After the Titanic sank recriminations and blame followed, sometimes ruining careers unjustifiably. As the decades wore on and she was found almost 2.5 miles down, history rehabilitated some people. The question still remains how to preserve the ship.
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Welcome to Stuff You Should Know, a production of I Heart Radio. Hey, I'm welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh, and there's Chuck and there's Jerry over there, and this is Stuff you should Know. Titanic Edition, Part two, this sequel. When we last left off, the Titanic had just set sail. Yeah, it was you you. I'd like to say it was in fine shape, but it had almost sucked another ship into it, and it had a coal fire aboard. But other than that, it was doing just fine. I wonder if the captain, after they averted hitting the New York was like, did you see those guys? They were totally pooping in their pants? Yeah, give them, give me another too, don't mess with me. So, uh yeah, I don't have the impression that the captain, I don't know if we said his name or not yet, Edward Smith, um his name. I don't know that he what he certainly doesn't in retrospect have a uh sterling reputation. No, no, I was gonna say, he doesn't have a reputation that is um like that of a maverick necessarily, like I think, have a sterling reputation at least exactly like he was. I saw in a I think a PBS documentary that that like captains like this at the time were likened to rock stars of today, like they had their own fans, and like it was a like you knew what captain you were sailing with, and it was a big deal. And he was one of the most famous and well well respected, if not revered as far as the captains go. But over time, yeah, exactly like stooping. But over time, um, because of like the inquiries and the desire to place blame and define like simple answers and compartmentalize everything, he's been um kind of painted with inaccurate brush that loses a lot of nuance. And one of the ways that he has been missle able that makes him seem like a maverick is that he was going full speed ahead, trying to break speed records, wanted to get there as fast as possible to show up those Kunard jerks, And that seems to just be not the case at all. And in fact, yes, the Titanic was going very fast. But according to a m an Irish journalist who has done a lot of research on this UH scene in Maloney I believe is their name, UH they were going that fast because they were trying to they were having to use up more coal to keep that fire from spreading, and that he didn't really have that much of a say in how fast the thing was going because they had to keep the coal fire under control. I'd like to slow down. Are we still on fire? Or we can't slow down there? But that really kind of goes to show you. It's like like really teaches you, like, oh, yeah, we've lost a lot of like the details here, or I shouldn't say that. Pop Cole sure has lost a lot of the details. There are plenty of people out there who know details like that. Those are the people you should listen to. Those are the people who we listened to. So you can feel pretty comfortable listening to us for the last episode in this one. Let's begin now to alright, so fast forward from April eleven, when it sets sail to April fourteen. We all know what happens over those three days. There's some steamy love making in the back of a car in the cargo hold, drawing me like one of your French girls. Wasn't that a good Kate Winslett, Yeah, I thought you were doing Leo either one would have been funny. Okay, there's room for me on that door. That was Leo. Yeah, and she said no, there's not. Oh man, we lost a bunch of listeners. No, no, it shook. I mean, can you joke about that? So it is the night of April fourteenth, twelve. This is the third day out. It is very cold. The water is about twenty degrees fahrenheit uh negative two point to celsius. And around noon that day some things started happening. They had this really cool modern Marconi wireless system where they could receive messages wirelessly, and the operators on board started receiving the first of at least what would be for messages about ice and like a big, big ice that's in the water. A second one comes in at five thirty five from an actual ship that said, hey, icebergs nineteen miles north of from right, you're headed right toward towards these ice bergs, and you know what they say, like they don't look big on top, but there could be serious trouble underneath. They really fill out under water. I don't think that's the thing. Uh. In about an hour before the collision, pm UH, the Californian which was a nearby vessel, said hey, we're stopped. We're surrounded by ice, and the operator on the Titanic said, literally, shut up, I am busy. I'm working Cape Race, which apparently was a relay station in Newfoundland, and they were busy sending out messages for the passengers. Yeah, the passengers could pace about sixty five bucks to send a Marconi Graham to basically show off to their friends and family back home that they were setting slow from the middle of the ocean. Yeah, because the postcard they sent was just in the mail room aboard the same ship at the same time as them. This this Marconi graham could go out immediately. So the first class passengers were sending out little hellos to the tune of about two d and fifty of them, I believe, just that day. So the Marconi operators were very much overworked, which is why he told the other one to shut up. Apparently said it twice, said shut up, shut