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[dramatic music]
and may contain m [Narrator] Titanic..
It's very name evokes a chill.
And the tale of its sinking is legendary.
Captain Smith was the man of the hour.
A hero of the era.
You have crew who were the best
that White Star could offer.
There were stories of heroism;
the way the band played until the end.
[soft music] [people screaming]
[Narrator] But are these stirring tales
of a heroic captain and crew actually true?
Since the tragedy,
Titanic historians have sought to acquire
the personal papers of Lord Mersey.
The man charged in Britain with investigating the disaster.
His private journals may hold the answers.
Now, for the first time since 1912,
these critical documents will be revealed.
A hundred and eight years later, here we go.
[Narrator] Will this information alter
the accepted story of how and why Titanic sank?
They didn't think that they would need to have
lifeboat drills.
Titanic told 'em to shut up and go away.
Nearly the entire response was completely improvised.
Californian could have galloped to the rescue
like the 5th Cavalry.
[bleep]
[Narrator] What new light
can the contents of this box shed
on one of history's most enduring disasters?
[dramatic music]
♪ ♪
[ominous music]
[Narrator] April 17, 1912.
Two days since Titanic's demise.
The Mackay-Bennett, a 269 foot cable repair ship
in service since the 1880s
is dispatched from Halifax, Nova Scotia on a grim task:
Sail into an icy hell
and retrieve Titanic's dead.
[dramatic music]
Richard McMichael is a historian at the
Maritime Museum of the Atlantic in Halifax.
As you can imagine, this is a nightmarish situation.
The crew's main role is to repair sections
of damaged Transatlantic cable.
There's nothing in the job description
about fishing women and children
out of the icy waters of the North Atlantic.
[Narrator] Mackay-Bennett's journey takes 36 hours.
And, when they enter the death zone,
they find several hundred corpses.
Men,
women,
children.
[ominous music]
[Richard] Fifty-one we have taken on board today.
This is the first day out.
The sea still seems strewn.
With the exception of ourselves and the bosun bird
is the only living creature here.
Put yourself in the position of these men.
One day alone, Mackay-Bennett recovers 128 bodies--
127 men, one woman.
[solemn music]
[Craig Sopin] There are photographs that exist
of those people being buried at sea.
Very solemn just to look at.
And then they would keep a log in real time.
[Richard] 8:00 p.m.
The tolling of the bell summoned all hands to the folks,
as the weighted body plunges into the sea,
there to sink to a depth of about two miles.
Splash,
splash,
splash.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] As the gruesome details of Titanic's fate
filters back to both continents,
a horrified public demands answers.
[dramatic music]
Mark Chirnside is a maritime historian,
and author of 10 books on British Royal Mail Ships.
It was such a huge disaster.
The questions were rightly being asked about how the
largest and most luxurious ship in the world
could possibly sink during its maiden voyage,
and with such a catastrophic loss of life.
There was such public interest in what had happened
that the British government determined
that they needed to appoint a wreck commissioner.
[Narrator] Lord John Charles Bigham, First Viscount Mersey,
is a well-connected barrister,
judge and politician.
And he's chosen for a monumental task.
Find out exactly what went wrong
on Titanic.
Charles Haas is an historian,
author and president of the Titanic International Society.
Lord Mersey was bringing to the table
considerable legal knowledge,
hopefully a sense of fairness, a sense of balance.
All of the things that a judge, if you will, needs to have.
The thing that we have to keep in mind, however,
is that the investigation in England
was a Board of Trade investigation,
which means that, essentially,
the very organization that had allowed Titanic to go to sea
is now investigating itself to some degree.
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Across 36 days of testimony
from nearly 100 witnesses,
answering 25,000 questions,
an exhaustive inquiry comes to a close.
While the report's final conclusions do levy criticism,
some observers wonder if the hundreds of pages of notes
Lord Mersey took in his private journal during the trial,
and stored in a leather-bound box
go much further than his public pronouncements.
[dramatic music]
[solemn music]
After a century tucked away
in their private family archives,
Lord Mersey's estate has agreed to share the contents
of the box publicly.
[Craig] Some judges think out loud.
Lord Mersey did not think out loud.
Lord Mersey thought on paper.
And it's only now that we get to see
what some of his private thoughts were.
[birds cawing]
My name is Ned Bigham, and I'm the fifth Viscount Mersey.
My great, great grandfather
was John Charles Bigham, Lord Mersey.
I don't think anyone has actually sat down
and gone through the box or the materials and said,
"What exactly have we got here?
What is its significance?"
It had just sat there for all these years.
[dramatic music]
So, 108 years later, here we go.
[dramatic music]
For the first time in recorded history,
we're gonna open the box.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] Mersey's drawings, observations and ruminations
will be examined by several renowned Titanic experts
who will explain the significance
of this "lost evidence."
And through the lens of this new information,
Titanic's journey will be reconstructed,
beginning with problems that arose before she set sail.
[soft music]
[Charles] The early part of the 20th century,
the United Kingdom was clearly a world power.
Its influence stretched literally around the world.
The shipping industry is front and center
in terms of the importance to the country,
and for that matter, to the world.
[Narrator] One of the most dominant shipping companies
of the day is Britain's White Star Line.
Founded in 1845, White Star made its fortune
delivering the Royal mail
while also providing top-flight passenger service.
[Mark] The extra size of these ships enabled White Star
to increase the number of first class passengers
that were carried, and have even more luxurious
first class accommodations
than the world had previously seen.
[Narrator] And White Star's newest steamer
is the most luxurious.
Titanic.
[dramatic music]
But the massive ship, at more than 882 feet long,
weighing more than 46,000 tons
and costing more than 180 million in today's dollars,
has a major problem few people remember today.
With the departure date in April fast approaching,
half the cabins are empty.
So White Star makes a fateful decision.
It brings famed Captain Edward Smith out of retirement
to shore up ticket sales.
If you wanna hire somebody from central casting
to be captain of a ocean liner
in the early part of the 20th century,
it's E. J. Smith,
whether or not he knew how to run a boat or not.
It doesn't matter, you know.
He just looks the part.
Edward Smith was one of the captains who
played up that sort of ship's captain thing.
He invited the rich and the famous to the captain's table,
hence his nickname, the Millionaire's Captain.
[Narrator] When April arrives, Titanic,
with Smith at the helm, is ready to sail.
But the Millionaire's Captain also brings plenty of baggage
with him onto the spit-shine deck
of the Titanic.
