Great Ship Disasters

Rating:
Summary: Fascinating book on maritime disasters
Review: I was a newcomer to the genre of nautical writing when I recently discovered this book by the Bonners, a respected husband and wife team in the field. After reading it, I can't imagine a more interesting introduction to the field. Prior to this my only knowlege of the area was when, about a year ago, I got on a website devoted to tracking current maritime accidents and disasters, and also piracy. It turns out piracy is on the increase, mostly off the coast of Pakistan and in Indonesia, but most are poorly armed, often with only knives or old, often not very serviceable guns. In one incident, an oil tanker turned away pirates trying to board her by turning the high-pressure fire hoses on them. (One almost feels sorry for the pirates).

But getting back to the present book, the book is divided into six chapters: Passengers, Cargo, and Other Vessel Disasters; Collisions, Fires and Explosions; Groundings, Founderings, and Capsizings; Unplanned and Mysterious Occurrences; and Improving Saftety at Sea for Mariners, Ports, and Vessels.

The book recounts dozens of famous and no- so-famous disasters. No book on sea disasters would be complete, of course, without discussing the sinking of the Titanic, and so there's a section devoted to that, which includes recently discovered facts and research. For example, it was learned that one factor contributing to the rapid sinking of the great ship was a large section of weakened hull with popped rivets, bulging plating, and eroded caulking that was hard to access and repair. Also, the captain and the senior officers were new to the new engines, being more familiar with triple-exapansion type engines, and they also didn't know the main center engine had no reverse gear, only forward and stop. It's thought that if they simply tried to make a hard turn rather than stop, the Titanic would have only grazed the iceberg and added many hours of life to the ship, during which many more of the passengers and crew could have been saved.

Another fascinating fact about the Titanic disaster concerns the story written in 1898 by Morgan Robertson, 14 years before the Titanic sailed. The novel recounted the fictional story of the SS. Titan, the largest and fastest ship of its day, which sank after striking an iceberg. The dimensions, total tonnage, and top speed of the fictional ship were strikingly similar to the ill-fated Titanic. Not only that, but it carried the minimum number of lifeboats allowed by the British Board of Trade, the same as the Titanic. Because of all the amazing coincidences, Robertson was regarded as a genuine psychic by many during his time, although he quite commendably insisted on being considered only a maritime fiction author.

In addition to the Titanic, many other stories are told, including that of the S.S. Zam Zam, the S.S. Olympic (the equally ill-fated sister ship to the Titanic, the same size, and sunk by a mine only weaks after it was converted to a hospital ship at the beginning of WWI), the Soviet submarine Kursk, the Yarmouth Castle, and the S.S. L'Atlantique. In fact, there's a section devoted to just Soviet nuclear sub disasters since there were so many of them.

In the years leading up the final breakup of the USSR, there were seven November class boats that were seriously damaged with substantial loss of life, such as the infamous K-19, whose story has been retold in the recent Harrison Ford movie. There have been no less than 40 serious incidents involving collisions between Soviet and American ships, resulting in five Soviet subs sunk with loss of life estimated at 625 dead. Of particular interest was the sinking of one of the new class of titanium hulled subs capable of diving to more than 3000 feet. This was the Mike-class sub Konsomolets, which sunk after a fire in the Norwegian sea when it was returning to port.

The book contains many photos including shots of the Titanic before it was launched, and another showing it riding very high in the water, not having been fully fitted out yet. The book is printed on high-quality, glossy paper which makes the photos more attractive. This is a well-written, beautifully illustrated book on the fascinating subject of disasters on the high seas.