Two radio accounts of the sinking of the TITANIC, by Lightoller and Boxhall.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I had not realised that these two accounts, recorded for BBC radio, one in 1936 (Lightoller) and one in 1962 (Boxhall)existed.

I found them utterly compelling.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/archive/titanic/5047.shtml

[Bruce Keefauver]

Me too. Thanks for posting this.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Lightoller's mention of the ice report that was not passed on, and Boxhall's account of working up the star sight taken by Lightoller, finding they were twenty miles ahead of the DR, Lightoller's description of the noise of the steam blowing off, Boxhall's account of working his way through the lower decks, and the carefully moderate remarks about the "Californian", bring the story far more alive for me than either of the films.

[Bobcat]

Amazing. Thanks for the link.

[Bruce Keefauver]

Lightoller's remarks sounded like he was reading something that he had written. Did he ever publish anything? He had quite a career. I'm not certain that I would have wanted to share a voyage with him but the tales he could have told...

ACB Do you know what sort of builder's sea-trials these liners would have had. I got the idea somewhere that they were not anywhere near as comprehensive as one would hope. (I'm thinking crash stops, hard over turns w/ various revs on different screws, turning radii etc; was full astern and hard over the best combination? Did they wring these ships out and fully understand how they performed or was it just build, load the passengers and (hopefully) start making money?

[Gerarddm]

IIRC there was a significant design flaw with her rudder vis a vis her triple screws. The rudder placement wasn't biting clean water, so she wasn't as responsive as she could have been.

[Bobcat]

Another irony of Titanic's sinking is that if she had hit the ice dead on she probably would have remained afloat.

[Sailor]

Bigger rudder may have helped Or had she kept her watertight doors open, more pumps would have been brought to bear on the incoming water, allowing her to sink more slowly and on an even keel. The even trim fore and aft would have kept the hole from submerging so much which would have reduced the pressure thereby reducing the rate at which water came in. Woulda coulda, shoulda. It's all over now.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Lightoller's remarks sounded like he was reading something that he had written. Did he ever publish anything? He had quite a career. I'm not certain that I would have wanted to share a voyage with him but the tales he could have told...

His career was blighted by the TITANIC, as you know - most unfairly after he had done a wonderful job with, as he put it, the whitewash brush, at the enquiries, he found that he would never be considered for command in White Star. He did write a book - "TITANIC and other ships" but it was suppressed at the insistence of the Marconi Company - presumably over the ice report that was not passed to the bridge, which he talks about. Four years after this talk he took his own boat over to Dunkirk...

ACB Do you know what sort of builder's sea-trials these liners would have had. I got the idea somewhere that they were not anywhere near as comprehensive as one would hope. (I'm thinking crash stops, hard over turns w/ various revs on different screws, turning radii etc; was full astern and hard over the best combination? Did they wring these ships out and fully understand how they performed or was it just build, load the passengers and (hopefully) start making money?

I honestly don't know, but I fancy they were quite thorough. There are a lot of pictures of big liners running trials, so I would think the trials would have been quite extensive. When we built a ship at H&W they took her for trials on what they referred to as their standard trials course, which included running the Cloch and Cumbrae run (13.66 miles) in the Clyde, and when asked was this the trials course for the TITANIC they said that it was.

I expect the big liners were well worked out; smaller less important vessels may have had much shorter trials.

[Bruce Keefauver]

Thanks Andrew.

I found a description of the trials and some engineering speculation re/ tactical turning diameter etc. in the excellent SNAME book publication Titanic Ships Titanic Disasters – an Analysis of Early White Star and Cunard Superliners by Garzke & Woodward (University of Michigan Professor of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering) Lots of interesting details, written for the lay reader, but also very much full of technical information. I’ve just started reading it again. But the bottom line remains that they were just going too fast (22.5 knots) for the conditions and they had only about 37 seconds from the call “Iceberg Dead Ahead” to collision. Btw the authors found the White Star trio to be well designed by the standards of the day and even today all things considered.

FYI Iceberg photo? http://gcaptain.com/iceberg-sunk-titanic-photo/?43586

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Bruce,

Agreed about the speed - and you will notice the emphasis that Lightoller puts on his statement that had Captain Smith known of the ice field ahead he certainly would have slowed down. Which of course is why his book caused such consternation at the Marconi Company - who employed and supplied the radio officers as well as the equipment.

This Wiki entry is highly relevant:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Ge...eless_officer)

Do we believe Lightoller? An interesting speculation; certainly he is transferring blame from Captain Smith to Philips, but both were dead and whilst Lightoller had good reason to, as he put it "use the whitewash brush" at the Enquiries, that was no longer the case in 1936. I think I do. I don't know if any work has been done on Smith's conduct of the other vessels under his command in similar circumstances.