[dramatic music]
Inside Lord Mersey's box is a red leather journal
that he kept by his side throughout the inquiry.
He used it to write down his notes and discoveries.
On page 114, there's a notation referencing
that most of Titanic's crew had been on the Olympic.
Why did Mersey think this detail was important?
In 1911, Captain Smith and his fellow officers
who later served on the Titanic's doomed voyage
crewed Titanic's sister ship, the Olympic,
on her maiden voyage.
While docking in New York,
the Olympic collided with a tugboat.
Then, three months later,
Smith's Olympic did something far worse.
[Charles] In 1911, the Olympic was leaving Southampton,
and the British Naval cruiser, Hawke,
was in the vicinity.
[ship horn blows]
Somehow, the Hawke managed to collide with the
Olympic in the stern.
[dramatic music]
Olympic was severely damaged and she experienced flooding.
Smith is on the bridge
and therefore in charge of the vessel.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] Coming up.
They didn't think that they would need to have
lifeboat drills.
He could have detailed one of the lower ranking officers
to walk from boat to boat,
but he didn't even do that.
And Lord Mersey wrote in his journal
that he found that to be unusual.
Indeed it was.
Titanic did receive a series of ice warnings.
We know the Titanic received these messages.
It should have been taken seriously.
Lord Mersey was asking the question,
"Why didn't they slow down?"
[dramatic music]
The fact is that lifeboats went into the water
with less than a full capacity.
Those crewmen should have been pulling people
by their collars to put them into the life boat.
[dramatic music]
[birds cawing]
[ship horn blows]
Titanic left Southampton on the 10th of April, 1912.
It was a bit of a gusty, cold day by all accounts.
[solemn music]
It was a proud moment for White Star.
She came out to the dock,
went round to the left
and then proceeded down the river.
All the indications were that Titanic was set
for a successful maiden voyage.
[ship horn blows]
[Narrator] As hundreds of well-wishers arrived dockside
to cheer Titanic off,
the ship's reputation precedes it.
[dramatic music]
Both the press and White Star espoused
a perception of invincibility.
But who could blame them?
Titanic is spectacular.
[dramatic music]
[ship horn blows]
Sixty-six hundred tons of coal
powers massive 17-foot propellers.
The ship is the length of two and a half football fields
and can ferry 3,547 passengers and crew.
She is the largest manmade moving object
on earth.
[dramatic music, crowd cheering]
For the passengers on board,
the first four days of the journey are euphoric.
That's especially true for the wealthy,
soaking in their world-class accommodations.
[Charles] When Titanic comes out,
it was actually referred to as The Millionaire's Special.
Because it could not be imagined
that someone would be able to spend that much money
on a Transatlantic crossing.
If you look at the best accommodations in the ship,
$4,350 for a crossing.
That's the equivalent of 10-year's salary
to an average American in 1912.
[Narrator] The first class price tag is steep,
but it comes with perks.
[dramatic music]
Among them is access to Titanic's state of the art
Marconi wireless system.
[Sean] The Marconi, this was modern technology
for a modern ship.
Part of the whole idea
was this sort of showman's thing.
You're there, you're rich, you're powerful.
You're right at the edge of modern technology.
And you could send messages
to tell your friends in New York or London or Paris
what you were doing.
These were young men on ships
tapping away on a Morse code player.
They were using lots of slang
and lots of, rather,
sort of relaxed way of talking to each other.
The fellows that worked in the wireless rooms
on board the ship we're not part of the crew.
In most cases, they were employees of the
Marconi Company.
[Narrator] The Marconi operators independence
has a glaring risk.
If people were being employed by Marconi to send messages
on behalf of private passengers,
did they then perhaps omit to look at the safety messages--
which should have been their priority.
[Narrator] Titanic will end up receiving 21 ice warnings,
via Marconigram, on its four days at sea.
But Captain Smith, like many Transatlantic veterans,
is skeptical of the new technology.
Someone who had sailed back and forth across the Atlantic
for so long, without the aid of any sort of technology,
didn't really take something like wireless very seriously.
[clicking]
[Narrator] Another thing Captain Smith
might not have been prepared for...
the lifeboat situation.
While White Star fitted Titanic with 20 lifeboats,
four more than were required by regulation,
it still isn't enough for a ship this large.
At full capacity, Titanic's lifeboats
could hold just half of the ship's 2,240 passengers.
While that fact is well known,
less known is that, according to the Mersey box,
Smith and crew may not have trained sufficiently
with the lifeboats they did have.
Titanic's lifeboats were raised and lowered
with a new crane system called "Welin davits."
Dave Brown is a Titanic historian
and retired commercial ship captain.
The crew, they were all certified seamen,
but the only thing
that they didn't have a lot of experience with
is Welin davits which were fairly new and coming online.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] As Sunday, April 14th dawns,
four days into Titanic's maiden voyage,
the crew is scheduled for a routine lifeboat drill.
Though his men are new to Titanic
and her lifeboat apparatus,
Captain Smith cancels the drill.
I cannot say why Captain Smith failed to do that.
At a bare minimum, he could have detailed
one of the lower ranking officers to walk from
boat to boat and check the lines and check, you know,
any pulleys had been greased or whatever was necessary.
But he didn't even do that.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] During the inquiry,
a Titanic lookout named Archie Jewell
testified that although they tested lifeboats
before leaving Southampton,
there were only two boats lowered away out of 20,
and they were not even put into the water.
In his private journal, Mersey notes:
This unusual.
[dramatic music]
And Lord Mersey wrote in his journal
that he had found that to be unusual,
indeed it was.
You really need to have a lifeboat drill.
[Richard] They didn't think that they would need to have
lifeboat drills.
And this goes back to hubris.
Why bother having lifeboat drills
when the ship simply can't sink?
[dramatic music]
Titanic did receive a series of ice warnings.
[Sean] Almost like some sort of music creeping up in the
background, are these messages from other ships saying,
"Be careful, there's danger ahead."
They were traveling at 21 knots,
which is practically full speed for the Titanic.
This was at night.
This was in an environment where they
knew that there was ice.
[radar beeping]
[dramatic music]
[solemn music]
[Narrator] April 14, 1912,
early evening.
It's moonless and the seas are eerily calm.
Titanic is steaming towards the Grand Banks
in the North Atlantic,
at a brisk 22 knots,
or 25 and a half miles per hour.
[dramatic music]
At 7:30 p.m., Second Officer Charles Lightoller
raises his sextant.
