Titanic - The Unsinkable Ship - Research Paper Example

?[Your full May 16, Titanic- The Unsinkable Ship The more the history of the sunken luxury liner, the R.M.S. Titanic, becomes old, the more the thirst regarding Titanic facts and myths increases. The Titanic is the most talked about ship, and has seen the biggest shipwreck in history. This paper intends to provide a detailed research regarding the magnificent vessel. The paper starts with a detailed history of the ship. This is followed by a complete description of the ship, with main focus on its interior design and luxurious amnesties provided to its passengers. The next section discusses in detail how and when the doomed journey started. The unfortunate day, when the ill fated vessel struck a huge iceberg, has been discussed in detail, with focus on what the passengers went through. A section has been devoted to discussing different viewpoints of researchers, who analyzed why the ship faced the wreck. Multiple analyses have been stated. Why man’s pride came to fall in front of the omnipotent God, in the form of the shipwreck of the unsinkable ship, has been stated. The report is summarized in a concluding paragraph. MLA referencing style has been used appropriately, both for in-text citations and referencing. History Before going into the details of the famous and tragic Titanic disaster, let’s first plunge into the history of the Titanic ship. Titanic is the ship that grabbed the attention of the whole world, when it was made, and when it sank (Molony). The 1950's version of the Titanic's sinking, "A Night to Remember', and the latest 1997’s version of James Cameron’s Titanic, are the masterpieces that detail the shipwreck. Ambekar (para.1) writes that, “Titanic was one the greatest ship built in twentieth century.” It was of such great strength that it was believed to be unsinkable. It was the largest ship ever made, “stretching a sixth of a mile from bow to stern, standing ten stories high from its keel to the top of its four funnels and displacing over 45,000 tons”, writes Barczewski (1). It was an ostentatious and grand ship, known as the British passenger ocean liner, and was owned and driven by White Star Line (Eaton and Haas). Thomas Andrews, the head of Harland & Wolff design department, was the designer of this 882.5 feet long ship. Commissioned by White Star and built by Harland and Wolff, it was created between 1908 and1909 in Belfast (Ireland), by more than 15,000 Irish shipyard workers. It is said that at that time, every worker was paid nearly $10 per week. Titanic was called unsinkable because of its strong structure. It had double bottom. The hull, whose number was 401, was divided into sixteen waterproof compartments. The structure of the ship was such that it could support the ship to stay floating, even if two of its middle compartments, or four of the front compartments, submerged under water and got flooded. Interior Design Now, let’s talk about the interior decoration of Titanic. Registered in Liverpool and belonging to the Olympic class of the White Star Line, the ship offered a luxurious lifestyle to its passengers, though it was far away from land. It contained all kinds of entertainment facilities, dining halls, pubs, dancing floors, living rooms, and massive kitchens. Equipped with four 400 kilowatt electrical generators, the Titanic ship had a plentiful supply of electricity. The passengers had the facility of separate rooms, and they could use electric heaters and electric lamps. The deck offered all kinds of continental foods, thus increasing the lavishness on the ship. The food was stored and refrigerated properly. Special areas had been dedicated to indoor games. A fully furnished gymnasium was also present in which the passengers could do their daily exercises. Passengers could use lifts for moving inside the ship. There was proper ventilation in the ship, due to which proper airy conditions were maintained. Passengers could use telephones to communicate. Radios were also available which had a great range of many hundred miles. Hence, we see that Titanic had all latest technologies and emergency facilities that were available in that time. No ship had offered these facilities to its passengers before Titanic. The article, The Titanic Ship: An Invincible Tragedy (Titanic-Facts.com, para. 5), states that: During the early part of the 20th century, it was considered quite sophisticated for wealthy families to spend portions of their time in Europe, which necessitated crossing the Atlantic at least once per year. Even to these jaded travelers, however, the Titanic ship was like no other. Nothing had been spared to insure the comfort of the first class guests. The ship was even equipped with only 20 lifeboats, so that precious deck space for the first class passengers would not be taken up by bulky lifeboats. But this was the luxurious journey only for first class passengers. There were also second and third class passengers on board, who were made to spend their journey in cramped compartments. These passengers mostly included the immigrants who were migrating to America to start their living, and were quite sure that they would reach their destination safe and sound because they were travelling in the most invincible ship ever made in human history. Start of the Disastrous Journey The first, and the last, captain of the unfortunate ship was sixty-three years old, Captain Edward John Smith. He had a wife, Eleanor, and a 12-year-old daughter, Helen. He had been in captaincy for White Star for 38 years. He had travelled in the North Atlantic for 26 years, and thus, was considered as the most perfect and experienced captain for Titanic’s first voyage. There were very few other captains other than him, who were properly familiar with the Atlantic Ocean, and the location of its glaciers and icebergs. According to him, this was going to be his last voyage in his career, because he was going to retire after Titanic’s first voyage. The journey was planned to start in March, 1912, but due to the national strike of coal at that time, and due to some remaining structural work, the