What If The Queen Mary Hit Titanic's Iceberg?

i have been thinking constantly about the notion of whether the queen mary could have survived a strike with titanic's iceberg i've gone back and forth in my mind about various factors that could have made her sink or swim so to speak and then i wondered if she were to sink how would the situation have played out and how would it have gone differently than titanic's sinking now i am definitely not a marine engineer nor do i have fancy computer models that could put this to the test but my hope is that this video is interesting and entertaining this video is just for fun and the predictions i make in this video are almost entirely speculation so if you hate speculation now's your chance to click away first we must look at why the titanic sank to begin with from the moment the ship's officers noticed the iceberg they had approximately 45 seconds to react before the inevitable collision there's a lot of speculation about whether the sinking could have been avoided if they kept the engines running to steer away from the iceberg or if they had rammed the berg head on the fact of the matter is they brought the engines to a stop turned the ship to port and hoped to avoid the iceberg she would have too if it wasn't for a rare formation of ice that created an overhang that pierced the ship's hull the titanic sustained about 250 feet of damage below the waterline which allowed water to rush into the hull now the titanic's lower decks were divided by 16 water tight compartments which went as high as five decks from the keel the ship could stay afloat with any four of the compartments flooded however the water was rushing into five compartments which caused a domino effect where the water began spelling over the top of the watertight bulkheads bringing the ship down by the head the queen mary in comparison was divided into 18 watertight compartments with bulkheads that extended up to six decks from the keel and could stay afloat with any five of the compartments flooded that might sound like a vast improvement but here's the interesting part if the same 250 feet of damage is applied to the queen mary that means she gets six compartments breached pushing her over the limit and here's the difference first the titanic was famous for implementing a double bottom keel for strength this simply means that instead of having just one outer shell to keep out the ocean it had a second one on the inside well the queen mary went a step further she not only had a double bottom keel but she had what is nicknamed a double hull which means there was an inner layer of watertight steel along the walls of the ship going up above the waterline but let's say this didn't matter let's say the iceberg pierced through both layers there was still one more fundamental difference between the queen mary and titanic the titanic burned coal in its boilers and had to store that coal in large bunkers along the watertight bulkheads but the queen mary didn't burn coal she burned bunker sea oil since oil is viscous you must store it in watertight containers the queen mary's oil tanks were built along the length of the hull allowing them to build longitudinal water type bulkheads in addition to the ones previously mentioned the tanks ranged in width from 8 feet to 16 feet meaning that if an iceberg punctured the double hull she might leak oil into the ocean but there would still be a third bulkhead protecting the boiler room now i know you might be saying well alex that's not fair the queen mary had technology that was 20 years ahead of titanic well no not in this case you see the rms mauritania was titanic's older rival she had her maiden voyage in 1907 almost five years before the titanic yet the mauritania had a double hull like the queen mary and even though she burned coal her coal bunkers were placed along the hull and could act as watertight bulkheads in case there was a whole breach the reason titanic didn't place its coal bunkers along the hull was because the ship could list to one side if the coal wasn't removed from both sides equally it was thought that if titanic had coal bunkers placed along the bulkheads then it would take a lot more to develop a list so at least they had a good reason as for why titanic did not have a double hull like the mauritania i honestly could not tell you but that is why i believe the queen mary could have survived a collision with the iceberg without sinking but what if the queen mary did start sinking let's say there was something i missed and the ship started going down how would the situation have played out differently than the titanic well let's start by talking about the execution of the lifeboat deployment and then finish with the technical differences between the two ships sinking on the titanic the ship's officers were in charge of the crew who prepared the lifeboats for deployment in the panic and confusion mistakes were made lifeboats were being deployed far under capacity other lifeboats that were already in the water started rowing away from the ship against orders fearing the ship sinking could cause suction that would pull the lifeboat under as the ship dipped further underwater panic began to set in and it became harder for the crew to maintain order many of the issues that took place that night could have been managed with the wisdom of the captain but he