BLUNDERS IN WIRELESS MESSAGES CONTRIBUTED TO GREAT LOSS OF LIFE
Testimony given before the Senate committee showed that blunders in wireless service had much to do with the great loss of life.
Harold S. Bride, who was relief operator on the Titanic, said that when Chief Operator Phillips sent out the call for help the first answer came from the Frankfurt of the North German Lloyd line. The operator on the Frankfurt apparently considered the call trivial, for half an hour after receiving the imperative appeal he called the Titanic to inquire specifically just what was wrong.
“Mr. Phillips said he was a fool,” Bride testified, “and told him to keep out, but did not tell him the Titanic was sinking.”
No effort was made to re-establish communication with the Frankfurt, although Phillips felt certain the vessel was much nearer than the Carpathia, with which communication had been established.
Another phase of the laxity of the wireless service was developed when Chairman Smith drew from the witness an acknowledgment that Sunday evening Bride was sitting, the telephonic apparatus strapped to his ears, adjusting his accounts, while the steamship Californian, seeking to warn the Titanic that icebergs were invading the lanes of ocean travel, called incessantly.
Bride said he heard the call, but did not answer because he was “busy.”
It was not until a half hour later that the Californian, striving to reach the steamship Baltic, reached also the Titanic, whereupon the warning that three great icebergs had been sighted was noted by Bride and verbally communicated to the Titanic’s captain.
Senator Smith established by William Marconi that the Titanic and the Frankfurt operated virtually the same type of instruments.
Marconi also criticized the operator on the Frankfurt for neglecting to act immediately after he received the first call for help. It was the duty of the wireless operator, he said, to tell his captain of the distress signal so that that ship might have rushed to the rescue.
Both Bride and Thomas Cottam, wireless operators on the Carpathia, were mere boys, neither being over twenty-three years old.
Neither had any telegraph experience previous to taking up wireless telegraphy and both while on the stand told tales of long hours at low wages and days and nights spent without sleep.
This inexperience and the mental condition of the young operators were the two points on which Senator Smith bore persistently. He had put Cottam through a grueling examination, in which the youth testified that he had not slept more than eight or ten hours between Sunday night, when the Titanic called for help, and Thursday night, when the vessel docked. Bride’s story bore out virtually all that Cottam’s had established.
“What practical experience have you had?” asked Senator Smith.
“I have crossed to the States three times and to Brazil twice,” said Bride.
Bride remembered receiving and sending messages relative to the speed of the Titanic on its trial tests. After leaving Southampton on the Titanic’s fatal trip he could not remember receiving or sending any messages for Ismay. Senator Smith asked particularly about messages on Sunday.
“I don’t remember, sir,” said Bride. “There was so much business Sunday.”
He was asked if Captain Smith received or sent any messages Sunday.
“No, sir,” was the reply.
After testifying he made no permanent record of the iceberg warnings, Bride insisted he gave the memorandum of the warning to the officer on the watch. The name of the officer he could not tell. He did not inform Captain Smith.
Later the witness told of having intercepted a message from the Californian intended for the Baltic, which told of the presence of three giant icebergs in the vicinity of the former vessel.
“I gave the message to the captain personally,” he said.
In an effort to determine whether the signal “C.Q.D.” might not have been misunderstood by passing ships Senator Smith called upon Mr. Marconi.
“The ‘C.Q.,’” said Mr. Marconi, “is an international signal which meant that all stations should cease sending except the one using the call. The ‘D.’ was added to indicate danger. The call, however, now has been superseded by the universal ‘S.O.S.’”
Senator Smith then resumed the direct examination of Bride, who has said the North German Lloyd was the first to answer the Titanic’s distress signal.
“Have you heard it said that the Frankfurt was the nearest to the Titanic?” the senator asked.
“Yes, sir; Mr. Phillips told me that.”
“How did he know?”
“By the strength of the signals,” said the witness, who added that the Carpathia answered shortly after.
In addition to further questions, Operator Bride said:
“We did not feel the shock when the ship struck. In fact, I was asleep and was not even awakened by the impact. When the engines stopped, Mr. Phillips called me and I put on the telephone apparatus while he went out to see what was the trouble. A little later he came back. He said things looked ‘queer.’ By ‘queer’ I suppose he meant that everything was not as it should be.
“When I heard the confusion on deck I went out to investigate, and when I returned I found Mr. Phillips sending out a ‘C.Q.D.’ call giving our position. We raised the Frankfurt first, and then the Carpathia and the Baltic. As I have said, we did not try for the Frankfurt for any length of time, but concentrated our messages on the Carpathia, which had answered that it was rushing to our aid.
“The captain came into the wireless cabin when the Carpathia advised us of its position and figured out the time when that vessel probably would arrive. He left when that was disposed of, and proceeded to the bridge. Then we began unofficially to keep in communication with the Carpathia.
“From time to time either Mr. Phillips or I would go on deck to observe the situation. The last time I went I found the passengers running around in confusion and there was almost a panic. They were seeking life belts. All of the large lifeboats were gone, but there was one life raft remaining. It had been lashed on the top of the quarters on the boat deck. A number of men were striving to launch it.
“I went back to the wireless cabin then. Mr. Phillips was striving to send out a final ‘C.Q.D.’ call. The power was so low that we could not tell exactly whether it was being carried or not, for we were in a closed cabin and we could not hear the crackle of the wireless at the mast. Phillips kept on sending, however, while I buckled on his life belt and put on my own. Then we both cared for a woman who had fainted and who had been brought into our cabin.
“Then, about ten minutes before the ship sank, Captain Smith gave word for every one to look to his own safety. I sprang to aid the men struggling to launch the life raft, and we had succeeded in getting it to the edge of the boat when a giant wave carried it away. I went with it and found myself underneath. Struggling through an eternity, I finally emerged and was swimming 150 feet from the Titanic when it went down. I felt no suction as the vessel plunged.
“Captain Smith stuck to the bridge, and, turning, I saw him jump just as the vessel glided into the depths. He had not donned a life belt, so far as I could see, and went down with the ship.”