journey was delayed, during which coal was collected from other ships and resources to ensure that the fuel did not get short during the journey. Coal was taken from many ships of the White Star Line and other friendly companies. Nobody knew that this fuel would add to the woe of the unfortunate disaster later on. The maiden voyage started from Southampton. “The White Star Line had taken great care to publicize the fantastic engineering of the Titanic and the world waited with baited breath for the ship to make her first voyage” (Titanic-Facts.com, para.1). It was April 10, 1912, when the luxury liner, the Titanic, left the port at South England, headed for New York. The day was Wednesday, a cool spring morning. Temple (7) writes that, “Titanic’s looming shadow made even the most powerful passenger feel small.” Around twenty-two hundred passengers ware boarded onto the ship from other boats. They belonged to all different countries of the world, including, Iran, Japan, France, and Italy. They were excited and overjoyed to anticipate the luxurious journey they were going to enjoy in the grand ship, the invincible Titanic. This ship was supposed to cross the Atlantic Ocean to reach its destination. It made its first stop at Cherbourg, France, where it was anchored at a mile’s distance from the shore, in order to attract the passengers and the onlookers. From Cherbourg, France, the ship restarted its journey and headed toward its next stop, which was Queenstown in Ireland. Titanic reached at this stop in the afternoon. It is said that a very respected Jesuit priest, Father Francis Brown, left the ship at this point in Ireland, which meant that he was the one who escaped the felony that struck the ship at al later time. He naturally survived from the frightful journey. From Queenstown, the Titanic headed on to New York after boarding more passengers. So, we see that the two halts, Cherbourg and Queensland, went fine, with one little tragic incident when the wake cavitations of the Titanic caused a smaller vessel to collide with its dock, before it reached Cherbourg. Or does this mean that the bad luck had already begun? The Tragic Day For four days, the passengers of the Titanic drank and danced on the floors of the luxurious ship. They continued to enjoy the amnesties and modern luxuries that were known at that time. Then, it was April 14, 1912, the last day of the smiles on the lips of Titanic’s passengers. It was the day when the Captain, Edward Smith, realized the fact that he had been unaware of a gigantic iceberg. It was a moonless night, and the ship was floating at full speed at 22 knots. “Four days into her journey, at 11:40 P.M. on the night of April 14, she struck an iceberg. Her fireman compared the sound of the impact to "the tearing of calico, nothing more." However, the collision was fatal and the icy water soon poured through the ship” (The Sinking of The Titanic, 1912”, para.3). The crew, under the instructions of Captain Smith, did its level best to turn the ship, but all went in vain because it was already moving in such a high speed that it was impossible to make it take a turn. They were successful in preventing only half of the ship from collapsing into the huge iceberg. The later half bumped into it with great speed, causing wreck to the unsinkable ship. Water started pouring into the ship when some of the water tight cubicles smashed into the iceberg. Gradually, the stern of the ship started rising and the bow went downward. It was the time when the Captain formally announced that the ship had smashed into the iceberg, and was flooding. Safety boats were arranged, but the number of passengers surpassed the number of safety boats available. As mentioned earlier in the paper, there were only twenty lifeboats available on the deck, because not many lifeboats were brought on board initially, in order to save space for the first class passengers. The lifeboats were not properly used as well; since, many passengers refused to board those boats. They were sure that the Titanic was unsinkable. Alongside the flooding, the ship also caught fire; and, the additional fuel, that was collected to be utilized in case of fuel shortage, added to the fire. People fought over life jackets. Life expectancy was already short because of the temperature of water, four degrees below the freezing point. So, life jackets were also of no big use. Surprisingly, there were no praiseworthy emergency measures that were observed being done in favor of the passengers. All of them were fighting for their survival, on their own. At last, the Titanic totally sank in the morning of April 15, at around 2:00 a.m. The bandmaster, Wally Hartley, continued to play hymns with his band, till the last moment. Titanic-Facts.com states that only 705 out of 2,228 passengers and crew members survived the disaster, and 1,523 lives sank deep under the Atlantic Ocean- 1,535 dead as reported in the New York American (Sandler and Studlar 5). The liner Carpathia was launched for the rescue of the survivors. When the names of those who survived the shipwreck were revealed, the world became astounded when it found out that so many famous people sank deep down the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean in a single night. The survivors told the stories of selfishness and discrimination, which the second and third class passengers had to face. They were forced to perish with the ill fated ship because they were not first class passengers. Also, there were very few lifeboats, which were being offered to women only. Many women opted not to board the lifeboats in order to stay with the men of their families, although it meant certain death for them. Molly Brown was a famous survivor, who told the stories of the doomed ship in its last moments. The Straus was one couple who perished with the ship because Mrs. Straus opted to stay with her husband and did not ride the lifeboat. The unfortunate passengers also included the crew of the ship and some of the members of the ship’s design team. Blame was given to the inadequacy of lifeboats and insufficient training of the crew to use