I've seen that photo before - in the the offices of Burlingham Underwood and Lord, in New York.

[Bobcat]

The statement that they were going "too fast" must be view with respect to the conditions. 22.5 knots is fine speed when the ocean is clear. It's only "too fast" when there's ice (or other obstructions) around. I tend to believe Lightoller that if the bridge had known the extent to which there was ice, the captain would have slowed down.

The other point is that radio was really new, just above a novelty. Smith and the others had navigated for years without radio messages from other ships. You would think that there were other methods that they would have used to determine if ice was going to be a problem. It seems hard to believe that the berg that sunk Titanic was a lone renegade berg far from any other bit of ice

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Those are two very good points, and we must also remember that the Western Ocean liners paid the highest salaries and attracted the very best officers.

Lecky's "Wrinkles in Practical Navigation", the leading textbook of the day, was aimed at these men and deals with their navigational issues at length.

Boxhall, the Fourth Officer, held an Extra Master's Certificate - the highest qualification obtainable.

Lightoller and Boxhall both make the point that the extremely calm conditions made it harder to see ice. They must have been familiar with ice.

Phillips on the other hand might not have been as aware of the danger, though he had two years service in North Atlantic liners.

Certainly he was responsible for not passing on the Mesaba's ice message and for cutting off the Californian's ice message.

Lightoller suggests that Phillips was aware of what the consequences of his actions had been and that he did not wish to live.

Worth noting that Lightoller, Bride and Philips were all on Collapsible B.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Lightoller's remarks sounded like he was reading something that he had written. Did he ever publish anything? He had quite a career. I'm not certain that I would have wanted to share a voyage with him but the tales he could have told...

Look what I just found:

http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0301011h.html#ch35

[Bobcat]

As for Phillips, it may be that not passing a message that was NOT denoted for the captain to see it personally was not a big thing.

At the time anyway.

When standing knee in water on collapsible B, the ship having gone down from a collision with an iceberg, Phillips must have thought very differently about not taking the extra step a few hours ago and getting an ice warning to Captain Smith.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

From Lightoller's own account, above:

She was certainly making good speed that night of April 14th, but not her best—nothing compared with what she would have been capable, in say a couple of years’ time. The disaster was just due to a combination of circumstances that never occurred before and can never occur again. That may sound like a sweeping statement, yet it is a fact.

All during that fatal day the sea had been like glass—an unusual occurrence for that time of the year—not that that caused any great worry. Again, there had been an extremely mild winter in the Arctic, owing to which, ice from the ice cap and glaciers had broken away in phenomenal quantities, and official reports say that never before or since has there been known to be such quantities of icebergs, growler, field ice and float ice, stretching down with the Labrador current. In my fifteen years’ experience on the Atlantic I had certainly never seen anything like it—not even in the South Atlantic when, in the old days of sailing ships, we used to sometimes go down to 65º south.

These were just some contributory causes that combined and brought into existence, conditions of which the officers of the ship were to a great extent ignorant.

Wireless reports were coming in through the day from various ships, of ice being sighted in different positions. Nor was that anything unusual at this time of the year, and none of the reports indicated the extent of the ice seen. A report would read “iceberg (or icebergs) sighted in such and such a latitude and longitude.” Later on in the day we did get reports of ice sighted in larger quantities, and also two reports of field ice, but they were in positions that did not affect us. The one vital report that came through but which never reached the bridge, was received at 9-40 p.m. from the Mesaba stating “Ice report in Latitude 42N to 41-25N. Long. 49 to Long. 50-30 W. Saw much heavy pack ice, and great number large icebergs. Also field ice. Weather good, clear. Phillips, the wireless operator on watch who received the message was not to know the extreme urgency of the warning or hat we were at the time actually entering the area given by the Mesaba, and are literally packed with icebergs, field ice and growlers. He was very busy working wireless messages to and from Cape Race, also with his accounts. The junior operator, Bride, of course, knew noting about this vital warning, being off duty, and turned-in. Later, when standing with others on the upturned boat, Phillips explained when I said that I did not recollect any Mesaba report: “I just put the message under a paper weight at my elbow, just until I squared up what I was doing before sending it to the Bridge.” That delay proved fatal and was the main contributory cause to the loss of that magnificent ship and hundreds of lives. Had I as Officer of the Watch, or the Captain, become aware of the peril lying so close ahead and not instantly slowed down or stopped, we should have been guilty of culpable and criminal negligence.

