Shortly after midnight on April 15, 1912, Harold Cottam, the wireless communication operator on the Carpathia, received a distress call from the RMS Titanic. The great ship had struck an iceberg and was sinking fast.
Shortly after midnight on April 15, 1912, Harold Cottam, the wireless communication operator on the Carpathia, received a distress call from the RMS Titanic. The great ship had struck an iceberg and was sinking fast.
IT WAS 12:15 A.M. ON APRIL 15, 1912. Harold Cottam was operating the wireless communication system aboard the steamer ship Carpathia. Cottam was almost done with his shift when a series of Morse code messages started to come through. He quickly sat down to decode them.
“Require immediate assistance…. Come at once…. We have struck an iceberg … sinking.” The message was followed by the location of the ship and the letters CQD, which meant “Come, Quick, Danger.” The message also included the letters MGY.1
Cottam was shocked. The letters MGY were the code symbols for the RMS Titanic.
Newspapers around the world had been filled with stories about the Titanic as it prepared for its maiden voyage across the Atlantic Ocean, from England to New York. The Titanic was the largest ocean liner ever built. Its engineering and design were state-of-the-art. Builders believed the mighty ship was virtually unsinkable.
Before the ship’s maiden voyage and tragic disaster, the White Star Line advertised the Titanic’s one-of-a-kind qualities, including luxuries never seen before on a ship.
The Titanic had departed from Southampton, England, five days earlier on April 10, 1912. After brief stops in France and Ireland to pick up more passengers, the Titanic steamed out to sea. More than two thousand passengers and crew were aboard.
Cottam quickly informed his captain of the message he had just heard. Fifty-eight miles away, the Titanic was sinking.
Aboard the doomed ship, little more than half an hour had passed since lookout Frederick Fleet had spotted a dark mass in the distance.
“Iceberg right ahead,” Fleet had quickly warned the officers on the bridge. However, the giant ship had not turned in time and scraped the side of the iceberg. In a matter of seconds, the ship’s fate had been sealed. The iceberg had opened the Titanic’s hull. Water flooded into the forward compartments.2
In the crow’s nest, lookout Frederick Fleet spotted an iceberg in the distance, warning the ship’s officers on the bridge. But the warning did not give the ship enough time to turn and avoid it. This is a photo of the Titanic taken in 1912 as it steamed out to sea.
This painting by Willy Stöwer shows passengers and crew members rowing lifeboats away from the Titanic as it sinks into the ocean.
The terrible news then spread to the crew and passengers. The Titanic had struck an iceberg and was going down. Stewards moved quickly across the ship’s many decks. Passengers were told to get to the lifeboat deck and put on their lifejackets. For the next two hours, a tragic drama would unfold upon the decks of the Titanic. The ill-fated ship and its passengers were about to slip into history.
Even before its maiden voyage, the Titanic had become a kind of symbol. Its great size and luxury represented the best that could be produced with that era’s wealth and know-how. People of all classes, from the very rich to the very poor, were aboard the ship that night. The loss of so many lives aboard the Titanic made the ship’s sinking a great tragedy.
The Titanic began as a triumph of the human spirit. It represented the human desire to build things bigger and better. Its end would be a reminder that nothing on the sea is unsinkable and that nothing in the world is certain.