up, exclamation points too. So two hundred and fifty first class passengers sent us just that day. It's like there were only three hundred and something first class aboard, so that was most of the first class. Yeah, well, hopefully there wasn't just like some obnoxious one that had sent out like ten or twelve but who knows, right, he was like, or send another marcornograph about Picasso. Yeah, so um he uh he, I was just thinking of Billy's ain again. Um, the Marconi operators like the presence of this, this Marconi wireless thing on board was just as cutting edges technology got at the time. It was a text. Basically, there were so few ships that had wireless aboard that it was just it was just nuts, which is why so many people were sending Marconi grams to show off. But at the same time, the fact that there were these wireless radios on some ships, including ships that were in the area, means that the Titanic did have warning that there was an ice flow like in between them in New York, and they started, you know, like you were saying, they were receiving warnings about the icebergs and ice flows. And again Captain Smith is depicted as having ignored this and just heedlessly headed on full steam ahead into an ice field, even though he had been warned against it. And from what I saw, um, this is again a mischaracterization because he didn't receive any warnings that that would warrant slowing down or changing course or anything like that. He knew that there are icebergs. It's just kind of like if somebody was saying, there's an iceberg twenty miles ahead of your your projected course, you know, heads up, he'd be like, okay, good to know, but that wouldn't require you to do anything about it. But there was one, the very faithful one that really may have sealed the fate of everybody aboard the Titanic. And that was that last one that um came in at eleven forty that said we're stopped and surrounded by ice That apparently did not make it to the captain as far as I know. Yeah, so like the deal, You're right, the deal was is is. Icebergs were very common. It wasn't like, oh my god, there are icebergs, we gotta stop everybody like they were used to dealing with icebergs. It was just a heads up. And that that last one may have been a big difference maker. Right, So, um, they knew that they are icebergs, um, but there was nothing to be worried about as far as they could tell. Uh. And when when Captain Smith handed over command of the ship for the night to um. I think, uh, Charles second officer, Charles Lightholer. So when he handed it over Lightholer he said, hey, um, if conditions become hazy, let me know and we'll you know, we'll slow down, but until then, full speed ahead. And it turns out that the night of April fourteenth, nine twelve, in the area of the North Atlantic was incredibly calm. The sea was like glass. Um, it wasn't hazy at all. It was totally clear, and there was no moon and lots of stars, so they couldn't see very far because there wasn't much light. They didn't have binoculars in the lookout. Um. But also because the sea was calm, there were no waves to um give out any telltale characteristics of breaking against iceberg's. It was just nothing but clear water everywhere they could see. So there was not a lot of chance of them spotting icebergs under the conditions that they were dealing with. So, speaking of the moon, did you ever hear that theory about how the moon could have impacted the fact that the iceberg was where it was? There was apparently on January four, a few months before the Titanic. The Moon made its closest approach to Earth in about four hundred years, which a so coincided within six minutes of a spring tide, which is the semi monthly alignment of the Sun and the Moon with the Earth. And basically all of this ends up in especially high tides entitle currents, and this was a really big year for icebergs. There were about double the amount of icebergs than average. And what usually happens is when they kind of calve off from where they start, they end up getting kind of hung up um when it gets into sort of shallower lanes, and that almost always happens. It kind of keeps them in place. But because of this strong spring tide, it may have like sent more icebergs out to see than normal. That's nuts, man. Yeah, And you know, again it's one of these things that other people are like, you know, everyone's trying to find these retroactive things to blame. But I think it all kind of adds up when you start looking at sort of the sliding doors theory of of fate, that it all sort of ended up impacting what happened that night. Yeah, and I think it's another reason why people are so engrossed by it because again, it's like it just seems almost preordained. Yeah, and that is very often traced back to this hubris that um kind of infested the whole origin and an idea of the Titanic, um that it was unsinkable and that it was just the biggest thing ever made. We're going to send it out as fast as we want. Um. That that is that that just seems like they were sailing into fate just from those things. You know. Yeah, I mean it's it is like a Hollywood script or something, but you know, it really happened. I know, somebody should make a movie out of him, so and get someone else to write it. Um oh Man. Eight hours long, Frederick Fleet and Reginald Lee were in the crow's nest, and I think Fleet is the one that later said that binoculars could have really helped, because Fleet was the one who was close to the end of the shift when he saw this iceberg. He sounds an alarm down to