them. Analyses of the Wreck When the Titanic's remains were eventually discovered in 1985, the world had its first glance at the doomed ship in more than sixty years. The Titanic was a symbol of human advancement and glory. Researchers have been arguing upon what caused the invincible ship to sink down the cold waters, when its structure was strong enough to cross the Atlantic Ocean without worry. Some researchers say that the material, that the hull was created with, was not meant to stand cold waters, since the metal got brittle in the water the Titanic was supposed to float in. Iron used in the construction of the ship contained a lot of sulfur, which made the structure susceptible to the cold waters of the Atlantic. Blames have been put upon the creators, that they did not have enough knowledge about metallurgy. Hence, when the ship smashed into the iceberg, it was not only a tear that pulled apart, forcing the water to come in; instead, the rivets and the metal simply broke apart, allowing heavy duty water to flow inside the ship. Researchers also suggested that if the Titanic had hit the iceberg from front, then there were great chances that the damage could have been cleared. The wreck was huge because the later part of the ship smashed into the iceberg. Too many watertight compartments were punctured, which made it unmanageable to seal the damaged parts of the metal. It is also known that the Titanic, like her sisters, the Olympic and the Britannic, did not have bulkheads in their structures. Some state that there were bulkheads, but they were present only as high as the lower level of the passengers’ accommodation, and did not go not all the way up to the weather deck. Some researchers argue how could there be such a huge iceberg near New York. Others answer that the shortest route that took the ship from Southampton to New York was the great circle that made the ship go to Greenland, down the Newfoundland, to the Quebec Coats, which was the main iceberg passage. The most well-known fact is that many of the three million rivets of the ship, that connected the hull plates together, propped loose when the ship bumped into the gigantic iceberg. When the rivets were gone, the plates went loose, allowing the water to flow inside the ship. The survivors of the ship also stated that the ship proceeded with much faster speed than was allowed. There was a rumor that the owner of the White Star Line, Bruce Ismay, had instructed Captain Smith to propel the ship faster enough to break the speed record in the Atlantic crossing. Bruce Ismay was one of the survivors, and was later on dismissed from his position at the White Star Line management. It was not proved whether or not he did instruct Captain Smith to move the ship faster than necessary, because Captain Smith did not survive to prove it. Many other vessels, that reached the place of the wreck later on, reported that there were many ice floes in the area where the Titanic sank, and it was a surprise why the Captain did not slow down the ship when he knew that there were icebergs in the area where the ship was moving. Hence, we see that the greatest shipwreck of the century has been researched upon a great number of times, with researchers coming up with a different theory each time. However, there can be multiple reasons why the ship sank. What the Disaster Meant? The doomed ship was a symbol of human pride and supremacy when it was created. It was considered as unsinkable, and its creators were proud of it. “The ship's builders had spared no expense in assuring that the Titanic would not only be the safest ship on the waters, but also the largest” (Titanic-Facts.com, para.3). But they never knew that there is an ultimate power that is governing the whole universe, and without the consent of which, no Titanic or no superbly-built structure can survive. That power is God. When man was creating the Titanic, he was so sure that no power could make it sink. God showed to man that He was the power that was being challenged. He proved that He is the one governing the floating of ships, the flying of birds, the running of oceans, and the standing of mountains. Pride does not suit man, and the wreck of Titanic is one of the biggest proofs of this. Conclusion The paper discussed in detail the structure of the massive vessel; its history and interior; when it started its first and the last voyage; and, how it sank in the cold waters of the Atlantic Ocean. The passengers never knew that what they were considering a lavish and an ostentatious luxury liner was actually a doomed ship, which struck a huge iceberg in the Atlantic. The Titanic started its voyage on April 10, 1912, and sank four days later, on April 14, 1912, taking lives of over fifteen hundred passengers on board. The survivors of the shipwreck reported what happened on the ship in the last moments. There were inadequate lifeboats, which was a big reason why many people perished with the sinking ship. There have been numerous theories regarding what made the ship sank, and not even one has been proved as yet. Some theories blame the makers of the ship, some blame the captain, and some blame the flawed structure. The sinking of this great vessel shows that man is not omnipotent, and God is the all-seeing, all-knowing power. Works Cited Ambekar, Yogesh. History of Titanic Ship. Buzzle.com, 2011. Web. 16 May 2012. . Barczewski, Stephanie. “What Have We Struck?” Titanic: A Night Remembered. USA: Continuum International Publishing Group, 2006. Eaton, John P., and Charles A. Haas. Titanic: Destination Disaster: The Legends and the Reality. USA: Norton, 1996. Molony, Senan. Titanic: A Primary Source History. USA: Gareth Stevens Pub., 2005. Sandler, Kevin S., and Gaylyn Studlar. Titanic: Anatomy of a Blockbuster. USA: Rutgers University Press, 1999. “The Sinking of the Titanic, 1912.” EyeWitness to History.com. Ibis Communications Inc., n.d. Web. 16 May 2012. . Temple, Bob. “All Aboard.” The Titanic: An Interactive History Adventure. USA: Capstone Press, 2007. Titanic-Facts.com. The Titanic Ship: An Invincible Tragedy. N.p., 2012. Web. 16 May 2012. . Read More