Mystery of Titanic | How the World's Greatest Ship Disappeared? | Dhruv Rathee in Hindi

Greetings, friends!

This is the incident of 10th April, 1912

RMS Titanic: world's largest and most luxurious ship in its time

It set out on its first voyage

It was traveling from Southampton, England to New York

All kinds of people were aboard- renowned industrialists and actors as well as immigrants,

who were on their way to America in search of a better life

It was being commanded by the 62 year old Senior captain Edward John Smith

There was a lot of excitement regarding this ship in the passengers, public and the media

It was not only the world's largest ship- around 269 meters in length

and more than 53 meters high-

the luxury on this ship was awe inspiring!

In those times, it cost 7.5 million dollars to build the ship, which,

if you take inflation into account, is equal to 400 million dollars today!

The facilities and decorations inside the ship could even leave a 5 star hotel behind

Stained glass mirrors, ornate wood paneling, two grand staircases

heated swimming pool, a Turkish bath, an electric bath

a gym, a squash court, 4 restaurants, 2 barber shops and a library as well!

Moreover, the kind of safety features that were used to build the Titanic,

this ship was believed to be "unsinkable"

It was a ship that could never sink- it was that safe!

White Star Line was the name of the company that built this ship

The Vice President of this company was so confident regarding that,

he had come out in front of the public and said that this ship is unsinkable!

But two days later after setting out on its first voyage, on 12th April, 1912,

Titanic began to get its first ice warnings

The Atlantic ocean that Titanic was crossing in order to get to America was replete with ice

There were mountains of ice- icebergs, that were a danger to this ship

These warnings are not an unusual thing

The ships that sail the oceans often communicate through radio and signal the nearby ships

about ice being present in their vicinity and seek caution in their path

After getting these warnings, Titanic changed its course twice to avoid danger

but it did not reduce its speed

It continued its journey towards its destination at a speed of 21.5 knots, which is equal 40 km/hr,

Two days later, on 14th April, 1912, there were 7 more ice warnings

but captain Smith and his crew ignored these warnings.

They did not slow the speed of Titanic

Slowly, the day draws to a close, the sun sets and the temperature sinks

The notable thing about the night of 14th April was that the moon was not visible

Without the moon, there was no moonlight and the visibility was low on this night

There was a crow's nest on the ship- a small platform at a height

which could be called a lookout point.

Someone is made to sit atop it so that they can keep watch on the track of the ship

to lookout for traffic or obstructions

The person sitting here has to face very low temperatures

The cold winds were blowing at a very fast pace

Moreover it was nighttime. The cold winds make the eyes tear up, which makes it difficult to see

At 11:39 PM, a man named Fredrick Fleet was atop the crow's nest

Suddenly, he saw before himself, a huge iceberg

He rang the bell thrice quickly so that the people below could be alerted

then picked up the phone and called the officers on the bridge

He screams that there was an iceberg infront of them and that the ship should be steered immediately

First officer, William, heard this message and signalled the engine room

that the ship should be steered in the left direction

But unfortunately, it was too late

Just one minute later, at 11:40 PM, the ship crashed into the iceberg

*The Titanic was a new breed of luxury life*

*Titanic left port of Southampton, England...*

*Among the passengers were many of the wealthy and influential-

the band plays, the gay tunes and American red time dancers"

The time was 11:40*

*The iceberg grazed the right side of the ship...*

*...and all of a sudden, she lifted up quickly

This iceberg was not a small one-

It was 200x400 feet in length- as big as a football field

and was so high that it was matching the crow's nest in height

Scientists estimate that the iceberg weighed as much 1.5 million tons

Titanic's front right side collided with the iceberg

Specifically, near the bow

Now, what is the bow?

You can see in this picture that the part right at the front is the bow

The part above the bow is called the stern and the protruded part below is called the keel

For around 10 seconds, the ship grazed against the iceberg

and a huge dent was formed

Due to this, small holes formed in the main body of the ship

You might wonder how that is possible?

How can a piece of ice tear through metal?

If you use the ice in your fridge, then yes, it won't cut through metal

But keep in mind the weight of a mountain of ice

It is true that even wood cannot cut through metal

but even then your metal car can crash into a tree and get deformed completely

Similarly, since the iceberg was so big and heavy, it caused massive damage to Titanic

A few seconds after collision, the ship's captain, Smith and architect Thomas Andrews

arrived at the site to see how much damage had the ship incurred due to the impact

When they saw, they realized that the ship would sink

They were completely shocked upon seeing this!