the bridge and First Officer William Murdoch was up there in about thirty seven seconds said stop the engines, go full speed astern, which was very common maneuver to sort of try and dodge something if you're in a big ship like that. And you know this again in retrospect, this was not a great idea. Uh they Some people posit that if it had just gone straight and hit this thing head on, it might not have sunk, but it ended up turning just enough to hit a very and especially when you factor in that fire, if that actually was a thing that weakened it, it hit the whole at a very vulnerable spot, possibly it's most vulnerable spot because of that fire. But also even had that fire not been there, it was like that was the Achilles heel of the the Titanic that area. And you know, it's tough to to fault Murdoch for, you know, trying to spin away for it, but it was it was well, it isn't except or it was an accepted technique to also just ram Iceberg head on um. But the reason Murdoch chose, probably why he chose not to do that, was because if you did that head on, you're gonna send everything and everybody lurching forward, because it's a head on collision. Um. When you side swipe something, that's much less jarring. And in fact, the passengers who did survive. The Titanic later said that there was a slight jar when this thing hit the iceberg. Um so much so that I think a passenger said, had he been holding a full glass of water, not a drop would have been spilled. So he did it I think out of instinct, because nobody wants to hit anything head on. But I think he also did it to spare the passengers and the crew and the cargo being jostled and jarred as rudely as they would have been had they hit it head on. Yeah. And this is where those rivets come into play as well, because it is theorized that because those rivets didn't hold like they should, uh, it ended up buckling the ship right there. And apparently it's that buckling that really sort of uh put the nail in the coffin for the Titanic. Yeah, like it might have survived the gouges had it not been for the buckling. Apparently. Yeah. Um so the I guess the buckling kind of pulled the rivets or the seams apart, and that allowed the water in. Is that the idea behind it? I think so, because you know they started Murdoch, you know, said let's get all these watertight door shut, which was a really really great move, but it was too late and they were there were five of them that were filling up. They originally thought. You know, Captain Smith was like, there, you know, there must be a three foot hole in this thing. Uh. And I saw a couple of different numbers. This article from how Stuff Works says three point two square feet for these six slim lacerations on the boat, I saw about twelve square feet. Yeah, I mean I saw I like into about two sidewalk squares. Um, like that took down the titan Now can you imagine? And that nuts Like of course you would think Captain Smith would be like, it's got to be a three ft gash just to have that kind of water, And he wouldn't know. It's not like he could see, like this was beneath the water. It struck the iceberg underwater. Um, so it was just an estimate. But yeah, now we know from from going down and looking at the Titanic, uh, using sonar, just how small they were. So just a couple of sidewalk squares. Huh. Yeah. And you know, the the really brutal part is Andrew's kind of just like in the movie Victor Garber. Once he got worded that there were five of those cavities filling up with water, he was like, that's it, man, Like we could have survived four. But and I know it doesn't seem like it right now, but this ship is going to go down. Yeah. So I mean, you remember, I think in the first one we said that the thing was designed to be just fine with two and that four it could probably make it, but five was the magic number. With five, it was like, this is this is not going to end well at all. And even with four compartments full and sealed off, there's a good possibility that the Titanic would have sunk, but it might have taken so long to sink that all of the everybody aboard would have easily made their way off. But that five, that fifth compartment was just it was just terrible, um because not only was the Titanic doom to sink, it was doomed to sink very very fast. I think Andrew's estimated two hours basically when he found out how many compartments were filling. Yeah, it was really the speed. And if you're saying to yourself, but Josh, how can you say that when they were short lifeboats. As we'll see, there were other ships nearby that that that likely would have gotten there quicker, or not gotten there quicker, but gotten there quick enough had it sunk lower to get people off of that thing. Yeah, um, take a break, Yeah, I think so I could use one, buddy. All right, let's take a break and we'll talk about what happened after that chunk of ice fell near Caton Leo right after this. So, um, when when Thomas Andrews explained to Captain Smith, like, this is going down and it's going to happen in about two hours. Um, Smith basically gathered his crew and said, hey, this is you know, the ship is sinking. We need to get everybody to the lifeboats. Um. He started, he started lowering the lifeboats. But apparently, from from what I've read aboard the Titanic, you wouldn't have known that that the ship was sinking based on the activity and the behavior of everyone aboard. Yeah, most people were kind of going about like their business, hanging out in the lounge, still sleeping, Um, getting ready to go to bed. Because