In the era before GPS,
this device is used to plot a ship's position.
According to information in the Mersey box
and other sources,
this moment initiates a series of fatal errors
by Titanic's officers.
[dramatic music]
The sextant was the critical instrument of navigation.
When you look through the telescope,
one side sees the horizon.
The other side here sees the sky.
So if I put it up like this and I adjust it,
what I'm going to do
is I'm gonna bring the celestial body down
till it sits on the horizon.
I call out, "mark."
And then the guy who's got the hack watch
writes down the exact moment of the hack.
When Lightoller took this reading at 7:30,
he either was wrong
or the hack watch was off by a few seconds.
[Narrator] A sextant in conjunction with a hack watch
and a nautical chronometer
can accurately determine a ship's position.
But if the officers taking the readings make a mistake,
the ship can veer off course.
If you're off by a minute of time,
is a mile of latitude.
It can grow very big.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] While historians have long suspected
that Titanic was lost en route,
proof of the navigational errors has been elusive.
That's because Titanic's log book,
the equivalent of a black box,
containing notes on every important decision
of a ship's journey,
has never been found.
Typically, it was put in a waterproof bag,
sealed, and the highest ranking officer
would take it onto the lifeboat.
[Dave] Theoretically, you carry all the records off the ship,
but the captain who knows that it's got some information
that he would rather not disclose,
will probably throw five pounds of rocks in the bag
and throw it overboard.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] Despite 25,000 questions
across a month of testimony,
Lord Mersey's private box doesn't contain
a single reference to the missing log book.
[Craig] There may be something in there that Captain Smith
didn't want the world to know about.
It could have been something damning to the White Star Line
and the Board of Trade.
We don't know.
[Narrator] Months before the inquiry,
steaming through the North Atlantic,
Titanic is not only lost,
she's heading into danger.
Throughout the day on April 14th,
Titanic's Marconi operators receive disturbing news
from other ships in the area.
Titanic did receive a series of ice warnings
from ships that lay ahead of its path.
These ice warnings were fairly specific
in terms of latitude and longitude.
They were taken to the bridge,
and the position was noted on a Transatlantic chart.
And there, it could be examined by each shift of officers
as they came on duty.
[trans coder beeping]
Almost like some sort of music creeping up
in the background, are these messages from other ships
saying, "Be careful, there's danger ahead."
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Nineteen and a half miles due North from Titanic,
the SS Californian, a freighter bound for Boston
sees an ice field around 7:30 at night.
Her skipper, Captain Stanley Lord,
isn't about to take any chances.
[dramatic music]
The Californian stops in ice.
It realizes it's dangerous.
The wireless operator sent a message to tell people
that ice was around.
Titanic didn't say, "Thank you very much.
I'm very glad you told us about this."
They told them to shut up and go away effectively.
They were busy sending private messages.
They didn't wanna know about it.
[Narrator] While Captain Lord hunkers down in the ice field,
to his south, Captain Smith powers Titanic ahead
with his engines steaming at near capacity.
In his final report,
Lord Mersey does note Titanic's excessive speed.
And in private, he expresses grave concern.
Within Mersey's box, tucked inside his journal,
he writes that there was no reduction of speed.
And then, Mersey points it out again.
[Ned] Okay. So now this is interesting.
Speed, 21 knots
and never reduced up to time of collision.
Notwithstanding, weary that icebergs in vicinity,
and that she would be likely to meet them.
[dramatic music]
[Craig] They were traveling at 21 knots,
which is practically full speed for the Titanic.
This was at night.
This was in an environment where they knew
that there was ice.
[Richard] We don't need to reduce speed.
We're not gonna have any issues with any icebergs
that we come across because we are Titanic.
After all, it is unsinkable, isn't it?
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] Sunday evening, April 14, 1912.
Under the command of Captain Edward J. Smith,
Titanic is just past the midpoint
of her journey to New York.
Steaming at nearly full speed,
she's scheduled to arrive on time
Wednesday morning at White Star's pier 59
along Manhattan's West side.
Nine other ships are also traversing the North Atlantic,
heading west and east along the same shipping lanes.
But just south of the Grand Banks,
the ice field looms.
Four miles wide and extending north and south
as far as the eye can see.
As each ship hits the danger zone,
they sound the alarm.
[radar beeping]
Wireless messages were sent by ships
who were traveling in the same waters,
and they were alerting each other to potential risks.
They thought it was dangerous
and they let the other ships know around them.
We know the Titanic received these messages.
We know they acknowledged some of these messages too.
It should have been taken seriously.
[radar beeping]
[Narrator] The Marconi messages not only reveal
where the ice is,
they also contain important details
on how big and dangerous the icebergs are.
Kristin Serumgard is the commander
of the International Ice Patrol.
She's familiar with the types of icebergs
the ships might have reported.
[Kristin] There's floes formed from frozen seawater.
There's a growler, which is about the size of a piano.
And then all the way up to what we call
a very large iceberg is over 200 meters.
[Narrator] In Titanic's day, just like now,
hitting an iceberg could rip a ship apart
and endanger the passengers.
A fact that wasn't lost on Lord Mersey in his black box.
[ominous music]
Inside his journal, Mersey hones in
on two specific ice warnings that reached Titanic:
"Two vessels informed her.
Icebergs,
growlers,
floes."
Lord Mersey drew some images--
things that the Titanic clearly would've passed
on its way to the big monster iceberg.
That also should have given the Titanic some pause.
It would have warned them that things were getting bad.
[Narrator] Lord Mersey also scribbles down
that the temperatures were falling,
and that this, to indicate ice.
And then, finally, and perhaps most crucially,
he notes and underlines,
no reduction of speed.
[Ned] This was obviously fairly significant for him.
Quite understandably, he was asking the question,
"Why didn't they slow down?"
If we didn't have this journal,
we wouldn't have known that Lord Mersey was taking in
all this information and clearly recognized the problems.
It was getting more and more towards criminal negligence
in this case.
[Narrator] Historians have spent countless hours
deliberating this question.
Why didn't Captain Smith slow down?
One theory centers around the behavior
of one of Titanic's most influential passengers,
J. Bruce Ismay.
Ismay was the chair of the White Star Line.
It was his role to run it and grow it into the 20th century.
[Narrator] On White Star's pride and joy,
Ismay reigned supreme.
Hobnobbing with wealthy passengers and keeping tabs
on Captain Smith and his crew.
