Facts and Myths About Titanic Add More Mystery to the Story

Bright Side

Animation is created by Bright Side. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Music from TheSoul Sound: https://thesoul-sound.com/   Check our Bright Side podcast on Spotify and leave a positive review! https://open.spotify.com/show/0hUkPxD34jRLrMrJux4VxV   Subscribe to Bright Side: https://goo.gl/rQTJZz ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Our Social Media: Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/brightside Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/brightside.official TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@brightside.official?lang=en   Stock materials (photos, footages and other): https://www.depositphotos.com https://www.shutterstock.com https://www.eastnews.ru ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------  For more videos and articles visit: http://www.brightside.me  ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- This video is made for entertainment purposes. We do not make any warranties about the completeness, safety and reliability. Any action you take upon the information in this video is strictly at your own risk, and we will not be liable for any damages or losses. It is the viewer's responsibility to use judgement, care and precaution if you plan to replicate.

Transcript

00:00:00In the Titanic movie, you won't see any fumes above the fourth funnel of the legendary

00:00:05ocean liner.

00:00:06And it's not a mistake.

00:00:08Back in 1911, the year before the dream ship's departure, large ships would mostly sail with

00:00:13four chimneys.

00:00:14They needed those to draw heat and fumes from their massive boilers.

00:00:18The Titanic was a real engineering gem that only needed three chimneys to function.

00:00:23So the fourth was added for balance and more impressive looks.

00:00:27The White Star Line thought the public would've been disappointed to see only three pipes

00:00:32on the greatest ship of all time.

00:00:34The Titanic sister ships, the Olympic and the Britannic, also had one fake funnel each

00:00:39for the same reason.

00:00:41The dummy chimney wasn't completely useless and served for ventilation.

00:00:45It took out the fumes from the machined spaces in the lower decks and from one of the first-class

00:00:49general rooms.

00:00:51One big ventilation funnel, instead of several small ones, helped to declutter the upper

00:00:55decks and left more open space for passengers to enjoy their strolls.

00:01:02When Titanic went down, the funnels, each weighing 60 tons, went down with the rest

00:01:06of the ship.

00:01:07They were made extra tall to make sure the passengers weren't covered in the soot being

00:01:12ejected.

00:01:13Their height and weight let them stay in the upright position.

00:01:16The forward funnel, followed by the others, fell only when the ship went for the final

00:01:21dive.

00:01:22Those chimneys were much lighter than the bow, so they spread among other debris.

00:01:27The light material they were made of flattened once it hit the bottom, and the iron-eating

00:01:31bacteria living deep down took care of it later.

00:01:35The bow of Titanic remained intact when it hit the seabed, but the stern was completely

00:01:40mangled.

00:01:41When the famous ocean liner hit that iceberg, things got really messy.

00:01:45It took the future movie star a whole 2 hours and 40 minutes to submerge completely.

00:01:51The collision let water flood 6 out of 16 watertight compartments.

00:01:56As the water gushed into the starboard side, the ship started to tilt down in the front

00:02:00and a bit to the right.

00:02:02By midnight, the damaged compartments were spilling water into others, and it was chaos

00:02:07because these compartments were only watertight horizontally.

00:02:11Soon enough, water started flooding through the anchor chain holes, and by 2 AM, the bow

00:02:16was sinking, and the stern's propellers were lifted out of the water.

00:02:20The ship kept flooding until the moment the bow went underwater, and the stern shot up

00:02:25almost 45 degrees.

00:02:27The weight of those massive propellers stressed the ship's midsection.

00:02:31The steel just couldn't handle it and failed.

00:02:34Survivors described that moment as some loud noise, like breaking china or falling gear.

00:02:39That was the Titanic's upper structure giving in.

00:02:43By 12 past 2 AM, the bow and stern were only connected by the inner bottom structure.

00:02:49Hours later, the bow, weighing almost 16,000 tons, broke loose from the stern.

00:02:55The stern rose sharply to an almost vertical position and started sinking slowly.

00:03:00By 2.20, it disappeared underwater.

00:03:03The bow was cruising down at about 13 miles per hour and had hit the ocean floor almost

00:03:08a half an hour before the stern.

00:03:10The two parts of the Titanic now lie 2,000 feet apart, pointing in different directions.

00:03:16The bow remained mostly intact, just covered in mud.

00:03:19The stern turned into a tangled wreck because of the implosions it went through during the

00:03:24descent.

00:03:25The air trapped within the structure just couldn't handle the increasing pressure of

00:03:29the water deep down.

00:03:31Signal rockets played a big part in the Titanic's tragedy.

00:03:35When a ship goes down, you're supposed to shoot up red flares to signal trouble.

00:03:39But someone decided to stock Titanic with white lights instead of the usual red ones.

00:03:44So when the ship smacked into that iceberg, the crew fired off white flares.

00:03:49The SS Californian was passing nearby, and his captain knew the Titanic was in a dangerous

00:03:54iceberg zone.

00:03:56The crew didn't spot the sinking Titanic, but they sure saw those white rockets.

00:04:01The radio between the ships was useless because the Californian's operator switched it off.

00:04:06The captain had a gut feeling something was off, so he flashed a Morse code light signal

00:04:11at Titanic.

00:04:12But he received no reply because the Titanic had already gone underwater.

00:04:18There was another ship, Samson, sailing alongside the Titanic.

00:04:22It had plenty of illegally hunted frozen seal meat from Canadian waters abroad.

00:04:26So it was sailing with lights off to remain unnoticed.

00:04:30When they saw the Titanic's white rockets, they thought it was the Coast Guard and zoomed

00:04:34away.

00:04:35Samson didn't have a radio, so they couldn't find out about the ongoing disaster.

00:04:40The crew got the news about Titanic only when they got to the coast of Iceland the

00:04:44following month.

00:04:46There have been many theories to explain the Titanic tragedy, and one of the recent ones

00:04:51says that there was a fire involved.

00:04:53An Irish journalist went full detective for decades, digging into the mystery, and stumbled

00:04:58upon a game-changer.

00:05:00He came across a photo album that had been hiding from the public for a century after

00:05:04the tragedy.

00:05:05In the pictures, taken at the Harlan & Wolfe Shipyard in Belfast, Northern Ireland, just

00:05:10over a week before the liner sailed, you can clearly see a massive 30-foot black spot on

00:05:16the ship's hull.

00:05:17Maloney researched the photos and eyewitness testimony from the time and claimed that a

00:05:22fire spontaneously broke out inside of one of Titanic's enormous coal bunkers.

00:05:27It was raging for a whole three weeks and messed with the metal, critically weakening

00:05:32a crucial segment of the ship's hull.

00:05:34Back then, most ships had just one hull, so it was the only skin the Titanic had.

00:05:40That's why the iceberg managed to punch a hole through the ship so easily.

00:05:44If it hadn't been for the fire, the Titanic might've shrugged off that iceberg collision.

00:05:49The company operating the liner knew about the fire, but they decided to conceal that

00:05:54fact.

00:05:55They didn't want any negative stories in the press as they faced some serious competition

00:05:59in transatlantic voyages.

00:06:01The Titanic was sold out, so they stocked up on coal and made its sail.

00:06:07The Moon might've also played a role in the sinking.

00:06:10Our satellite heavily affects tides on the Earth.

00:06:13The closer it is to our planet, the stronger the tides are because of the increasing gravity

00:06:17of the Moon.

00:06:18Back in 1912, the Moon was so close, it made several glaciers in Greenland break apart.

00:06:25Massive chunks of ice that broke off from the glaciers started floating south.

00:06:29The supermoon event came just 6 minutes after a spring tide.

00:06:33During new and full moons, the alignment of the Moon, the Earth, and the Sun makes their

00:06:38combined gravity reach its peak.

00:06:41And the day before, our planet had come the closest to the Sun that year, which made the

00:06:45gravity even stronger.

00:06:47This mixture of events created perfect conditions for one of the most powerful tides in history.

00:06:53It created the perfect conditions for the icebergs breaking off from Greenland's glaciers

00:06:58to move freely.

00:07:00Opponents of this theory say that the difference in tidal force wasn't actually that big,

00:07:04and it couldn't have been the main cause of the sinking.

00:07:08The iceberg tore down the side of the ship, leaving a huge opening in the hull.

00:07:12It wasn't a continuous rip, and damage was caused in several places.

00:07:17Some experts believe the ship would've survived the iceberg if it had hit head-on.

00:07:22The Titanic had watertight compartments designed to prevent flooding in case of a collision.

00:07:27Only the first 3 or 4 of these compartments would've been flooded.

00:07:31This could've helped save a lot of lives.

00:07:33Supporters of this theory put the blame for the disaster on First Officer William Murdoch.

00:07:39Huge fast-moving ships don't just turn in a matter of seconds like a speeding car.

00:07:44It takes minutes.

00:07:46When Murdoch realized the collision was inevitable, he tried dodging left to avoid a direct hit.

00:07:52But despite his efforts, the ship still collided with the iceberg.

00:07:56You know the rest.

00:08:01They were on their way to the New World when a rendezvous with an iceberg crushed all of

00:08:05their dreams and hopes.

00:08:07There was panic and tears and heartbreaking goodbyes, like that of Jack and Rose.

00:08:12Or was there?

00:08:13Let's see how well you know the real story of Titanic.

00:08:18The love story of Jack Dawson and Rose DeWitt Bukater was inspired by true events.

00:08:24What do you say?

00:08:25Is it a myth or a fact?

00:08:34The most emotional Titanic love story was actually all made up by the screenwriter and

00:08:39director of the famous movie, James Cameron.

00:08:42Some passengers featured in the movie were real though, and by a mere coincidence, there

00:08:47was a Jay Dawson on board.

00:08:49His name was Joseph, not Jack, and he worked as a coal trimmer.

00:08:54The most expensive object lost with the Titanic was a painting by Pablo Picasso.

00:08:59What's your take on this one?

00:09:07It's a myth, another one given to us by the famous movie.

00:09:11The most valuable item that went down with the Titanic was probably a Mary Joseph Blondel

00:09:16painting created in 1814.

00:09:19Some other valuable items were a violin that belonged to Wallace Hartley, the musician

00:09:25who insisted that they had to play till the very last moment.

00:09:28There was also a 1912 Renault Type CB Coupe de Ville that would now cost millions of dollars,

00:09:34a handwritten manuscript by Joseph Conrad, first edition essays by Francis Bacon, five

00:09:40Steinway Grand Pianos, and, of course, some fine china plates and cups, and first class

00:09:46passengers jewelry.

00:09:49The Titanic was the largest and the most luxurious passenger ship of its time.

00:09:54Does it sound real to you?

00:09:58Yep, it's totally true.

00:10:05In April 1912, the Titanic was the largest ship ever built.

00:10:10It was 882 feet long and had a maximum passenger capacity of 2,435 people.

00:10:19That's not a lot compared to the largest cruise ship of today, the Symphony of the

00:10:23Seas.

00:10:24It's just a bit longer than the Titanic but has more than double the passenger numbers.

00:10:29And yes, no other cruise liner has probably beaten the Titanic in terms of luxury to this

00:10:34day.

00:10:36It costs more than $200 million to build in today's money.

00:10:40The tickets were also quite expensive, duh!

00:10:44First class tickets ranged in price from $1,700 in today's money for a berth up to $50,000

00:10:52for one of the two parlor suites.

00:10:55Second class tickets were $700.

00:10:58Third class passengers had to pay between $170 to $460.

00:11:05Most of the passengers of the unsinkable ship managed to survive.

00:11:09True or false?

00:11:17Sadly it's false.

00:11:19Only 37% of all the passengers actually survived the meeting with the Titanic.

00:11:25Around 61% of the first class passengers, 42% of the second class passengers, and 24%

00:11:33of the third class passengers made it out alive.

00:11:37The Titanic was passing through the Bermuda Triangle when things went wrong, and that's

00:11:42probably why it sunk.

00:11:44What do you say, myth or reality?

00:11:54It's 100% a myth.

00:11:56The Titanic never even came close to the Bermuda Triangle.

00:12:00The liner sank about 400 miles south of Newfoundland, which is a huge distance to the north of Bermuda,

00:12:06the infamous area where ships and planes disappear without a trace.

00:12:11We might have the moon to blame for the sinking of the Titanic.

00:12:15True or false?

00:12:23This one is true.

00:12:26The moon heavily affects the tides on Earth.

00:12:28The closer the moon is to the Earth, the stronger the tides are because of the increasing

00:12:32gravity of our satellite.

00:12:35Back in 1912, the moon was so close it made several glaciers in Greenland break apart.

00:12:42Massive chunks of ice that broke off from the glaciers started floating south.

00:12:46The supermoon event came just six minutes after a spring tide.

00:12:50The alignment of the moon, the sun, and the Earth that makes their combined gravity reach

00:12:55its peak twice a month.

00:12:57And the day before, our planet had come the closest to the sun that year, which made the

00:13:01gravity even stronger.

00:13:04This mixture of events created perfect conditions for one of the most powerful tides in history.

00:13:10Icebergs breaking off from Greenland's glaciers drift off to the coastal waters of Labrador

00:13:15and Newfoundland, where they often run aground.

00:13:18To move on, they need to either melt and become lighter or catch a high tide that would carry

00:13:23them further.

00:13:25The 1912's tide was as high as it gets, so they shifted many shipping routes south because

00:13:31of the huge amount of icebergs.

00:13:33But not the Titanic, of course, as they believed it was unsinkable.

00:13:39It took 4 hours and 40 minutes for the Titanic to sink.

00:13:42What do you say?

00:13:50It's false, and if you're a Titanic expert, you definitely know it was actually 2 hours

00:13:55and 40 minutes.

00:13:57And this was slow enough given the damaged cause by the iceberg.

00:14:01It didn't sink faster thanks to the ship's construction.

00:14:05There were 16 watertight compartments in the lower part of the ship.

00:14:08They worked as a lifeline.

00:14:10When the iceberg crashed into the hull, it broke into 6 boxes.

00:14:14The Titanic could have stayed afloat only if 4 compartments had been damaged.

00:14:20Water filled the first 6 compartments within 1 hour.

00:14:23During this time, the ship tilted slightly to the right side.

00:14:26Then, water began to flood the 7th box when all 6 boxes were filled.

00:14:32And from that moment, the sinking rate was growing with every second.

00:14:36The ship's bow sank under the water, and then the stern filled up.

00:14:41One of the leading reasons for the Titanic tragedy was signal rockets.

00:14:45True or false?

00:14:47What's your take on it?

00:14:55This one is true!

00:14:57When any ship sinks, the crewmembers must release red flares.

00:15:01It's a signal to all nearby ships that someone is in trouble.

00:15:05But for an unknown reason, someone put white lights in the Titanic's rocket box.

00:15:11When the ship crashed into an iceberg, the crewmembers released white flares.

