Titanic Facts 4

Still Swimming: The SS Nomadic is one of the small ships that brought the passengers to Titanic, also known as a tender. Leaving her to board the Titanic, was none other than Margaret Brown, who would later be known as the iconic "Unsinkable Molly Brown." The Nomadic is the last surviving White Star Line vessel and is still used today. She went through an extensive restoration in 2012, meaning this 100 year old vessel is here to stay.

Circa March 2012. Photo courtesy of Wikipedia.org 

The Curse of the Maiden Voyage: Titanic is not the only White Star Line ship to sink on its maiden voyage. 

The 1^st ship - also dubbed "the first Titanic", was the RMS Tayleur. She sank on her maiden voyage on 1854 when this iron clipper ran aground and sank. Of the 650 on board, 290 survived. Faulty engineering and an inexperienced crew were to blame.

2^nd ship - The Titanic wasn't the only White Star Line vessel to hit an iceberg. The SS Naronic, which was built in 1892 and was lost at sea in 1893. They can't really prove that the Naronic hit an iceberg, mainly because the ship's never been found. Also, no eye-witnesses, because all of the 74 on board perished. The only bit of evidence that they can go by is four bottles that washed up on shore that were written by people claiming to be passengers. This one in particular is the only letter that mentions an iceberg as the culprit of the sinking.

"3:10 AM Feb.19. SS Naronic at sea. To who picks this up: report when you find this to our agents if not heard of before, that our ship is sinking fast beneath the waves. It's such a storm that we can never live in the small boats. One boat has already gone with her human cargo below. God let all of us live through this. We were struck by an iceberg in a blinding snowstorm and floated two hours. Now it 3:20 AM by my watch and the great ship is dead level with the sea. Report to the agents at Broadway, New New York, M. Kersey & Company. Goodby all."

The letter was signed by John Olsen, who claimed to be a cattleman. Here's another mystery … no such name existed on the ship's manifest. One of the life boats from the ship was found 90 miles where the Titanic would sink

The 3^rd – Titanic.

Competition Has a Heart: When Titanic struck the iceberg and launched the lifeboats, hoped seemed dismal for the majority of passengers. Some claimed they saw the light from a ship miles away. This would later be confirmed as the SS Californian, who also saw Titanic's stress flares, but did not act on it. They were only 10 miles away. Much further, but the closest to respond to Titanic radio operator, Jack Phillips, distress signal was the RMS Carpathia. Unfortunately, the Carpathia was forty miles away when they received the signal and much smaller ship was slower than the Titanic and would take four hours to reach the sinking ship. 

At around 3:30 am, passengers in lifeboats saw the Carpathia's lights and their hope for survival arrived at 4:00 am. Why the title of this fact? The RMS Carpathia was owned by Cunard Line, White Star Line's biggest competitor.

Whatever Happened to the RMS Carpathia?: Sadly the ship that saved the only survivors of the Titanic tragedy met a sinking fate. During the first World War, the Carpathia was used to transport American and Canadian troops to Europe. Only July 15, 1918, a German Navy submarine, U-55, torpedoed the Carpathia and she sunk 120 miles west of Ireland. The ship was discovered in 2000 by diver Clive Cussler. Guess who owns the RMS Carpathia? Why our grave robbing friends at Premier Exhibitions Inc. formerly known as Titanic Inc. They plan on doing the same thing as they did to the Titanic and that is bringing artifacts from the ship back to the surface and put it on display in worldwide exhibits.

Picture of the Carpathia sinking. 

Blood and Iron: White Star Line may have commissioned Titanic and her sister ships, but they were all built by Harland and Wolff. This ship  hired more than 15,000 workers, working from 7:50 am to 5:30 pm. They had one ten minute break, as well as a 30-minute lunch break. Skilled shipyarder workers earned 2 pounds a week. That is $3.32 in US currency today. Unskilled shipyard workers earned 1 pound a week. The hard work and incredible work load of all who made the Titanic from a vision to a reality was not without forms hurt or tragedy. Many of the riveters ended up losing their hearing due to the very loud noises around them.

Titanic Put the "Mail" in "RMS": RMS stands for Royal Mail Ship and Titanic was under contract to deliver speedy mail. It had over 3,000 mailbags with more than seven million pieces of mail.