Sunday, March 3, 2013

Iceberg, Right Ahead!

This past week, Brian and I attended the Titanic Artifact Exhibition that's been touring the country. So it became my P52 for Week 9.

P52: Week 9 - Titanic Exhibit

Overall, while I did enjoy the exhibit and found it very interesting, it made me a little sad. One, yes, for the poor people who had to go through this tragedy (and the hundreds that did not survive), but 2, sad for humanity's folly, selfishness, and arrogance!

There was a coal shortage at the time, but Titanic HAD to sail--it WAS the unsinkable ship, after all--in its grand debut. So, the company took coal from other ships, thus forcing many of those passengers to switch to the Titanic to be able to make their trip. Then, while they had the legal number of lifeboats required, it was only legal per the current ships out there. Titanic was larger than any of them. Therefore, not enough for the actual number of people on board. Then of course, there were the 3 warnings about ice/icebergs they received on their way. Not only were the warnings not heeded, the ship continued on at almost the fastest speed it could reach. And then, after the ship began to sink, the lifeboats left with very few people, and many didn't go and rescue anyone else left in the water.

If only they had ....

But, they didn't, and thus the tragedy occurred. So sad. But, we learned from it. But, isn't it sad that we only make great changes after things like this occur, instead of someone thinking ahead to the what-ifs?But then, we ARE only human.

I would say the most interesting part of the exhibit was that each person received a card, similar to a boarding pass that one might have received back then. It had the name of one of the passengers on the Titanic and a little bit of information about them. (What class they were in, and sometimes a room number, and a little bit of extra information, if it was available.) Then, toward the end of the exhibit, there's a wall with the names of all the passengers, and whether they survived or perished. And you can find out about your person.

My person was a Mrs. Kimball, wife of a wealthy businessman, staying in 1st class. She survived. (I don't think her husband did.) Brian's person was an engineer in 2nd class. He didn't survive.

2 comments:

Charles Gramlich March 4, 2013 at 8:20 AM  

Without humanity's folly there were be far fewer tragedies.

M March 9, 2013 at 7:48 PM  

Sounds like a cool exhibit.

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