this is I think around eleven or so when when it struck the iceberg, and like I said, it was such a faint jar that I think people couldn't believe that the Titanic would be taken down by something that only produced that that faint of a jar um. And so a lot of people just kind of acted like nothing was wrong. Yeah, I mean, crew included, I think it was. I think when the message went out from the captain, there was a lot of disbelief all the way around, right like, surely if we hit an iceberg bad enough to sink it, we would it would be you know, it would be evident, like just standing here like, but that's just not the case. And you know, because it was so large, uh you know, like you said, you wouldn't even spill a glass of water. So no one except Leo and Kate they saw that chunk of ice fall. Yeah, oh yeah, they I forgot. They were witnesses to it. They knew what was going on. I forgot about that. Yeah, they were out there, King and Queen of the world. All right, So ulf the captain is sending out messages and I mentioned that ship nearby. There were a couple but the Carpathia was a Cunard Line steamer, and they were like, oh, you need help, do you back. No, they acted fast, of course, but they were about fifty eight miles away and they knew. They're like, there's no way we can get there in time. No, especially not if it's going to sink in a couple of hours. But again, had you know, even just the only four compartments not flooded, the Carpathia probably could have made it there in plenty of time. But there was actually, Chuck another ship, though, the Californian, that was closer to the Titanic, and as we'll see in the inquiry that followed, it's basically the Carpathia hero California villain. The Californian was um accused of basically refusing to render aid, and that just wasn't the case. Um, there was a mystery ship that very much did refuse to render aid and just pretended like it didn't see what was going on. But yeah, it was actually a ship called the Mount Temple that was keptain by a man named James Moore, Captain James Moore. That was I believe, within ten miles of the Titanic the entire time that some passengers and crew uh later said they could see the lights, they could hear the lifeboats being lowered. They could hear the cries of people in the in the water, and that survivors said they saw another ship. They there was close enough that they could see some of the porthole lights, like that's how close it was, and that it just sat there, wouldn't come And it was because the captain made the decision that that he wasn't gonna risk go anyto the ice ice flows. Well, he also didn't come forward and say, yeah, that was me. He let um the captain of the Californian, Stanley Lord take the take the blame. And Stanley Lord went to his grave basically a disgraced captain, even though he would be vindicated when they finally found the Titanic and said, oh wait, you were way far away. And also more to the point, you didn't realize that the Titanic was in distress. So history has rehabilitated a lot of people. But at the time, and for many many years, you know, we like simple stories where there's a hero and a villain, and the Carpathio was the hero in the Californian was the villain. That's right, good story, I think so too. So they're giving out these life jackets, uh, made of or plenty of those, and they I think there was room for eleven seventy six passengers on lifeboats if they're all full. Uh. There were about two d and change of passengers and crew aboard. So at am, the captain says, start lowering these things. Let's get those first class passengers in there first. I think there were fourteen of the lifeboats, were the big daddies that could carry sixty five people. Uh. There were I think two emergency ones that could carry thirty five each, and then four collapsible boats that could carry forty nine people each. And uh, I see different numbers bandied about, but supposedly that first lifeboat uh, and maybe the first few were not full. And I think that first one only had anywhere from five to eight people out of sixty five. Yeah, mostly because there are a lot of people aboard who were like, I don't believe the Titanic is sinking, and that getting in that life seems way more dangerous to me than staying more than nice, warm, toasty Titanic where there's lots of brandy to be had. Um. And that's why some of those first lifeboats, That's what I was saying like it was apparently eerily calm and quiet and not at all chaotic. And then when it finally became apparent that, yeah, the ship was sinking and no, there's not enough lifeboats to save everybody, that's when it became rather chaotic. And then suddenly people were not only getting into lifeboats until the capacity was full, they were like jumping into lifeboats that were being lowered and injuring people already in there. Like it it became kind of pan ammonium all of a sudden. Yeah, like when your drink was sliding off the bar. Then it got real, you know, that's right. So, uh, first and class, I'm sorry, First and second class passengers are being uh going up to the highest deck, which is where these lifeboats are. They just like in the movie, the third class passengers were you know, kind of locked down there for the time being because they were waiting to get other people out of the way and then they were going to let them out. Uh, And that that John Hart, third class Stewart. John Hart basically was like you, a lot of you people haven't even been out of third class, so you don't even know where to go. So John Hard spent