00:15:15Their ship, SS Californian, was nearby at the time.

00:15:19Its captain knew the Titanic was going through a dangerous iceberg area.

00:15:23The crew of this ship didn't see the Titanic in the dark, but they noticed white rockets.

00:15:29Radio communication between the vessels didn't work.

00:15:32The SS Californian operator turned off the receiver.

00:15:36The Californian captain felt that something was wrong, so he sent a Morse lamp signal

00:15:41to the Titanic.

00:15:42But it was too late.

00:15:44The ship was already underwater, so no one could respond.

00:15:49Another ship, Samson, was sailing alongside the Titanic.

00:15:53It drifted with lights off since it was catching seals and that's not legal.

00:15:58When the captain saw the Titanic's white rockets, he thought it was the Coast Guard.

00:16:03So Samson sailed away as fast as they could.

00:16:07They realized they had abandoned the drowning passengers once they made it to Iceland and

00:16:11learned the horrible news.

00:16:13In 1996, one expedition managed to raise the Titanic from the ocean floor.

00:16:18Do you believe it?

00:16:25If you don't, you're right.

00:16:27There were different ideas on how to raise the Titanic from doing it with compressed

00:16:31air to putting it in wire mesh and covering it with liquid nitrogen or using giant magnets.

00:16:38The only real attempt to raise the Titanic was made in 1996 and it failed dramatically.

00:16:44The expedition's goal was to lift a part of its hull, weighing about 21 tons.

00:16:50It would still have been the largest piece to see the sunlight again, if the operation

00:16:54had succeeded, that is.

00:16:56They lowered four large bags filled with diesel fuel to the bottom of the ocean and attached

00:17:01them to the hull plate.

00:17:03Then, the fuel bags were released and they started lifting the pieces on their own.

00:17:09The plate was about 200 feet below the surface when the weather got rough.

00:17:12The expedition members decided to tow the part to calmer waters around 80 miles away.

00:17:18Long before they reached the towing destination, half of the plate broke off and sank to the

00:17:22bottom again.

00:17:23Two of the lifting bags seemed to have broken loose and the hull went down.

00:17:28The Titanic will most likely crumble to dust halfway up if someone tries lifting it again.

00:17:34So, how many correct answers do you have?

00:17:37Let me know in the comments below!

00:17:42On April 10, 1912, crowds gathered at Southampton Beach to wave off what was, at the time, the

00:17:49world's largest and most prestigious ship, the RMS Titanic.

00:17:54The cost of the most expensive first-class parlor ticket was $4,350.

00:17:59That's around $70,000 in today's money.

00:18:03But barely 5 days after steaming away, the ship was swallowed by the Atlantic Ocean.

00:18:09So let's rewind and go back to what actually happened on that fateful night.

00:18:13The captain wanted to set a speed record for the ship's maiden voyage and arrive early.

00:18:18The ship was deemed unsinkable, so he went full throttle into the dark Arctic waters.

00:18:24After spotting the 100-foot iceberg, the crew desperately tried to steer the vessel away

00:18:29and avoid the collision.

00:18:30But the Titanic was traveling too fast, and the iceberg tore down the side of the ship,

00:18:36creating a huge opening in the hull.

00:18:38It wasn't a continuous rip, and damage was caused in several places.

00:18:43In total, the damage spanned along an area of around 300 feet.

00:18:47But the ship's designers had prepared for the prospect of a collision and added watertight

00:18:52compartments down each side of the ship to act as a buffer zone.

00:18:56Four of these compartments could be breached, and the ship would still stay afloat.

00:19:00But because the iceberg tore down the side of the Titanic, it ripped holes in six compartments.

00:19:06The compartments didn't extend up the total height of all decks, and weren't actually

00:19:10sealed at the top.

00:19:12This is why when more than four were flooded, water reached over the top of the bulkheads

00:19:17and filled the remaining compartments, causing the ship to sink into the ocean.

00:19:22Think of it as water spilling over an ice cube tray.

00:19:25But what if the collision was head-on?

00:19:28Would it still have sunk?

00:19:31Ships are designed with potential crashes in mind, and most vessels have collision bulkheads

00:19:36in the bow.

00:19:37Most of all, it's like your car's bumper or crumple zone – it's a safety feature

00:19:41that can withstand a direct hit.

00:19:44The bow could have taken some of the impact, and some experts have suggested that if it

00:19:48hit head-on, only two to four of the watertight compartments would have been flooded.

00:19:53So in theory, the Titanic might not have sunk, and it might have even been able to

00:19:58continue sailing to its final destination at a much slower speed.

00:20:03The force of impact would likely have been huge, though.

00:20:06But although passengers would have been injured by the force, they'd have been able to stay

00:20:11on the ship to wait to be rescued by other ships, rather than being forced into the icy

00:20:16waters of the Atlantic.

00:20:17Still, one of the Titanic's designers, Edward Wilding, suggested that the force of the impact

00:20:23might not have actually been that big.

00:20:26He told the British Inquiry that lots of people scarcely felt the collision, and he believed

00:20:31the ship would not have sunk if it did hit the iceberg head-on.

00:20:35The ship was also designed with remotely operated watertight doors between all compartments,

00:20:41so any floods could have been quickly sorted out.

00:20:44Because Titanic had 6 breaches from the side collision, and because it happened so quickly,

00:20:49sealing the doors wouldn't have made a difference, as it was essentially impossible

00:20:54to save it by that point.

00:20:56The ship immediately began to flood, with water pouring in at a rate of roughly 7 tons

00:21:01per second, 15 times faster than it could be pumped out.

00:21:06So while it sounds like the Titanic would have survived had the ship hit the iceberg

00:21:10head-on, this idea does come with some issues.

00:21:15First off, the collision bulkheads were designed to survive a crash with another ship, not

00:21:20a giant iceberg.

00:21:21If two ships collided, both would absorb some of the impact in their bulkheads, sharing

00:21:26the impact and likely staying afloat.

00:21:29But an iceberg is stationary, meaning that Titanic would absorb most of the energy from

00:21:34the collision.

00:21:35If Titanic hit head-first, because of the speed it was traveling, the impact would have

00:21:40likely traveled down the whole body of the ship.

00:21:44Just imagine a 46,000-ton ship traveling at around 20 knots.

00:21:48At some point, it hits an iceberg that weighs what could be over 100,000 tons.

00:21:54This collision would likely create a powerful force causing massive damage to the vessel.

00:21:59It is likely that seams would split, staircases would come tumbling down, and rivets would

00:22:04burst open across the ship.

00:22:07All that would have potentially flooded even more compartments.

00:22:10This could have caused Titanic to sink in a matter of minutes rather than hours.

00:22:15But that's just the tip of the iceberg.

00:22:18As we all know, the biggest part of it is hidden underwater.

00:22:21So if Titanic had been traveling head-on, it's likely it would have hit the part of

00:22:26the iceberg below the water first, which would send it veering off course.

00:22:31Hitting an iceberg is not like hitting a brick wall.

00:22:34In this case, the ice under the water would have torn open the bottom of the ship and

00:22:39caused damage to the sides.

00:22:41Icebergs also aren't flat solid objects.

00:22:44If a flat collision happened, the ship might have stayed afloat, but icebergs come in many

00:22:48shapes and sizes, from domes to wedges.

00:22:52Studies have also been done on the steel used to produce Titanic, and the tests show the

00:22:57metal was about 10 times more brittle than the steel we use today.

00:23:01The ship was built before we understood the effects of low temperature on steel.

00:23:06The old steel used to make the vessel would not bend when faced with freezing temperatures,

00:23:11but break.

00:23:12Recovered pieces of Titanic's hull plates show that the hull just shattered on impact.

00:23:18Hitting head-on would also cause a very severe and abrupt stop.

00:23:22So even if the ship hadn't sunk, there would still have been major issues.

00:23:26Think about when you suddenly hit the brakes on your car, or when the bus stops while you're

00:23:31walking down the aisle and you get flung forward.

00:23:34Passengers would have been thrown across the ship, and because the crash happened at night,

00:23:39most people were sleeping, so wouldn't be able to effectively prepare for any sort of

00:23:43impact.

00:23:44This would result in injuries for most people on board.

00:23:47It would be especially bad for those at the front of the ship, where the accommodation

00:23:52for the off-duty firefighters, greasers, and engineers was.

00:23:56But while passengers and off-duty crew may have been thrown out of bed, there would be

00:24:00a lot more survivors than in the original scenario.

00:24:05Many ships have had head-on collisions and made it back to shore.

00:24:08Not many people know that Titanic actually had two sister ships.

00:24:13The White Star Line, the company that built Titanic, also built vessels called Britannic

00:24:18and Olympic.

00:24:19Captained by Edward J. Smith, who would later helm Titanic, the Olympic set off on its maiden

00:24:25voyage in June 1911.

00:24:28But much like Ford's sister ship, disaster was just around the corner.

00:24:32On its 5th commercial voyage, Olympic collided with a Royal Navy ship, HMS Hawk.

00:24:38While the Olympic received damage to its side, Hawk crashed into the other vessel head-on.

00:24:44The bow of the Hawk was completely crushed by the collision, but because the ship had

00:24:48watertight compartments, it managed to survive the impact and later returned to shore for

00:24:53repair.

00:24:55Another study case is the SS Andrea Doria, which was an Italian ocean liner that made

00:25:00global headlines in 1956.

00:25:03Like the Titanic, the Andrea Doria was heading for New York City on its 101st voyage when

00:25:09disaster struck.

00:25:11On July 25, the vessel collided with the 524-foot Swedish passenger liner Stockholm.

00:25:17The Stockholm hit the ship head-on, but the point of impact for the Andrea Doria was on

00:25:22its side.

00:25:23The front of the Stockholm was completely smashed, but because the impact was on its

00:25:28hull, it managed to survive.

00:25:30The Andrea Doria, however, sadly sank due to the collision being on the side of the

00:25:35ship.

00:25:36So these cases could suggest that maybe the Titanic would've survived had it hit the

00:25:41iceberg head-on.

00:25:43But we have to remember that the Titanic hit the thing full speed, whereas both the Olympic

00:25:48and the Andrea Doria were traveling slower.

00:25:53A beam of electric light pierces the darkness over the calm waters of the Atlantic Ocean.

00:26:01The Titanic is quietly making its way through the waves, its passengers asleep, when suddenly

00:26:07a monstrous white shape is caught in the light beam.

00:26:10The fateful iceberg is about to rend the side of the legendary ship.

00:26:21April 14, 1912, only two days before someone will take a photo of a giant iceberg with

00:26:28a pretty unusual elliptical shape.

00:26:31It turns out that this iceberg most likely formed out of snow that fell 100,000 years

00:26:37ago.

00:26:38Researchers used computer modeling to figure out its origin.

00:26:41They used data from 1912 and added some new information about winds and ocean currents.

00:26:47They concluded that the iceberg was probably a part of a small cluster of glaciers in southwest

00:26:53Greenland.

00:26:56These days, it's possible to calculate the roots of such icebergs in any given year in

00:27:01the past.

00:27:02So, the infamous chunk of ice was on its way from Greenland to an area further south from

00:27:07Cornwall.

00:27:09If the ship had passed through that region only two days later, the iceberg would have

00:27:13moved far away from the point where they met.

00:27:17At first, the weight of the most well-known iceberg in the world was 75 million tons.

00:27:23With time, it started to slowly melt away.

00:27:27And when it sank the Titanic, its weight was only 1.5 million tons.

00:27:32By the time of the collision, it had probably been melting for months.

00:27:36But it was still a true monster.

00:27:39When the Titanic sank, the iceberg was 400 feet long, and more than 100 feet of its surface

00:27:45was above the water.

00:27:49Some people believe it was a supermoon that caused the Titanic to sink.

00:27:54That night, there was a rare lunar event.

00:27:56It hadn't happened for 1,400 years.

00:28:00In normal conditions, the iceberg wouldn't have traveled so far south without melting

00:28:04and losing the largest part of its mass.

00:28:07But the supermoon could have been the reason for an unusually high tide that pulled the

00:28:12iceberg away from the glacier way faster than usual.

00:28:16There's a specific type of bacteria that slowly consumes the remains of the Titanic.

00:28:23Salt corrosion, ocean currents, freezing temperatures, plus this rust-eating microorganism might

00:28:30consume the entire wreckage.

00:28:33American actress Dorothy Gibson was aboard the Titanic.

00:28:37She survived, and when she arrived in New York, she started filming a movie called Saved

00:28:43from the Titanic almost right away.

00:28:45The movie was released only a month after the Titanic sank, and in the movie, she even

00:28:51wore the same shoes and clothes she had during the actual disaster.

00:28:56The movie was a big success at that time, but the only known copy was destroyed in a

00:29:00fire.

00:29:03Fourteen years before the Titanic sank, a novella called Futility had been published,

00:29:08and it seemed to have predicted the whole event.

00:29:11The plot centered around a fictional ship called the Titan that sank during its voyage.

00:29:17The Titan was almost the same size as Titanic, and they both went to the bottom in April.

00:29:23The reason was hitting an iceberg, too.

00:29:26Both the real and fictional ships were described as unsinkable, and both of them had the legally

00:29:31required number of lifeboats, which, as it turned out later, were nowhere near enough.

00:29:39We've seen it in the movie, but there were some real-life love stories happening on the

00:29:43Titanic, too.

00:29:44Thirteen couples even took a trip on the Titanic as part of their honeymoon.

00:29:49One of the couples owned Macy's department store in New York.

00:29:52Once it became clear the Titanic was rapidly sinking, the woman refused to go into a lifeboat

00:29:58without her husband.

00:30:00But he didn't want to join her while there were still women and children who he thought

00:30:04had to go first.

00:30:06Then his wife gave her coat to her maid.

00:30:08She insisted that the maid should get into the lifeboat, and she wanted her to be warm.

00:30:13As for the woman herself, she decided to stay with her husband till the end.

00:30:21Some people believe Titanic sank because of a mummy, not an iceberg.

00:30:26It all started around 1000 BCE with a mysterious woman who lived in Egypt, in the city of thieves.

00:30:33People knew little about her, but they called her a priestess.

00:30:37Her mummy was put in a wooden sarcophagus and covered with a large lid with the image

00:30:42of her face and some mystical inscriptions.

00:30:46This place had been hidden until the first half of the 19th century, when a group of

00:30:50locals accidentally came across it.

00:30:53They disturbed her peace.

00:30:55No one knows how, but the mummy disappeared that day without a trace.

00:31:02A couple of decades later, a group of rich friends from England traveled to Egypt and

00:31:07found the empty mummy casket with the image of the priestess, whose dark eyes seemed to

00:31:12be looking into the void.

00:31:14They decided to buy it, but the buyer disappeared the same night before he even got the case.

00:31:21All members of the group had some accidents.

