One hundred years ago on Tuesday, the Titanic — then the largest and most luxurious ship in the world — slid down the greased slipways from her building berth and into the waters of Victoria Channel in Belfast Harbor. It was a moment of enormous pride and emotion for the men who had built her, and the euphoria of the cheering crowds was reflected in contemporary accounts of the launch. “If the circumstances under which the launch took place can be accepted as an augury of the future,” said one Belfast newspaper, “the Titanic should be a huge success.” John Parkinson’s father Frank worked on the ship and watched as the great liner was launched. “I remember asking him, ‘How can a ship that big stay up in the water?'” said Parkinson. “My father’s response was instant: ‘Johnny, that ship will always stay up in the water.'”
But less than a year later, on the night of April 14, 1912, the Titanic’s maiden voyage ended in disaster when the ship sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The iceberg she struck ripped a 300-ft.-long gash in her steel hull, and the vast inrush of water took her down, resulting in the deaths of 1,517 people. Back in Belfast, shipyard worker Frank Parkinson broke down and sobbed when he heard the news.
Which may be true. But there is still the fact that although there were 2,201 people on board, the Titanic had only enough lifeboat capacity for 1,178. “There was no effective lifesaving Plan B to prevent the passengers and crew perishing in the freezing waters of the North Atlantic,” says McCaughan. And it was that one simple oversight that ultimately turned the Titanic from the greatest ship in the world to a byword for disaster.
See if the Titanic steered into the iceberg.
See the Titanic in the top 10 clashes at sea.
