Titanic: Death Of A Titan Essay, Research Paper
After years of construction and work, the Titanic was finally ready for her maiden voyage. The beginning of her voyage was to take place on the morning of April 10, of 1912 at approximately 10:00am. The firs of Titanic passengers began to board the ship. Most of these passengers were British residents who had journeyed to Titanic by means of transportation either that a boat train. The real precipitance came when the boat train arrived. People rich or poor were scattered all aver Southampton?s bay, attempting to find their gangway. After the second and third class passengers boarded, the firs class passengers were to be escorted to their cabins. Approximately at 12:00pm Titanic was ready to set sail. After Titanic sets out into the open sea, her water displacement causes mooring ropes of the New York, which was a small ship, to brake. Which causes her stern to swing towards Titanic’s mighty bow. Titanic official?s quick actions prevent a catastrophic collision. After hours delayed the Titanic finally sets sail into the open sea headed towards Cherbourg, France.
The Titanic lowered her anchor when arrived at Cherbourg, France, at about 5:30pm of the same day. More passengers boarded the Titanic. At approximately 8:10pm Titanic raised her anchor and sailed towards Queenstown, Ireland. She arrived at Queenstown at around 11:30am of the next morning to pick up more passengers and 1,385 bags of mail as well. Now Titanic once more raised anchor and by 1:30 she was on her way to New York.
It was 11:30pm of the night of April 14, of 1912. As Titanic sped through the darkness towards its doom, the majority of the passengers and crew had not the slightest inkling idea that they were in danger at all. The last games of cards were breaking up. The last conversations were ending. Most passengers were already in bed, but the few who remained, were heading towards their cabins. Though the passengers settled, the officers on the bridge kept a sharp look out for anything in Titanic?s path. Ice reports had been sent to the Titanic all day form other ships but Titanic?s wireless operators chose to neglect the messages and so Titanic sailed in to history. High up in the crows nest, were lookouts Fleet and Lee. They to kept a sharp look out.
Fleet peered into the darkness. He saw an object darker than night it self, coming towards the Titanic. He picked up the phone and yelled into it ?Ice burg right ahead? ?Thank you? the officer on the other line replied. Every one on the bridge were altered, as the officers made the desperate attempt to steer the giant ship around the iceberg. But the ship was to close, and she and she hit along the starboard side of Titanic. ?What have we hit?? asked captain smith walking out of his room. ?An iceberg sir? replied Officer Murdoch. The Titanic had hit an iceberg and the freezing Atlantic was rushing into her bow below.
After the collision with the iceberg, the only thing left to save the passengers and crew, were the lifeboats. After the grinding jar, Captain Smith ordered the lifeboats to be uncovered. Meanwhile stewards past through the halls telling all the passengers to get their life jackets on. Many people didn?t take this seriously and wanted to stay in their room. Finally with the firs class passengers on the top decks, the lifeboats were ready to be lowered.
Now it was up to the crew to get the first class passengers safely into the lifeboats. The crewmen ordered for women and children firs. Many women weren?t willing to leave their husbands. They thought the nice warm ship was the better place to be, other than that dinky, little lifeboat. Ida Straus refused to leave her husband, Isador, stating that she would go were her husband would go. As time went by, the band on the Titanic, lead by Wallace Harley, played to try to keep the passengers calm. No one really thought the unsinkable ship was in any kind of real trouble.
Thomas Andrews, the ship?s designer, was called to survey the damage. Upon his unbelievable findings, he gave Titanic, the unsinkable ship an hour or two before she founders into the icy Atlantic. As people became more aware that she was in trouble, a seat in a lifeboat became what every one was after. But the same rule still applied ?Women and children first?, though so the men were out of luck and running out of time. But some men got lucky, some boats were letting men onboard if no women were in sight. As boats and time ran out, officers were given guns, to keep down any raiding of boats. There were obviously not enough boats for very one, so help was needed. Wireless operators Phillips and Bride tried to contact any near by ships, but all were to far. The nearest ship contacted was the Carpathia, but she would take four hours to reach the Titanic. That would be too late.
Although the Carpathia was the nearest ship contacted, there was a ship even nearer. This ship was believed to be the Californian. The Californian had tried to reach the Titanic earlier, before the collision, to war her about ice. The Californian though, was to shut up and get off the line. The Californian decided to turn in for the night, and turned off their wireless. The Californian was so close, her officers could see the Titanic and wondered why she looked so queer? When they saw the Titanic disappear, they thought she had just steamed away. The officers on the Titanic saw the Californian also, and contact was tried, but failed.