couldn't possibly be in several places at once he relied on his highly trained officers to manage the evacuation it's possible this situation wouldn't have happened on the queen mary simply because unlike the titanic the mary was equipped with an intercom system this means that the captain of the queen mary could coordinate the ship's evacuation by using the laudaphone intercom to give orders to the crew and direct passengers to the escape routes not to mention hearing the captain give commands and assurances over the intercom would have helped prevent panic since everyone on the ship would look to him for guidance and order when it comes to the differences between the lifeboats on the two ships the most noticeable thing is that the titanic's 16 clinker-built lifeboats and four collapsible lifeboats could not carry the full capacity of the ship the conventional thinking was that the lifeboats would only be used to ferry passengers from the sinking ship to the rescue ship titanic was without aid for several hours and therefore more than half the people in the ship died as a result the lifeboats were lowered from the ship using nothing but ropes and manpower the queen mary on the other hand had 24 steel lifeboats together they were capable of carrying the entire capacity of the ship plus an extra 46 people they were lowered down from the ship with her electrically powered davits but even if the electricity had gone out the lifeboats could still be lowered with gravity although the descent would be slower and harder to control once titanic's wooden lifeboats were in the water they could be road with oars but the queen mary's were made of riveted steel and were the first fleet of lifeboats to be mechanically powered they each had a diesel engine which drove a propeller another issue that plagued titanic's lifeboats was that the ship developed a port list as it sank which meant that the lifeboats that went down on the starboard side began to scrape against the hull getting caught on rivets and steel plates which made the boats swing and bump erratically to prevent this from happening to the queen mary's lifeboats steel ribs were designed into the sides of the boats these not only added strength but they acted like sleds so if the boats went down against the wall of the ship they slid past the rivets and hole plates with minimal disturbance there is one more topic to discuss you see the hypothetical scenario where water managed to rush into six compartments on the queen mary doesn't necessarily spell out doom remember when i said that the water spilled over the watertight bulkheads on titanic which was like a domino effect well the queen mary's watertight compartments were all capped with a watertight roof meaning that even if the room filled up water couldn't spill over the bulkheads but would the weight of five compartments filled with water be enough to doom the ship well to be honest i don't know but one thing is for sure she wouldn't have been able to continue sailing even if she didn't sink the angle of her pitch or any possible list that she could have developed would have made her dangerous for people to walk on and at least two of her propellers would be partially out of water so here is a full rundown in my opinion of what would have happened if the queen mary collided with titanic's iceberg first the ship would have sustained 250 feet of damage flooding the first five compartments but the sixth compartment would have possibly remained dry due to the iceberg being unable to puncture the longitudinal water type bulkhead eight feet further in due to the five compartments filling with water the ship would possibly have developed a list the captain would have ordered the bilge pumps to be run in order to slow the filling of the compartments and the ballast tanks inside the double bottom hull would probably be adjusted to help right the ship and decrease its angle of pitch and roll from there the captain would have roused the crew and had them prepare to launch the lifeboats the ship could technically stay afloat with five compartments breached but depending on the risk of the six compartment flooding they would possibly launch the lifeboats as a precaution if a rescue ship arrived the queen mary's passengers would probably take that ship to the nearest port if the queen mary remained afloat then cunard would make attempts to salvage it by patching the holes and pumping out the compartments so i suppose with everything said and done i think the queen mary would have survived a collision with the iceberg so long as the conditions were the same as that of titanic's tragic night and even if the ship sank i still believe that most if not all of the ship's passengers and crew would have survived just due to the fact the sinking would have been much slower because of the superior water type features of the ship and the ability to coordinate and communicate through the loudspeaker system [Music] well everyone i hope this video was intriguing and entertaining let me know if you think the queen mary would have survived the iceberg collision i'd love to hear your opinion be sure to like the video and subscribe for more content thanks for watching

Channel: Alex the Historian

Views: 356,021

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Id: z4mpMaVGDL0

Length: 10min 31sec (631 seconds)

Published: Tue Oct 26 2021