Facts about Titanic

At 11.40pm on 14^th April 1912, the unsinkable passenger ship the RMS Titanic struck an iceberg and sank in just three hours, killing 1,503 passengers. While you’ve likely seen the film starring Leonardo Di Caprio and Kate Winslet, how much do you know about the actual voyage?

1. The Titanic was filled with passengers from a variety of backgrounds, the most expensive ticket sold on the Titanic was one for first class which cost $4,350 in 1912, which would be around the region of $70,000 in today’s money!
2. Before setting off there were warnings that the voyage might encounter ice bergs and there were 6 further official warnings that they received during the voyage itself.
3. On the day the Titanic sank, there was a lifeboat drill planned but for some reason, it never happened. Perhaps, it wouldn’t have been such a tragedy had it taken place?
4. Speaking of lifeboats, there were not enough on board to carry the entire ship’s passengers and crew to safety. Despite this though, many of them were launched half empty, each one had the capacity for around 65 people but the first one departed with just 28 people inside.
5. It wasn’t just lifeboats that the crew didn’t have access to, they also had no binoculars because the key to unlock them had been lost. This meant that the lookouts didn’t have adequate equipment to spy potential dangers.
6. There is some debate about how accurate the film is, but one thing it did get right was that the musicians did continue to play on the first class deck as the boat sank. They continued to play for 2 hours. None of them survived. The ship’s chief baker however did survive even though he was left treading water for around 2 hours – he claims that he was drunk at the time so the temperature didn’t affect him.
7. There were 2,200 passengers on board when the boat sank, with 1,503 dying as a result of the collision. Of those victims, only 340 were recovered from the ocean with 119 of them being unidentifiable.
8. Did you know there is a conspiracy that says the Titanic was sunk on purpose? One of the claims is that the ship that sunk wasn’t the Titanic but its sister ship, the Olympic which was the subject of a large insurance claim. The story says that the boats were switched prior to the voyage and that the collusion was staged, however, help was expected to come and save the passengers and crew.