00:31:23The casket changed its location a couple of times until it, as some believe, ended

00:31:29up on the Titanic.

00:31:32It took more than 70 years for a robot submarine to find the ruins of this legendary ship.

00:31:38The wreck lies nearly 13,000 feet under the surface of the Atlantic Ocean, split into

00:31:44two halves.

00:31:46Why did the liner break apart?

00:31:48No one knows exactly.

00:31:50Some think it happened because of the water that got inside when the ship collided with

00:31:54the iceberg.

00:31:55The pressure was so powerful, it separated two parts of the vessel, starting with the

00:32:00ship's bottom structure.

00:32:02Others say it was because of the hull rivets.

00:32:05They had a high concentration of slag or smelting residue, and that's something that can cause

00:32:10the metal to split apart.

00:32:13The ship generally had many flaws, starting with the design.

00:32:16The watertight bulkheads weren't completely sealed on top.

00:32:20This allowed the water to flow between the compartments and, in the end, sink the vessel.

00:32:26The iron of the ship's rivets and steel of the hull ended up ruined because of high

00:32:30sulfur content, cold temperatures, and high speeds.

00:32:34The steel shattered and the rivets popped out quite easily.

00:32:38Because of this, Titanic sank 24 times faster than it would have otherwise.

00:32:43If the ship had hit the iceberg head-on instead of ramming it with its side, it would have

00:32:48probably stayed afloat.

00:32:50How come the crew members didn't have binoculars?

00:32:53It would have surely helped them spot the iceberg on time and maybe even avoid the disaster.

00:33:00But the binoculars on the Titanic were locked in a storage cabinet.

00:33:04Only one crew member had the key, and he had been transferred off the ship right before

00:33:09it set sail.

00:33:11He later said he hadn't remembered to hand over the key.

00:33:15But even without the binoculars, the ship might have had some time to change course

00:33:19and avoid the collision if the crew had gotten some warning.

00:33:23But that's the thing.

00:33:25Someone did warn them.

00:33:27About an hour before the incident, a ship that was relatively close to Titanic, the

00:33:32SS Californian, sent a message to inform them it had stopped because of dense ice field.

00:33:38But the warning never got to the Titanic's captain.

00:33:42Some experts say it was because the radio operator didn't think it was that urgent.

00:33:47And later, the SS Californian said they didn't get a call for help from the Titanic because

00:33:53their radio operator was off-duty.

00:33:56Some say the crew on the Titanic couldn't spot the iceberg on time because of an optical

00:34:01illusion.

00:34:03Atmospheric conditions that night probably caused super-refraction, which could have

00:34:07camouflaged the berg.

00:34:09After all, no one actually saw the iceberg until it was too close to the ship to somehow

00:34:14avoid the crash.

00:34:16Not even a whole minute passed between the moment they saw the iceberg and the collision.

00:34:22It was only 37 seconds, and it took Titanic 2 hours and 40 minutes to disappear below

00:34:29the ocean's waves.

00:34:34Can you guess how many theories of the Titanic's sinking exist?

00:34:38Right, loads, including a theory of my own, which I'm going to share with you today.

00:34:43And then you can decide which one seems most likely to you.

00:34:48One Piece Theory The very first version of the events was the

00:34:53One Piece Theory.

00:34:55It's very simple and basically claims that the sinking happened without any breakups.

00:35:00At 2.15 a.m., the ship collides with an iceberg.

00:35:04To 18 a.m., the lights go out.

00:35:07The ship reaches an angle of 45 degrees and then quickly begins its final plunge into

00:35:12the ocean depths.

00:35:14To 20 a.m., only about three minutes later, the RMS Titanic disappears under the surface

00:35:19of the ocean for good.

00:35:21The liner doesn't break.

00:35:23It just goes down as a whole piece.

00:35:26Of course, this can't be true.

00:35:28In April 1912, the Titanic was not only the largest ship in the world, but also the largest

00:35:34ship ever built.

00:35:35It's hard to believe that such a heavy vessel could have gone down without breaking.

00:35:40That's just impossible.

00:35:41Well, I mean, you can't blame the theorists.

00:35:45Before we found the wreckage, there were no other theories.

00:35:48Wait a minute, or were there?

00:35:51The day after the disaster, the survivors gave their interviews.

00:35:55They talked about what had happened, and some of them claimed that the ship had actually

00:35:59broken in two when it had been flooded.

00:36:02For example, Jack Thayer, a 17-year-old boy, outlined the sinking as he remembered it.

00:36:09And L.D. Skidmon drew a sketch based on his description.

00:36:13The picture clearly showed the ship breaking in half.

00:36:16But no one believed Jack or other witnesses.

00:36:19There was no evidence, so their claims were received with a grain of salt.

00:36:24But in 1985, things changed.

00:36:29First breakup theory.

00:36:31That's when Robert Ballard found the wreckage of the Titanic in the depths of the ocean.

00:36:35When people saw the wreckage, it became clear that Jack and the other survivors had been

00:36:40right.

00:36:41The Titanic did indeed break in two when it sank.

00:36:45So it's time for a new theory.

00:36:48At 2.15am, the keel breaks, the starboard list eases, and the hull continues to bow

00:36:55and crumble.

00:36:562.17am, the galley sections break off.

00:37:00The towers immediately drop under their own weight.

00:37:03The lights go out.

00:37:05The stern is pulled into the air.

00:37:07The bow breaks off and starts sinking.

00:37:10The aft is barely hanging on to the starboard side of the stern section superstructure.

00:37:14The stern section slowly lists over to port as it begins sinking again.

00:37:19It rises up one last time and pivots in a semicircle as it sinks.

00:37:25It all sounds pretty convincing, right?

00:37:28But people began to find plot holes in this theory.

00:37:31For example, the Titanic couldn't have held together until it reached such a high angle.

00:37:36The breakup would have had to begin much earlier.

00:37:40This only meant there was still a vast field for research and speculations.

00:37:45So people started to come up with their own possible scenarios.

00:37:48How about we look first at the ones no one likes?

00:37:52V-Break and Erin 1912 V-Break.

00:37:57According to the first breakup theory, the Titanic reached a high angle, and the weight

00:38:01of its unsupported stern caused it to crack from the top down.

00:38:06But it's physically impossible.

00:38:08So are there any other ideas?

00:38:11In 2006, Roger Long, a naval architect, decided to research a so-called V-theory.

00:38:172.17am.

00:38:20The breakup begins at a shallow angle, perhaps as little as 11 degrees.

00:38:26The upper structure fails and starts to crack.

00:38:29At this moment, only its double bottom is holding the Titanic together.

00:38:34It starts to bend under the strain, too, failing the ship.

00:38:38Water is pouring through the crack.

00:38:40It increases the weight in between the two sections, bending the Titanic the other way

00:38:46and pulling it into shape somewhat resemblant to the letter V. The upper decks get mangled

00:38:51and bent together.

00:38:53The bow heads for the bottom, and the stern is the last to sink.

00:38:58This theory has since been disproven many times, though.

00:39:01Roger Long believed it because the broken edges of the upper decks in the Titanic's

00:39:06bow section were all mangled and crushed.

00:39:09However, we have learned that it happened because of the so-called hydraulic downburst,

00:39:14the force of the water crashing into the deck as the Titanic hit the ocean floor.

00:39:21Another V-break theory states that the bow had risen out of the water after the break.

00:39:26This theory was mainly peddled by one former Titanic enthusiast.

00:39:31Not only has this theory been proved to be physically impossible due to the bow's incredible

00:39:35mass, it was also inspired by incorrect information.

00:39:40Remember Jack Thayer?

00:39:41Well, it was based on his sketch and the words of a couple of passengers.

00:39:46But the truth is, none of them had ever seen the Titanic break down like this.

00:39:51Jack himself even stated in an interview that the sketch was completely out of context to

00:39:56what he had actually seen.

00:39:58It was drawn by a passenger on the Carpathia, the ship that received the Titanic's distress

00:40:03signal and came to its aid.

00:40:05It couldn't be used as evidence.

00:40:08Now that we know this, let's move on to the theories that most people believe in.

00:40:14James Cameron's Banana Peel Theory

00:40:17Who hasn't seen the legendary movie about the Titanic, right?

00:40:22It became the leader of the 70th Academy Awards ceremony in the number of nominations and

00:40:27awards, and deservedly so.

00:40:31But did you know that James Cameron had been interested in the Titanic for many years and

00:40:36studied the ship's history?

00:40:38His books and research are very detailed, and he even came up with his own version of

00:40:43the events.

00:40:44It's called the Banana Split Theory, and this is actually what you could see in the movie.

00:40:50Here's how it goes.

00:40:51The Titanic reaches a 23-degree angle and fractures down to the keel.

00:40:56The double bottom acts as a hinge as the stern falls down.

00:41:00When the double bottom fails, the bow and the stern separate.

00:41:04The stern lifts to port, standing vertically, and then begins to go underwater.

00:41:11This theory is the most scientifically accurate one, along with Roy Mengott's theory.

00:41:17Wait, who's Roy Mengott?

00:41:20Mengott Theory

00:41:23Roy Mengott was an engineer who came up with the most plausible theory for the time being.

00:41:282.17am.

00:41:29The lights go out on the Titanic.

00:41:32At this moment, the ship is at an angle of 20 to 23 degrees.

00:41:37Suddenly, the vessel snaps in two just around the third funnel.

00:41:41It causes the stern to settle into the water.

00:41:44The keel fails first.

00:41:46The draft and lower hull are crushed and break apart.

00:41:50Water surges into the bow and stern of the ship through the huge cracks, causing the

00:41:55bow section to sink beneath the waves.

00:41:58The stern rises up to the angle of 70 to 90 degrees, and then it sinks too.

00:42:05This theory seems to make the most sense, but it's quite controversial.

00:42:10The survivors who saw the breakup stated that the stern had settled back with the bow completely

00:42:15missing.

00:42:16Mengott's theory, however, contradicts that statement.

00:42:20While James Cameron's scenario takes this into account.

00:42:23Are you thinking what I'm thinking?

00:42:25The truth must be somewhere in the middle.

00:42:29My Version

00:42:31Now as promised, I'll provide you with my version of the events.

00:42:35Well, it's not really my theory.

00:42:37More like a combination of Roy Mengott's and James Cameron's ones.

00:42:42I believe that James Cameron was right about the breakup.

00:42:452.17am.

00:42:48The ship is at a high angle.

00:42:50The lights go out.

00:42:51Then it snaps into two pieces.

00:42:54The bow starts sinking.

00:42:55The double bottom is still attached to the stern for a minute or so.

00:42:59Once the double bottom fails, the two parts separate and the bow goes down.

00:43:05Then, as Mengott said, the stern rises up at a high angle, and then it begins to sink

00:43:11vertically.

00:43:13It might have actually happened because the survivors stated that they had seen a clean

00:43:17break.

00:43:18This means it couldn't be hidden.

00:43:20And they had also seen the stern staying vertically in the air for a long enough time, probably

00:43:25a few minutes, before disappearing.

00:43:28Anyways, all of these are just speculations.

00:43:32Regardless of how the Titanic broke apart and sank, it was a great tragedy.

00:43:37It's already been 110 years since the Titanic collided with an iceberg and sank.

00:43:42Did you know that in 2022, the Blue Star Line Company is completing the construction of

00:43:48an exact replica of the Titanic?

00:43:51Called the Titanic Two Liner, the ship will be sent sailing along the same route with

00:43:562,400 people on board.

00:43:58Let's hope that everything goes well for them.

00:44:02Staying in the water that's 70 degrees Fahrenheit for a long time definitely won't do your health

00:44:07any good.

00:44:08A water temperature of 50 degrees Fahrenheit is a nightmare.

00:44:12It feels much colder than the air of the same temperature.

00:44:15The passengers of the Titanic were in 28 degrees Fahrenheit water.

00:44:20Can you imagine how cold it was?

00:44:23Even the iceberg that the Titanic met was warmer.

00:44:26The water didn't freeze because of the high salt content.

00:44:30But what if the temperature had been higher?

00:44:32What if the Titanic had sunk in warm water, say, 120 degrees Fahrenheit?

00:44:38Theoretically, this could have happened had the waters of the North Atlantic met a warm

00:44:42undercurrent from the southern part of the ocean on disaster day.

00:44:46But this heat wouldn't have been enough.

00:44:49The ocean area is too vast, and the temperature is too low at night.

00:44:53The warm undercurrent alone wouldn't have made a difference for people who were overboard.

00:44:58But if the Titanic had sunk in another place at one particular moment, perhaps then all

00:45:03people could have been saved, thanks to an incredible natural phenomenon.

00:45:07Now, on board, everybody.

00:45:09Our voyage to a parallel universe begins.

00:45:13It's a moonless night on April 14th through 15th.

00:45:17The Titanic crashes into an iceberg.

00:45:20Icy water floods the lower decks.

00:45:22The captain sends a distress signal.

00:45:24The nearest rescue ship, Carpathia, is 58 miles away from the sinking Titanic.

00:45:29At maximum speed, Carpathia will get there in four hours.

00:45:33That's quite long, even in warm tropical waters, since your body loses heat anyway.

00:45:39The Titanic begins to sink.

00:45:41The crew downs lifeboats.

00:45:43Some of the passengers jump overboard.

00:45:46The ship is going under the water.

00:45:49There are no boats left, so you jump along with other passengers.

00:45:53It feels as if you got inside a huge iceberg.

00:45:56The water is so cold that it's hard for you to move.

00:45:59You can't even scream because there's no air in your lungs.

00:46:03At this moment, you feel a pleasant warmth coming from the depths.

00:46:08The heat rises above your knees and waist, then reaches your neck.

00:46:12Finally, you regain control of your muscles and can breathe deeply.

00:46:16You notice that all the other passengers feel the same warmth.

00:46:20The water becomes a little hot.

00:46:22It makes you happy.

00:46:24But in a moment, horror replaces your delight.

00:46:27The ocean begins to foam.

00:46:29And not because of the high temperature.

00:46:31But because something is rising from the ocean floor.

00:46:35You hear a heavy low sound coming from the depths.

00:46:38It's not a sinking Titanic, but something bigger.

00:46:42You can see a huge iceberg nearby.

00:46:44It's melting, and a huge chunk is breaking off from it.

00:46:48A million bubbles appear on the surface.

00:46:51Then you feel something hit you in the leg.

00:46:53Thousands of strange lightweight rocks are rising from below.

00:46:58There are also massive plates among them.

00:47:00People use them as lifeboats.

00:47:02You climb on one of those rocks and look at the ship.

00:47:06It doesn't sink, since all the water is bubbling and pushing the vessel up.

00:47:11You take one of the small rocks and understand everything.

00:47:14It's pumice.

00:47:15An underwater volcano has woken up right under the ship.