a lot of time directing people to the proper route to get them to safety or at least an attempt at safety. Yeah. I mean there were a lot of like, um stories of heroics, of everyday heroics of people who were just like, you know, this is my job. I'm gonna die doing my job trying to make you know, people as safe as possible. Um, And that that's that's a John Hart's a very good example of that totally. UM. So, the first officer Murdoch and second officer Lighthowler um were in charge of overseeing the lifeboats on the port side and the starboard side, UM, and they kind of approached it differently. I believe Murdoch was basically like, hey, you're breathing, get in a lifeboat, or you're just gonna try to get as many people out of here as possible, whereas light Aller was like, if you're a woman or a child, come on, but if you're a man, I'm going to shoot my gun in the air. Because by the way, all of the officers who were in charge of overseeing lifeboats were issued pistols basically keep people in line and in worst case scenario, shoot people who tried to get aboard lifeboats that otherwise shouldn't have been um and I think light aller shot or no, not a light aller. I think one of the um the fourth or the fifth officer had to fire his gun in the air to basically like get people to come back to their senses because they were like men were starting to try to push aboard lifeboats while women, Yeah, exactly, while women and children were still there. So again it was it was nice and calm, and everybody was, you know, following the order of women and children first. And then you know that that kind of started to crumble. Um in place. It's not everywhere, but in some places. Billy's ainet grabbed a kid. I have a child, remember that? Yeah? Yeah, and that was in another movie I saw recently. What Billy Jane or Billy's Ain't stealing a kid to get in the lifeboat. No, I'm trying to think there was another movie that was made recently where this couple that's like a kind of a post apocalyptic thing or something's going This isn't gonna be interesting. I'll try to figure it out and tell you later. But somebody else did the same thing, grabbed a kid and used a kid. Yeah, and you don't realize it until about two thirds of the way through the movie, and then you're like, oh my god, Like that's it's it was really well done. But I didn't realize that they'd stolen that from Titanic. All right, well, let me let me know. Uh, so the band really did play on that's that movie scene is straight out of reality, apparently, right down to the song. I think, um, they say the last song was either Autumn or Nearer My God to the and I think near my God is the one they played in the movie. Very you know, say what you want about the movie. That was. There were some really really gripping scenes in the second half of that film, and that was one of them. Uh. The other one that really always got me was uh. And and this is kind of the point where we are now with how this thing actually sank. Um, when Cathy Bates is as Molly Brown is in that lifeboat and sees that those propellers up in the air, Uh, it was pretty remarkable. Yeah, the the that those lacerations in the hole they took on um like water towards the bow, So the front of the ship was suddenly much heavier than the back of the ship, and the ship was built so strongly even with those sub sub standard rivets, the wrought iron ones, that the it didn't just break immediately, that it actually lifted up the rear and the propellers became became um visible first, and then it kept going higher and higher and higher, and then the pressure on those on the plates that were that whole held the whole thing together became so enormous that it was something like seventeen and a half tons of pressure per square inch. That's how much pressure was being exerted on the basically the halfway point where where the where the where the Titanic split in two. And finally it did split in two, but it didn't break into two immediately. The bottom of the whole, the um that connected the front of the back still hung on and it almost became like a hinge. And so the whole bow went under water, but just dangled there for a little while until it finally filled up. And at one point the stern, the back half of the ship was straight up in the air basically and was about as tall as the twenty five story building. Imagine being a lift and seeing that I can't I cannot like, I can't like all of this, all of these things that you're seeing. You're like, this shouldn't be happening. None of this should it be, should exist right now? And it was, and it was all still it was going pretty fast too. I mean like they launched the first lifeboats about two hours before. The stern was now suddenly like twenty five stories into the air. Finally the bow part fills up with enough water that it breaks off and it it was so heavy that it traveled the about two point four miles down to the sea floor or the Titanic rest today, in like six minutes. That's how fast it traveled down there, and just hit like a like a missile, basically it hit the sea floor. Yeah, and you know, obviously this is when they start losing like remarkably they had electricity, uh and even I think um radio that Marconi was still working for a while. But obviously when this thing s puts in half, that's when these flickering lights even go out. And that was also a very you know, pretty emotional part in the movie, when it goes quiet, when you know there's so much chaos going on, and when those lights go out in the boat is Finally, you know, when