20. Although the iceberg must bear the brunt of the blame for the loss of the Titanic, significant engineering failures hastened the ship’s sinking and dramatically increased the resulting death count.
The sinking of the RMS Titanic, immortalized in modern popular imaginations, was one of the deadliest peacetime maritime incidents in history. Costing the lives of more than 1,500 of the 2,224 passengers aboard, including her chief architect Thomas Andrew. The Titanic sank after colliding with an iceberg on April 15, 1912, whilst embarking upon her maiden voyage from Southampton to New York City. Although it is undeniable that the tragedy was ensured by the negligence of Captain Edward Smith, ignoring six warnings of sea ice on April 14 and continuing to travel at full speed, noteworthy engineering failures contributed to the dire scale and swiftness of the disaster.
Taking just two and a half hours to sink, and with rescue over nine hours away, the speed with which the Titanic sank is of critical importance to the incident. An examination of the wreck of the Titanic has revealed that many of the approximately three million rivets holding the colossal vessel together were constructed from low-quality iron; upon impact, these crucial fixtures merely crumbled apart to expose the ship to the icy waters. Furthermore, despite possessing 16 watertight compartments and capable of remaining afloat with four flooded, these were not independently sealed internally. Consequently, water from one spilled through gaps into adjacent compartments hastening the ship’s sinking.