101 Years Ago

[CapnAwesome]

I don't know, considering that the Titanic was one of two ships of that design. It's sister ship was called the Britannic. You know what happened to it? It sank. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMHS_Britannic

Three. There was also the RMS Olympic, which did not sink.

Right. One out of Three ships not sinking is not a great record of success.

[Jackalope]

Three. There was also the RMS Olympic, which did not sink.

Right. One out of Three ships not sinking is not a great record of success.

Wasn't disagreeing with you, except on the count of ships in the line.

[Minimalist]

Right. One out of Three ships not sinking is not a great record of success.

The others might not have sunk either if they didn't keep hitting icebergs and mines.

[Anomalocaris]

Actually, no. It's design was as good as any of the era and well above what was considered to be adequate. It's construction was also well above standard and probably as good as any. It's silly to say she would not meet 2010 Safety of Life at Sea standards and therefore a poor design for her time.

As it happens, she probably would have survived the damage that sank the 2006 Costia Concordia last year.

But very bad luck indeed.

I don't know, considering that the Titanic was one of two ships of that design. It's sister ship was called the Britannic. You know what happened to it? It sank. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMHS_Britannic

That's what happens when a merchant ship with all her portholes open hits a mine.

Even state of the art battleships of the era, designed to be vastly more survivable than any passenger ships could economicaly be made to be, sank after hitting one little mine while buttoned up in readiness. See the sinking of the dreadnought HMS audacious, whose crew was rescued by none other than titanic and britannic's sister ship, the Olympic.

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Three. There was also the RMS Olympic, which did not sink.

Right. One out of Three ships not sinking is not a great record of success.

The engineering standard of success is what did it take to sink them, not how many of them sank.

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Weren't the hulls of ships of that day made almost exclusively using "pig iron"? Seems I listened or read something years ago that claimed that the Titanic took so much damage due to having a pig iron hull that was very brittle. I dunno.

No, the hull was made of steel, not iron. The steel was of good quality for the era. Better steel would not become popular in merchant ships until after WWII.

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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/a...liner.html

In the rush to beat competition from Cunard, the White Star liner was supplied with a vessel that was made using substandard materials.

McCarty and Foecke tested 48 rivets recovered from the wreck and found they had high levels of slag, a result of smelting that can make the iron brittle. If put under intense pressure, the rivets made from it would have been liable to splinter.

Plus the bulkheads did not go all the way up (poor design) there were too few lifeboats ( criminally negligent homicide!) and rescue ships with radio capability were too far away...but they were only too far away because the ship sank so fast.

Again, those rivets were considered to be of very good quality for the time and was of a grade well above typical rivets used in merchant ship of the era. The fact frequently harped on - that there in fact existed an even higher grade of rivets that could have been used - is rediculous. The titanic is a profit supported merchant ship. It can't economically use the best of everything. It ready used better stuff than standards, knowledges, and conventions of the era demanded.

The same applies to the bulkheads, and the lifeboats, and the radio operating procedures.

The fact remains that while titanic had fewer lifeboats and other passenger safety features than would be required today (but more than required in 1912), the basic survivabity of her hull was in many ways superior to most contemporary passenger ships, including those meant for the very same North Atlantic route titanic took, such as the new Cunard liner Queen Mary 2. No modern cruise ship is designed to survive with 4 adjacent compartments or 300 feet of her hull open to the sea, like the titanic was. The much larger Italian cruise ship Costia Concordia sank last year with rather less of her length opened to the sea than titanic suffered in 1912. It was only the fact she sank 50 yards from a beach in warm, swimming pool water that kept the Concordia from topping titanic's death toll.

Guess what, the bulkheads in the 2004 QM2 still doesn't go all the way up, just like the titanic's. It's a fact having watertight bulkheads going all the way up breaks up the ships large public spaces, and makes the ship feel cramped and uncomfortable for passengers and therefore less profitable.

[A Theist]

Three. There was also the RMS Olympic, which did not sink.

Right. One out of Three ships not sinking is not a great record of success.

Yeah but Cap, the Titanic and the Britannic were designed to sail and to take on the rigors of the waves...they weren't designed to collide with icebergs or sail into mines...other than that, Chuck is right, they were well designed for their day, and were probably better than a lot of ships today, when they weren't sailing into mines and colliding with icebergs.