both halves fully go underwater, then you're just left with screaming human beings. Yeah, there was a survivor who said that it sounded to him like the sound of all the people crying and screaming and yelling for help in the water, that it sounded like the sound of Cicada's on like a summer night. It was just that kind of frenetic and and all encompassing. But then I saw another survivor who said that the worst part was when those when it started to like fall silent, when they were like fewer and fewer people yelling, because you knew that the people who'd just been yelling a few minutes before, we're now dead. They'd frozen to death. Apparently, the the temperature of the water was so cold that you would lose consciousness in about six to twelve minut It's basically yeah, and you know, we've been joking around and stuff. I think that the adage comedy is tragedy plus time. Uh, you can apply here, but we do not take any of this slightly. It's at this point it is one of the most horrific scenes that anybody could ever imagine being a part of absolutely, which is again why why so many people celebrate Molly Brown. Um, Because there were so many people out in the water still with those cork life jackets. Um. The guy who I think the quartermaster Robert Hitchens, who was basically the captain of the lifeboat that Molly Brown happened to be in, refused to go try to pick up survivors who might be in the water. He said, they're all dead and she's She threatened apparently to throw him overboard if he didn't go find people. And what was amazing is that some people did actually survive. Um. The chief baker, his name was Charles Jofflin or j Offen. He survived paddling around for two hours, two hours, and then he finally found a capsized lifeboat and clung to that climbed aboard that, and some people did survive like that. But but um, but he he was in the water for a couple of hours, and weirdly they attributed to him getting drunk before he went in the water. But this was apparently after he had helped save a bunch of people. The first thing he did is he went and stocked as many lifeboats as he could with bread, and provisions. Um. Then he started actually physically throwing women who refused to get into lifeboats into the lifeboats. And then after there was no one left to help, he went and started drinking. For some reason, they think that that kept him alive, where otherwise he might not have just maybe by freaking out, like it kept him from freaking out. Yeah, well warmed him up to maybe. I don't know, No, I think it's supposed to do the opposite of that opposite. Yeah, like, don't take that advice, don't drink choke. There's another story I saw talking about the sound of the um, like the people who were crying out. Um. There was a young survivor, I think he was like nine or ten or twelve, um. And he later on they moved, his family was moving to America, and he found out the hard way that he couldn't go to baseball games because the sound of the cheering crowd took him right back to the sounds of the people crying for help the Titanic. And he just wanted to love baseball but absolutely couldn't because because of that. Basically, he had PTSD. Basically, yeah, that's very sad, But let's take our last break here and we'll talk about what happened after to am, after the Titanic made its way to the bottom of the ocean. All right, so the Titanic is underwater at this point. It is chaos and death and despair everywhere you can see. The Carpathia finally arrives at about four thirty am on April and you know, these lifeboats were adrift. They had no compasses, no lights, they were freezing. Uh, they were I think the Carpathia recovered fourteen boats and seven and twelve people, which is remarkable. One of those people, only one of those I think died on routes in New York. And uh, you know, the world starts getting word that the Mighty Titanic has sunk, and it's you know, it's front page news all over the world. Basically. Yeah, when the our Pathea finally made port in New York, it was surrounded by um smaller boats that have been rented by the press who were trying to get scoops by shouting up to people aboard asking for quotes and and all that. Like, there was a gobs of money thrown at people by journalists to try to get their story because there. This is as international news as as news gets. Yeah. So apparently the Californian looked for bodies and did not find any may not have accounted for the drift, and you know, may have been looking sort of in the wrong place. And White Star said, as you would say, nuts to that, let's send out a bunch of search vessels to see what we can do. And I think they knew at that point they were not going to find anyone alive, but they were at least trying to recover bodies. And they sent out a few boats and one of them found three hundred and six bodies, one found fifteen and one, and then another couple found four people in one person uh. And again all these people died in the most tragic way you could imagine. They were water logged, They were so heavy that it took several people to lift them aboard. The first class passengers were put in coffins. They were embalmed. Um, this is really gruesome, but sometimes they had to break their frozen limbs just to fit them inside. It was um. It was sort of no time for the formalities of burial. It seems like it was a mass casualty scene and so they were just kind of doing what they could. I think. Yeah, some of the crew was actually buried at sea, which I I would be like, I don't bury me at see. That sounds like