Please always remember that an amateur built the Ark. Experts built the Titanic.
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Please always remember that an amateur built the Ark. Experts built the Titanic.
Pete...kinda puts things in perspective....doesn't it?
What built the iceberg? The Titanic didn't sink because of its shipyard. (Her sister ships didn't fall apart easily.) It sunk because the managers and their need to be first and be best.
Lesson learned: sometimes caution is okay. It's okay to go slow the first time.
(Thinking back to the very first fly I tied...which went v e r y slow.)
Actually, the Titanic DID sink because of the shipyard. It had a similar problem to the early Liberty ships which cracked their hulls due to the cold North Atlantic waters. A materials problem led to a design flaw which caused the initial crack in the Titanic started by the iceberg to continue on until too many compartments were broken open to the sea.
Engineer Pete
Pete,
Interesting. I saw a show where they took some of the hull to the naval engineering facility in Maryland. The Navy seems to think that the large number of carbon inclusions in the high carbon steel of the day and the cold sea water made the steel brittle. I wonder if they were able to get final proof of their theory.
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Eric "nighthawk"
American veteran and proud of it!
Nighthawk,
I seem to remember reading in Pop Sci or Pop Mech sometime in the mid '90's that they had found the rivets that were used on the Titanic had a high sulfur content, which makes steel brittle and thuse the rivets broke causing the seams to break open and leak. I don't know if that's still the theory or not, but it was back then.
Anyway, I also understand that the true sistership of the Titanic, forgot the name, but was built right alongside the Titanic, also had a catastrophic end. I believe I saw this on the History Channel (wonderful channel, BTW). Therefore, my vote would be with the shipyard/naval architect problems.
Paul
There was a similar problem in Boston. There was a HUGE molassas storage tank which broke during cold weather due to a simlar cause. It killed MANY people and horses in the congested area in which it was located.
A famous legal comment came from that case. Half the world's experts felt one way and half the other. I believe it was the judge who said something like: "It is disconcerting that half of the world's experts are incompetent."
Yikes, I'd hate to see the iceberg that made it all the way to Boston.
Sorry, couldn't resist.
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Keepeth they back cast out of the freakin' flora.