. Radio operator Harold Bride suggested to his colleague Jack Phillips that he should use the new SOS signal, as it "may be your last chance to send it".

The two radio operators contacted other ships to ask for assistance. Several responded, of which RMS Carpathia was the closest, at 58 miles (93 km) away. She was a much slower vessel and, even driven at her maximum speed, would have taken four hours to reach the sinking ship.

By this time, it was clear to those on Titanic that the ship was indeed sinking and there would not be enough lifeboat places for everyone. Some still clung to the hope that the worst would not happen: Lucien Smith told his wife Eloise:

"It is only a matter of form to have women and children first. The ship is thoroughly equipped and everyone on her will be saved."

Charlotte Colyer's husband Harvey called to his wife as she was put in a lifeboat, "Go, Lottie! For God's sake, be brave and go! I'll get a seat in another boat!"

Other couples refused to be separated. Ida Straus, the wife of Macy's department store co-owner and former member of the United States House of Representatives Isidor Straus, told her husband: "We have been living together for many years. Where you go, I go."

They sat down in a pair of deck chairs and waited for the end. The industrialist Benjamin Guggenheim changed out of his life vest and sweater into top hat and evening dress and declared his wish to go down with the ship like a gentleman.

At this point, the vast majority of passengers who had boarded lifeboats were from first- and second-class. Few third-class (steerage) passengers had made it up onto the deck, and most were still lost in the maze of corridors or trapped behind barriers and partitions...

.. that segregated the accommodation for the steerage passengers from the first- and second-class areas.

This segregation was not simply for social reasons, but was a requirement of United States immigration laws, which mandated that third-class passengers be segregated to control immigration and to prevent the spread of infectious diseases.

First- and second-class passengers on transatlantic liners disembarked at the main piers on Manhattan Island, but steerage passengers had to go through health checks and processing at Ellis Island. marinamaral.com/blog/2017/6/21…

A long and winding route had to be taken to reach topside; the steerage-class accommodation, located on C through G decks, was at the extreme ends of the decks, and so was the farthest away from the lifeboats.

By contrast, the first-class accommodation was located on the upper decks and so was nearest. Proximity to the lifeboats thus became a key factor in determining who got into them. To add to the difficulty, many of the steerage passengers did not understand or speak English.

It was perhaps no coincidence that English-speaking Irish immigrants were disproportionately represented among the steerage passengers who survived. Many of those who did survive owed their lives to third-class steward John Edward Hart, who organized three trips into..

... the ship's interior to escort groups of third-class passengers up to the boat deck. Others made their way through open barriers or climbed emergency ladders. Some, perhaps overwhelmed by it all, made no attempt to escape...

.. and stayed in their cabins or congregated in prayer in the third-class dining room. Leading Fireman Charles Hendrickson saw crowds of third-class passengers below decks with their trunks and possessions, as if waiting for someone to direct them.

The first signs of panic were seen when a group of passengers attempted to rush port-side lifeboat No. 14 as it was being lowered with 40 people aboard. Fifth Officer Lowe, who was in charge of the boat, fired 3 shots in the air to control the crowd without causing injuries.

No. 16 was lowered five minutes later. Among those aboard was stewardess Violet Jessop, who would repeat the experience four years later when she survived the sinking of one of Titanic's sister ships, Britannic, in the First World War.

Collapsible boat C was launched at 01:40 from a now largely deserted area of the deck, as most of those on deck, had moved to the stern of the ship.

It was aboard this boat that White Star chairman and managing director J. Bruce Ismay, Titanic's most controversial survivor, made his escape from the ship, an act later condemned as cowardice.

The last boat to be launched was collapsible D, which left at 02:05 with 25 people aboard; two more men jumped on the boat as it was being lowered. The sea had reached the boat deck and the forecastle was deep underwater.

First-class passenger Edith Evans, a prominent New York socialite, gave up her place in the boat, and ultimately died in the disaster. She was one of only four women in first class to perish in the sinking.

Captain Smith carried out a final tour of the deck, telling the radio operators and other crew members: "Now it's every man for himself."

As passengers and crew headed to the stern, where Father Thomas Byles was hearing confessions and giving absolutions, Titanic's band played outside the gymnasium. Passengers present remember them playing lively tunes such as "Alexander's Ragtime Band".

Part of the enduring folklore of the Titanic sinking is that the musicians played the hymn "Nearer, My God, to Thee" as the ship sank, but this appears to be dubious.

The claim surfaced among the earliest reports of the sinking, and the hymn became so closely associated with the Titanic disaster that its opening bars were carved on the grave monument of Titanic's bandmaster, Wallace Hartley, one of those who perished.

George Orrell, the bandmaster of the rescue ship, Carpathia, who spoke with survivors, related: "The ship's band in any emergency is expected to play to calm the passengers. After Titanic struck the iceberg the band began to play bright music, dance music, comic songs..