the opposite of okay to me, right, I've never been okay with burial. Let's see. Okay, you're telling me that. I'm just going on the record in case we ever go on a cruise together. Yeah, all right. So the US kind of like really insinuated it's self into this tragedy, umque to a questionable degree in some people's minds at the time. You know, the Titanic was a British ship, the White star Line was a British company, um. And yet the US held public inquiries. The Senate did um on the Titanic tragedy before the Brits could even do it, because they they started this inquiry I think one or two days after the Carpathia made port. That's how quick these the The inquiry was launched by the U. S Senate UM. And so all of these people who were subpoenaed as witnesses before they could leave New York, um had to stay and give their testimony before they could go back to England. So the British had to wait to hold their public inquiry until the American one was over, which I think kind of chafed everybody a little bit. But between the British inquiry and the American inquiry, they both basically reached the same conclusions, and they were threefold lifeboats, lifeboats and lifeboats. Yeah, and and not just the amount like kind of the stuff we've already been over. Like there was no system, it seems like, and this is all because it's true. It seemed like no one knew how to load these things. It seemed like there was a lot of indecision about where you actually do the loading. There were a lot of opinions flying about about who should be loaded, about how many crew members you need on these lifeboats, and there was just there was no direction at all. There was no uniformity and there was no plan. And that's like we mentioned at the beginning, because so many of these crew members just kind of showed up at the last minute and they didn't even have training and how to do this. Yeah. And like we said, the Californian was vilified. Um. That was another thing. Um. But the they it was you know, even at the time it was explained by the California's captain, like, look, the wireless operator went to bed. He didn't hear these distress signals. Yes, they were shooting off rockets, but we thought it was another boat that was mainly doing it to navigate through the ice. Like it didn't seem like a distressed thing to us. Um. And again history has kind of exonerated him, but at the time he was not very well thought of. Neither was J. Bruce is May, who survived because he got in a lifeboat. He was vilified as a coward who didn't go down with his own ship. Um. He was painted as um having dressed up as a woman to get a board, like just basically anything you can think of that's despicable. He was described as having done to get a board of lifeboat to save his own skin. Um. The only way that he could have had any honor dignity is if he had like willingly died with the ship. He didn't do that, And supposedly in retrospect he was probably unfairly characterized. Uh. He went to his grave saying that he Um there was no women or children anywhere near where he was, Like, they were not around, and he decided to get into a lifeboat that had space. Um, but even still, like he's just considered this despicable figure because of this kind of historical trend that was initiated during the public inquiries. Yeah, and of course Andrews the designer, uh and Captain Smith, you know, as in the movie you see them both go down with the ship. And that another very impactful emotional scene with Victor Garber. I think doesn't need like set the time correctly on a clock or something like. I know, I think he went and rearranged the deck furniture, the wicker chairs. No he didn't. I think he said the clock. Right, He's just such a cliche, he said, he said the clock chair. And and you know this is as things are sliding off tables. And uh, it's a good movie now that I'm talking about it, I kind of want to watch it again, all right. Um. There were other people that were hailed as heroes. The Captain of the Carpathia was knighted by King George five for his actions and saving people. The um Marconi operators and the just the Marconi operating or wireless system in general was viewed as heroes because had it not been for those instant distress signals that were sent over Marconi wireless. Um, who knows how long those those people would have been out there in lifeboats and how many more would have died. So, yeah, a lot of people could be saved, could have been saved. I think the number I've seen most widely used as five hundred. Had the lifeboats been properly filled with passengers, another five hundred people would have survived. Um. But you also have to say, well, how many people would have died had the Marconi wireless not been in operation at the time too, So Marconi himself is actually hailed as a hero for having, you know, come up with this this wireless even though I don't think he invented the technology. Binocular locker, maybe it doesn't need a lock, Yeah, Davy Player was like, oh god, I've got the key in my pocket, right, maybe just put it in a in the basket right there in the crow's nest, or just taking in your cheek, you know, locks, you don't need a lock. Okay, Are they afraid they're gonna people are gonna walk off with the binoculars? Right? They well they did. There were a lot of um, a lot of reforms that came out of this. They they started um launching ice patrols. Uh, wireless operators started appearing on ships far more prevalently, and they were there were operators sitting there around the clock to help with distress