The time remaining for the Titanic was running short. As the last of the lifeboats left, over a thousand people stood on the decks, with no where to go. Some jumped and some tried to reach higher ground. As the bow went under, the ship began to tilt down rapidly, the stern riding into the air, spilling people into the sea. When the water reached the bridge, people finally began to believe that Titanic would eventually sink. As the urgency of the situation began to dawn on all concerned, the later boats tended to be filled to much nearer than normal capacity.
Since most of the boats had already left, Captain Smith ordered the collapsible boats to be lowered. They were located at the roof of the bridge. And so they were lowered and were being prepared to be lowered into the ocean, but the water reached them before they were finished. Soon after realizing that they weren?t going to finish in time, they began cutting the ropes that had already been put on the boats with the water reaching up to the peoples? necks. Water soon began to take over the Grand Staircase, were as many of the wealthiest passengers onboard stood helplessly with no were to go. As the ship was dragged down by its forward flooded section, the hull rose almost vertically, the fore funnel breaking off and falling among swimmers in the water. As water accumulated in the Grand Staircase passengers awaited their end. Not much time passed but the pressure of water above the great dome over the Grand Staircase got to great and the wonderful glass dome shattered and water began cascading in the ship ripping the Grand Staircase out of its foundation. Afterwards water began rushing with incredible force through the first class halls, ripping through doors and walls.
The stern kept rising higher every second. Everything onboard, plates, furniture, food, it all began to fall out of place. People began jumping of the ship hoping that they could manage to escape but the water was to cold and people lay helpless in the water. Passengers stood on the decks praying for a salvation but all hope was lost. People began accumulating in the stern holding on what ever they could. The Light of the floating palace flickered once and then went out forever. The only light remanding was from the crescent moon above shinning upon Titanic?s decks. As Titanic?s bow continued to sink, the weight of the stern in the air became to great. A loud cracking sound was heard throughout the high seas as if it were coming from the distance and then the ship rapidly broke in two pieces. Titanic broke off between the 3rd and 4th funnels. As the Titanic split the Firs Class Aft Staircase, the famous Caf? Parisien, the First Class Smoking Room, the hospital, the engine room, it was all destroyed as the ship ruptured. As the ship detached, all the people floating in the water behind the ship were crushed do to the fact that stern weighting over 30,000 tons and that witnesses say that the stern prostrated aloft of every soul behind the great stern.
As the bow sank to the bottom of the cold Atlantic going at around 30 knots and with the immense water pressure, it began to fall a bit apart. The bow landed 12,000 feet below sea level. The bridge detached from the Titanic?s bow as it was on its way down to the bottomless Atlantic. The stern lay on top of the ocean in normal position for about a minute. But then it to got overtaken by water. The stern began to rise very rapidly. When the stern stopped ascending it virtually stood in a 90* angle. Now the few remaining passengers were either holding on to something or falling to their deaths. Titanic lay at a 90* perspective for about a minute. Then it began to sink faster and faster. The few remaining passengers onboard began taking their final deep breaths, for which they knew the end had come. As the mighty vessel finally went down, it was accompanied by a rising crescendo of noise as furniture and fittings crashed about inside the hull, coal shifted in the bunkers and hot boilers split and exploded on contact with the ice-cold water. But suddenly, all was silent and the ship had disappeared forever, taking with it over 1,000 people and leaving others drowning in its ice-cold awake.
More than a 1,500 people floated hopelessly in the water, trying to find something to grab on to. The lifeboats didn?t return for fear of being swamped. The screams and cries of the people in the water slowly stopped as they died in the freezing waters of the North Atlantic. After half an hour or so one lifeboat returned to the disaster site to locate survivors but they were to late. Out of 1,500 people on the ocean only 6 remained alive. Over 1,200 passengers, rich or poor received their eternal rest in the cold riveted Atlantic for which their bodies were never found. All that was left were the lifeboats, bobbing in the gradually settling waves, floating scene of Arctic desolation lit only by the stars in the clear sky above. The time was 2:20am, 2hr 40min from the time that the iceberg ripped into Titanic?s hull. Today in the disaster area all you?ll hear are the screams and cries of the 1,500 souls who lost their lives on the cold and fateful night of April 14and15 of 1912.