The Crash: Timeline
ICE WARNINGS COME IN RAPIDLY FROM SURROUNDING SHIPS FOR MORE THAN TWELVE HOURS
+ April 14, 1912: 9:00 a.m.- Titanic recieves a message from the Caronia warning of much ice ahead.
+ April 14, 1912: 11:40 a.m.- A Dutch liner called the Noordman warns of much ice in the same place as the Caronia. The message is delivered to the bridge. Little does the crew know that in twelve short hours they will be hitting a life-or-death iceberg.
+ April 14, 1912: 1:42 p.m.- Another message is recieved from the Baltic warning of " large quantites of field ice" about 250 miles ahead of the Titanic. It is delivered to Captain Smith who gives it to Bruce Ismay (owner of the Titanic) who puts it in his pocket.
(+ April 14, 1912: 5:30-7:30 p.m.- The air temperature drops ten degrees to 33 degrees Fahrenheit.)
+ April 14, 1912: 5:50 p.m.- Captain Smith alters the route of the Titanic a little more South.
+ April 14, 1912: 7:00 p.m.- The Titanic's wireless operators recieve three ice warnings from the Californian telling them to change direction and travel farther South. The operators deliver the ice warnings to Captain Smith. Captain Smith does not change course or slow down, but instead orders his lookout, Fredrick Fleet, to look closely while they were sailing.
+ April 14, 1912: 7:30 p.m.- Harold Bride, the junior wireless officer, recieves another message from the Californian (two hours straight ahead) that says that there are three large icebergs ahead. Bride then takes the message to the bridge but Captain Smith is at a dinner party. Officer Lightoller is sailing the ship. Captain Smith never recieves the message. The iceberg is now only 50 miles ahead of the Titanic.
+ April 14, 1912: 9:00 p.m.- Captain Smith excuses himself from the dinner party and goes to the bridge. He is happy that the Titanic is traveling at its top speed of 20 knots, or 26 miles per hour. He is happy that the night is clear so that they can continue at this speed (The Titanic was pressured to travel as fast as it possibly could for publicity). He orders officer lightoller to not slow down unless the night becomes unclear.
+ April 14, 1912: 9:20 p.m.- Before Captain Smith leaves for bed he informs Officer Lightoller that "if it becomes at all doubtful" he should come get Captain Smith.
+ April 14, 1912: 9:30 p.m.- Jack Phillips, senior wireless officer, recieves another message from Californian that reports that there is "a great number of large icebergs" in the Titanic's path. Phillips is busy sending other messages so he ignores this one. This message is never delivered to the bridge. Officer Lightoller orders Fredrick Fleet to keep his eyes peeled for icebergs until morning.
+ April 14, 1912: 10:00 p.m.- Officer Lightoller leaves the bridge and First Officer Murdoch begins sailing the Titanic.
(+ April 14, 1912: 10:30 p.m.- The outside temperature drops to 31 degrees Fahrenheit.)
+ April 14, 1912: 10:55 p.m.- Jack Phillips recieves another warning about icebergs and ice fields from the Californian who is only 20 miles away. Phillips is still busy so he tells the Californian's wireless operator, "Shut up,shut up, i am busy working Cape Race." The message from the Californian is never delivered.
ICE WARNINGS END
+ April 14, 1912: 11:30 p.m.- The Californian's wireless operator turns off his set (not because he was mad but because this was normal) and goes to bed. There is now no one close enough to the Titanic with a source of communication. Lookout Fleet notice a haze of some sort directly ahead but assumes that it is not an iceberg.
+ April 14, 1912: 11:40 p.m.- The Titanic is still traveling at its fastest speed of 20.5 knots. Titanic lookout, Fredrick Fleet, sights the iceberg dead ahead from the birds nest. It is only about 500 yards away from the Titanic. It is a very large iceberg, about 60 feet above water. He rings the bell three times, meaning that there is danger ahead. In return he recieves a simple reply, "Thankyou!" Murdoch orders the engine rooms to stop the engine and then tries to turn. He also pulls the lever that closes the watertight doors down below the water line. This all happens in a little over 30 seconds. There is then a silent pause of hope and then a gentle bump and quiet scrape. Most passengers feel nothing and continue sleeping. Only a few passengers come to the deck to see if anything is wrong. Captain Smith feels a slight bump and comes to the bridge to see if anything is wrong. The crew is ecstatic, thinking that the Titanic only scratched by the iceberg and has no damage.
+ April 14, 1912: 11:50 p.m.- After only 10 minutes after the Titanic hit the iceberg, six safety compartments have already flooded. The Titanic was designed to be able to stay afloat if four safety compartments are flooded, but not six. After hearing the news, Captain Smith goes and gets Thomas Andrews who had not felt the Titanic hit the iceberg. He is in his room studying drawings of the Titanic, looking for different ways he could still improve the Titanic after this journey is complete. When Captain Smith finds him, he tells Andrews of the crash and takes Andrew down to the engine rooms to see if Andrews knows how long they have or if they will be sinking. After a quick inspection, Andrews concludes that the Titanic will begin rapidly sinking soon and has no longer than two hours.