They thought that this ship was unsinkable!

At the beginning of the video, I'd mentioned that this ship was considered unsinkable, owing to impressive safety features

There were two main safety features which led to this belief

First- this ship had a double bottom hull

The main body of the ship is called a hull

A double bottomed hull would mean two layers:

even if the layer below got damaged, the second layer could save the ship

Second- the hull of the ship was divided into 16 separate water tight compartments

Even if 4 out of 16 compartments were filled with water, the ship would still sail

It would make no difference to the ship

But the impact created by the iceberg was on the side of the ship

The double bottom hull proved to be of no use

The sides only had one single layer

Second- the impact was so large that 6 out 16 water tight compartments were breached

Water was filling in all of them

The limit was 4. The inundation of 6 compartments meant that the ship couldn't be saved from sinking

The unsinkable ship would sink!

20 mins after collision, at 12:00 AM, captain Smith ordered his crew to send a distress call over radio

The nearby ships would maybe detect it and come to save them

Senior radio Jack Phillips turns out to be the hero of our story

One after the another, he began sending distress signals- there was no response

He sent another, and another... there must be some ship out there that would pick up their distress call

20 mins later, at 12:20 AM, there was a ship called RMS Carpathia that was present near the Titanic

It detected the signal

He spoke to the operator of Titanic over radio and directed his ship to move towards Titanic

and go save them

The problem was that despite its closeness, this ship was 107 kms away

Even if it moved towards the Titanic at its top speed, it would take 3.5 hours to reach the Titanic

Would the Titanic ship stay put for 3.5 hours?

The rest of the crew members lit up flares and rockets in the sky

in the hope that a ship nearby would notice them

But unfortunately, apart from the ship Carpathia, there was no response from any other ship

Meanwhile, Captain Smith ordered the evacuation of passengers using the lifeboats on the ship

As per protocol, women and children would be given preference to board the lifeboats

As for the passengers on the ship, they were not that scared

Most of the passengers believed that Titanic was an unsinkable ship, there is no need for worry

After all, the company that put out ads, claimed this again and again!

So, yes, they might have hit an iceberg, but the ship wouldn't sink!

For this reason, the first life boat that went down had a capacity of 65 people, but only 28 went

Half the lifeboat remained empty as it was lowered!

With the passage of time, compartments began to be filled with water one after the other

The ship began to tilt

Gradually, the passengers realised that the ship could indeed sink

When this realization dawned, there was chaos and people began to run around in panic

By 1 in the night, so much water had filled the compartments in the front

that the bow of the ship had gone underwater

Due to this, the rear part of Titanic surfaced out of the water

The propellers at the back surfaced out of the water

When the ship tilted to this degree, pandemonium reigned

People began to fight with one another for a seat in the lifeboat

The problem was there was a scarcity of lifeboats on the ship- there were only 20 lifeboats

which could accommodate only 1,200 people approximately

But there were around 2,200 aboard the ship

At 2:05 AM, the last lifeboat was lowered from the Titanic

But 1,500 people were still onboard

In this chaos, some people tried snatching their place in the lifeboats

But some people had accepted their fate and stayed back in the ship

*The end was chaotic. Everybody was crying, praying,

trying to get into the few lifeboats that were left.

Oh... it was, um, pretty sad at the end.*

As per eyewitnesses, the ship broke into two halves at around 2:20

and then slowly began to sink

It did not take even three hours for the unsinkable ship to sink

Of 1500 people aboard the ship either drowned with the ship

or the ones that knew how to swim, were killed by hypothermia

The temperature of the water was -2 degrees Celsius

If you fall into the water at this temperature, you'd die within minutes due to hypothermia

It is said that the captain of Titanic, Edward Smith stayed at the wheel until the end and drowned with the ship

Some even believe that he committed suicide by killing himself

The ship RMS Carpathia, that had set out to save the Titanic

reached this location around 3:30-4:00 AM

to save the people on the ship -but it was one hour late

After the disaster of the Titanic, questions were raised, many controversies took birth

investigations were conducted and some unknown facts surfaced that shocked everyone

How would it feel if I say that there was another ship 37 kms away from Titanic that night,

which could make it in time to save the passengers of the Titanic

It is true- the ship was S S Californian

One hour before the Titanic hit the iceberg, the last iceberg warning was issued by S S Californian

They had warned- Watch out! There are a lot of icebergs in the ocean here

After that at 11:15, the radio operator on the Californian ship had switched off the radio

The Californian ship had stopped for the night and was not moving ahead, keeping the danger in mind

Since the ship had stopped for the night and the radio was off, it did not receive the distress signal

The ship was so close to the Titanic that the passengers on the deck of the Titanic

could see the ship on the horizon

When the officers were boarding the passengers in the Titanic,

one officer even remarked that he could see a ship in the distance

and that it would come save them soon and so there was no need to worry.

