Why did the Titanic sink? 5 most interesting theories

(ORDO NEWS) — In mid-1912, one of the worst disasters in history occurred. On the night of April 14-15, in the waters of the North Atlantic, the British steamship Titanic was wrecked. On board there were 2,208 people, but only 704 people managed to survive. There is no doubt that the huge ship sank due to a collision with an iceberg. Only why he did not change course and did not avoid disaster, at the moment, no one knows for sure. On the Internet, you can find a huge number of theories on this topic, and their number is constantly growing. Recently, a new suggestion was made by climatologist Mila Zinkova.

After examining the stories of survivors after the crash, she announced that the cause of the crash could be the aurora borealis that appeared in the sky. But how could a natural phenomenon affect the route of a huge ship? Within the framework of this material, I propose to consider the most popular theories about the sinking of the “Titanic” – there are several of them.

Wreck of the Titanic

Many books and dozens of documentaries have been written about the catastrophe that happened more than 100 years ago. During conversations with the surviving passengers, the researchers managed to find out many details about the wreck of a huge ship. Its length was as much as 269 meters and the shipping company “White Star Line” assured that it was unsinkable. Only on April 14, 1912, at 23 hours 40 minutes, for unknown reasons, he lost his course and sank. More than 1,500 people died, and the rest of the people were rescued by the steamer Carpathia, which sailed for the distress signal.

Victims of the Titanic

All surviving humans confirmed that the ship collided with a huge iceberg. But no one could explain why he went off course. And this is not surprising, because most of the rescued were ordinary passengers. There were many famous people aboard the ship. One of them was businessman John Jacob Astor, who was reputed to be a good inventor and author of fantastic stories. He went on a journey with his pregnant wife. They wanted their child to be born not in Southampton, England, but in American New York. John Jacob Astor was unquestionably the richest passenger on the Titanic.

Perhaps the reason for the wreck of the ship could be told by its captain – Edward John Smith. In the course of his career as a captain, he was given the opportunity to operate the ships Adriatic, Majestic, Coptic and Olympic. People who knew him said that he was highly respected, but unpleasant situations arose on almost all ships under his leadership. For example, in 1906 a fire broke out on the ship “Baltic” he was driving. Other ships under his command often ran aground. But, despite all these incidents, everyone trusted him. The trip on the Titanic was to be the last in his career – after that he wanted to retire. Unfortunately, he was never able to retire, because during the shipwreck he was not saved. The researchers couldn’t even find his body.

Reasons for the sinking of the Titanic

Scientists regularly try to unravel the mystery of the Titanic. In the course of scientific work, a variety of hypotheses are put forward. Some of them sound very convincing and are based on the stories of the surviving passengers. But among them there are also assumptions put forward by supporters of conspiracy theories. Next, we will consider the most interesting theories about the sinking of the Titanic. Of course, let’s talk about the most recent of them, which was put forward by the aforementioned Mila Zinkova.

Compass error

A new theory on the cause of the Titanic crash was reported in the Science Times scientific journal. Mila Zinkova drew attention to the fact that the survivor of the shipwreck, writer Lawrence Beesley, said that the northern lights could be seen in the sky that night. This is the name of the atmospheric phenomenon that occurs when the electrons ejected by the Sun interact with the magnetic field of our planet. My colleague Lyubov Sokovikov recently wrote about this in more detail – in this article everything is explained in detail. Perhaps it was the northern lights that caused the collision of the ship with the iceberg.

The Northern Lights were also seen by at least three surviving passengers on the Titanic. And the assistant captain of the rescue ship “Karpatia” said that on the tragic night the sea was calm. The aurora borealis could have been triggered by a strong solar flare that caused a strong burst of electromagnetic radiation. And such outbreaks, by the way, can greatly affect the technology on Earth. For example, during the so-called geomagnetic storm of 1859, telegraph systems failed throughout Europe and North America. And the aurora borealis that arose were so bright that the inhabitants of the Caribbean islands woke up thinking that morning had come.

Solar activity on that fateful night could have altered the Titanic’s compass. The ship could well turn in the wrong direction, where a huge iceberg was waiting for her. This theory is very plausible because the technical equipment was really working very badly that night. The sinking Titanic sent SOS signals to nearby ships, but they did not receive them. Only the Carpathia ship succeeded, but even it sailed completely to the wrong place where the Titanic was sinking. But it was this mistake that saved the people, because the ship sailed exactly to the place where the surviving people found themselves after the disaster.

Fire on the ship

In 2008, Ray Boston, who devoted more than 20 years to studying the sinking of the Titanic, suggested that a fire on the ship was the cause of the tragedy. It is believed that even before the ship sailed, a fire broke out in its coal compartment. It was not extinguished, because the management considered that the fire could not do much harm to the ship. It was planned that the Titanic would safely take passengers to New York and there the fire would be completely extinguished. While sailing, the fire could well provoke an explosion. Captain Edward John Smith could pick up speed so that the ship sailed faster to the end point, because another explosion could destroy the entire structure.

Other ships reported large numbers of icebergs floating in the waters of the Atlantic. But due to the high probability of a powerful explosion, the captain could hardly slow down. The ship “Titanic” could accelerate to 42 kilometers per hour, and with such a fast movement it is very difficult to dodge blocks of ice. So, there is a possibility that even after finding the iceberg, it was difficult for the captain to turn in the other direction. As a result, the ship crashed into an iceberg at high speed. Unfortunately, Ray Boston does not have convincing evidence, but his theory still sounds very plausible.

Conspiracy theory

Fans of conspiracy theories stick to the version published in the book “The Riddle of the Titanic”. It says that in fact, in 1912, it was not the Titanic that sank, but the ship Olympic, very similar to it. According to historical documents, on September 20, 1911, he collided with one of the cruisers of the British Navy. Both ships were seriously damaged, but the insurance company did not consider the damage to the Olympic to be significant. The ship’s owners decided to cheat and deliberately sent it to an area with a lot of ice blocks to make the damage more serious. The Olympic was moving very quickly and the collision resulted in the death of thousands of people.

This theory at first seemed very plausible. The fact is that after the discovery of the remains of the sunken ship, there was no mention of the name “Titanic” on it. However, later on the sunken ship was found building number “Titanic” – 401. And “Olympic” had number 400. Despite the fact that the theory was destroyed, some people still continue to believe in it.

Torpedo hit

Another theory is that the Titanic was not damaged by a collision with an iceberg. Some people believe that the ship’s hull was damaged by a torpedo fired by a German submarine. And this shot was allegedly also coordinated with the owners of the Titanic. It is believed that the damage caused should have solved some of the problems with the insurance companies.

It is believed that the submarine commander was a relative of one of the owners of the Titanic. And that is why he agreed to pull off a scam that could clearly lead to the death of people. However, very few people believe in this theory. And all because no torpedoes were found near the remains of the ship. Yes, and a torpedo strike would hardly have gone unnoticed by both passengers and the ship’s crew.

The curse of the pharaohs

One of the passengers on the infamous ship was the historian Lord Canterville. There is information that he was transporting the mummy of a resident of Ancient Egypt on the Titanic. Since it was of great historical value, the box with it was placed not in the hold, but near the captain’s bridge. Some people believe that the spirit of this mummy took possession of the mind of Captain Edward John Smith. Despite warnings about blocks of ice, he did not slow down, which caused the disaster. Many people believed in this theory decades ago, because the curses of the pharaohs seemed real to them. One has only to remember the sad fate of the researchers who found the tomb of Tutankhamun, which I talked about in this article. After the discovery of the tomb, they began to die one after another, but recently we have already found out that the Egyptian curses do not exist.

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