00:47:21Thousands of tons of volcanic rock are floating to the surface.

00:47:25When it erupts, its magma shakes the entire space, heats the water, and destroys the seabed.

00:47:32But it doesn't result in anything destructive on the surface.

00:47:35The enormous pressure of hundreds of millions of gallons of water suppresses the volcano's

00:47:40power.

00:47:41Molten rocks of the Earth's crust are pressed against the seabed.

00:47:45And pumice rises to the surface.

00:47:48And here's why it happens.

00:47:49The upper part of Earth consists of many solid parts, tectonic plates.

00:47:55These plates collide with each other and divide.

00:47:58And when one part separates from another, the magma immediately comes up.

00:48:03So all volcanoes are these unstable fault sites.

00:48:07If the Titanic had sailed over one of these areas during an eruption, many passengers

00:48:11would have been saved.

00:48:14Back in the parallel universe, you notice the Titanic starts sinking again.

00:48:18The water is no longer bubbling.

00:48:20The volcano has gone out.

00:48:22In a matter of seconds, the ocean turns icy again.

00:48:26Fortunately, you have your pumice lifeboat.

00:48:29This is enough to wait for rescuers.

00:48:32But let's imagine a situation with no underwater volcano and an iceberg.

00:48:36A situation when the water was warm from the very beginning.

00:48:41One of the engines in the motor compartment of the ship breaks down.

00:48:44Several pipes burst because of increased pressure.

00:48:47And now there's a crack in the ship's body.

00:48:51Water is filling the lower decks.

00:48:53The ship is sinking.

00:48:55People evacuate on lifeboats.

00:48:57There's less panic since the night is warm and no one is freezing.

00:49:01Each passenger gets a life jacket.

00:49:03The ship is breaking.

00:49:05You understand that you have to jump.

00:49:07The Titanic goes underwater.

00:49:10Many passengers fall overboard in horror.

00:49:12They dive into the dark ocean and immediately come to the surface.

00:49:16It's a panic and complete chaos takeover.

00:49:19The ship disappears in the dark.

00:49:21And finally, it's all silent.

00:49:23A few minutes pass and you notice there's no panic at all.

00:49:27The water is warm.

00:49:29Almost all passengers have life jackets.

00:49:31Someone is floating on the wooden ship wreckage.

00:49:34After a couple of hours, the water no longer seems so comfortable.

00:49:38The ocean takes away your body heat.

00:49:41To keep warm, passengers swim closer to each other in a tight circle.

00:49:45Yeah, now it's quite possible to wait for another couple of hours

00:49:48till the rescuers come.

00:49:50People on lifeboats sail closer and take those who freeze on board.

00:49:55Passengers take turns.

00:49:5620 minutes in the water, then 20 minutes in boats.

00:50:00It's essential not to take your clothes off.

00:50:02Even a wet outfit helps keep your body warm for longer.

00:50:06And when it seems that everyone is saved, somebody screams.

00:50:10A girl in a boat looks scared.

00:50:12She trembles with fear and points her finger into the black water.

00:50:16Passengers try to see what's there and notice a triangular fin.

00:50:21One, two, three.

00:50:22There are so many of them.

00:50:25The noise of the sinking ship has attracted a group of sharks.

00:50:29And now they are circling the survivors, hoping to satisfy their hunger.

00:50:34They're swimming slowly.

00:50:35It doesn't look like they're going to attack.

00:50:37But you should keep your eyes open,

00:50:39as these fish are some of the world's most aggressive and dangerous sharks,

00:50:43the bull sharks.

00:50:45They can be agile, fast, and unpredictable.

00:50:48They don't swim in the cold waters of the Atlantic,

00:50:51but the water in this parallel universe is perfect for them.

00:50:55The sharks are strong and sturdy.

00:50:57They create the illusion of slowness to relax their prey.

00:51:00They're called bull sharks because of their short, blunt muzzle,

00:51:03like that of a bull.

00:51:05And they like to hit a target or other sharks with their forehead.

00:51:09Several fish are ramming boats.

00:51:11Someone falls into the water.

00:51:13Fortunately, people help them back on board.

00:51:16The sharks aren't going to retreat.

00:51:18Chaos and panic ensue.

00:51:20People are screaming and splashing the water with paddles to scare away the fish.

00:51:24But it doesn't help.

00:51:26One of the sharks opens its toothy mouth and clings to a boat.

00:51:30At this moment, you notice more fins nearby.

00:51:33A pack of great white sharks arrives at the party.

00:51:36They are some of the most dangerous animals on the planet.

00:51:39They're big, fast, and strong.

00:51:42And their 300 triangular teeth lined in several rows are sharp as blades.

00:51:47Great white sharks swim around the boats and scare away the bull sharks.

00:51:51You fall off the boat and see a big fin approaching you.

00:51:54Fear awakens the survival instinct in you.

00:51:57You're trying your best to swim away from the shark as far as possible.

00:52:01Of course, it's useless,

00:52:03since the shark is much faster and will definitely catch you.

00:52:06You feel your foot touching the shark's nose.

00:52:09The other foot gets into the toothy mouth.

00:52:11You scream in horror.

00:52:13After a second, the shark lets you go.

00:52:17Great white sharks rarely attack people.

00:52:19If they bite, it's just to test you.

00:52:22After all, the shark's favorite prey is seals.

00:52:25It simply loses interest if it realizes you aren't a seal.

00:52:29But if the shark is starving,

00:52:31it doesn't matter to it what kind of prey you are.

00:52:34Lucky for you, this one is not like that.

00:52:37Those survivors in the boats have almost nothing to fear either.

00:52:41Great white sharks don't attack them.

00:52:43They can push boats slightly, but only to test them.

00:52:46The great white shark is swimming away from you.

00:52:49But a bull one appears, and it looks like it's hungry.

00:52:52The shark is swimming towards you, opens its mouth, and...

00:52:56a loud ship horn penetrates the water.

00:52:59This is the RMS Carpathia that has come to the rescue.

00:53:02All the sharks swim away scared.

00:53:04All passengers are saved.

00:53:06Back in our universe, another ship that had been nearby

00:53:09could have saved the passengers much earlier.

00:53:12But that's another story.

00:53:16You know SOS, don't you?

00:53:18Three dots, three dashes, and three more dots.

00:53:21It's an easy enough signal to tap out in Morse code.

00:53:24It means Save Our Souls or Save Our Ship.

00:53:28The crew of the legendary Titanic had been desperately trying to send this signal for

00:53:32two hours the night of April 14, 1912.

00:53:37There were other ships not too far from the spot where the iceberg took down the mighty

00:53:41titan of the sea.

00:53:43But the call for help seemingly disappeared before it could reach them.

00:53:47The passenger ship SS Mount Temple did pick up the signal and tried to respond.

00:53:53But the Titanic never got the answer.

00:53:55So what was silencing the ship's cries for help?

00:53:59Some unknown Bermuda Triangle of the North Atlantic?

00:54:03Consider this.

00:54:05Eyewitnesses say the sky was painted with a brilliant Aurora Borealis that cold, fateful

00:54:10night.

00:54:11Beautiful, yes.

00:54:12But on that day, the northern lights may have sealed Titanic's fate for good.

00:54:17You see, the Aurora Borealis forms thanks to geomagnetic storms.

00:54:22Sounds complicated, but those are basically fluctuations in the Earth's magnetic sphere.

00:54:28And what causes those is the Sun itself.

00:54:31The magnetic sphere is like a protective bubble that surrounds our planet.

00:54:35It blocks harmful solar rays, winds, and other cosmic dangers from reaching us.

00:54:41Without it, life on our planet wouldn't be possible.

00:54:43Earth would look more like Mars.

00:54:46You also have it to thank for compasses pointing north.

00:54:50Experts know the Earth's magnetosphere affects navigational equipment, or disrupts it.

00:54:55Which brings us back to the Titanic.

00:54:58Recently, a published weather researcher named Mila Zinkova proposed a theory that solar

00:55:04flares, which provoked a geomagnetic storm, could've played a major role in the Titanic's

00:55:10untimely demise.

00:55:12Solar flares make themselves known on Earth all the time.

00:55:16Some people are especially sensitive to the magnetic storms they cause.

00:55:20These unlucky folks can feel weakness, fatigue, headaches, and even mood swings.

00:55:25On usual days, the pressure is the same on both sides.

00:55:29The magnetosphere blocks all the bad stuff, and we're all happy.

00:55:32But sometimes, explosions occur on the side.

00:55:36They can be massive, Earth-sized.

00:55:38These flares shoot out a wave of charged particles that collides with the magnetosphere at high

00:55:43speeds.

00:55:44Our protective bubble then goes on the defense.

00:55:48It shrinks, deforms, and pushes those particles toward the poles.

00:55:52Enter those brilliant lights dancing above the Titanic that night.

00:55:56In the north, we know it as Aurora Borealis.

00:55:59In the south, Aurora Australis, or the Southern Lights.

00:56:04When the magnetosphere pushes those solar and cosmic particles toward the poles, they

00:56:08collide with molecules of different gases.

00:56:11That's why you get the range of colors.

00:56:13For example, oxygen can be green or red depending on the distance, and nitrogen is blue or purple.

00:56:21What multiple people saw that night was exactly this phenomenon, including the second officer

00:56:26from the rescue ship Carpathia.

00:56:29He wrote it down in the logbook before getting the distress call from the Titanic.

00:56:33But I'm getting ahead of myself.

00:56:36Auroras are a visible sign of a geomagnetic storm.

00:56:39Now about navigational equipment.

00:56:41This applies to satellite and radio frequency devices.

00:56:45Remember, they didn't have iPhones back in the Titanic days, so the average person

00:56:50couldn't notice their gadgets going haywire.

00:56:52But navigational devices and wireless telegraph did exist and were actively used.

00:56:58Rewind back to the Middle Ages, when sailors noticed that, on some days, compasses wigged

00:57:04out.

00:57:05The arrows spun in all directions, and people back then had no idea why.

00:57:10It wasn't until the 18th century when French scientists found out that such problematic

00:57:15days occur at the same time as black spots appearing on the sun.

00:57:20Solar flares.

00:57:21The mystery was solved.

00:57:22Now the Titanic had the most advanced well-known radio equipment at that time.

00:57:28They tested it thoroughly to make sure it worked for distances up to 2,000 miles away.

00:57:34Titanics passed them all.

00:57:36On April 10, 1912, the massive liner left Southampton and set off for New York.

00:57:42The very next day, the crew started getting the first reports of drifting icebergs and

00:57:47ice fields.

00:57:48They put dots on the map to mark the coordinates and let out a sigh of relief.

00:57:54All the troublesome spots were north of the Titanic's planned route.

00:57:58But after a couple of days, the warnings were moving farther and farther south, encroaching

00:58:03on the majestic ship.

00:58:05On April 14, Captain Edward Smith decided to change course to the south in hopes of

00:58:10bypassing the ice.

00:58:12This ended up being a huge mistake.

00:58:16Enter the magnetic storm.

00:58:18If it was throwing the navigation equipment off, even by a tiny error of half a degree,

00:58:23the captain could've been mistakenly taking the ship right toward a cluster of icebergs.

00:58:28What's even worse, the radio operators ignored warnings coming from other ships.

00:58:34Or they simply forgot to hand them over to the captain.

00:58:38As hired contractors from the radio company, they were more interested in transmitting

00:58:42paid telegrams from passengers on that luxurious liner.

00:58:46The radio transmitter kept going out of order that evening, probably because of all this

00:58:50private traffic.

00:58:52When it was finally fixed, operator Jack Phillips received another message from the SS Californian

00:58:58at 10.30 pm.

00:59:00Their operator was trying to warn Phillips about the coordinates of drifting icebergs,

00:59:05but he paid them no attention.

00:59:07He was nervous and in a hurry.

00:59:10Was the magnetic storm to blame for his frayed nerves and bad mood?

00:59:14We can only speculate.

00:59:16But as you know, some people are more sensitive to these things.

00:59:20The weather was fine, the ocean was calm, the water was smooth as glass.

00:59:26Despite all the warnings, the ship continued to sail at a maximum speed of over 22 knots.

00:59:31An hour later, Titanic collided with the infamous iceberg.

00:59:36On April 15th at 12.14 am, in the middle of the night, Titanic's operators started to

00:59:42transmit the first emergency signals.

00:59:45The SS Californian was sailing just 20 miles from the Titanic.

00:59:49They could've easily come to a quick rescue.

00:59:52Ten minutes before the disaster, the Californian's radio operator had gone to bed.

00:59:58He was the only one who understood Morse code on the ship.

01:00:02According to this new theory, the magnetic anomalies possibly blocked Titanic's messages

01:00:07to other ships.

01:00:09For example, the steamer SS La Providence didn't receive any signals from the sinking

01:00:14ship at all.

01:00:16Yet they were still getting transmissions from another giant, the Olympic, which was

01:00:20500 miles from the Titanic.

01:00:23That night, the signals were acting strange.

01:00:26They simply got lost somewhere in space, or they were like a jumbled riddle, impossible

01:00:31to solve.

01:00:32The SS Mount Temple did get a message and rushed to Titanic's aid.

01:00:37But as fate would have it, the rescue ship got stuck in ice.

01:00:41She did arrive at Titanic's last known coordinates, but the luxury liner was nowhere to be seen.

01:00:47So were the coordinates accurate at all?

01:00:50The steamer Carpathia was about 60 miles away.

01:00:53At 12.30, their radio operator told the Titanic's crew they were rushing to help.

01:00:59The ship famous for coming to the aid, Carpathia, was going full steam ahead.

01:01:04But here's the odd part.

01:01:06At first, they headed to the wrong spot.

01:01:09The magnetic storm could've thrown its equipment off.

01:01:12Good news is the steamer did end up reaching the right place when they saw the lifeboats

01:01:16full of passengers.

01:01:18Interestingly, once she reached land, the Carpathia didn't have any problems with her

01:01:23equipment.

01:01:24The blackout happened just around the wreckage site.

01:01:27The following investigation blamed radio amateurs for blocking signals.

01:01:32We now might know otherwise.

01:01:34Zinkova explains that at that time, they didn't know exactly how and to what extent the sun

01:01:40influences the Earth.

01:01:42No one could've guessed that the sun could tamper with these massive ship's navigational

01:01:47equipment, especially one that had the best of the best at the time.

01:01:51There's another theory that even the moon could've played a role.

01:01:55Some researchers claim that in January 1912, our natural satellite was closer to the Earth

01:02:01than usual.

01:02:02It caused very strong tides and raised the sea level.

01:02:05Every year, icebergs break away from Greenland and stop around Newfoundland.

01:02:10But not that year.

01:02:11The increased water flow pushed them further for three months.

01:02:15And come April, they were right in the way of transatlantic ships.

01:02:19Unfortunately, it was a recipe for disaster when it came to the mighty Titanic.