Ismay is on deck around 2:00 p.m.
when Titanic receives an ice warning from the Baltic,
another White Star-owned ship,
about 230 miles to the East.
What happens next would give fodder
to a century of conspiracy theorists.
And it's a moment Lord Mersey also focuses on.
There was a paper written Marconigram
delivered to Captain Smith, that he showed to Bruce Ismay,
that Bruce Ismay took, stuck into his pocket.
Why did Captain Smith give Bruce Ismay the telegram?
[Narrator] Mersey references Ismay's own testimony
from the British inquiry.
On page 222, Ismay underlined,
Captain handed me the Baltic message,
which Ismay held on to for a while.
So, this is obviously quite significant for Lord Mersey.
[dramatic music]
[Craig] Why would Ismay have stuck it in his pocket?
Was there something he didn't want the bridge crew to see?
Did he not want them to slow down?
[Sean] He didn't want the Titanic to be late.
The press would be waiting on the docks.
People would be there waiting.
There had been theories that Ismay was keener
to get there on time than to get there safely.
Captain Smith asked Ismay for the ice warning back
that Sunday evening,
so that he could put it in the chart room.
[Narrator] The Baltic message is posted alongside
the six other ice warnings received throughout the day.
Then at 9:20 p.m.,
Captain Smith heads to his cabin to go to sleep,
handing command to his senior officers.
[Dave] The North Atlantic was extremely calm
as they went into sundown and into the night.
That made it more difficult to find the iceberg.
You can't see it.
If it's very calm out,
there's no waves breaking on the edges of the iceberg--
you're not gonna even see that it's there.
[Charles] The lookouts are above the canvas dodger
of the lookout's nest.
Their face is being whipped by a 25-mile an hour cold wind,
which inevitably could cause tearing to take place,
which in turn could hurt their vision.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] At precisely 11:39 p.m.,
crow's nest lookout Frederick Fleet
spots the gigantic, dark mass.
He strikes the lookout bell three times.
[bell dinging]
[dramatic music]
Fleet lunges for the telephone,
reaching Sixth Officer James Moody on the bridge.
Iceberg!
Dead ahead.
When you're traveling at 21 or 22 knots,
and you see iceberg dead ahead,
there wasn't enough time to turn.
It was already too late.
The ship was doomed.
[dramatic music]
[ominous music]
[Narrator] April 14, 1912.
RMS Titanic has been at sea for four and a half days.
At 11:39 p.m., 375 miles off the coast of Newfoundland,
Titanic's seven ice warnings received throughout the day
are no longer a warning.
They're a frightening reality.
[bell dinging]
Iceberg!
Dead ahead.
[Narrator] With the iceberg spotted 1,500 feet ahead,
and with Titanic bearing down on it at 26 miles per hour,
First Officer William McMaster Murdoch
has less than 45 seconds to
determine the fate of thousands.
[dramatic music]
He says, "Full to port."
Murdoch signals the engine room.
Ring, ring, ring.
[Narrator] But by the time Murdoch makes
his desperate maneuver,
the iceberg is already on them.
At reportedly 60 feet high,
it's even with Titanic's crow's nest
and it's estimated 400-foot length is greater
than a football field.
Scientists say it could have weighed up to
one and a half million tons,
the equivalent of 15 fully loaded aircraft carriers.
The iceberg packs the punch of a granite mountain.
When you compress carbon under pressure,
you get this very strong diamond,
and that's kind of the similar concept
of compressing the fresh water into a glacier
that forms an iceberg.
Dense, glacial ice has a much higher probability
of causing significant damage to a ship.
[Narrator] At 11:40 p.m.,
Titanic makes contact.
[ominous music]
The iceberg scrapes along her starboard side
for eight seconds...
gouging the double-plated steel hull.
The collision takes place, opening its side to the iceberg
so it can cut into it like a tin of sardines.
[Narrator] The forward compartment, three cargo holds
and two engine rooms are blown open.
And the frigid sea pours in.
Meanwhile, some 90 feet above,
those first class passengers still awake
catch an ominous glimpse into their fate.
When the iceberg struck, they felt something,
but they weren't sure what it was.
And they went to the portholes of the ship
and actually saw pieces of ice coming off the iceberg
onto the deck through the portholes.
[Narrator] Moments after impact,
First Officer Murdoch orders full stop,
and he engages Titanic's high-tech watertight doors.
Down in the tank top level,
bells started going off and doors started closing.
It must've been sounded pretty much
like the hammers of hell down there.
Murdoch did not know whether there was damage or not.
He's just got to close the watertight doors
and then find out.
That's all he can do.
[Narrator] Murdoch's decision to seal the doors
is rooted in ship science.
When activated, the watertight doors keep
Titanic from foundering
by walling off the flooded areas
from the rest of the ship.
You wanna close them so the water doesn't escape
and make the ship bow or aft heavy.
You wanna stop the water from coming in and spreading.
[Narrator] The head of the British inquiry
trains his investigative eyes
on those crucial first minutes
after the doors are activated.
Lord Mersey learns that some of the watertight doors
were then manually raised by crew
to move around hoses and pumps.
But he notes and underlines
that the doors were then all left open.
Lord Mersey obviously thought that was important
that no one ever requested the doors to be re-closed.
He certainly recognized the fact
that there were some problems here.
[Narrator] Captain Smith, who had gone to sleep
for the evening at 9:20 p.m.,
suddenly snaps to attention.
He felt a ca-thud and heard the ship's engine bells ring.
I can't imagine what that must have done to his heart rate.
[Narrator] Smith rushes to the bridge.
He asks First Officer Murdoch what they struck.
"An iceberg, sir." Murdoch replies.
Smith's first priority upon arrival at the bridge
is to immediately send down people
to determine just what's going on down below.
How bad is it?
[Narrator] In testimony, Fourth Officer Joseph Boxhall
recounts that he did not find any damage.
With Boxhall's assessment in hand,
Captain Smith issues an order to the engine room
that causes Lord Mersey to sit up and take notice.
An order that flies in the face
of what we think we know about Titanic's story.
According to history, Titanic hit the iceberg,
the crew shut the watertight doors
and the ship came to a dead stop.
But is that what really happened?
[Craig] Lord Mersey wrote down during Frederick Scott's
testimony that the ship was ordered half-speed ahead
and then stop and ahead.
What was all this?
Captain Smith may have been trying to speed up
in hopes that things really weren't so bad.