signals. But I mean, you know, and these probably saved thousands and thousands of lives. But because these things hadn't existed at the time or were ignored, like the lifeboat regulations, then uh, you know, a lot of people died brutal um So Chuck. The Titanic wasn't it went down and was not discovered until five I believe, right, Yeah, I mean that's when things get really interesting. Uh. I think anyone who had any even passing interest in the Titanic is marveled for years. Like we were talking about an episode one about these images and especially you know, the way these things are lit with these little sort of you know, these little swimming robots and their flashlights in the dark down there. It adds this eerequality to it with the suspended debris, and how easily this thing, you know, would would kind of come apart if it was knocked against or something. Just really stunning, stunning footage and that's I think what like drove James Cameron, he got really into it. Oh yeah. Um. The guy who discovered the Titanic was Dr Robert Ballard Um and he I saw a talk by him where he was talking about one of those early ones where they were using one of their UM remote vehicles with equipped with like a spotlight on it, and he said in from the inside, the gloom of the Titanic looked like a light came on, he said, He and the rest of his crew on the vessel aboard or uh on on the surface just like stopped breathing, Like there was the eerious thing you'd ever seen. And he realized that the searchlight had just was reflecting off of one of Titanic chandeliers that was still hanging there. I can't imagine what that sensation would have been like just terror, but also just total awe. You know. So the Titanic is falling apart thanks to a kind of iron loving bacteria I believe called hal amonas Titanic A. Yeah, I think that's right, right, surely that's on purpose. Yeah, yeah, they I think they discovered it from evaluating the Titanic, right, Okay. Um, And so they're there there. They basically don't think it's going to be around much longer. But Dr Ballard just saying, no, no, we can, we can do something with this. There's actually underwater technology that uses epoxy paint where you can paint underwater. And he has a proposal to save the Titanic by painting it and turning it into an underwater museum. Because outside um outside in the debris field like um, bodies were you know, dissolved and eaten within a very short amount of time. But there's still plenty of objects that are still there. Inside the Titanic. There's no currents, and a lot of areas inside the Titanic might be anaerobic, so it's quite possible that there are bodies generally preserved in there, and that a lot of this like rooms and um uh, different areas in the bowels of the Titanic are still in relatively good shape. So he's saying all like, it's imperative that we keep the Titanic from rupturing and opening up and exposing its innards to the currents and the oxygen in the ocean um, and we can do that by painting it. The outside of it, So I'm really hoping that he uh, he's successful in that quest. Very cool. Yeah, you got anything else? I got nothing else. I got one more thing. We could not talk about the Titanic without talking about futility. The book that was written by a guy named Morgan Robertson, and it's about the biggest ship ever built, the titan Uh that is um headed from Liverpool to or New York to Liverpool when it encounters an iceberg in the North Atlantic and sinks. And like the description of the type, the titan almost matches of Titanic even though it was built fourteen or it was written fourteen years before. Very cool. We cover that on something else at some point. Didn't we do an episode on coincidence once? I don't know, because if so, I'll bet that was it. Well, if you want to know more about the Titanic, have a good rest of your life, because there's a lot to learn. So go forth, find your favorite Titanic based podcasts or website and start there. And since I said start there, it's time for finally listener mail. You know, instead of listener mail, let's do the old call for reviews that we do once every five years, all right, let's do it. Um. Yeah, I didn't have a listener mail ready, so you know, occasionally we like to ask people for reviews and ratings on iTunes because we were told ten years ago that that helped. Yeah, I mean I think it still does. Um. So if you want to go onto Apple Podcasts or whether you're on Spotify, wherever you are, there's probably a way to leave a review. And if you can leave us a nice review in a rating like yeah, that's that definitely at the very least, it boosts our spirits, right, that's right. And also tell a friend. I mean, we've we don't try to grow the show very much, which is weird. We've never been great at it yet somehow it happened. But we've always counted on you guys to spread the words. So if you could tell a friend or family member about us, that would be wonderful. Yes, So, I guess thanks to all of you leaving us reviews and ratings, preferably good ones. Um, and even if you don't, thanks a lot for listening. We appreciate you all, each and every one of you agreed if you want to get in touch with us in the meantime while you're leaving your review to say hey, I just left your review, or I will never leave your review. It doesn't matter, even if you just want to say hi. You can shoot us an email to stuff podcast diheart radio dot com. Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeart Radio. For more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.