The Theories Of The Titanic Disaster
People have been fascinated with the Titanic disaster since it happened in 1912. There have been many theories about the cause throughout the years however they never found out who was really to blame. Our first theory is that captain Smith of the Titanic might be responsible because there were statements that he didn’t handle the situation after hitting the iceberg very well and therefore the number of casualties got higher. Another theory is that shipbuilders are responsible for the sinking because they used substandard iron instead of a normal one. The third theory is that it was Thomas Andrews’ fault, he was the architect of the ship and he built small watertight compartments lower than they were supposed to be. The fourth theory is that captain Stanley Lord is to be blamed because his ship was nearby but they didn’t come to help when titanic started to sink. Last but not least theory is that Bruce Ismay played part in the Titanic’s demise because he put pressure on Captain Smith to maintain the high speed of the ship.
In the first paragraph, I’m going to talk about theory number one that the responsible person is Captain Smith. Titanic’s cruise was supposed to be his last trip before retirement. First of his mistakes was that he didn’t listen to several warnings about icebergs in the waters they were sailing. This is based on the statements of several captains that gave warning to him. However, the ship continued at high speed through the dangerous territory heedless of the warnings. After Titanic hit the iceberg he supposedly didn’t handle the situation very well which increased the number of casualties. He knew there weren’t enough lifeboats nevertheless he failed to organize the sailors to help people, especially women and children, into them. On top of that, he failed to inform all of his crew about the accident or too little number of the lifeboats. On the other hand, there are several statements saying exactly the opposite. That the captain was of much help and his quick actions saved many lives of the civilians. In addition, the speed factor was also probably caused by the director of the White Star Line, Bruce Ismay, who wanted to complete the journey in only six days.
In the second paragraph, I am going to talk about the shipbuilders’ part in the tragedy. There were of about 3 million rivets used on the Titanic which were supposed to be made of very strong Iron. However, findings show that they actually used substandard, low-quality, iron instead. Probably to decrease the expenses. If good quality rivets had been used the sections may have stayed together when the ship hit the iceberg. However, the shipbuilders needed to finish the ship as quickly as possible at the minimum amount of money.
Thomas Andrews, the ship architect, could be another person responsible for the sinking. Titanic had 16 watertight compartments however they didn’t reach as high as they were supposed to in order to give more living space in the first class. If just two of the watertight compartments had reached all the way to the top the Titanic wouldn’t have sunk. Nevermind this design may not have worked in the first place so we don't know if it could have really prevented the tragedy. Moreover, it couldn't have been very effective because modern ships don't use them nowadays.
The final warning about the icebergs was sent to Titanic from the Californian which was captained by Stanley Lord. This ship was staying the night in quite close proximity to Titanic. However, they turned off their radio in the evening of that fateful night. During the night there were reported several rockets being fired into the sky. Captain Lord was informed but he decided that they were just having a party on Titanic. The Californian crew took no action. Had they turned on their radio, they could have received the distress messages from the other ship and might have been able to reach it in time to save all the passengers. Perhaps, even after noticing the rockets they didn't want to get off course and therefore get behind their schedule.
The last but not least responsible person could be Bruce Ismay who was the Managing Director of the White Star Line. The “ship industry” was extremely competitive at that time, especially competition for Atlantic passengers was intense. The White Star Line wanted to show that they were able to make it in only six days. Because of this tight schedule, they couldn't afford to slow down. As I mentioned before it was the reason why Mr. Ismay put pressure on Captain Smith to keep up the high speed of the ship. Maybe his reason was that he actually believed - as all others did - that Titanic was “the unsinkable ship”.
In conclusion, I would like to say that the high number of fatalities was probably due to the shortage of places in lifeboats, Captain Smith’s bad coordination of his crew after hitting the iceberg and the lack of help from the Californian. The sinking of the Titanic and its run into the iceberg was probably caused by the bad weather conditions, Captain Smith’s ignorance of the warnings, Bruce Ismay’s insistence on high speed and bad construction and design of the ship. To this day we’re still trying the solve the mystery what might have been the key factor in this tragedy. All in all, I believe that this whole terrible disaster in our history was a series of unfortunate events and poor decisions resulting in deaths of many people.
