Hindsight: the ability to understand, after something

has happened, what should have been done or what

caused the event.
I. Work with a partner:
1. What do you know about the Titanic?

2. Why is it such a famous shipwreck?

3. According to the definition of hindsight, what can we understand about the accident,
making use of hindsight? Read the chronology and facts below before you answer this
question.

II. Read the chronology of the happenings concerning the sinking of the
Titanic:

April 11th - Titanic departs on her first Atlantic crossing. Calm clear seas.
April 12th - Calm clear seas, fine weather. Ice warnings are given by other ships.
April 13th, 22.30 - Heavy ice warning is given by a passing ship Rappahannock which
already reported some damage from ice. In total, Titanic receives 6 such warnings.
April 14th - Captain Smith delays a scheduled change of course by 30 minutes. Scheduled
lifeboat drill was cancelled by the Captain. Reasons are unknown but some people think it
was to allow passengers to go to church. Lookouts were sent to the crows nest. Apparently
the lookouts had no binoculars. At that time, some ships captains approved the use of
binoculars whilst others did not.
April 14th at 23.40 - Titanic is 5 miles south of where she should have been had she been
perfectly on course. Titanic and the iceberg collide some 1,500 miles south of the Arctic
Circle.

The iceberg photograph below may have been the Titanic sinking iceberg taken on the
morning of April 15,1912 by a passenger on the German ocean liner SS Prinz Adalbert,
unaware of the disaster on the previous night.
The water temperature on the night of the
Titanic sinking was thought to be about 28
degrees Fahrenheit, just below freezing -
lethally cold for all those passengers who
had been forced to take to the open water to
escape the sinking ship. There were
insufficient lifeboats to hold all the
passengers and crew, they totalled only 20,
comprising of 16 wooden, 4 collapsible.
Harland And Wolff wanted 64 lifeboats.

II. Discuss:
What do you think that could have been done to prevent it from happening?
1- It was Captain Smith's fault:
This was Captain E.J. Smith's retirement trip. All he had to do was get to New York
in record time. Captain E.J. Smith said years before the Titanic voyage, "I cannot
imagine any condition which would cause a ship to founder. Modern shipbuilding
has gone beyond that. If Captain Smith had believed the Titanic was sinkable, the
accident might have been more careful with the iceberg lookouts.

2- It was the Shipbuilder's fault:

When the ship hit the iceberg, the force of the impact caused the heads of the rivets
to break and the sections of the Titanic to come apart. If good quality iron rivets had
been used the sections may have stayed together and the ship may not have
sunk. About three million rivets were used to hold the sections of the Titanic
together. Some rivets have been recovered from the wreck and analysed. The
findings show that they were made of sub-standard iron. If shipbuilders had used
good quality iron, the head of the rivets wouldn't have broken and the Titanic
wouldn't have fallen apart.

3- It was Bruce Ismay's fault:

Bruce Ismay was the managing director of the White Star Line and he was aboard
the Titanic. Competition for Atlantic passengers was fierce and the White Star Line
wanted to show that they could make a six-day crossing. To meet this schedule the
Titanic could not afford to slow down. It is believed that Ismay put pressure on
Captain Smith to maintain the speed of the ship. If he hadn't wanted to show that
they could have made the crossing within six days, he would have slowed the
Titanic down.

4- It was Thomas Andrew's fault:

The belief that the ship was unsinkable was, in part, due to the fact that the Titanic
had sixteen watertight compartments. However, the compartments did not reach
as high as they should have done. The White Star Line did not want them to go all
the way up because this would have reduced living space in first class. If Mr
Andrews had insisted on making the compartments the correct height then, maybe,
the Titanic would not have sunk.
Watch the extract from the movie Titanic and answer
the following questions.
1. Describe the scene.

2. What were some of the problems that you saw in the segment that should have
been dealt with differently, now that you can use hindsight?

3. Why is the use of hindsight so important in the case of the Titanic sinking?

4. What has changed in traveling security after the accident?

5. Think about a situation (or situations) in your life in which you would have acted
differently if you had had the chance to use hindsight?

Watch the extract from the movie Titanic and answer

the following questions.
1. Describe the scene.

2. What were some of the problems that you saw in the segment that should have
been dealt with differently, now that you can use hindsight?

3. Why is the use of hindsight so important in the case of the Titanic sinking?

4. What has changed in traveling security after the accident?

5. Think about a situation (or situations) in your life in which you would have acted
differently if you had had the chance to use hindsight?