01:02:26No one could ever have imagined that the unsinkable Titanic would collide with an iceberg.

01:02:31Except for one man, William Thomas Dead.

01:02:35Well, not directly, of course.

01:02:37It's not like he jolted out of bed one day, envisioning the fall of the Titanic.

01:02:42Rather, he wrote an empowering short story called How the Mail Steamer Went Down in Mid-Atlantic

01:02:48by a Survivor on March 3, 1886, 26 years before Titanic sank.

01:02:55Ok, let's do a super quick recap.

01:02:57Titanic was traveling from Southampton to New York in April 1912 in the North Atlantic.

01:03:03The ship hit an iceberg, and less than 3 hours later, it was completely underwater.

01:03:08Out of 2,208 people on board, just 706 survived due to the limited number of lifeboats and

01:03:16icy cold water.

01:03:17Another passenger ship, Carpathia, heard the distress call, picked up the survivors, and

01:03:22brought them safely to New York.

01:03:25The short story William Dead wrote was about Thomas, a British sailor, who got on a passenger

01:03:30liner bound for the U.S.

01:03:32At one point, the protagonist realized there weren't enough lifeboats for everyone on

01:03:37board the ship in case something happened.

01:03:39A couple of days later, heavy fog covered everything in sight.

01:03:44Luck was not on the liner's side, and it collided with a stray ship, just like Titanic

01:03:49struck an iceberg.

01:03:51Only 200 out of the 916 people made it safely to the U.S.

01:03:55The main character managed to survive by jumping into the water and climbing into one of the

01:04:00lifeboats.

01:04:01Now, you'd think that the story riled up everyone in the industry to add extra lifeboats

01:04:06on ships, but sadly, it received very little attention when it was published.

01:04:12Even more tragically, William Thomas Stead was on Titanic when it sank, and he didn't

01:04:18make it.

01:04:19The survivors who knew Stead mentioned that he had always been cheerful and had loved

01:04:23to chat during meals.

01:04:25He complimented the ship's design and how sturdy it was.

01:04:29Witnesses also talked about how he'd been helpful when the ship had been sinking, having

01:04:34given his life jacket to someone else.

01:04:36He was a journalist by profession and was on his way to New York for a ceremony.

01:04:41One of his most important contributions to modern journalism was the use of illustrations

01:04:46in every newspaper article.

01:04:48He also introduced newspaper interviews, and they're still used to this day, along with

01:04:53illustrations.

01:04:55But this story wasn't the only published work that predicted the disaster.

01:04:59Morgan Robertson was an author and former ship captain who wrote short stories and novels.

01:05:05His most notable novella is The Wreck of the Titan.

01:05:08It's also known as Futility.

01:05:11The book was written in 1898, 14 years before Titanic.

01:05:16It was a fictional story about the Titan, an ocean liner similar to Titanic, which was

01:05:21crossing the North Atlantic.

01:05:23It's also a coincidence that Titan was just as fast as Titanic and shared many other similarities.

01:05:30Like size and design.

01:05:32The book described it as unsinkable and the largest ship to hit the ocean at the time.

01:05:37That's what they said about Titanic, too.

01:05:40Another eerie similarity was the limited number of lifeboats it had.

01:05:44The story took place in April, and that's when Titanic set off on its journey and hit

01:05:49the iceberg.

01:05:50The Titan story also mentioned that barely anyone had survived that horrible accident.

01:05:56Unlike Stead's story, the protagonist of Robertson took a different path.

01:06:00The Titan sinking happened somewhere halfway through the book, so after the accident, the

01:06:05main character went on with his life.

01:06:08The book was brought back into the spotlight after the Titanic disaster.

01:06:12How could someone describe the events that took place almost a decade later so accurately?

01:06:18Many started to believe Robertson could see the future.

01:06:21But the reality was that Robertson knew his way around a ship.

01:06:25It was easy for him to write down the nitty-gritty of things without doing more research.

01:06:30Realistically, one of the biggest threats for ships at that time was hitting an iceberg

01:06:35or colliding with other ships.

01:06:38The next story sounds somewhat mysterious.

01:06:40Once, Alex McKenzie heard a voice that warned him not to board Titanic.

01:06:46But when he turned around, there was nobody there.

01:06:50As he continued walking, the voice spoke to him again, but this time it was louder and

01:06:55more distinct.

01:06:56He took the warning seriously and decided to cancel the trip and go back to Glasgow,

01:07:01Scotland, his hometown.

01:07:04His grandparents weren't too happy to find him back home instead of on Titanic.

01:07:08After all, the ticket was very expensive.

01:07:11That disappointment very soon disappeared when they heard that the ship had struck an

01:07:16iceberg.

01:07:17John Coffey was a member of the crew of Titanic, but he decided to ditch the ride when the

01:07:22ship stopped at his hometown in Queenstown, Ireland.

01:07:26His inner voice told him to get off the liner, and he did.

01:07:30He was only 23 at the time, and for someone his age, it could be a major career boost

01:07:35and an opportunity to grow.

01:07:37Despite the horrible tragedy, the guy signed to work with the RMS Mauritania just months

01:07:43after the Titanic's sinking.

01:07:45Talk about commitment!

01:07:47Some added info was revealed about what may have contributed to the fall of Titanic.

01:07:52The constructors insisted that the ship was unsinkable, but many people later theorized

01:07:57that the vessel's steel plates had been too frail for the freezing Atlantic water.

01:08:02It may have caused the rivets to pop, allowing ocean water to seep inside.

01:08:07Another theory is that there may have been a fire in the hull of the Titanic that had

01:08:11been raging for three weeks before the voyage.

01:08:15The fire softened the steel, allowing the iceberg to cut through it like a hot knife

01:08:19through butter.

01:08:21Some pictures before the ship set off on its journey show black marks on the hull,

01:08:26which could have been caused by fire.

01:08:28Either way, the iceberg would have caused significant damage in any case, no matter

01:08:33if there was a fire or not.

01:08:35Some people also blame those who designed the Titanic.

01:08:38The ship was built with large joints at the bottom, which probably snapped easily during

01:08:43the collision.

01:08:44Of course, these are all theories, but we know for a fact that the iceberg was the main

01:08:49character of this drama, and that the works of Stead and Robertson should have been taken

01:08:54seriously.

01:08:56Either way, this should be a lesson for the future, helping to prevent similar tragic

01:09:00accidents.

01:09:02By the way, ocean liners and passenger ships wouldn't exist if it hadn't been for Thomas

01:09:07Newcomen.

01:09:08In 1712, he invented a steam engine that was so strong it could produce enough energy to

01:09:14power a ship.

01:09:16Then a century later, in 1819, the first steamship traveled across the Atlantic Ocean

01:09:22to Liverpool, UK.

01:09:24It only took the vessel 29 days to cross the ocean.

01:09:27The passenger ship industry boomed in the early 1900s when it became easier for people

01:09:32to move to America or go on holidays.

01:09:36As decades rolled by, the use of aircraft stole the spotlight from passenger ships since

01:09:41planes were faster and more efficient.

01:09:44Nowadays, it's quite rare for a passenger ship to collide with anything in open water.

01:09:49Modern technologies can detect anything that can pose a threat and even predict stormy

01:09:54weather.

01:09:55Cruise ships these days are giants compared to the vessels of Titanic's era.

01:10:00Modern ships can carry almost twice the number of passengers and have amenities folks back

01:10:05then could only dream of.

01:10:07Most cruise ships these days have several restaurants to choose from, multiple swimming

01:10:11pools, and game rooms to catch a break.

01:10:14If you're in the mood for some fun, you can watch live performances.

01:10:18Don't forget about the helicopter pad, because why not?

01:10:22Don't worry if you start feeling unwell.

01:10:24The in-house doctors are always there to help any passenger in need.

01:10:29And these ships are only going to get bigger.

01:10:32Putting Titanic and a modern cruise ship side by side is like comparing a corgi to a Doberman.

01:10:38Back then, Titanic was the biggest and most cutting-edge vessel anyone could dream of.

01:10:43So who knows what the future of cruise ships can hold?

01:10:46We might even have entire cities floating around.

01:10:50That would be a really big boat.

01:10:53It was the biggest ship ever built in its time, and it was supposed to be unsinkable.

01:10:58But within days of steaming out on its first voyage in 1912, the Titanic was gone beneath

01:11:05the relentless waves of the North Atlantic Ocean.

01:11:08And of its more than 2,200 passengers and crew, only 706 survived that dreadful night.

01:11:15Would a smaller ship have fared any better in the same situation?

01:11:19Did the size of the iceberg truly matter in the end?

01:11:23Was it a mistake for the ship to change course at the last minute as it tried to avoid impact?

01:11:29These are three questions that have people pondering, what if?

01:11:34We do know that Titanic was considered an engineering marvel in its day.

01:11:39Designed by Thomas Andrews for the British shipping company White Star Line, it was just

01:11:44over 880 feet long and 175 feet tall.

01:11:48Built with abundant space for 840 staterooms, a swimming pool, a squash court, a gym, and

01:11:55two dining rooms.

01:11:56But it was below deck that one of its most impressive new features could be found.

01:12:02The Titanic's hull was divided into 16 compartments designed to be watertight.

01:12:07Up to four of these compartments could take on water in the event of a breach, with the

01:12:12remaining 12 helping to keep the damaged ship afloat.

01:12:16It was thanks to these compartments that the ship was regarded as unsinkable.

01:12:21Rumor has it that Philip Frank, White Star Line's vice president, even declared,

01:12:27There is no danger that Titanic will sink.

01:12:29The boat is unsinkable, and nothing but inconvenience will be suffered by the passengers.

01:12:36On April 14, 1912, that proved to be mistaken when Titanic struck an iceberg.

01:12:43As ice ripped along the ship's hull, several of those watertight compartments ruptured.

01:12:48It took only two and a half hours for Titanic to sink.

01:12:54Could the size of the iceberg that hit Titanic seal its fate?

01:12:58Would a bigger or smaller iceberg have made any difference?

01:13:02Icebergs come in a wide variety of shapes and sizes.

01:13:06They are pieces of ice that have broken away from glaciers or ice shelves in the Arctic

01:13:11and Antarctic, and are now wandering across the ocean until they eventually melt.

01:13:17One of the tallest icebergs ever found would have easily dwarfed Titanic.

01:13:23Discovered in 1957, it was 550 feet high.

01:13:27That's close to the height of the Washington Monument.

01:13:30Imagine ramming into something that big!

01:13:33Smaller icebergs, though, can turn out just as dangerous.

01:13:37Some are the size of houses and called bergy bits.

01:13:40Others, closer to the size of a car, are called growlers.

01:13:45These can be much harder for ships and boats to locate, making them more difficult to avoid.

01:13:51And though smaller, they can produce a lot of damage when hit.

01:13:55It's also critical to recall that icebergs are always bigger than they seem, with the

01:14:01majority of their mass lurking below the ocean's surface.

01:14:05In fact, over 80% of an iceberg's volume is underwater.

01:14:10Most of its sharp, jagged edges cannot be seen.

01:14:13Roam too close, and you risk damaging your ship's hull.

01:14:18Because Titanic had little notice of its impending doom, a smaller iceberg, struck

01:14:23at the same angle, could still have been enough to bring that mighty ship down.

01:14:28Now, it's possible that had the iceberg been larger, it would've been spotted sooner.

01:14:34Titanic might've had time to alter course and avoid the impact.

01:14:38But missing that one iceberg would not have guaranteed Titanic safety.

01:14:43It was traveling in a dangerous stretch of the Atlantic called Iceberg Alley.

01:14:48It's located 250 miles east and southeast of Newfoundland, Canada.

01:14:54Behind one iceberg, there could be another, and another after that.

01:14:58And so the crew on board had to remain very attentive to avoid several potential collisions,

01:15:04not just one.

01:15:06A smaller ship might've been better suited for the trip.

01:15:09Titanic's size was certainly a challenge when it came to steering.

01:15:14In fact, it had just left her dock in Southampton when it nearly collided with another smaller

01:15:19ocean liner, the SS New York, missing it by just 2 feet.

01:15:24The gigantic steamship was obviously not made for maneuvering quickly in tight quarters.

01:15:29A ship that size required time and space to change course.

01:15:34But when it comes to ships vs. icebergs, a ship's size doesn't always matter.

01:15:40The Islander was a steamship designed to travel the Inside Passage in Alaska.

01:15:45In the summer of 1901, it struck an iceberg, which tore a hole in the front portion or

01:15:51bow of the ship.

01:15:52The vessel did not sink right away, and the crew tried to steer it to safety.

01:15:57Ultimately, its bow completely submerged, and its stern was lifted up and out of the

01:16:03water.

01:16:04It didn't take much longer before the ship sank completely.

01:16:07Of the 168 passengers and crew members, 128 survived, and $3 million in gold was lost.

01:16:15Islander had a 240-foot hull, making it almost a quarter of the size of Titanic.

01:16:21And that smaller size didn't seem to be much help in preventing a collision with an

01:16:26iceberg.

01:16:28And then there was the Hans Hedtoff in 1959.

01:16:32Also known as the Little Titanic or the Danish Titanic, it was referred to as the safest

01:16:38ship afloat.

01:16:39It was 272 feet long with 95 people on board.

01:16:44Much like the real Titanic, the Hans Hedtoff was specifically engineered to handle most

01:16:49of what the sea could throw its way.

01:16:52Along with its double steel bottom, it also had an armored bow and 7 watertight compartments.

01:16:58How could such a ship sink?

01:17:00But it could, and it did.

01:17:02It was on its first voyage, returning to Copenhagen, when it ran into trouble.

01:17:07On January 30, it hit an iceberg.

01:17:10An SOS was sent, but when the Johannes Cross arrived to help, the Hans Hedtoff was nowhere

01:17:16to be found.

01:17:18The only evidence of the ship's existence was a life belt that was washed ashore in

01:17:23Iceland 9 months later.

01:17:26Again, the ship's smaller size didn't work in its favor.

01:17:29A smaller size of Titanic wouldn't have guaranteed a safe voyage in 1912.

01:17:35The final what-if concerns the last-minute choice when the iceberg was spotted and the

01:17:41alarm sounded.

01:17:42First, Titanic could attempt a complete stop.

01:17:45But this wasn't an option, as the ship needed a half a mile to come to a halt, and the iceberg

01:17:51was a mere 900 feet away.

01:17:54Second, the Titanic could attempt to avoid the iceberg by steering away from it.

01:17:59This is what the captain ordered, but the attempt was unsuccessful, resulting in a deep

01:18:04gash across the ship's hull.

01:18:06The final option?

01:18:07To hit the iceberg head-on.

01:18:10Would this have made any difference?

01:18:12The answer is an intriguing maybe.

01:18:15Some think a head-on collision would have saved Titanic.

