Possible outcome of Titanic not sinking

The Militant One

We all know the story and we all know the facts. I have spent 18 years studying every rivet, deck, passenger and crew member on that voyage. Although there was no single fatal error that caused the maiden voyage to end suddenly, there were many small errors that caused the liner to sink and cause mass casualties. We could discuss the wrought iron rivets used or we could discuss Bruce Ismay's desire to only use 20 life boats rather than the 48 life boats that Edward Wilding originally had planned. But we're not going to. It is well known that the sinking of Titanic caused the downward spiral of the White Star Line, the creation of the International Ice Patrol and other organizations and a laundry list or new rules that were implemented.

What would this world have become if this tragic event had not have happened? J.J. Astor would have lived, Bruce Ismay's reputation would be stellar, Benjamin Guggenheim would have lived, the Rubayat wouldn't have been lost, Colonel Butt (President Taft's military advisor) would have survived, etc.

Allow me to set the stage for the POD:

Wireless Operator Jack Phillips was tirelessly tapping away on his Marconi machine sending messages to Cape Race to send messages through to New York. It was a late Sunday, 9:05 PM and wanted nothing more than to close his eyes for the evening. In the middle of his message, he received another message from the Californian, "Dammit to hell!" He thought to himself.

'We are stopped and surrounded by ice.' The Californian relayed. Although tired and annoyed, Phillips wrote down the message. Phillips, almost driven mad by these ice reports wanted to simply tell the other ship to shut up. But He paused for no more than a second and messaged back, "What are your current coordinates?"

Phillips' wireless began to make sounds. "42° 03’ N, 49° 09’ W. Be advised, ice hard to see. Recommend full stop until dawn." Phillips wrote it down vigilantly. He ripped the paper from his pad and walked down the Officer's promenade to the bridge.

Jack Phillips walked into the bridge where Second Officer Lightoller was standing, preparing to be relieved within the hour. "Sir, I have received another report from the Californian. Where is the Captain?"

Second Officer Lightoller took the message and read it. "He just turned in, if the Californian has stopped, the ice must be quite heavy. I am expected to be relieved my Mr. Murdoch soon, please take this to the Captain at once." "Yes, sir!" Phillips replied.

Phillips quickly walked to the door of the of the Captain's quarters. He was about to knock but paused for a moment, then gingerly knocked on the door. To Jack Phillips, it must have felt like hours but it was only a few seconds. "What is the matter Mr. Phillips?"

"Sir, this report just came from the Californian, they are stopping for the evening and are concerned about ice." Phillips handed the Captain the message. Captain Smith read the message, "Thank you Mr. Phillips, go back to your station."

A few minutes later, Captain Smith stepped onto the bridge at 9:20 pm, 25 minutes before First Officer Murdoch would arrive. Mr. Lightoller turn to Captain Smith. "Quite late for you, sir."

Captain Smith still had the note in hand. "Yes it is Mr. Lightoller, I would like you to oder the ship to full stop." Mr. Lightoller looked perplexed, "sir?" Captain Smith gave a reassuring smile, "nothing to worry about, there is heavy ice about and I don't want to muss up the paint." Mr. Lightoller smiled, quite right sir." He looked to Quartermaster Hitchen who was at the ship's wheel, "Mr. Hitchens, all stop!"

"Aye, sir!" Mr. Hitchens replied and he relayed and moved the handle of the ship's telegraph to "STOP." Slowly but surely, the 45 thousand ton vessel would slow and come to a stop.

Mr Ismay was in the first class smoking room, he felt the slight vibration stop. He grew accustomed to the hum and noticed when he could no longer hear it. He knew the ship's engines have come to a stop. Fearing the unimaginable, he stood from his seat and left the room towards the bridge. He had to walk passed the grand starcase and out the door to the first class promenade. He walked down the promenade and up the stairs, straight to the bridge. "Captain, why have we stopped?"

