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Is It Time To Pardon the Iceberg?


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Old 03-01-2017, 12:49
phylo_roadking
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Actually...bunker fires were very common in coal-fired ships. Fire control was one of the main tasks of coal trimmers, the guys employed to level out the coal in the bunkers to stop it shifting or the ship listing. Bunker fire fighting was by pumping in seawater by hose...but wasn't popular cos of the amount of steam generated in an already terrible working environment, and raised coal dust in the air...which was itself a very flammable mix. Mainly the fires were fought by shovelling the burning coal down the feed chutes to the boiler room and burning it in the boilers, which was another the trimmers' jobs...feeding the chutes.

Titanic had 73 trimmers in her crew, it was these guys and the stokers who stood to their posts to keep the boilers fed and thus keep the power on as she sank. Only 20 of the 73 survived.
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Old 03-01-2017, 12:52
phylo_roadking
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P.S. Anyone who thinks burning coal can't weaken iron plates and rivets has never seen what burning HAY can do to the steel frame of a barn. The steel girders forming the roof frame can slump in the middle like soft toffee.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:01
BinaryDad
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P.S. Anyone who thinks burning coal can't weaken iron plates and rivets has never seen what burning HAY can do to the steel frame of a barn. The steel girders forming the roof frame can slump in the middle like soft toffee.
I think a lot of people tend to conflate softening/weakening of steel with melting - at the point where steel becomes molten. I think that people quite often do this on purpose, especially when it comes to certain conspiracy theories.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:02
bri160356
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Just for you Doctor_Wibble;….’growlers’ are actually pieces that have broken off even larger fragments known as ‘bergy bits’;

…..and that rhymes with ‘tits’ !
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:03
CLL Dodge
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Titanic had 73 trimmers in her crew, it was these guys and the stokers who stood to their posts to keep the boilers fed and thus keep the power on as she sank. Only 20 of the 73 survived.
The 20 who abandoned their posts.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:04
phylo_roadking
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It wouldn't have helped that the Titanic's construction was already compromised...not just by the quality of the iron plate, but by the rivetting holding the whole plot together. There were three grades of rivet used by Harland&Wolff, and each was far harder to flatten out than the next grade down. And as rivetters were paid by the rivet not the hour..many told the young lads fetching for them to bring them the softer grade two rivets rather than the grade three, harder ones. A few years ago industrial archeologists found thousands of discarded, unworked grade three rivets on and around the Titanic slipway.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:08
phylo_roadking
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The 20 who abandoned their posts.
True...but it illustrates 1/ how many she carried, and 2/ *for some reason* they were ALL at said posts when the 'berg hit...rather than their normal working in shifts. Something untoward was happening in the bunkers...
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:08
SaturnV
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I think a lot of people tend to conflate softening/weakening of steel with melting - at the point where steel becomes molten. I think that people quite often do this on purpose, especially when it comes to certain conspiracy theories.
Science and general knowledge are never the strengths of conspiracy theorists.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:17
TerraCanis
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When it comes to impact resistance of metals, "hard" isn't necessarily a good atribute if it leads to, for example, fracturing rather than stretching of rivets. And low temperatures tend to push metals away from ductility region and toward brittleness. As with other properties, metal quality plays a significant part.
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:23
bri160356
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True...but it illustrates 1/ how many she carried, and 2/ *for some reason* they were ALL at said posts when the 'berg hit...rather than their normal working in shifts. Something untoward was happening in the bunkers...
Some may find this enlightening;

http://titanic-model.com/db/db-03/CoalBunkerFire.htm
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Old 03-01-2017, 13:46
jra
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It wouldn't have helped that the Titanic's construction was already compromised...not just by the quality of the iron plate, but by the rivetting holding the whole plot together. There were three grades of rivet used by Harland&Wolff, and each was far harder to flatten out than the next grade down. And as rivetters were paid by the rivet not the hour..many told the young lads fetching for them to bring them the softer grade two rivets rather than the grade three, harder ones. A few years ago industrial archeologists found thousands of discarded, unworked grade three rivets on and around the Titanic slipway.
I saw a programme on TV that mentioned this rivet issue and the conclusion was that no single event was responsible for the sinking, but a combination of events. Also, more people died than needed, because distress calls were initially ignored or were delayed in being sent out (can't remember which).
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Old 03-01-2017, 14:02
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Did George Bush have advanced knowledge of the Titanic sinking? The people need to know.
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Old 03-01-2017, 14:07
BryanandLuc
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From the OP's link, an Irish newspaper

"It’s a perfect storm of extraordinary factors coming together: fire, ice and criminal negligence."

Sounds familiar?
Game of Thrones is based on the book A Song Of Ice And Fire and is made in Ireland
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Old 03-01-2017, 14:17
RobinOfLoxley
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Britannic also sank quickly, in spite of improved safety measures. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMHS_Britannic
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Old 03-01-2017, 15:25
Elvisfan4eva
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Lots of things contributed to the loss of life. There weren't enough lifeboats and another ship which could have got there in time had switched off communications so didn't hear any SOS. There was no requirement to communicate all night in those days. Also some iceberg reports never actually got to Captain Smith that night.
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Old 03-01-2017, 15:29
Elvisfan4eva
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I saw a programme on TV that mentioned this rivet issue and the conclusion was that no single event was responsible for the sinking, but a combination of events. (can't remember which).
Was it the one I saw last night where they tested the type of iron rivets used and proved that steel rivets would have been far stronger?
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Old 03-01-2017, 15:53
gomezz
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With a coal store on fire it seems to add up that another option in fighting the fire, would be to get rid of the coal in that huge store as quickly as possible, hence the speed
Didn't buy this argument. If it was true that they were carrying only sufficient coal to make the crossing without incident then they would have had plenty of room in the other coal bunkers to shift the coal to from the one on fire. Or was it a top-loading, gravity-feed set up?
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Old 03-01-2017, 15:55
RobinOfLoxley
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The programme the other day mentioned warped and buckled watertight bulkhead and brittle steel.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%2...utf-8&oe=utf-8

Don't remember any mention of rivets this time, but it's easy to miss an odd bit of a programme, especially when perusing rubbish on DS at the same time.
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Old 03-01-2017, 16:02
Joey_J
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Didn't buy this argument. If it was true that they were carrying only sufficient coal to make the crossing without incident then they would have had plenty of room in the other coal bunkers to shift the coal to from the one on fire. Or was it a top loading, gravity-feed set up?
Yeh it was a top loader pal
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Old 03-01-2017, 16:27
Union Jock
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People just repeating the lie! The hole in the side is too small to have been from an iceberg.
LOL, should it be iceberg size then?
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Old 03-01-2017, 16:37
SULLA
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None of the many survivors ever mentioned a fire.
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Old 03-01-2017, 16:42
Andrue
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I saw a programme on TV that mentioned this rivet issue and the conclusion was that no single event was responsible for the sinking, but a combination of events. Also, more people died than needed, because distress calls were initially ignored or were delayed in being sent out (can't remember which).
That usually is the case in any disaster. Most things are the result of a chain of events or collection of circumstances.
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:25
Miss XYZ
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I will forgive the iceberg but not Kate Winslet for not letting Leonardo on her door.
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:26
SaturnV
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None of the many survivors ever mentioned a fire.
Only crew would have even been aware of it, none of he passengers.
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Old 03-01-2017, 17:32
Elvisfan4eva
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None of the many survivors ever mentioned a fire.
They wouldn't know about it as it was below deck in the coal bunkers. It was mentioned at the inquiry in to the disaster but not considered a major factor in the sinking.
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