There may have been some talk about moving ahead
to try and calm the passengers,
letting them think that the ship is moving normally.
[Narrator] For 20 minutes,
Smith decides to keep the ship pressing forward
at half speed instead of coming to a full stop.
Moving the boat forward was something that increased
the influx of water and was a very dangerous,
if not disastrous thing to do.
If there were openings in the hull,
you'd push them open more.
Any weaknesses, you would exploit them.
[Charles] If we start moving through the water
and there is damage of some sort
on the starboard side of the ship,
any forward motion is going to increase the water flow
through that crevice,
and might have an effect on how quickly the ship sinks.
[Narrator] With precious minutes ticking by,
Captain Smith summons Titanic's carpenter to sound the ship.
A nautical term for assessing a ship's seaworthiness.
When the report came back to captain Smith,
it wasn't a very good one at all.
Lord Mersey made a note of that fact in his journal.
[Narrator] The carpenter is said to have reported
seven feet of water in a few minutes.
At that point, the damage was already done.
The ship was doomed.
But Lord Mersey may have been taking more note of that fact
than Captain Smith was.
It should have led the captain to other choices.
For instance, immediately lowering those lifeboats.
Putting everybody on those lifeboats
that he possibly could.
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Then, shortly after midnight,
22 minutes after hitting the iceberg,
Thomas Andrews, Titanic's chief designer
arrives grim-faced on the bridge
after surveying the decks below.
Titanic, Andrew says, has only two hours left.
Captain Smith, he seems really overwhelmed by it all.
Almost to the point of a paralysis taking place.
Here's a guy at the end of his career,
retirement is in sight,
and everything that he had achieved in 30-some-odd years
with the White Star Line is now at risk.
And not only that, he is at risk
along with 2,200 other people.
[dramatic music]
[crash]
After the collision,
the amount of water flooding into Titanic was fatal.
The flooding was far beyond
the capacity of the pumps to keep up with.
They struggled to even slow it down
and Titanic was simply doomed.
[Narrator] Twenty-five minutes after the collision,
Captain Smith orders his senior officers,
Murdoch and Lightoller, to prepare the lifeboats,
which can only hold half
of the more than 2,200 lives on board.
Worse still, as Lord Mersey noted during the inquiry,
the crew is unfamiliar with the lifeboat
state-of-the-art crane system.
They canceled the drill earlier in the trip.
Regardless, they're now faced with a thankless task.
Having to spread the word.
We can be given a warning.
Somebody can walk up to us and say, "This ship is sinking."
But if we look around and see
it looks like we're floating just fine,
then we question that warning that we've been given,
and we actually need to see that the ship is sinking
to see that something is wrong.
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Though his passengers
may not have believed the warning,
Captain Smith is fully aware of the slow motion catastrophe
unfolding around him.
He makes a beeline for the Marconi wireless room
and its operators,
25-year old Jack Phillips and 22-year old Harold Bride.
[clicking]
Who else can you turn to
other than these two wireless operators
who suddenly are his only source of help.
[trans coder beeping]
This was now their only lifeline
for contacting the outside world.
And Captain Smith must've wondered,
perhaps this was the miracle that would rescue him.
[Narrator] Of course, Smith has no idea
that Lightoller's erroneous sextant reading
from earlier in the evening,
places his ship at a different position
than the coordinates he's sending out for help.
Still the SOS fans out, and some ships respond instantly.
"Putting about and heading for you."
Replies veteran Captain Arthur Rostron
of the SS Carpathia, 58 miles away.
Despite having 740 passengers of his own,
he lights up his coal burners
and sets a course for Titanic's position.
[dramatic music]
Meanwhile, on board the Californian,
about 20 miles north of Titanic,
and the closest ship to her,
Captain Lord has stopped down in the ice field
and the Marconi is switched off.
In those days, the fellows that worked
in the wireless rooms on board ship
clocked off at a certain time.
At that point, the Californian was deaf to the world.
It didn't know.
[Narrator] With the Californian hunkered down
for the night, across the same ice field,
a chaotic scene is unfolding on Titanic.
More than an hour after the collision,
the first of Titanic's lifeboats begins lowering
into the sea.
[dramatic music]
Around 12:45 a.m., Captain Smith gave an order.
And that order was to load the lifeboats
with women and children.
[Narrator] This leads to the next revelation
from inside Lord Mersey's box.
During the British inquiry,
Mersey makes a note in his journal
referencing the testimony of Second Officer Lightoller,
who says that he didn't load the lifeboats to capacity
because he worried the new davits
wouldn't hold the weight.
Obviously, Second Officer Lightoller
had to have some excuse
for not loading the lifeboats to full capacity.
That was his excuse.
I can't believe that Lord Mersey would have bought it.
[Narrator] Ultimately, Mersey did not.
In his final report,
he discovers there are a number of explanations
why the lifeboats weren't full.
Specifically, he writes that Lightoller's worry
about the weight proved to be an unfounded apprehension.
The fact is that lifeboats went into the water
with less than a full capacity.
Those crewman should have been pulling people
by their collars to put them into the lifeboat.
[Narrator] As Officer Murdoch fires the first
of eight distress rockets into the night sky,
the makeshift evacuation continues.
On deck, confusion reigns.
Dr. Samantha Montano studies human response to disasters.
In 1912, there was no formal emergency management
in the way that we have it today.
Because there was that lack of training,
that lack of planning about what to do
in a situation like this,
nearly the entire response was completely improvised.
[Narrator] With Titanic's bow sinking lower,
and the stern slowly rising
against the blackness of the sea,
the panic begins.
The remaining passengers of all stations,
surge toward the few remaining lifeboats.
It's life or death.
We do see more of that panic.
It tends to be when people feel the threat is imminent,
there is still a chance of escape,
but that chance is dwindling.
[Narrator] With the window of escape closing fast,
White Star Lines chairman, Bruce Ismay,
makes his way across the deck
towards one of Titanic's few remaining lifeboats.
One of the crew says, "Mr. Ismay,
there's a space in this boat."
And Ismay's got split second to make a decision.
When the opportunity presents itself,
he gets into the boat.
[Narrator] Ismay is one of many men
who displaces women and children
during those last desperate minutes.
Lifeboat 15 was one of the last lifeboats to be lowered
on the starboard side,
and the vast majority of its occupants were men.
It opens the question as to why there weren't more
women and children in the lifeboat.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] Inside the box, Mersey notes his concern.
Here's another interesting section.