Captain Smith looked to Mr. Ismay's direction. "We have received a large amount of reports on ice. For the safety of the ship and passengers, I have chosen to stop for the evening." Mr. Ismay had the look of anger on his face, "this will cause us to delay, when can we get underway dammit?"

Captain Smith decided to amuse Mr. Ismay and reply to him. "In the morning, when our lookouts can see what is in front of them. They have no glasses, we haven't seen them since Southampton." Mr. Ismay glared "This is unacceptable, E.J. God himself cannot sink this ship."

Captain Smith, having heard that from Mr. Ismay all week, "with all due respect Mr. Ismay. If God can create the world in six days, I am sure he can sink one ocean liner. I will not risk the lives of anyone on this ship including you, sir. Now if you excuse me, I need to speak with my officer's on a new course and heading."

The Titanic would arrive in New York on the 18th, a day behind schedule. Captain Smith and his officer's chose to sail further south and stop nightly. Although it frustrated a few passengers, most did not mind an additional day of luxury. The Titanic would continue to sail for until 1935 when it would be retired and scrapped.
 

MattII

Full stop for 8 hours? Seems a bit unlikely to me, surely a reduction to 10 knots, and maybe after a near-miss to 7. Just stopping dead would send all the wrong signals, both to the passengers and to the world at large.
 

BlondieBC

Banned
The safety issues would not have been fixed until a large loss of life due to lack of lifeboats. It would have been some other ship on some other day would have lost many more passengers.

The competition for the biggest, fastest cruise ship continues. So maybe a few more keels to huge passenger ships will be laid down before WW1, and most of these will be lost in the war.


The Kiat said:
Maybe it gets torpedoed during the Great War as it transports soldiers to the continent?
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Most likely. This does seem to be the fate of passenger liners of over 10,000 tons with a British Flag.
 

APreston

Not to detract from the OP, but a corollary question: if Titanic maintains her speed and heading and doesn't hit the iceberg, is she on pace to take the Blue Riband back from Cunard? Ismay wanted a headline from pulling Titanic to New York a day early, maybe this is what he had in mind.
 

Armored Diplomacy

The lifeboat policy gets introduced after a liner being used to transport troops in World War I gets torpedoed and goes down with massive loss of life.
 
Pyeknu494

Pyeknu494

APreston said:
Not to detract from the OP, but a corollary question: if Titanic maintains her speed and heading and doesn't hit the iceberg, is she on pace to take the Blue Riband back from Cunard? Ismay wanted a headline from pulling Titanic to New York a day early, maybe this is what he had in mind.
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Titanic was never designed to take the Blue Riband from Mauretania. The Olympic-class ships were always built for luxury, not speed.
 

bsmart111

With no International Ice Patrol in March 1937 the Normandie while attempting to regain the Blue Riband (recently lost to the Queen Mary) rams an iceburg at full speed at night. The combination of the time of day, the rapid attempt to abandon the ship and the extreme cold causes a huge loss of life, even among those who make it into the open lifeboats.
 
MonsooN

MonsooN

Peter Parker said:
The lifeboat policy gets introduced after a liner being used to transport troops in World War I gets torpedoed and goes down with massive loss of life.
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Would it though?

People had been lost at sea in their hundreds and even thousands every year for decades before Titanic. The losses and how to prevent them were even debated in Parliament sometime in the 1880s but nothing was ever done.

With Titanic, it seems as though it was a combination of it being the maiden voyage, the fact that it was supposedly unsinkable and that there were also many important people on board that seemed to make it more interesting than usual.

If Titanic had made it, it would have doubtless been converted into a troop carrying ship, just like the Queen Mary in WW2.
 
Jape

Jape

Titanic was a dramatic event certainly but as you yourself say Monsoon, ship safety was hardly a new concern. I could imagine after numerous liners are lost in the War, post-war committees looking into the inadequate precautions. There's a good chance Titanic goes down in 1916 not 1912, and possibly with worse losses. A commission gives its hearing and is quietly brought into place during the 1920s with some harumphing off White Star and Cunard over enforced costs etc.