For the last hour of my watch on that never-to-be-forgotten night I had taken up a stationary position on the bridge, where I had an unobstructed view right ahead, and perhaps a couple of points on either bow. That did not signify that I was expecting to see ice, but that there was the possibility of seeing ice, as there always is when crossing The Banks; ice may be sighted. In point of fact, under normal conditions, we should have probed to be well south of the usual ice limit; only in this case the ice limit had moved very many miles south, due solely to the immense amount of ice released in the Arctic.

In ordinary circumstances the cold current carrying the icebergs south, strikes the warm current flowing to the north-east and under-runs in—that is to say the cold current goes under the warm current, on the same principle that warm water always rises.

The effect of this is to melt the iceberg around the water line. It soon “calves” or breaks up into smaller pieces, which again break up, continuing to float in the warm surface current for a short time, until completely melted. And so the work of disintegration goes on in an ever increasing ratio, thereby forming the “ice limit.”

It is often said you can tell when you are approaching ice, by the drop in temperature. The answer to that is, open a refrigerator door when the outside temperature is down, and see how close you have to get before you detect a difference. No, you would have to be uncomfortably close to “smell” ice that way.

Ten p.m. came and with it the change of the officers’ Watches. On the bridge, after checking over such things as position, speed and so forth, the officers coming on deck usually have a few minutes chat with their opposite number, before officially taking over. The Senior Officer, coming on Watch, hunts up his man in the pitch darkness, and just yarns for a few minutes, whilst getting his eyesight after being in the light’when he can see all right he lets the other chap know and officially “takes over.”

Murdoch and I were old shipmates and for a few minutes—as was our custom—we stood there looking ahead, and yarning over times and incidents part and present. We both remarked on the ship’s steadiness, absence of vibration, and how comfortably she was slipping along. Then we passed on to more serious subjects, such as the chances of sighting ice, reports of ice that had been sighted, and the positions. We also commented on the lack of definition between the horizon and the sky—which would make an iceberg all the more difficult to see—particularly if it had a black side, and that should be, by bad luck, turned our way.
The side of an iceberg that has calved or broken away from its parent glacier will usually be black, where the fresh ice is showing, and is consequently more difficult to see at night. After considerable exposure, this side turns white like the rest.

We were then making an easy 22 knots. It was pitch dark and dead cold. Not a cloud in the sky, and the sea like glass. The very smoothness of the sea was, again, another unfortunate circumstance that went to complete the chain.

If there had been either wind or swell, the outline of the berg would have been rendered visible, through the water breaking at the base.

Captain E.J. was one of the ablest Skippers on the Atlantic, and accusations of recklessness, carelessness, not taking due precautions, or driving his ship at too high a speed, were absolutely, and utterly unfounded; but the armchair complaint is a very common disease, and generally accepted as one of the necessary evils from which the sea-farer is condemned to suffer. A dark night, a blinding squall, and a man who has been on the mental rack for perhaps the last forty-eight hours, is called on to make an instantaneous decision embodying the safety of his crew and his ship. If he chooses the right course, as nine times out of ten he does, all well and good, but if on the tenth time his judgment is, momentarily, in error, then he may be certain he is coming under the thumb of the armchair judge, who, a thousand to one, has never been called on to make a life and death decision in a sudden emergency.

Captain Smith, with every other senior officer (apart from myself), went down, and was lost with the ship, and so escaped that never to be forgotten ordeal carried out in Washington; repeated again in England, and finally concluded in the Law Courts.

Murdoch, the First Officer, took over from me in the ordinary way. I passed on the “items of interest” as we called them, course, speed, weather conditions, ice reports, wished him joy of his Watch, and went below. But first of all I had to do the rounds, and in a ship of that size it meant a mile or more of deck, not including a few hundred feet of ladders, staircases, etc.

Being a new ship it was all the more necessary to see that everyone was on the top line. I had been right fore and aft several decks, along a passage known as Park Lane, leading through the bowels of the ship on one side, and bringing me out by a short cut to the after deck. Here I had to look round to see that the Quartermaster and others were on their stations, and then back to my warm cabin.

The temperature on deck felt somewhere around the zero of Canada, although actually, it wasn’t much below freezing, and I quickly rolled into my blankets. There I lay, turning over my past sins and future punishments, waiting until I could thaw and get to sleep.

[Captain Intrepid]

I don't know what the culture was back then, but in the Coast Guard if definitely on the side of "If anything out the ordinary happens AT ALL call the Captain, even if you don't think you probably have to."

[seedy]

Fascinating. Speaking as a locomotive engineer who's run in zero-visibility storms at night.