This is May the 10th,
and it's a testimony by Samuel Rule,
who was a steward, talking about the lifeboats,
and in particular talking about lifeboat 15.
Sixty-eight who were saved who went in the lifeboat,
were made up of 61 men, double underlined,
and seven women and children.
[Craig] This was an age in England
where honor and chivalry prevailed.
Now at the end, 61 men are, in a sense, rushing
to get into this lifeboat
with only seven or so women and children
who may have been left.
How could that possibly be?
What happened to the women and children first rule?
Was it a case that men had rushed the boats?
[solemn music]
[Narrator] At 2:00 a.m.,
with the ship minutes from sinking,
Titanic's eight-member band
under the direction of Wallace Hartley
segues into a rendition of
"Nearer, My God to Thee."
All while the last of the remaining lifeboats
are launching.
One of the last orders attributed to captain Smith
was poking his head into the wireless shack
and basically telling Phillips and Bride,
"It's every man for himself, boys."
He knew of the magnitude of the tragedy
that was going to unfold when the ship sank.
Some of the firsthand accounts say
that he goes to the bridge, locks himself in
and waits for the tide to come in.
[Narrator] Titanic's bow submerges
and the stern rises nearly perpendicular to the water.
It's propellers completely aloft.
Just then, the once mighty unsinkable Titanic
splits in two...
and slides into the icy depths.
[solemn music]
At 2:20 a.m., April 15th, 1912,
just over two and a half hours
after hitting a one and a half million ton iceberg,
the seemingly unsinkable Titanic...
breaks in two.
For many of the thousand-plus free falling victims,
the end, while horrific and violent,
is also swift.
Some of these people may have been injured,
hit by falling objects,
hit by a lifeboat,
battered by the sinking of the ship.
If the person gets submerged,
they're gonna get a lung full of very cold salt water,
and they're gonna drown almost immediately,
and they're gonna die.
[Narrator] Those who survive the smack
into the subfreezing ocean,
experience excruciating pain.
Second Officer Charles Lightoller would equate it
to a thousand knives driving into the body.
Shiya Ribowsky is a medical legal investigator
and forensics consultant.
That makes sense because extreme cold
is going to feel like extreme heat.
At 28 degrees,
there's a physiologic response that happens
also known as a cold shock reflux.
And that's followed by
repeated, very rapid gasping.
You know, your brain is saying,
"Hey, get me out of this water."
And your arms just laying there at your side,
because they're no longer under your voluntary control.
[gurgling water]
I remember talking to a survivor, Eva Hart,
and her saying,
"Charles, it was not the screams that unhinged me.
It was the silence that came afterwards
when the cold had done its work."
[gurgling water]
It gives you an idea of just how deadly this exposure was.
Because of the 1,500 or so people that perished,
we can assume that hundreds perhaps
could have been rescued.
Only around 40 or so people
were pulled out of the water and survived.
[Narrator] Those 40 are picked up by two lifeboats
that turned back for them.
They are the only ones out of 20 lifeboats to do so.
Another boat, lifeboat number one
turns away from the victims in the water,
despite having enough room for them.
Here's an instance where a lifeboat
left with only 12 people, instead of 42.
The boat could have easily gone back and picked up others.
[Narrator] When a crewman on lifeboat number one
urges everyone to turn back,
two first class passengers, Sir Cosmo Duff-Gordon,
and his wife, Lady Duff-Gordon, refuse.
Sir Cosmo decides to give the crew five-pound notes.
It certainly didn't smell too good.
The Duff-Gordons were called to the British inquiry
to testify, and of course they simply denied
they were bribing the crew not to go back and rescue others.
[Narrator] The Duff-Gordons are the British inquiry's
only testifying passengers.
[dramatic music]
As Titanic sinks to the bottom,
RMS Carpathia is less than 30 miles away
and heading to the rescue.
Captain Rostron,
he went charging off in the middle of the night,
into an ice situation
that had already sunk the world's largest ship.
Rostron became the hero of the day, you know.
What'd he do?
He risked all those people's lives.
[solemn music]
The sun was about to come up over the horizon
when he found the lifeboats.
[Sean] And so they brought on as many of the survivors
they could find...
responding in a human way
to the suffering of people around them.
[solemn music]
One boat to come alongside
was the boat that carried Lightoller,
and he was immediately escorted to the bridge.
And Rostron said to him,
"Where is the Titanic?"
And with his voice cracking, Lightoller said,
"She's gone down, sir."
[ominous music]
[Narrator] As the morning sun arcs over the horizon,
the last of Titanic's lifeboats
paddles up alongside Carpathia.
Escorted on board, is White Star president,
J. Bruce Ismay,
quaking from the cold.
[Sean] For the owner of the ship to come home in a lifeboat
was seen as shameful.
He was immediately accused of cowardice
and seen as being someone who failed
to stand by his captain,
stand by his ship, stand by his passengers.
The ship that had made his name
was now threatening to ruin his name.
Ismay was in such a delicate frame of mind
that the surgeon of the Carpathia put him on opiates
to ease the pain.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] Rostron sets sail for New York,
where Carpathia is expected on the evening of April 18th.
Meanwhile, Titanic's Marconi operator, Harold Bride,
is plucked from a lifeboat
and dispatched to the wireless room.
An anxious world awaits.
A ship containing some of the richest, most powerful,
best known people in the world had sunk.
Everyone wanted to know what had happened.
The president of United States wanted to know
about his friends who were on board the ship.
What happened to Colonel Astor?
What happened to Benjamin Guggenheim?
[dramatic music]
[Sean] The rest of the world was screaming at the Carpathia
to let it know what had happened to the Titanic.
And they chose to rebuff information,
and they chose not to answer.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] But that doesn't stop a now lucid Bruce Ismay
from sending a cryptic message of his own
to White Star offices in London.
Titanic crew aboard Carpathia should be returned home
earliest moment possible.
Suggest you hold Cedric Sailing.
Yamsi.
I think the use of the reversal of the name
to say Yamsi rather than Ismay,
it might now look rather suspicious.
And you wonder what's going on.
Ismay sent this message,
have all the crew taken back to the UK
so that there could be a debriefing
and to come up with a unified story.
So if there was an inquiry,
everyone would be singing from the same page of the hymnal.
[dramatic music]
You've probably got 20 to 25 crew members
who really have stories to tell.
You wanna get them back to Blighty.
You wanna find out what their stories are
before the Americans could get to 'em.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] After rescuing the last
of Titanic's 705 traumatized grief stricken survivors,
Captain Rostron's Carpathia sets a course
back from where she started...