The *Ice Patrol is established some time later, perhaps after WWII when yet more post-war investigations note the dangers and losses meated out to Atlantic and Artic convoys.
 

bsmart111

MonsooN said:
Would it though?


If Titanic had made it, it would have doubtless been converted into a troop carrying ship, just like the Queen Mary in WW2.
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Or would it have continued its regular service like the Lusitania did? That of course does not guarantee it will suffer the same fate but it doesn't protect it either
 

Color-Copycat

Pyeknu494 said:
Titanic was never designed to take the Blue Riband from Mauretania. The Olympic-class ships were always built for luxury, not speed.
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Not to mention the fact that Cunard had already been outfitting its liners with steam turbines for some time. That was like the early 20th century naval equivalent of the jet engine in terms of speed.
 

The Militant One

APreston said:
Not to detract from the OP, but a corollary question: if Titanic maintains her speed and heading and doesn't hit the iceberg, is she on pace to take the Blue Riband back from Cunard? Ismay wanted a headline from pulling Titanic to New York a day early, maybe this is what he had in mind.
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Unfortunately, that is a myth.

Pyeknu494 said:
Titanic was never designed to take the Blue Riband from Mauretania. The Olympic-class ships were always built for luxury, not speed.
Click to expand...

I could hug you right now. The White Star Line knew that they couldn't produce ocean liners as fast as Cunard, IIRC Cunard could get their vessels at 23 knots and White Star Line could do 21 knots if they push all the boilers. Since the White Star Line knew they couldn't beat them in speed, they would attempt to beat them in size and luxury. I cannot remember who said it, but someone said "The Olympic class may not be the fastest, but they are the grandest."

My theory about the life boats is that it would most likely would have taken decades for anyone to realize a serious life boat issue. Titanic's case was so unique that it prompted the question of the life boats. Interesting subject of note is that life boats were not intended for long term duration. Their intention was transportation back and forth from a foundering ship to a rescue ship. This is why they believed 20 was more than enough. Unfortunately the nearest vessel to the Titanic had its wireless off and the life boats mission went from transportation to long term duration, roughly two hours in frigid waters.
 
modelcitizen

modelcitizen

O pretty butterfly!

Butterfly alert.

There were some important movers and shakers who went down with the Titanic, and others who didn't die but had their lives altered dramatically.

Maybe the Arch-Duke and his wife decide to take a cruise on the Titanic circa late 1913, which propels the schedule out of shape to the extent that the Arch-Duke's would-be assassin gets run over by a bus en route to the scene of the would-be crime.

Of the folks who did not die with the Titanic, a number of them acted as important buffers between continental conflagration and continued peace and onward progress in the delightful areas of civilization and what not.

Ocean liners get bigger, better, faster.

Airliners seeking to compete are pressed to excel in directions other than those given by WW1. Instead of development time for fighter planes and (to a lesser extent) bombers, ttl sees earnest additional resources to make the ocean-crossing airliner a worthy option to the Cunard and White Star heavyweights.

With so many of the best and brightest young men not dying on battlefields --eight million soldiers!-- innovators from otl have unexpected support and competition to drive them even further.

In our timeline, the inventor of the jet engine is discouraged and the Brits don't see an actual jet plane until nine years after Frank Whittle first submits his ground-breaking work on jet-propelled airplanes.

In this timeline, instead of facing derision and dismissal, the jet-engine pioneer gets support and additional ideas for improvement from men who did not leave the world of the living a decade before Whittle's work emerged. The British get jet planes in the air in a significant manner before the mid-1930s...

All this wealth not spent on massive-scale warfare goes into unexpected directions. Let's imagine that some of these directions are shall we say aeronautic in nature. And it's a Scotsman to first step onto the surface of the moon in 1963, accompanied by his Gurkha adjutant...
 
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