[Bobcat]

Fascinating. Speaking as a locomotive engineer who's run in zero-visibility storms at night.

Not that hogheads have to worry about icebergs.....

Gasoline tanker trucker stuck on a grade crossing on the other hand *can* be a worry.

[Bruce Keefauver]

Thanks for the Lightoller book link Andrew. Boy, did that fellow have a career or what.

[kbowen]

Another irony of Titanic's sinking is that if she had hit the ice dead on she probably would have remained afloat.

Yes, and the skipper that had just gone off watch had survived a shipwreck in exactly that way: he had been in the crew of a square rigger when a cliff came out of a fog bank, and to the horror of the crew, the captain made the snap decision to plow straight into it. The ship stuck into the rocks and everyone got off. One wonders what the skipper's choice might have been if he had still been on the bridge when the iceberg showed up.

[jackster]

Lightoller says that the Officer on Duty, W.M. Murdock(sic?), ordered "Hard 'a starboard, full speed astern" with "Iceberg dead ahead" while going 22 knts.!
The idea being to first swing the bow around and then, shifting the rudder, to bring the stern around, in an attempt to avoid the danger.
She struck on the starboard side.
I guess I don't see why the 'hard 'a starboard' order!?
I can see that if there was sternway, the bow would, or should, swing to port, but first the ship would have to loose all headway and develop sternway within a VERY short distance while traveling at 22 knts. That distance was not enumerated, but from what I can gather, not more then say 1/4 mile?
What am I missing here?
Great stories, by the way AC-B, thanks for posting.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Lightoller says that the Officer on Duty, W.M. Murdock(sic?), ordered "Hard 'a starboard, full speed astern" with "Iceberg dead ahead" while going 22 knts.!
The idea being to first swing the bow around and then, shifting the rudder, to bring the stern around, in an attempt to avoid the danger.
She struck on the starboard side.
I guess I don't see why the 'hard 'a starboard' order!?
I can see that if there was sternway, the bow would, or should, swing to port, but first the ship would have to loose all headway and develop sternway within a VERY short distance while traveling at 22 knts. That distance was not enumerated, but from what I can gather, not more then say 1/4 mile?
What am I missing here?
Great stories, by the way AC-B, thanks for posting.

What you are missing is the reversal of the helm orders aboard British ships in 1932! Until that time helm orders were given in the sense of a tiller - so Murdoch was actually ordering "Hard-a-Port!"

Don't worry - you are very far from alone in that!

[jackster]

What you are missing is the reversal of the helm orders aboard British ships in 1932! Until that time helm orders were given in the sense of a tiller - so Murdoch was actually ordering "Hard-a-Port!"

Don't worry - you are very far from alone in that!

OOH!
Ta!

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Here is an excellent website devoted to the radio aspects of the TITANIC's sinking:


http://www.hf.ro/

[Bobcat]

I was confused as well with the command given and the apparent intended result. It never occurred to me that a big steam ship would have a "pretend tiller, " meaning that the directions were given as if the wheel were a stick bolted to the rudde rhead.

[Bruce Keefauver]

This might be worth a look http://channel.nationalgeographic.co...james-cameron/

I'm not so sure that the port your helm (tiller term) (to stop the stern from swinging to starboard) was actually ordered or applied. It seems like there would not be enought time. I think that was what people assumed Murdoch was trying to do.

Also I wonder if the stop-slow (maybe full)-astern order actually had any impact. It was not as if the engineer's would be expecting such an order in the middle of the night in the middle of the "great western sea" and there would have been a bit of a fuss with lots of valves to turn.

Btw the CL screw was driven by a non-reversing turbine and a Full Astern order would have closed down it's steam (directing it to a condenser) which would have reduced the flow over the rudder making it less effective.

[jackster]

Bruce,
Interesting and informative comments about which and how effective the commands were.

I understand the "Port/Starboard Your Helm" command on a tiller boat and share Bobcats surprise to hear of its' use on the Titanic!

There seems to be less than unanimous agreement, even from those directly involved, much less all those who subsequently investigated. But a fun exercise to speculate about anyway .

I do, though, see the ostensible intent of trying to first swing the bow to port (whatever helm order that would be! ) then back to starboard to swing the stern to port as well. And trying, however that may be, to slow the ship to lessen the impact. What do you all think?

Whether or not it would be in time is another question.

But what else could have been done on such short notice? And if true, seems to have been quick and clear thinking in a time that would surly have brought, to me at least, sharp dread and panic.

If the CL (centerline?) screw was non-reversing, how would you put the ship astern? Were the other screws reversing?

[Bob Adams]

If the CL (centerline?) screw was non-reversing, how would you put the ship astern? Were the other screws reversing?