01:18:18In this scenario, the collision would have limited the damage to the very front of the

01:18:23ship.

01:18:24Instead of the iceberg tearing through the hull and compromising several of the watertight

01:18:29compartments, only four of the compartments would have been breached.

01:18:33This meant the others could do their job of keeping Titanic afloat.

01:18:37The ship could be stuck, unable to move, but it would remain above water until help arrived.

01:18:44This would provide a ship like Carpathia enough time to reach the scene of the accident and

01:18:49bring the people on board to safety.

01:18:52One of the Titanic's designers, Edward Wilding, made a similar claim during an inquiry into

01:18:58the sinking.

01:18:59He argued that most people would have survived a head-on crash, and that Titanic itself would

01:19:05not have sunk.

01:19:07Others disagree, though.

01:19:08First, the special bulkheads on Titanic were designed specifically to protect the ship

01:19:14against collisions with other vessels, not with icebergs.

01:19:18These compartments would crumple upon impact, absorbing some of the force, while the other

01:19:23ship absorbed the rest.

01:19:25Though the damage would still be extensive, the remaining bulkheads would keep the ship

01:19:29afloat.

01:19:31But an iceberg does not have the same flex in a collision as you would experience with

01:19:36another ship.

01:19:37Most of the force would be absorbed by Titanic, resulting in greater damage to the ship.

01:19:43Even worse, the impact would be carried through the full length of the ship.

01:19:47Rivets would burst, seams would tear, the compartments would quickly flood, and the

01:19:52ship would sink even faster, resulting in fewer survivors.

01:19:57In any case, as with most what-ifs, we'll never really know the answer.

01:20:02As tragic as Titanic's first and last voyage was, it did result in changes that helped

01:20:08make venturing out to sea much safer.

01:20:12Warnings from hearings on the disaster led to the creation of the International Ice Patrol

01:20:17or ICC in 1914, an organization that tracks icebergs in the Atlantic and Arctic Oceans

01:20:24to ensure vessels in the area can avoid them.

01:20:27In the US and Britain, ships were obligated to carry enough lifeboats to accommodate every

01:20:33person aboard.

01:20:35Regular lifeboat drills were made mandatory.

01:20:38And finally, the bulkheads on ships were made higher to keep water out, and bottoms

01:20:43were stretched to create double hulls, helping make the compartments truly waterproof.

01:20:48There's no denying that Titanic was a terrible tragedy, but the lessons learned from that

01:20:54night to remember has helped prevent many more.

01:21:00April 14, 1912.

01:21:03The dark night was filled with horrible sounds of a giant metal vessel breaking into two.

01:21:08The largest ship of that time collided with an iceberg that was on its way.

01:21:13The Titanic, one of the biggest stories of the 20th century that people still talk about.

01:21:22The starboard side of the giant vessel brushed up against the iceberg.

01:21:26It was 11.40pm when things started going wrong.

01:21:30This iceberg caused enough damage for at least five watertight compartments in the

01:21:34hull to start filling with water.

01:21:39The crew immediately began a brief investigation to see if they could do anything and fix things.

01:21:44They had no one to rely on, all alone in the darkness of the cold night, far away from

01:21:50the land.

01:21:51The North Atlantic Ocean, around 400 miles south of Newfoundland, Canada.

01:21:56They needed time to figure out how to bring people to safety.

01:22:02They had some time, true, but not enough.

01:22:05If you watched the movie, you know the ship didn't plunge immediately after the icy

01:22:10doom had happened.

01:22:11The whole process lasted a good 2 hours and 40 minutes.

01:22:15But the situation was hard.

01:22:17There were 2,200 people to take care of, including crew and passengers.

01:22:22And things happening on the ship were chaotic.

01:22:27The chief designer, Thomas Andrews, soon realized they wouldn't be able to stay afloat.

01:22:32By midnight, the entire crew had begun preparing the lifeboats for launch.

01:22:37They had 20 boats with space for only 1,178 people, which was just a bit more than 50%

01:22:43of the people on board.

01:22:47The order was to get women and children to safety first.

01:22:51Crewmen were there to row and guide the boats.

01:22:56The scene over the next 2 hours gradually started escalating.

01:23:00The crew members had a task to wake up passengers and warn them something bad was happening.

01:23:05They wanted to place them into a fleet of lifeboats as soon as possible.

01:23:11At 12.15 am, some crew members sent out a distress signal.

01:23:15A steamship called Frankfurt was among the first ones that received the message and responded,

01:23:21they were about 170 nautical miles away.

01:23:24Some other ships also got the message and offered their assistance, but sadly, they

01:23:29were too far away as well.

01:23:33At 12.20 am, the canard liner Carpathia got a distress signal from the Titanic and changed

01:23:39its course right away.

01:23:41They were 58 miles away at the time, and it would take them more than 3 hours to get there.

01:23:5030 minutes later, the crew was lowering the first lifeboat.

01:23:53It was carrying only 27 passengers, although it had room for 65.

01:23:58Many of the lifeboats that were launched first were well below capacity.

01:24:05Crew members were worried, thinking the Davids wouldn't be able to hold a fully loaded

01:24:10lifeboat.

01:24:11And in the beginning, many passengers were just too afraid to leave the ship.

01:24:16They still thought Titanic was unsinkable and couldn't imagine the scenario that was

01:24:20going to happen 1-2 hours later.

01:24:25The crew was firing the first of 8 distress rockets, unsuccessful.

01:24:30No one was close enough to help.

01:24:34By 1.20 am, they lowered 10 lifeboats.

01:24:37Number 8 had only 28 people in it.

01:24:40One of the passengers on the number 10 was 9-week-old Melvina Dean.

01:24:45She would later become the last survivor who lived until 2009 and turned 97.

01:24:53It was 2 am already.

01:24:55Three of the collapsible boats were the only lifeboats that remained on the ship.

01:24:59The bow of the vessel had sunk low and had tipped far under the surface.

01:25:04People around it could now clearly see stern propellers above the water.

01:25:10Crew members were lowering collapsible lifeboat D from the roof of the officer's quarters

01:25:15with over 20 passengers in it.

01:25:18As the ship's bow went under, the water was washing collapsible A from the deck.

01:25:23Those 20 people were struggling because their boat was partly filled with water.

01:25:29As crew members were trying to release collapsible B, it fell.

01:25:34Before they righted it, the water swept it off the ship.

01:25:3730 passengers still managed to find safety on the overturned lifeboat.

01:25:43At 2.17 am, the ship's wireless operator decided to transmit one last distress call.

01:25:50A minute later, the light on the ship finally went out.

01:25:53Titanic and all left on board plunged into darkness.

01:25:57The bow continued to sink, and the stern was rising higher above the surface, which placed

01:26:02great strain on the midsection.

01:26:06Horrible sounds were filling the night.

01:26:09Titanic, this massive legendary ship so many people placed their hopes in and were excited

01:26:14about, broke into two between the third and fourth funnels.

01:26:21Reports would speculate it took about 6 minutes for the bow section to reach the ocean bottom.

01:26:27The stern settled back in the water before it rose again, into a vertical position.

01:26:32It remained in this situation until it finally disappeared into the ocean.

01:26:39At 2.20 am, the stern apparently retained air inside, and water pressure crushed it

01:26:45as it went down.

01:26:46The stern landed about 2,000 feet away from the bow.

01:26:52People consider the Titanic the fastest ship in the world.

01:26:55They thought it was unsinkable because 4 of its compartments could be flooded, and that

01:27:00still wouldn't cause a critical loss of buoyancy.

01:27:03Its life was problematic since its beginning.

01:27:08While the ship was leaving port, it moved within a couple of feet of the steamer New

01:27:13York.

01:27:14It managed to safely pass by, which was a huge relief for all those worried passengers

01:27:19massed on the ship's decks.

01:27:24Titanic sailed off on the 10th of April.

01:27:26Its first journey was across the highly competitive Atlantic route.

01:27:30On the launch day, the Titanic became the biggest movable object in the history of humankind

01:27:36– 882 feet long, 92 feet wide.

01:27:43Not that big if you compare it with today's ships.

01:27:46The biggest cruise ship in the world today is Royal Caribbean's Symphony of the Seas,

01:27:51which is roughly 5 times the size of Titanic.

01:27:54If you put that ship in a vertical position, it would be nearly as tall as the Empire State

01:27:59Building, which is 1250 feet without antennas.

01:28:05But Titanic was a huge attraction back in its time.

01:28:09At one moment of their journey, they stopped in France, after which they made another stop

01:28:14in Ireland.

01:28:15Once the final passengers boarded, the massive ship set out at full speed for their final

01:28:21destination, New York City.

01:28:25Four days after the beginning of its journey, Titanic failed to divert its course from a

01:28:30huge iceberg – the story we all know about.

01:28:35Only 700 people survived, and most of them were women and children.

01:28:40The night was extremely cold.

01:28:42One hour and 20 minutes after Titanic had gone down to the bottom of the ocean, survivors

01:28:47weren't even sure someone was coming to save them.

01:28:51Finally, they saw the light.

01:28:55It was Carpathia coming towards them.

01:28:57They came for the people in the lifeboats.

01:29:00The crew brought them aboard and pulled a handful of other passengers out of the water.

01:29:05Many ships tried to contact Titanic a few hours after it sank.

01:29:09Their messages were never returned.

01:29:14Later, when there was an investigation of what really happened, they discovered the

01:29:19Leyland liner, California, had been less than 20 miles away when Titanic was sinking.

01:29:25But the crew didn't hear the distress signals coming from Titanic because their radio operator

01:29:31was off-duty.

01:29:35Countries from both sides of the Atlantic were shocked and horrified when they heard

01:29:38details of what happened to Titanic.

01:29:41They decided to make changes to ship operations, rules that would help avoid such events in

01:29:46the future.

01:29:49They held the first International Convention for Safety of Life at Sea, where they adopted

01:29:54rules for every ship to have lifeboat space for each passenger on board.

01:29:59Also, lifeboat drills became mandatory.

01:30:05They also decided to establish an International Ice Patrol.

01:30:09Its main role was to monitor icebergs in the North Atlantic shipping lanes.

01:30:13Ships also needed to maintain a 24-hour radio watch.

01:30:20Titanic wasn't built alone.

01:30:21Because of the size of this magnificent ship and all the new equipment it required, it

01:30:26would've been too expensive as a one-off.

01:30:29So the team built the Titanic alongside two sister ships, and both of them had eventful

01:30:35lifetimes.

01:30:39RMS Olympic came first.

01:30:41It was launched in 1910, and for a whole year was the biggest liner in the world.

01:30:47The Britannic was another sister ship that sailed for a while before it too ended down

01:30:53on the ocean bottom.

01:30:56But only Titanic became a legend and one of the most fascinating stories of modern history.

01:31:04The year was 1854, and the SS Arctic, the fastest passenger liner of its time, set out

01:31:10to cross the Atlantic.

01:31:12As it sailed through the Misty Vale, it slowly disappeared into the unknown.

01:31:19The Collins Line, an American shipping company, was started in 1818 and only began seriously

01:31:26trading in the transatlantic by 1835.

01:31:29Such steamships crossed the Atlantic from Liverpool to New York within just 10 days.

01:31:35Doesn't sound like a great speed today, I know, but back then, the same thing took other

01:31:39ships several weeks.

01:31:43Light on the water with their wooden hulls, powering through with a strong steam engine,

01:31:48those steamships were the favorite choice for many high-profile people.

01:31:52What could go wrong with such an advanced ship, they thought?

01:31:56This reminds me of some other ship everyone believed to be unsinkable.

01:32:01But anyway, back to the Collins Line.

01:32:04It grew to be a serious contender on transatlantic routes, with only one other competitor, the

01:32:10Cunards Line.

01:32:11It was a British company also aiming to be the main force through the Arctic passage.

01:32:17In 1835, the company received a new ship that traveled to Liverpool and came back to New

01:32:23York with the largest cargo ever at that time.

01:32:26From then, the Collins Line was steadily growing.

01:32:29It seemed like there would only be future successes for it.

01:32:34Unfortunately, their lavish ships became costly to run with the amount of coal used.

01:32:41Massive power along with weak wooden hulls meant they needed many repairs after each

01:32:46voyage.

01:32:48So every trip ended up being expensive.

01:32:51But since the ships were safe and had a great reputation, people were willing to pay the

01:32:55price and the company was definitely not in crisis.

01:32:59They had achieved something no one had managed to do before them.

01:33:03Like I told you, their ships crossed the Atlantic in a whopping 10 days.

01:33:07And Edward Collins, the owner, was very determined to maintain the pace.

01:33:13Their five ships easily outran the Cunards Line of only three.

01:33:18With this great praise, it provided more attention.

01:33:22Though the Cunards ships were slower with their iron hulls, they believed there was

01:33:27still profit regardless of how slowly they sailed.

01:33:31Among Collins ships, the Arctic, the third of them to be launched, was the largest, reaching

01:33:37284 feet long, with two side-lever steam engines, each with 1,000 horsepower.

01:33:44The paddle wheels made 16 revolutions a minute when at full speed.

01:33:48At the time of its launch, the press called it the most stupendous vessel ever constructed

01:33:54in the United States.

01:33:56But glamour and fame couldn't avoid what would come next.

01:34:01On the 27th of September, the Arctic was on its journey from Liverpool to New York, continuing

01:34:06a speed pace through the thick fog.

01:34:09It's possible that by that moment, after four years of record-breaking trips, the crew became

01:34:14overconfident with their sailing and the ship.

01:34:19Going only 50 miles from Newfoundland, they carelessly continued through the fog with

01:34:23no radio contact, sonar, or any other form of identifying objects, equipped only with

01:34:29Morse code.

01:34:32A smaller ship, the SS Vesta, which operated as a fishing vessel, often worked around Newfoundland.

01:34:39It was passing through the same path as the Arctic and crashed into its side.

01:34:45Shocked by the collision, the captain of the Arctic offered help to the much smaller Vesta.

01:34:50But it was soon clear that the damage that seemed minor on the Arctic was far worse.

01:34:57Beneath the waterline, a hole was letting water into the hull.

01:35:01The cost of the much faster wooden hull now seemed less valuable.

01:35:05They steered toward land, trying to plug the holes.

01:35:08But they weren't doing so well, and the sea water continued to pour in, filling up higher

01:35:12and pushing the ship down.

01:35:16And finally, once the engine room was full, it put out the boilers, taking away the massive

01:35:21power the Arctic was once legendary for.

01:35:26They moved slowly until coming to a complete stop.

01:35:29The ship continued to sink, and the order was to abandon it.

01:35:33At the time, maritime law allowed for the Arctic to carry only six lifeboats, only capable

01:35:39of saving 180 people.

01:35:41The crew and some of the passengers managed to push their way aboard and took most of

01:35:45the seats on those boats.

