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"The Titanic sinking - Natural or Human Disaster?"

I thought I'd better post this before Machie and Garin have nothing left to say about it. (As if Machie and Garin would ever run out of things to say)
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There are many reasons for the sinking of The Titanic to be a human disaster. One reason being the fact there were only 20 life boats on board, meaning that less than half the passengers, not including the crew, would not be safe when the ship went under. Another human error was that look-outs may not have had any binoculars, however this wasn't proved, but would made the fact that the Titanic was speeding through the ocean, even though the crew had been warned about the icebergs that were sighted earlier in the region even worse, because he couldn't see the iceberg until they were much closer, and to late to aviod the it. After the Titanic was peirced by the iceberg, 5 of the 16 water-tight compartments were flooded, if only 4 got flooded the ship would have stayed afloat, the extra flooding was partly due to the fact that the water-tight compartments were not built to the very top, meaning that the water flowed over the top of the doors flooding more compartments. Only 703 out of the 2200 travellers survived, this is related back to the first point, about the lifeboats. However it isn't just that there weren't enough, but when they first tried to get the passengers into the lifeboats, no one believed that the ship was sinking, therefore no one planned to get on and the first few lifeboats were sent away with less than half the full capacity.

Even though there were many human errors, nature played a part in this disaster. Such as the iceberg, completely natural, no relation to mankind at all, therefore cannot be human error, and it was the iceberg that caused the hole, that allowed the water to overflow 5 compartments, making the ship sink. Darkness was another factor that contributed to the sinking of the Titanic, if it weren't dark then the look-out would have seen the iceberg in time for the ship to turn and possibly miss it.

So, was it a human disaster or natural? I'll leave you lot to argue about it.
Also, please consider that even though there are more human errors than natural, most of the human errors are linked. So its about half and half of each.

Right, so if a ship piloted by idiots crashes into an iceberg, it's partially the iceberg's fault for being there?

So if an airline pilot gets his maps wrong and flies headlong into the face of a mountain, do we also blame the mountain (also entirely natural) for getting in the way?

Ludicrous, pedantic argument that flies in the face of logic.

Can't be fu--.. bothered.. to read some of the rest of the discussion so;

Man steers ship.. ship hits huge iceberg in the middle of the sea which didn't just casually drift there in five minutes or so..

It's possible to say the iceberg may have moved into the planned route and that there was fog, but at the end of the day whoever steered the boat into the iceberg has to get the blame.

Him, and the person who didn't think to add an iceberg cattle-grate ;c]

Cycloon wrote:
> Well yes it's semantics. If it had hit another ship it'd of been
> entirely human, but because the hittee happened to be a great
> big lump of ice, that's the natural disaster bit. If the iceberg
> hadn't of been there there would of been no disaster, regardless
> of human folly.

That's prob'ly how my teacher explained it. (I fell asleep and asked a friend for a short summary at the end)

> This is a very odd discussion.

Yeh.. I try my best :)

Well yes it's semantics. If it had hit another ship it'd of been entirely human, but because the hittee happened to be a great big lump of ice, that's the natural disaster bit. If the iceberg hadn't of been there there would of been no disaster, regardless of human folly.

This is a very odd discussion.

That's okay I cheated and added 'icebergs' in ^^

Personally I think the Titanic disaster is a human disaster that involved a big iceberg =)

To those pleading the case for a natural disaster ...

How is it a natural disaster? A ship drives almost full speed into an almost stationary iceberg ... yet it's natures fault for putting the iceberg there?

EDIT : Machie's Wiki description infringes on my rant ... :(

I agree with Garin. But then I did come across this on Wikipedia =)

A natural disaster is the consequence of the combination of a natural hazard (a physical event e.g. volcanic eruption, earthquake, icebergs, landslide) and human activities.

Sunflower wrote:
> Well, actually I asked my History teacher (he's teached history
> for 12 odd years)

I wouldnt trust a history teacher to get his own name correct. :)

People claiming its a natural disaster seem to base their argument on semantics. An iceberg is natural thus its a natural disaster.
Quite a weak argument in my opinion.

That's not likely - all disasters, whether man made or natural, are affected after the initial event by both. I.e the tsunami in 2004. The waves washed away thousnds of people, but there was no early warning system. Both.

The Titanic is both - the simple fact it hit an iceburg means it was partially a natural disaster, exacerbated by human error. Things are never that clear cut.

Well, actually I asked my History teacher (he's teached history for 12 odd years) and he said the Titanic sinking is considered both because it contains both human and natural error. Also, the Titanic is possibly the only disaster to be caused by both man and nature, well so far.