New York City.
But on board, White Star president, J. Bruce Ismay,
is becoming increasingly panicked.
It doesn't take an Einstein to figure out
that if you've just sunk the biggest ship in the world
with a lot of people dying,
that there's going to be a reporter or two around
when you get to the dock.
[dramatic music]
There's that editorial cartoon of Ismay
looking like a maniac in a lifeboat
filled with nothing but grieving women.
And of course, the byline is J. Brute Ismay,
instead of Bruce.
[Narrator] In Washington, William Alden Smith,
a hard charging Senator from Michigan
is gearing up to lead an American inquiry
into the sinking.
It's set to begin the day after Carpathia's arrival
in New York.
So Ismay is desperate to dash back to London.
And he thought, "Let's just get out of here.
Let's get everyone back home.
We don't wanna get caught up in this
'cause this isn't gonna look good."
But unfortunately for him,
Senator Smith's plans put a stop to that.
[Narrator] Turns out Senator Smith was tipped off
by the U.S. Navy,
which intercepted Ismay's telegram.
So Smith prepares subpoenas to give to Ismay
and Titanic's officers
upon arrival in New York
on the evening of April 18th.
Lining the banks of the Hudson River
were 100,000 people.
From the battery all the way up
to the White Star Line pier at West 14th Street.
All of new York's policemen had been summoned
to patrol the crowds, 'cause people knew
this was gonna be mayhem.
[Narrator] As Carpathia snakes its way up the Hudson,
a tug boat filled with photographers
follows the ship to pier 54.
The flash of cameras lights up the sky.
Revealing Carpathia's decks
crammed with terrified passengers.
For those without knowledge
of what had become of their loved ones,
the hurt,
the pain of Titanic's loss
was continuing and maybe even deepening.
What became of my father?
What became of my husband?
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Halfway across the Atlantic Ocean,
the terrible fate of all those men,
women and children is all too evident.
The crew of the cable repair ship, Mackay-Bennett,
joined by the SS Minia, have completed the grim task
of recovering over 300 bodies,
One hundred and sixteen of which were buried at sea.
On April 26th, the Mackay-Bennett
steams back toward Halifax.
For the living, the voyage is surreal.
The wind and motion of the ship
causes the tarpaulins to rise and fall
producing the illusion that the bodies have come to life.
Must've been absolutely horrific for the crew
because you're walking around doing your daily duties,
and of course you turn your back,
and the next thing you turn around,
the canvas is blowing out over slightly
and you could see an arm exposed
and then you sorta tucked that arm back in.
How more nightmarish can this get?
[solemn music]
The arrival of Mackay-Bennett in Halifax on April the 30th
was a huge deal.
All the church bells in Halifax ring a death knell
for the Titanic victims.
[bell ringing]
There's a fleet of horse-drawn hearses
waiting at the dock
to take the bodies off to the Mayflower Curling Club
to be processed, to be identified.
And that's just one more surreal touch
to add to the whole thing.
[Narrator] With nearly 200 distended corpses
laid out on the curling rink ice,
each body is tagged,
numbered,
noted.
[gentle music]
[Richard] This is Fairview Lawn Cemetery here in Halifax,
and for 121 of Titanic's passengers,
this is where the maiden voyage ends.
This whole series here of headstones
have one thing in common: no names.
Just, died April 15th, 1912.
For every identified body in Fairview Lawn Cemetery,
there's two that are not.
This is all classes, walks of life represented.
And that speaks volumes as to the tragedy of Titanic.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] While the dead are being brought to Halifax,
600 miles away in New York City,
the next phase of the spectacle is beginning.
In a packed ballroom in the Waldorf Astoria,
a day after the Carpathia arrived,
Senator Smith gavels in the United States inquiry.
A moment not lost on his counterpart in Britain.
Inside Lord Mersey's personal papers
are two copies of the official United States Senate inquiry
into the sinking of RMS Titanic.
The hearings start on April 19th, 1912,
two weeks before the British inquiry.
The American inquiry is like a three-ring circus.
And you have Senator Smith from Michigan,
who is doing his utmost to make Bruce Ismay
look like the worst villain since Pontius Pilate
turned Jesus over to the Romans.
[Narrator] Ismay is the first witness called,
and his testimony is damning.
He claims that he was just a voluntary passenger,
and that no one else was on deck
when he decided to save himself.
Senator Smith roasted Ismay left and right,
and condemned him
in the speech that he gave before Congress.
[Narrator] The vitriolic American attack on Ismay,
a leader in the shipping industry,
crosses the line.
The United States inquiry is seen as an affront to honor
and a threat to Britain's national interests.
This wasn't just a ship--
the Titanic was the pride of Britain.
It was very important for the British government
that Britain's maritime interests weren't threatened
as a result of Titanic disaster.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] When Lord Mersey is selected to lead
the British inquiry into the Titanic disaster
on April 22nd, 1912,
he's celebrated as a man of integrity.
[dramatic music]
We have a copy of the Daily Mail,
which is Wednesday, April the 24, 1912.
And it's got a little piece on him.
A man who fears nobody, Lord Mersey.
As a barrister, he earned the nickname,
the Little Terrier of Toxteth,
for his sort of dogged determination
to extract the truth from those he was cross questioning.
I think for him, the Titanic must've been an opportunity
to really get to the bottom of this appalling tragedy.
[Narrator] As the fallout from the hard hitting U.S. inquiry
continues to rain down on Great Britain,
the eyes of the world are on Mersey.
He awaits his turn
on the dais.
He knew what his position was.
He knew what he had to do.
He knew what his charge from the crown was
in terms of getting to the bottom of the disaster.
[Narrator] The British inquiry begins on May 2nd, 1912.
During its first week,
many of Titanic's surviving crew members testify.
Soon though, the focus turns to another ship entirely:
The Californian.
The ship that didn't hear Titanic's distress calls
because they'd turned off their wireless
and gone to bed.
[dramatic music]
Inside his personal box,
Mersey's copy of the American inquiry
contains the bruising examination of its captain,
Stanley Lord.
Stanley Lord has really posed
these difficult, difficult questions.
Captain Lord's testimony in the American inquiry
would probably serve as a kind of a pointing tool
as to where Mersey might go further.
[Mark] Lord Mersey wanted to investigate
how far Californian was from Titanic.
