The titanic was underway. Making seven knots as she moved gracefully out towards sea. We were already past the docks and moving through the mouth of the river. Every passenger was either walking the deck or sipping wine in many saloons and cafes of course I was unable to do the second choice so I had to walk up the deck while my parents were drinking the wine. After a brief stop off at Cherbourg and Queensland the ship was casting off. Settings sail for New York. Taking her innocent victims on a death ride that they would soon not forget. This was unknown to all passengers at the current time of day.
The first few days were uneventful. Captain Smith steadily increased the speed day by day. The ship covered 386 miles the first day, 519 miles on the second day and 546 miles on the third. It was reported to us that Smith would increase the millage day by day. Smith was that confident that cancelled the emergency drills and ignored the iceberg warning for the patch of water he was entering. We were told by the captain the night before that the next night we would not stop and travel through the night which was a rear thing to do as most ships didn’t. As the bell rang for everyone to come down and have their evening meal.
The Titanic, although a floating palace, did not have advance warning systems that we have today. The Titanic had a back up system, the six lookout guards whose job it was to stand in the crows nest and keep a vigil look out for passing icebergs or other objects that may cause harm. High up in his observation port, that cold night, Frederick Fleet gazed out across the glistening sea searching for icebergs and sheet ice. It was 11:40pm on the 14th April 1912 when the iceberg was spotted coming straight towards the ship. He rang his bell as loud as he could so all of the ship could hear him sounding the alarm he phoned down to the bridge but the first time he had no answer then the second he did after the tension going out of his spine. He had them that he had seen a iceberg straight ahead of the ship and it was going to hit the boat. The boat was a scene of chaos the men down below were trying to stop the propellers form turning the men above board were trying to wrench the wheel around as far as it could go and along with that the passengers were trying to find out what the fuss was about. The iceberg got closer and closer until the boat hit it. Then the unsinkable ship was doomed for its adventure to the bottom of the ocean if they did not close the water tight doors quickly.
They had not done enough to save the ship form going under the water. The iceberg tore through the side of the ship, quickly flooding its compartments. Thomas Andrews predicted that the ship only had 2-3 hours before it vanish under the sea.
The order was given by Captain Smith to evacuate the ship. The order was also given the women and children were first to go off the ship.
But there was a enormous problem, there were not enough lifeboats on the Titanic which only had 20 on board, which only enough for 1178 of the 2220 passengers. Also nobody had been trained or knew what to do because the Captain decide that nobody needed training and had cancelled the drill s the day before it set sail.
