Facts and Myths About Titanic Add More Mystery to the Story

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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!

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