01:35:47Things were pretty wild, and everyone forgot about their manners, not letting the ladies

01:35:51and the youngest ones board first.

01:35:55It took four hours for the Arctic to sink.

01:35:58150 crew and 250 passengers were on board.

01:36:02Those that weren't able to find a lifeboat made a desperate attempt to build their own

01:36:06rafts from parts of the ship.

01:36:10Two days later, only three boats made it safely to the shore.

01:36:14The other three were never found.

01:36:16Believe it or not, the rescue party also saved some people that had been clinging to the

01:36:21wreckage for two days.

01:36:24Unlike the crew, the captain went down with the Arctic, but amazingly survived.

01:36:30He would be only one of 85 people that made it out of the 400 on board.

01:36:38When the news arrived two weeks later, the public responded with great sadness to the

01:36:42losses.

01:36:43Great anger soon followed towards the poor safety measures in the crew.

01:36:47The press published demands to change the laws for more lifeboats.

01:36:51It only made sense to have enough for every person on board a ship.

01:36:57But they ignored those requests.

01:36:59This neglect would lead to more disasters in the future.

01:37:02Enough lifeboats would only come into maritime law some 60 years later, after the disaster

01:37:08of the Titanic.

01:37:11Edward Collins' wife and two children were also aboard the ship and didn't return.

01:37:17He was heartbroken, but didn't stop running his business.

01:37:22The Collins line still had a reputation to uphold, the biggest, fastest, and most luxurious

01:37:28on the Atlantic.

01:37:29Edward Collins would now build an even better ship than any other.

01:37:34It was named the Adriatic, and it was the largest ship in the world, 354 feet long.

01:37:41With two alternating steam engines that had never been built of this size, these steam

01:37:46engines at the time were at the height of engineering, though today you can only see

01:37:51them in models and toys.

01:37:54With the new addition of two masts, the Adriatic would also be able to sail if needed.

01:37:59Luckily, they made some lessons from the disaster of the Arctic.

01:38:04But before their new ship, the Adriatic, was built, another disaster had occurred.

01:38:09The sister ship of the Arctic had also sunk.

01:38:14They believe this second ship was desperate to stay in front of the Cunard's line and

01:38:18hit an iceberg somewhere during the race.

01:38:21This weird contest took the lives of 141 people.

01:38:27The desperation of Collins and his weakly built hulls pushed the company towards bankruptcy

01:38:32in 1858.

01:38:34The newly built Adriatic, costing over $1 million, had only made one voyage in the end.

01:38:41But even that voyage was considered a disaster.

01:38:45The ship collided with a tugboat.

01:38:47It still managed to finish its maiden voyage at a suitable time.

01:38:52After the company had gone bankrupt, they had to sell the ship for only $50,000.

01:38:57They removed the great giant engines, replacing them with only sails.

01:39:05Although it was once the greatest ship on the high seas, it was only 30 years later

01:39:09until it was abandoned, labeled irreparable, and anchored in a river.

01:39:16The other remaining ships were also sold and only used for parts.

01:39:20Edward Collins left the industry altogether, seeking work on dry land instead.

01:39:27As the Collins line was no longer in the mix, the Cunards would grow in strength.

01:39:32Without competition, they would win the Blue Ribbon for the next 30 years, and 180 years

01:39:38later after producing hundreds of ships, they still have a constant presence on the

01:39:43seas as they provide transatlantic crossings, world voyages, and leisure cruises.

01:39:50To this day, the Cunard line is the only one to run ships between Europe and America, and

01:39:56it's great proof that it's not always the fastest that's the best.

01:40:04Meet Arthur John Priest.

01:40:06No, he isn't famous for being a painter or for discovering some long-lost treasure.

01:40:11He didn't invent some cool gadget or break any world records.

01:40:15No, Arthur John Priest is famous simply for being unsinkable.

01:40:21Proving one can be both lucky and unlucky at the same time, Priest was involved in,

01:40:26and survived, several mishaps at sea, including the fateful maiden voyage of the Titanic.

01:40:32Priest was not a rich man interested in sailing for pleasure.

01:40:35He was part of the working class, employed as a stoker or a fireman, stuck for hours

01:40:41within the hot bowels of large steam-powered vessels.

01:40:44His job was dirty and difficult.

01:40:47He was responsible for keeping the furnaces lit, feeding them coal to ensure enough steam

01:40:51was produced for the engines to work.

01:40:54He had to be careful about not overheating the system or setting fire to the whole ship.

01:40:59The furnaces had to be carefully watched and constantly fed.

01:41:03He breathed it all in a while, working and fighting with the sweat and the dirt.

01:41:08He would often work shirtless because of the heat and was always covered in black coal

01:41:12dust, and when he finally had a break, his shared living quarters were nearby in the

01:41:17same part of the ship.

01:41:19He must have been good at his job, though, because he had no trouble finding work, but

01:41:24wherever he went, bad luck seemed to follow.

01:41:27The first incident was a mild one.

01:41:30As a young man, Priest worked on the RMS Asturias.

01:41:34The passenger liner first set sail in 1907, traveling between Southampton in the U.K.

01:41:39to Buenos Aires in Argentina.

01:41:42At some point during its maiden voyage, the ship suffered a small collision.

01:41:46The damage was bad enough that the ship returned for repairs.

01:41:49Thankfully, there were no reports of any serious injuries.

01:41:53Priest, unfazed, simply went to work on another ship.

01:41:57But his bad luck lingered on the Asturias.

01:42:00In 1914, the Asturias became a hospital ship, helping care for sick men and women around

01:42:06Europe while bringing them home to England.

01:42:09But in March 1917, at just around midnight, the ship was struck by a foreign object.

01:42:15Its hull was breached and the engine room flooded.

01:42:18The captain ordered everyone to abandon the ship, sending crew, patients, and health staff

01:42:23scrambling for the lifeboats.

01:42:25The vessel was still moving, powering through the water because the main controls, located

01:42:30within the flooded engine room, could not be turned off.

01:42:33The captain refused to leave the ship while people were still trying to escape.

01:42:37He was able to aim the Asturias towards Bolthead, where it finally hit land and couldn't sink.

01:42:43The remaining lifeboats were lowered and the final survivors made it to safety.

01:42:48When they studied the damage on the ship later, the Asturias was declared a total write-off.

01:42:54It might be hard to pin this particular disaster on Priest.

01:42:58After all, he wasn't even on the ship at the time.

01:43:01But it seemed that many of the ships on which he served were destined for trouble.

01:43:06His bad luck followed him to his next job on the RMS Olympic, a massive ocean liner.

01:43:12The Olympic was big.

01:43:13In fact, it had been designed and built as part of the fleet that included the Titanic.

01:43:18But with size came sacrifice.

01:43:21The Olympic was great at moving in one direction, but very difficult to handle when it needed

01:43:25to turn.

01:43:26It was September 1911.

01:43:29The Olympic was trying to alter its course.

01:43:31The Hawk, a smaller ship sailing nearby, didn't give the larger vessel enough room to maneuver,

01:43:37and the two slammed into each other.

01:43:40Because the Hawk was engineered to deal with potential confrontations when out at sea,

01:43:44its reinforced bow tore through the Olympic.

01:43:48Two large gashes appeared on the ocean liner's side.

01:43:51The propeller shaft was badly twisted, and worse, the ship began to take on water.

01:43:57Somehow, the Olympic made it to shore without sinking, and nobody was seriously hurt.

01:44:03Priest had no idea that this was just a small taste of what his future held for him.

01:44:09He next found employment on a brand new ship, a better ship, an unsinkable marvel that was

01:44:14said to be the biggest vessel to have ever been built.

01:44:17Yes, he was going to work on the Titanic.

01:44:20And what a job!

01:44:21It took 29 boilers, requiring 850 tons of coal a day, to produce enough steam to power

01:44:27the Titanic.

01:44:28Priest was just one of 150 stokers toiling away in the ship's underbelly, keeping those

01:44:34fires burning day and night.

01:44:36He made around $30 a month.

01:44:39But on April 14, 1912, he would find himself flung from a world of extreme heat to one

01:44:45of blistering cold.

01:44:47At approximately 1135 pm, the crew spotted an iceberg.

01:44:52The Titanic tried to avoid it, but the alarm had been sounded too late.

01:44:57Five minutes later, the two collided.

01:44:59The iceberg tore through the hull, and the once watertight compartments inside were badly

01:45:04ruptured.

01:45:05As the cold Atlantic water flooded in, the ship began to sink.

01:45:09Distress signals were sent, but the closest ship, the Carpathia, was over three hours

01:45:14away.

01:45:15In the dark of night, and stuck in the middle of nowhere, the crew and passengers panicked.

01:45:21Those who could scrambled for the lifeboats.

01:45:24Others jumped into the icy waters.

01:45:26In total, only 706 survived that terrible night.

01:45:30Priest, at the time of the collision, was down in the ship's lower quarters.

01:45:35He was on break, relaxing from a hard day of work.

01:45:38And as the ship went down, so did his chances of survival.

01:45:42He and his fellow workers were in the most dangerous position on the ship.

01:45:46They had to make their way through a maze of corridors and gangways, some of which were

01:45:50flooded, in a mad dash to the deck.

01:45:53And then they faced the frigid water, jumping in and desperately swimming to safety.

01:45:59The ocean was so cold that Priest even suffered frostbite before finding his way onto a lifeboat.

01:46:05He was one of only 44 stokers to survive that night.

01:46:09After an experience like that, most of us would never set foot on a boat again.

01:46:14But Priest had to work.

01:46:16His next job also ended in disaster.

01:46:19He was offered employment on the HMS Alcantara.

01:46:23It went down in 1916, and Priest was again one of the few to make it to safety.

01:46:28He was badly wounded in the process.

01:46:31But he kept pressing his luck, and his next job as a stoker may have felt eerily familiar.

01:46:37He would be working on a ship built by the same people behind both the Olympic and the

01:46:41Titanic.

01:46:43And this ship, named the Britannic, was the biggest of the three.

01:46:47It was also believed to be a superior vessel, fitted with new safety features after the

01:46:51Titanic sank.

01:46:53For example, it had 48 open lifeboats, 46 of which were the largest ever used on a ship

01:46:59before.

01:47:00Two of these were even motorized and equipped with special communication devices.

01:47:05The good news?

01:47:06The Britannic survived its first trip without incident.

01:47:09It was already doing better than the Titanic ever did.

01:47:12However, on November 21, 1916, the Britannic was shaken by a loud explosion while traveling

01:47:19through the key channel in the Aegean Sea.

01:47:21The hull was damaged, and some of the compartments began to fill with water.

01:47:26But, unlike the Titanic, the Britannic had been designed for just such an emergency.

01:47:31The ship had been fitted with five watertight bulkheads.

01:47:34Intact, these would help keep the ship safe and floating for a much longer period of time.

01:47:40But there was one issue.

01:47:42Portholes along the lower decks had foolishly been left open.

01:47:45As the ship tilted, the portholes let in water, which flooded the Britannic and hastened its

01:47:50descent into the sea.

01:47:52This effectively made those watertight bulkheads useless.

01:47:56The ship was going down fast.

01:47:58Much faster, in fact, than the Titanic had sunk.

01:48:02Thirty-five of the lifeboats were successfully launched, saving most on board.

01:48:07Of the 1,066 passengers and crew, 1,036 survived.

01:48:11Priest, his luck intact, was one of them.

01:48:15And yet, he still wasn't done with a life at sea.

01:48:19He accepted a position as a stoker on the Donegal.

01:48:22It was a smaller passenger ferry that had been converted for use as a hospital boat.

01:48:27In April 1917, it was struck by a foreign object while fleeing an unsafe situation.

01:48:33And though he suffered from a head injury, Priest was again one of the survivors.

01:48:38It took experiencing two collisions and four sinkings before Priest was finally ready to

01:48:43retire.

01:48:44In fact, he reportedly said he only gave it up because no one wanted to sail with him.

01:48:49Can you blame them?

01:48:50He would live out the rest of his life on dry land in Southampton, England, with his

01:48:55wife Annie and their three sons.

01:48:57But Arthur John Priest would always be remembered as the unsinkable stoker.

01:49:03Thick fog is rising over the ocean as the sun is slowly sinking towards the horizon.

01:49:08It's hard to see further away than a few dozen feet, but that's enough to notice a hulking

01:49:13skeletal shape in the distance.

01:49:15As your ship approaches the figure, your heart beats faster, and then you make out the details

01:49:20of another vessel, abandoned by the looks of it.

01:49:25Ghost ships do exist, and their mysteries aren't always solved.

01:49:29Take M.V.

01:49:30Hoita, for example.

01:49:31It was a wooden vessel built in 1931 as a luxury yacht.

01:49:35It had served well to various people over 20 years before it was bought by a Samoan

01:49:40sailor and became a merchant ship.

01:49:43In 1955, though, Hoita's service came to an abrupt and mysterious end.

01:49:49On October 3rd, it set sail for another trading voyage that should have taken no more than

01:49:5448 hours.

01:49:56Delays happen in the sea, so when Hoita didn't arrive on October 5th as scheduled, there

01:50:02was little worry yet.

01:50:03But then it failed to come on the following day too.

01:50:07There was no distress signal or any other sign of Hoita's presence anywhere between

01:50:11its departure and arrival points.

01:50:14A search-and-rescue party was dispatched to find the ship, and for six days, they were

01:50:19scouting the area of nearly 100,000 square miles.

01:50:22On October 12th, the mission returned to the base empty-handed.

01:50:26Hoita vanished without a trace.

01:50:31It was only a month later that another merchant ship, Tuvalu, noticed the missing vessel far

01:50:36away from its route, drifting in the open sea and listing heavily.

01:50:41The sailors boarded the ship and found that all of its crew and passengers, 25 people

01:50:46total, were missing, along with all the cargo the vessel had been carrying.

01:50:52The radio was tuned to the International Distress Channel, meaning that the crew had been trying

01:50:56to ask for help, but they couldn't reach anyone because the radio cable had been damaged,

01:51:01limiting the range to two miles.

01:51:05The lifeboats were missing as well, indicating that people on board must have left the ship.

01:51:10Unfortunately, they seem to have taken the logbook with them, leaving the rescue team

01:51:14clueless as to what had happened.

01:51:18Even today, the mystery of MV Hoita hasn't been solved yet.

01:51:22No one knows where the crew and passengers had gone and what had caused them to leave.

01:51:27SV Carol A. Deering wasn't a ghost ship in the usual sense of the word.

01:51:33There are no sightings of it in the open sea.

01:51:35Instead, it was found on the shore, but the circumstances of it running aground are a

01:51:40puzzle shrouded in mystery.

01:51:43Carol A. Deering was built in 1919 in Maine, and it was a large vessel made for commercial

01:51:50voyages.