And what action could Californian have taken
in order to try and rescue Titanic's passengers and crew
and come to Titanic's assistance.
[Narrator] Earlier, the Californian
was 19 and a half miles north of Titanic's position
when it saw the ice field and telegraphed the warnings.
[tapping]
The wireless operation on board the Californian
sent a message.
"We're here, we're stopping, it's dangerous."
And it was received by the Titanic as almost like an aside.
They were told to shut up.
The wireless operation on board the Californian
then went to bed at the end of his day.
And at that point, the Californian then was cut off
from the outside world.
[solemn music]
Captain Lord was now finding himself
amongst all these powdered wigs in central London,
far from the sea as you can get,
and he's being grilled mercilessly.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] Captain Lord asserts
that his ship was 30 miles from Titanic when she sank.
But separately,
Californians crewmen testify that they were close enough
to spot ship lights and flares
that could have been Titanic's.
[dramatic music]
These witnesses made the inquiry think
that they were in sight of the Titanic
and failed to act.
There's a very serious accusation.
[Narrator] Among a stash of saved letters
in Lord Mersey's box,
is one from Rear Admiral Arthur Gough-Calthorpe,
a Naval assessor and senior legal advisor
to Mersey during the inquiry.
Rear Admiral Calthorpe is really throwing doubts
on the whereabouts of the Californian.
Obviously, this was a very hot topic for the inquiry
and the guilt or innocence of Captain Lord
depended very much on it.
[Narrator] Gough-Calthorpe writes Mersey
a passionate letter, refuting Captain Lord's sworn testimony
that he was too far away to mount a rescue.
There is a strong presumption
that Californian was not where she says she was.
So he's casting doubt
on the assertion made by Captain Lord,
who clearly stated that the Californian
was well out of range of the Titanic.
What does this do?
This now tells Lord Mersey
that what he heard may not be accurate,
even if he found Stanley Lord to be credible.
[Narrator] When Lord Mersey issues his final judgment
on July 30th, 1912,
he blames the collision on excessive speed,
with the disaster compounded by a lack of lifeboats.
Despite concluding that Titanic's captain,
Edward Smith, made a very grievous mistake,
Lord Mersey states that, "It is in my opinion impossible
to fix Captain Smith with blame."
[solemn music]
However, Mersey's final report
did take aim at the Californian.
Concluding that Captain Lord could have come
to the assistance of the Titanic.
Had she done so, she might have saved many,
if not all of the lives that were lost.
Captain Lord, he was blamed for not doing enough.
The personal impact on him was probably stronger
than the financial impact of it.
He tried to clear himself,
but time ran out on him.
Californian could have galloped to the rescue
like the 5th Cavalry.
[bleep]
matic music]
[ominous music]
[Narrator] Since Titanic's demise in 1912,
a century worth of historians have sought access
to Lord Mersey's innermost thoughts.
Wondering whether they differ
from his public pronouncements.
[ominous music]
The notes in his journal were kept private
throughout the years until now.
If we didn't have these notes,
we wouldn't have known
that Lord Mersey was taking in all this information
and clearly recognized the problems.
[Narrator] After a careful review,
it's clear.
His final public judgment largely matches
what is in his private box.
There exists no evidence to prove
Lord Mersey was compromised in any way.
In the view of many historians,
Lord Mersey's inquest was fair,
his judicial responsibility uncompromised.
The British inquiry was not a criminal trial.
No one ever went to jail,
and there were very few lawsuits filed
against White Star or the Board of Trade.
And so, with Captain Smith going down with his ship
and his crew largely absolved,
popular perception of the disaster
has been open to interpretation.
Many who have retold Titanic's story
have latched on to the narrative of a
tragic act of God,
but Mersey knew better.
Mistakes were made
and more than 1,500 men, women, and children
lost their lives.
[soft music]
While the story of Titanic never faded,
the ship itself disappeared from view.
And then,
seven decades later,
a final piece of lost evidence emerges.
[solemn music]
In 1985, oceanographic explorer, Robert Ballard,
made the discovery of a lifetime.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] Ballard spots Titanic's boilers.
Its telltale bow,
and confirm something equally significant.
When Titanic was finally found,
its position was about 13 miles
from where it was reported to be.
[dramatic music]
[Narrator] The discovery of Titanic's position
on the ocean floor, may speak to one last mystery.
Could its passengers have been saved
if only SS Californian had heard her distress call
and come to the rescue?
Maybe not.
When Titanic hit the iceberg,
her Marconi operators sent out an SOS,
but they gave the wrong location
because Titanic officers had taken a bad sextant reading
earlier that evening.
Carpathia was only able to find survivors
because her crew had seen a flair
fired from one of the lifeboats.
The absolute miracle that night,
was that in going towards the distress position,
which we now know is not accurate at all,
that the Carpathia stumbled into the place
where the lifeboats were.
[Narrator] Does this exonerate Captain Lord
of the Californian?
Had he steamed immediately to the location of the SOS,
he would have found nothing.
Years later, the British government reassessed the role
of Californian in the disaster.
In 1992, there was a subsequent inquiry
that exonerated the captain.
[solemn music]
Even if the Californian had left immediately on receipt
of the first distress message,
it could not have arrived in time to make any difference.
[solemn music]
[Narrator] Today, the Titanic lies
in an eerie state of decomposition.
Rusting on the bottom of the Atlantic,
but it's still as mesmerizing and captivating to the public
as it was 108 years ago.
[soft music]
♪ ♪
We're fascinated by the Titanic
because it is like a myth;
it's like something from a Biblical story.
[dramatic music]
It contains greed,
human ambition,
vanity.
This vast, modern and beautiful ship,
full of hope and ambition collided with fate
and in a spectacular way.
Although this was an accident,
it was clearly an avoidable one.
The crew didn't steer away from the iceberg.
They didn't reduce the speed.
They didn't load the lifeboats like they should have.
Many more lives could have been saved.
[Richard] The Titanic is the one event
that the last century will always be remembered for.
It's the combination of pride, hubris,
playing fast and loose with the regulations of the time,
and it's an incredibly tragic event
the world will never forget.
[ship horn blows]
[Narrator] Lord Mersey's British inquiry
led to crucial shipping industry changes
across the globe.
Adding more lifeboats to passenger ships,
24-hour radio communications,
and the formation of the International Ice Patrol,
to name a few.
One hundred and six years after it was created,
no ship heeding the warnings of the Ice Patrol
has struck an iceberg.
Titanic's legacy lives on.