.... anything that would prevent the passengers from becoming panic-stricken. Various awe-stricken passengers began to think of the death that faced them and asked the bandmaster to play hymns. The one which appealed to all was 'Nearer My God to Thee'."

Several survivors who were among the last to leave the ship claimed that the band continued playing until the slope of the deck became too steep for them to stand, Gracie claimed that the band stopped playing at least 30 minutes before the vessel sank.

The ship's designer, Thomas Andrews, was reportedly last seen in the first-class smoking room, having removed his lifebelt, staring at the painting above the fireplace.

Captain Smith's fate is unclear as there are conflicting accounts of his death; he either entered the wheelhouse on the bridge and died there when it was engulfed or jumped into the water just before the bridge was submerged and subsequently perished in the water.

At about 02:15, Titanic's angle in the water began to increase rapidly as water poured into previously unflooded parts. Her suddenly increasing angle caused a "giant wave" to wash along the ship from the forward end of the boat deck, sweeping many people into the sea.

The parties who were trying to lower collapsible boats A and B, including Chief Officer Henry Wilde, First Officer Murdoch, Second Officer Charles Lightoller and Colonel Archibald Gracie, were swept away along with the two boats

Bride, Gracie and Lightoller made it onto boat B, but Murdoch and Wilde perished in the water.

Eyewitnesses saw Titanic's stern rising high into the air as the ship tilted down in the water. It was said to have reached an angle of 30–45 degrees. Many survivors described a great noise, which some attributed to the boilers exploding.

After another minute, the ship's lights flickered once and then permanently went out, plunging Titanic into darkness. Jack Thayer recalled seeing "groups of the fifteen hundred people still aboard, clinging in clusters or bunches, like swarming bees; only to fall in masses..

... pairs or singly as the great afterpart of the ship, two hundred fifty feet of it, rose into the sky." Shortly after the lights went out, the ship split apart.

The submerged bow may have remained attached to the stern by the keel for a short time, pulling the stern to a high angle before separating and leaving the stern to float for a few minutes longer.

The ship disappeared from view at 02:20, 2 hours and 40 minutes after striking the iceberg. "gradually [turning] her deck away from us, as though to hide from our sight the awful spectacle..."

In the immediate aftermath of the sinking, hundreds of passengers and crew were left dying in the icy sea, surrounded by debris from the ship. Titanic's disintegration during her descent to the seabed caused buoyant chunks of debris

These injured and possibly killed some of the swimmers; others used the debris to try to keep themselves afloat. With a temperature of 28 °F (−2 °C), the water was lethally cold.

Almost all of those in the water died of cardiac arrest or other bodily reactions to freezing water within 15–30 minutes. Only 13 of them were helped into the lifeboats even though these had room for almost 500 more people.

The noise of the people in the water screaming, yelling, and crying was a tremendous shock to the occupants of the lifeboats, many of whom had up to that moment believed that everyone had escaped before the ship sank.

Titanic's survivors were rescued around 04:00 on 15 April by the RMS Carpathia, which had steamed through the night at high speed and at considerable risk, as the ship had to dodge numerous icebergs en route. Carpathia's lights were first spotted around 03:30.

They were all on Carpathia by 09:00. There were some scenes of joy as some families and friends were reunited, but in most cases hopes died as loved ones failed to reappear. At 09:15, two more ships appeared on the scene – Mount Temple and Californian.

When Carpathia arrived at Pier 54 in New York on the evening of 18 April after a difficult voyage through pack ice, fog, thunderstorms and rough seas, 40,000 people were standing on the wharves alerted to the disaster by a stream of radio messages from Carpathia and other ships.

It was only after Carpathia docked – three days after Titanic's sinking – that the full scope of the disaster became public knowledge.

Photo: Unidentified Titanic survivors aboard Carpathia.

Four ships chartered by the White Star Line succeeded in retrieving 328 bodies; 119 were buried at sea, while the remaining 209 were brought ashore to the Canadian port of Halifax, Nova Scotia, where 150 of them were buried.

Memorials were raised in various places – New York, Washington, Southampton, Liverpool, Belfast and Lichfield, among others – and ceremonies were held on both sides of the Atlantic to commemorate the dead and raise funds to aid the survivors.

The bodies of most of Titanic's victims were never recovered, and the only evidence of their deaths was found 73 years later among the debris on the seabed: pairs of shoes lying side by side, where bodies had once lain before eventually decomposing

Less than a third of those aboard Titanic survived the disaster. Some survivors died shortly afterwards; injuries and the effects of exposure caused the deaths of several of those brought aboard Carpathia.

Titanic Orphans, brothers Michel and Edmond Navratil, 1912. They were the only children to be rescued from the Titanic without a parent or guardian. They were born in Nice, France.

*Done*

(I think I need a drink now)

Not really. I'm going back to my commissions and will prepare the next story for @FacesAuschwitz. Stay tuned....

Important to say that when I'll talk about certain topics of which I don't know much about, the information comes sometimes from different sources and I select the best parts, compile in some tweets, summarize the story and add some photos to illustrate the events.