01:51:51Unfortunately, despite its large cost of construction, it had only served for a year before its last

01:51:56trip.

01:51:58July 19th, 1920.

01:52:01The ship was traveling from Puerto Rico to Rio de Janeiro via Newport News to deliver

01:52:06a cargo of coal.

01:52:08It was almost halfway to the final destination when the captain felt seriously ill, and the

01:52:13crew turned back to drop him and his son off and replace the captain.

01:52:18The voyage went without incident, but when it came to Barbados in December to resupply,

01:52:23there were strange moods among the crew.

01:52:26The first mate didn't seem to be happy with the new captain.

01:52:29No one paid much attention to it back then, when they probably should have.

01:52:35The last sighting of Carol A. Deering at sea was on January 28th, 1921, when a light ship

01:52:41noticed it off the coast of North Carolina.

01:52:44There was some commotion on the quarter deck of the ship, where the crew were normally

01:52:48not allowed.

01:52:49Then, another vessel sighted it, but there was already no one on the decks.

01:52:54On January 31st, the merchant ship was found hard aground in the Diamond Shoals, a site

01:53:00notorious for numerous shipwrecks that had been occupying there for centuries.

01:53:05When the search and rescue party boarded the ship, they found it abandoned, the log and

01:53:09personal belongings of the crew gone, along with the two lifeboats.

01:53:15There is still no answer to what happened on board of Carol A. Deering that January,

01:53:20although the most popular version was mutiny.

01:53:23Maybe we'll never find out the truth though.

01:53:27SS Baychimo is perhaps one of the most notable ghost ships in history.

01:53:31This large cargo steamer was built in 1914 in Sweden and plotted its way dutifully over

01:53:3716 years, trading provisions for pelts with native tribes of Alaska and Canada.

01:53:43But then, on October 1st, 1931, Baychimo got caught in pack ice.

01:53:49At first, it seemed the crew would be able to wait it out and continue on their route,

01:53:52because the ship broke free in a couple of days.

01:53:55But in less than a week, it became caught again, this time for good.

01:54:01In another week, a rescue party was sent to fetch 22 of the Baychimo's crew, while another

01:54:0615 remained behind to wait through the winter if necessary and get the ship back.

01:54:11But a month later, after a powerful blizzard struck their camp, the sailors went out of

01:54:16their shelters only to find the ship gone.

01:54:19Luckily, a few days later, a native hunter told them Baychimo hadn't been lost yet.

01:54:25He'd seen it about 45 miles from where they had been stationed.

01:54:28They managed to track it down, but decided the ship wouldn't survive the winter.

01:54:33So they took the most valuable cargo from its hold and abandoned it.

01:54:37They were wrong though, SS Baychimo did survive that winter, and many more that followed.

01:54:43When the ice broke, it sailed away on its own, drifting listlessly along the shores

01:54:47of Canada and Alaska.

01:54:50There were numerous sightings of the ghost ship, sometimes adrift in the open sea, and

01:54:54at other times, stuck in the pack ice again.

01:54:57People attempted to board and salvage it, but weather conditions or lack of equipment

01:55:02always prevented them.

01:55:04SS Baychimo was last sighted by Native Alaskans in 1969, 38 years after its abandonment.

01:55:12What became of it later remains unknown.

01:55:16The story of SS Orang Medan is one of the most puzzling and harrowing ghost ship stories

01:55:21of the 20th century.

01:55:23No one even knows for sure if the ship even existed in the first place.

01:55:27It wasn't recorded in Lloyd's Shipping, the international register of ships, which

01:55:31makes it either a tall tale or a vessel that avoided being officially recognized for some

01:55:36shady reasons.

01:55:38In any case, the accounts as to what happened to the Medan vary.

01:55:42According to most reports, it was carrying some unknown cargo in the Indonesian waters

01:55:46when a distress call was received by another ship in the vicinity.

01:55:50The officer on duty heard an SOS message, but its contents are different depending on

01:55:56the accounts.

01:55:58The message did not repeat and the crew of Medan didn't answer to any attempts to contact

01:56:03it back.

01:56:04The ship that received the distress call hurried to the rescue, but they only reached the vessel

01:56:09the following day, when it was already drifting and slightly listing.

01:56:14When the rescuers boarded the ship, they found that none of the crew had survived.

01:56:19However, one lifeboat was missing, which implied that there was at least one crew member who

01:56:24managed to escape.

01:56:26What happened to the rest of the people on board remains a mystery to this day.

01:56:31Still, there are no hard facts about this story, so we might never find out whether

01:56:36SS Orang Medan was actually a ship and not a thing of fiction.

01:56:41SV Zabrina was a three-mast sailing barge built in 1873 for river trade ships in South

01:56:48America.

01:56:49She served for well over four decades, proving to be a sturdy and reliable ship.

01:56:55It was later transferred to Europe, where it continued serving its purpose well.

01:57:00Then, in October 1917, Zabrina set sail on a regular voyage only to be found ashore several

01:57:07days later.

01:57:09Mysteriously, although the ship was perfectly intact, the entire crew of five and the captain

01:57:15were gone.

01:57:17There is no direct evidence or hard facts as to what really happened that day.

01:57:21The most convincing theory is that the crew were washed away from the deck because of

01:57:25an underwater explosion.

01:57:28Then, the ship sailed ahead without them, but the truth, as always, remains unknown.

01:57:35April 1912 marked one of the most terrible tragedies in the history of the world.

01:57:40The most unsinkable vessel, the pinnacle of engineering at that time, the huge Titanic,

01:57:45sank.

01:57:46On that dark, moonless night, the ship had many chances to save its passengers.

01:57:51There was another ship just a few miles away that could have saved the Titanic, but it

01:57:56didn't.

01:57:57It wasn't a phantom ship, and it's not some legend or a theory.

01:58:01This is a documented reality.

01:58:03There are records and witnesses' statements confirming this.

01:58:07But why didn't this ship help?

01:58:09Let's find out what happened that night by looking at these events from three different

01:58:13points of view.

01:58:15Let's start with the Titanic version.

01:58:1711.30 pm.

01:58:19The moon hides behind black clouds.

01:58:21Visibility is bad.

01:58:23Everything is calm on the Titanic.

01:58:25Under the captain's guidance, the communications operator stays in touch with the mainland

01:58:30through the radio.

01:58:31At this moment, some stranger breaks into the frequency, interrupting the operator's

01:58:36communication.

01:58:37It's unclear what this strange man wants and what he's talking about.

01:58:41The operator doesn't try to figure it out.

01:58:44He shouts at the guy, demanding him to disconnect.

01:58:47The connection is interrupted.

01:58:49At 11.40 pm, the Titanic crashes into an iceberg.

01:58:54The ice breaks the hull.

01:58:56Water begins to flood the lower decks.

01:58:58Nobody is panicking yet.

01:59:0020 minutes later, at midnight, the ship's crew sends a distress signal through the radio

01:59:05frequency.

01:59:06Few people understand how bad the situation really is.

01:59:10After 20 minutes, at 12.20 am, they start lowering lifeboats with passengers.

01:59:16At 12.25 am, they receive a response to the distress signal.

01:59:21This is RMS Carpathia.

01:59:23Their captain reports they're already sailing at maximum speed towards the Titanic.

01:59:28But the problem is that the crash site is 58 miles away.

01:59:32This means Carpathia will only be here in four hours.

01:59:37At 12.45 am, the sinking ship's crew release rockets into the air.

01:59:42These flares are one of the main reasons for the terrible fate of many passengers.

01:59:47But more on that later.

01:59:4990 minutes later, the Titanic's deck breaks, and the ship dives underwater.

01:59:55At 4.10 am, the Carpathia finally arrives at the shipwreck location.

02:00:00The crew members make heroic efforts to save all the people.

02:00:03They take 705 survivors on board.

02:00:06At this moment, another ship appears.

02:00:09It's SS Californian.

02:00:11The Carpathia sails towards the New York coast with all the people.

02:00:15The Californian floats in search of passengers and finds nothing but wreckage.

02:00:20The ship was only a few miles away while the Titanic sank into the icy water.

02:00:26The Californian could have saved these people, but did nothing.

02:00:30Its captain, Stanley Lord, made one of the most terrible acts that a sailor can allow.

02:00:36He didn't help a sinking ship.

02:00:39When the world found out about all this, they detested Captain Lord.

02:00:43They couldn't bring charges against him, and the trial didn't punish him.

02:00:47But his career was ruined entirely, as no other ship company would hire him.

02:00:52Despite this, he never confessed he had been guilty.

02:00:55Before he passed away, the captain said it hadn't been his fault.

02:01:00If this was true, then what happened there?

02:01:04This brings us to the Californian version.

02:01:07It's the night of April 14th.

02:01:09The Californian is sailing in the cold waters of the North Atlantic.

02:01:13The ship gets into a section with a lot of icebergs.

02:01:16At 10.10 PM, Captain Lord stops the ship.

02:01:20It's too dangerous to move around this area, as they can damage the hull.

02:01:25At 11 PM, the ship starts drifting.

02:01:28It's impossible to move in such conditions with such poor visibility.

02:01:32The captain knows that the Titanic is coming here, so he orders the radio operator to warn

02:01:37the ship about the danger.

02:01:40Radio operator Evans turns on the receiver and tries to contact the Titanic.

02:01:45He spends about 30 minutes on it.

02:01:48The connection is finally established.

02:01:50At this moment, the Titanic radio operator is speaking with the mainland.

02:01:55Evans interrupts this conversation and tries to warn the ship about icebergs.

02:01:59The operator doesn't understand Evans' words.

02:02:03He's annoyed because Evans broke into the channel so brazenly.

02:02:07He shouts at Evans and cuts the connection.

02:02:10Tired, Evans turns off the receiver and informs his superiors about the incident.

02:02:16It's still a mystery how the captain reacted to this news.

02:02:19He probably thought the Titanic knew about the danger.

02:02:23He lets Evans go to bed.

02:02:25If Evans hadn't turned off the radio and waited one hour, he would have heard a distress signal

02:02:30from the Titanic.

02:02:32But you shouldn't blame him.

02:02:33At this point, he has no official reason to stay at the transmitter.

02:02:38Evans is too exhausted and can't fight drowsiness.

02:02:41So, Evans goes to bed.

02:02:44The Titanic begins to sink.

02:02:47Its captain sends a distress signal.

02:02:49The operator on board the Carpathia catches it, but the Californian doesn't, since the

02:02:54receiver is turned off.

02:02:57Captain Lord can't sleep.

02:02:58He feels that something is wrong.

02:03:01Meanwhile, the Titanic is rapidly sinking under the water.

02:03:05The captain gives the order to launch rockets into the air.

02:03:08And here is where one of the critical mistakes takes place.

02:03:12They release warning lights, but they are not red.

02:03:15The crew forgot to take red rockets on board for some reason, so they lit up the sky with

02:03:20a bright white light.

02:03:22If you need to send a distress signal, you need to release red lights.

02:03:27Captain Lord sees these lights, but doesn't perceive them as a cry for help.

02:03:31It can't be that there are no standard red rockets on such a massive ship as the Titanic.

02:03:37But unfortunately, it can.

02:03:40Captain Lord thinks the Titanic is sailing away.

02:03:43Perhaps there is some unknown reason behind those white lights, but he doesn't really

02:03:48know.

02:03:49So, Captain Lord has no idea that the Titanic is sinking.

02:03:54He still decides to contact the ship, but this time, not through radio communication.

02:04:00Captain Lord doesn't wake up the radio operator and sends a signal to the Titanic through

02:04:05a signal lamp.

02:04:06It's important to understand that many old-school captains didn't take radio communication seriously.

02:04:12They didn't understand the value of this technology.

02:04:16That's why Captain Lord doesn't wake up Evans.

02:04:19He sends light signals, but the Titanic doesn't respond.

02:04:23Many survivors later mentioned seeing the flashing lights of the Californian, but there

02:04:28was nothing they could have done.

02:04:30The ship's crew doesn't hear their cries for help.

02:04:34At 2.20 a.m., the Titanic completely goes underwater.

02:04:38A little more than two hours later, radio operator Evans wakes up and turns the transmitter

02:04:44on.

02:04:45He hears many rescuers talking about the sunken ship.

02:04:49Evans understands everything.

02:04:51He reports this to the captain.

02:04:53At that moment, the Californian immediately heads to the wreck site.

02:04:57They meet Carpathia there.

02:04:59With the survivors on board, it sails towards New York.

02:05:03The Californian stays sailing and looking for people.

02:05:06They find nothing but wreckage.

02:05:09The Californian returns to the mainland.

02:05:11The news about the ship that could have saved the Titanic is spreading all over the country.

02:05:17The trial begins.

02:05:19Captain Stanley Lord and the crew tell their version.

02:05:23They say their ship had been standing still.

02:05:26Many people don't believe them, and some of the surviving passengers claim to have seen

02:05:30the Californian sailing by.

02:05:32Still, the judge declares them innocent.

02:05:361962.

02:05:38Captain Stanley Lord is a very old man.

02:05:41He calls a notary to confess something.

02:05:44The captain makes his last remark about this case.

02:05:47He swears he's not guilty.

02:05:50But if it wasn't the Californian sailing past the Titanic at that moment, then what?

02:05:55The Samson Theory could answer that question for us.

02:05:59The sealing ship Samson is sailing in the cold waters of the North Atlantic.

02:06:04The crew aren't sleeping.

02:06:06They carefully study the surroundings, but not because they're afraid of icebergs.

02:06:10They're scared of meeting with the U.S. Coast Guard.

02:06:14The Samson ship's crew catch seals, which is illegal.

02:06:18At 12.45 a.m., Samson's captain sees white signal rockets.

02:06:23The team is sure it's the Coast Guard.

02:06:26They turn off the lights and sail away.

02:06:29It's dark, so they don't notice the sinking Titanic.

02:06:33They return to the coast of Iceland and hear about the disaster.

02:06:37They realize they have abandoned the drowning passengers.

02:06:41The nephew of one of Samson's crew members reads about this story in his uncle's diary.

02:06:47The nephew asks for permission to publish these recordings.

02:06:51All the people realize that Captain Lord wasn't guilty.

02:06:54But unfortunately, he didn't live to see this moment.

02:06:58Actually, it's still unknown who is guilty in this story.

02:07:02Two ships were nearby the Titanic.

02:07:05Their captains were adequate people.

02:07:07They would have helped save all the passengers.

02:07:10Their fault was that they couldn't understand what the Titanic wanted on that dark night.

02:07:16Someone forgot to put red flares in the box.

02:07:19This small but fatal detail was one of the leading causes of the tragedy.

02:07:23That's it for today!

02:07:24So hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like and share it with your

02:07:29friends!

02:07:30Or if you want more, just click on these videos and stay on the Bright Side!

Category

Transcript

Recommended