[gerdesj]

"it is believed he didn't react quickly enough) and helped make it shocking that it happened at all."

Smith was born in 1850. Back then 52,000 tonne displacement ships were pretty rare (rocking horse shit rare).

I contend that the likes of Titanic were too complicated and too big and unsafe by design. Nowadays we have far bigger ships. I've sailed on a monster cruise ship into NOLA from the Gulf of Mexico - we overtook a tanker on the way upstream and the manoeuver took about 30 minutes. The really mad thing was that we all had to park up for several hours in a herringbone formation before entering port.

Huge stockpiles of coal means that you have loads of dust which is easy to ignite. We know she set sail with at least one fire on board.

The Captain (Smith) didn't stand a chance, in retrospect and in my opinion. There was way too much going on.

[DoreenMichele]

One study suggested the metal was unusually brittle and that is likely a significant factor in the disaster. Another found that the Captain's decision to leave the doors closed -- which has been questioned by some people -- was the right call and slowed the sinking. All other scenarios sank dramatically faster and had other issues, though I don't recall the details.

I can imagine that some sort of mistake in judgement occured rooted in confidence that was somewhat misplaced. His track record of safety was with ships other than the Titanic. I can also well imagine I've misspoken or misremembered and it was some other error that was made that was attributed to "overconfidence" due to his impeccable record.

But overall I agree that much was out of his hands and repeating what I've heard might be one possible factor is not intended to malign his character.

[dingaling]

> His track record of safety was with ships other than the Titanic.

He was in command of her sistership Olympic when she collided with HMS Hawke in 1911.