The center screw was turbine powered, high tech at the time. When backing down, it was simply shut down. The other screws were recipocating steam engine powered and reversable, although if they had time to stop then reverse them before impact is debateable. Crash reverse is something the engine room gang would be trained to do. Personally I think they would have been better off to maintain headway which would have increased the effectivness of the rudders.

[Bob Adams]

Watching our own Roger Long investigate Titanic's breakup on History 2 right now....cool!

[Sailor]

As a kid I was absolutely enthralled by the ship and her story. Made models etc. I think the assessment I gave above about opening her watertight doors is the most realistic thing they could have done to help the situation. Once the ice came out of the night, it was too late to avoid hitting it. It's the post collision actions that could have been different to save more people. I don't remember enough about the engineering aspects of the ship though. I know that most of her pumps would have been locked away behind watertight doors and therefore useless until the previous water tight bulkeheads had been filled and started to overflow. I bigger rudder may have helped but it's doubtful. Crashing astern power would not have had time to take effect. I sailed in a steam powered ship. Steam turbines mind you but steam none the less. Full astern from full ahead would have been a VERY big deal. Much less load on the boilers. They'd be lifting all over the place. In our ship, we'd have been burning very rich until the engineers could reduce our fuel to match the steam required. They wouldn't have been making it much of a priority over getting the screw turning in reverse though. They are sitting right next to the valves that open and shut the throttles to the steam trubine and could have them switched fairly quickly. Just not quickly enough for the ship to lose much way in that estimated 1/4 mile. At 22 knots you'll cover that distance in the proverbial blink of an eye. (You do your speed in cables every six minutes. At 22 knots you'll cover 22 cables in 6 minutes. That's 16 seconds per cable. 2.5 cables will flash by in 40 seconds. Engines slowing and reversing maybe it took 45 seconds. Mabye it was closer to 1/2 a mile. Either way, it took no more than a minute between sighting the berg and the impact. There was next to no reaction time.) The helmsman will hardly have the helm over by the time the impact occured. I can't imagine that her bow had even started to swing by then. She was moving fast but a long thin hull like that doesn't turn quickly. Her speed would help but the small rudder would hinder. I think any chance of saving more people rested entirely in the actions taken after the collision. Carpathia not responding is pretty much inexcusable. Seeing the fireworks she should have radioed to make sure everything was ok. Assuming it was celebratory is not satisfactory in my books. They were trying to call TITANIC and her radio operator was told to shut up because TITANIC was trying to talk to shore. Put that together with her suddenly coming to a stop ( suddenly I use relatively) and sending up a distress signal and there's no excuse for not going to help. At the very least she should have called. Or switched on her radio to make SURE all was ok.
Unfortunately, it's easy to see all this from the comfort of my antique rolltop 100 years later. I also understand (being a watchkeeper in a large steam powered ship) that it is difficult to make decisions without all the information one might wish to have in order to make that decision.
Can anybody with more technical knowledge back up my theory of sinking on an even keel?
Daniel

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

Just a couple of points - she was quadruple expansion with an exhaust turbine - the port and starboard engines could go astern quite fast...the CARPATHIA was the ship that did respond - you are thinking of the CALIFORNIAN.


There is a superb account of the engineering aspects here:

http://www.shipsnostalgia.com/guides...d_Boiler_rooms

You will need to register but its free and is a superb site.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

One point which Sailor makes and which Lightoller makes is that the boilers all lifted off following the crash stop - the noise from the safety valves was deafening for several minutes.

[Andrew Craig-Bennett]

I have an idea that the sinking on an even keel theory was tested; what I remember of the account that I read is that a large scale model with correct Cof G, CB and waterplane forms and bulkheads was built and allowed to flood in a tank - she was doing well until free surface took charge and she capsized, rather sooner she did when allowed to flood as per the actual sinking. I'll try to find the reference

TITANIC did not have longutudinal subdivision; LUSITANIA did (using the coal bunkers) but without cross-flooding ducts such as modern ships have, and that is reckoned to be why she rolled over so relatively fast.

[johngsandusky]

There is also some defense of Californian. It is presumed that she was within sight of the disaster. It is known that she was stopped in ice for the night. Yet she was not in sight of the rescue by Carpathian in the morning. Of course the flare sightings, reasonably believed to be from Titanic, mean she couldn't have been too many miles off. But she was likely more than the oft quoted 6 or 7 nm. Of course, the statements and memories of her officers and crew were affected by the knowledge of the disaster. But that is also true of Titanic's officers. I'm not contending that any of them were lying, but people's memories are variable.