+ April 14, 1912: 12:00 p.m.- With Andrews depressing news in mind, Captain Smith orders the crew to begin preparing the lifeboats. He also orders all stewards and stewardesses to begin waking up the passengers and hand out life belts (life jackets). Most passengers believe that nothing is wrong and that this is simply a precaution. One women remarked that "the Titanic could roll over 1,000 icebergs and not sink". Some passengers will not even leave their rooms. One man claims that "it will take more than an iceberg to get [him] out of bed". The water is now seeping above the keel (the bottom frame) and will soon be flooding people's rooms.
(+ April 14, 1912: 12:00- 2:00 p.m.- Several ships as far as 500 miles away notice the Titanic's distress rockets and begin to sail toward the Titanic. The closest ship to the Titanic is the Carpathia which is 58 miles away from the Titanic. Even though the Carpathia is the closest to the Titanic, it would still take somewhere around three hours to reach it. This is one hour to late.)
+ April 15, 1912: 12:15 a.m.- The Titanic's band sets up in the first class lounge on the top deck. They later move onto the actual boat deck so passengers will be calmed as they load into lifeboats. No member of the band ever tries to load into a lifeboat. The whole band goes down with the ship.
+ April 15, 1912: 12:20 a.m.- After twenty minutes of waiting for any possible miracle, Captain Smith gets conformation that the Carpathia is on its way, 58 miles away. Even though the Carpathia is the closest ship to the Tiitanic, it will still take about three hours to reach them. Captain Smith realizes that the Titanic is rapidly sinking and gives the sad, highly anticipated order to start loading ONLY women and children into lifeboats.
+ April 15, 1912: 12:45 a.m.- About one hour after the Titanic hit the iceberg, the first lifeboat, lifeboat number 7, is safetly lowered into the ocean. The lifeboat has enough space to hold 65 passengers, but is only lowered with 27 people. A "mystery ship" is seen in the distance and the Titanic tries to contact it with distress rockets and morse lamp codes, but there is no response. The ship then disappears into the distance. If they had contacted them, all of the Titanic's passengers could have been safetly rescued. The identity of this ship is never known, not even until this day.
(+ April 15, 1912: 12:55- 1:10 a.m.- Three more lifeboats are lowered with way less passengers than they can hold (20-30 passengers out of 60-70)).
+ April 15, 1912: 1:15 a.m.- The Titanic begins to flood quicker and tilt more. Boats are now being loaded to full capacity.
+ April 15, 1912: 1:30 a.m.- After an hour and a half of calmness, the Titanic's passengers become more panick stricken and the now tilted deck becomes very hectic. The Titanic sends more wireless messages to the Carpathia explaining that they are now desperate.
+ April 15, 1912: 1:45 a.m.- The last message is sent to the Carpathia. It reads: "Engine room full up to boilers."
+ April 15, 1912: 2:10 a.m.- Captain Smith tells wireless officers, Bride and Phillips, to stop sending messages and try to load onto a lifeboat. He informs that it is now "every man for himself."
+ April 15, 1912: 2:15 a.m.- The Titanic's crew begins to loose all hope. Captain Smith is seen returning to the bridge and is never seen again. Thomas Andrews is seen alone in the first class smoking room and is never seen again. The band stops playing their music. Many passengers and crew members begin to jump over board in a hope to survive. Two collapsible lifeboats have been turned upside down from water impact. A dozen of people try to climb on to each boat. They are later rescued, but only half of them are still alive.
+ April 15, 1912: 2:20 a.m.- The Titanic's lights flash on and off once and then go out for good. There is sudden darkness. Passengers then hear everything in the ship lung forward and watch as the ship breaks in half. The back end of the ship is left high in the water, but then settles and quickly fills with water and torpedoes to the bottom of the ocean, with 1,500 passengers and crew still on board. After the ship is fully underwater, survivors recall twenty minutes of painful screaming, begging, and praying coming from the live people still floating in the water. Many survivors cover their ears or sing in attempt to drown of the screaming. After the twenty minutes is over, there is a chilling, dead silence. The silence of death.
+ April 15, 1912: 3:30 a.m.- One hour after the Titanic officially sinks, the Carpathia arrives as planned. The Carpathia shoots off distress rockets in the distance to let the survivors know that they are here.
+ April 15, 1912: 4:10 a.m.- First lifeboat with passengers is picked up by Carpathia.
+ April 15, 1912: 5:30 a.m.- The Californian hears about the sunken Titanic and begins to turn around to see if any help is needed.
+ April 15, 1912: 8:30 a.m.- Last lifeboat is picked up by the Carpathia. The Californian arrives at the site where the Titanic sunk, next to the Carpathia. It then steams ahead to look for any stranded survivors clinging on to debris in the ocean. Many dead bodies are found but no live bodies are.
+ April 15-18, 1912- The Carpathia sails to New York with the Titanic survivors on board.
+ April 18, 1912: 9:00 p.m.- The Carpathia arrives in New York. Friends and family of the Titanic passengers await to see if their loved ones survived the crash.
(+ April 25- July 3, 1912- The U.S. and British Inquiry investigates the crash of the Titanic and decides that no one is to blame for the sinking of the Titanic and that it was purely and accident.)
(+ April 17- May 15, 1912- White Star sends out various ships to recover dead bodies. In-all, they find 328 dead bodies that they then try to identify and bury. Any bodies that are not identified are buried in a burial site blandly marked by numbers and a memorial for their bravery for dying on the Titanic.)