But this Californian ship did not come even when rockets and flares were lit up

It is reported that after 12 AM, the crew members on the Californian ship

had actually seen the rockets fired from Titanic

They had even informed their captain Stanley Lord but the captain insisted that it was no distress signal

rather the rich men on Titanic who were partying

Had Captain Lord of the Californian ship taken the rockets and flares seriously that night

so many people aboard the Titanic could have been saved!

Next morning when they switched their radio on, they receive the SOS calls from Titanic

They reach the site but it was too late by then

They only saw dead bodies floating in the water

Both the inquires that were conducted in this matter put the blame on Captain Lord of the Californian

But one single man cannot be blamed for such a huge disaster

Other people were responsible as well

Like the lifeboat example I mentioned, there were not a sufficient number of lifeboats

because the company that made the ship thought it was unsinkable and the lifeboats were unnecessary

Apart from that, the captain of Titanic had not even conducted safety drills

A safety dill was to be conducted on the day Titanic collided with the iceberg

But the captain canceled that because he thought they were unnecessary since the ship was unsinkable

The next mistake was that of steersman Robert Hichens, who was at the steering wheel

That night, when an iceberg alarm was sounded, the officer on the deck instructed that

the ship should be turned left

But in panic, Robert Hichens misunderstood the message

and steered the ship towards the right

This was the opposite direction- towards the iceberg

By the time he realized his mistake, it was too late.

British inquiry also found that Titanic was issued so many iceberg warnings and to proceed with caution

but despite that, the ship was sailing at full speed.

Why was that?

Why did the captain not slow down? There are many theories behind that

A popular theory suggests that Joseph Bruce, the chairman and managing director of White Star Line

the company that manufactured the Titanic, influenced captain Smith

and pressured him that the speed of the ship be maintained

There was tremendous pressure from the company that the ship had to complete its first voyage in 6 days

so that a record could be broken-

so that they could show that the Titanic was not only the biggest, the most expensive ship

but the fastest ship as well!

A specific incident happened on 14th April, at 2 PM

when Captain Smith saw the ice warning and showed it to Joseph

that they should reduce the speed because there is an ice warning

But Joseph stuffed the paper in his pocket so that the people and the crew members did not find out

He did not want the speed of the ship to slow down

This one disaster changed this industry worldwide for ever

Many new regulations and standards were set up to avoid such disasters in the future

In 1914, an International Ice Patrol was set up

so that the oncoming ships could be alerted about the icebergs in their path

A treaty International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS ) was signed

which set new standards regarding ships

For example, a lifeboat regulation was framed

mandating that the ships should have a sufficient number of lifeboats for every passenger

When the Titanic sank, it took more than 70 years to find its wreckage under sea

In Sept 1985, an American ocean explorer, Robert Ballad

and a French oceanographer managed to find the Titanic under the sea

Its wreckage was found 3,800 metres (3.8 kms) under the sea

Two separate pieces of the ship were found- 600 meters apart

Today, so many years later after the ship sank, environment has started to erode the ship lying underwater

The actual ship looked like this and today, this is all that's left of it

It has been reported that bacteria and other organisms are eating away its metal framework

It is expected that by 2030, this ship would completely disintegrate underwater

Today, even after 110 years, the fascination regarding Titanic still remains in the minds of people

In 2012, an Australian billionaire Clive Palmer planned that he would make Titanic 2

A copy cat and a copycat model of the original Titanic

He even declared that it would sail on the same route

All the elements of the ship was to be constructed in the same way as the original

Originally, the project was set to be completed in 2016, but it has not been completed even in 2022 due to delays

It is said that people do not have interest in this project because if an exact replica of the Titanic was made,

because it would not have either TV or Wifi and nobody would want to go on it

It might be that the unsinkable Titanic 2 might have already sunk even before it sailed

If you liked the video, then do watch the video on the Bermuda Triangle