Disaster Lessons #2
The Takeaway
The sinking of the Titanic led, in 1914, to the world’s first international treaty on safety at sea, SOLAS — and ship safety standards stopped being a patchwork of national rules and became a single set of rules shared by the whole world.
Here is what happened, and what changed.
What Happened
In April 1912, the luxury liner Titanic, on her maiden voyage, struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic and sank. Of the roughly 2,200 people on board, more than 1,500 lost their lives.
The Titanic of that era was billed as an “unsinkable ship,” built with the very latest technology. Even so, she went down within just a few hours of hitting the iceberg.
What Went Wrong
She carried only 20 lifeboats — nowhere near enough for everyone on board. Worse, under the British rules of the time, the number of lifeboats a ship had to carry was decided by the ship’s tonnage, not by the number of people aboard.
On top of that, a ship nearby had switched off its wireless, so it never noticed the Titanic’s distress signals. There was simply no rule requiring anyone to keep listening.
In other words, the ship herself was magnificent — but the preparations for “just in case,” as a system, were not in place.
It is like everyone riding together in a car with no seatbelts. Once the accident happens, no matter how fine the car is, it cannot protect the people inside.
What Changed
The year after the sinking, in 1913, an international conference was held in London, and on January 20, 1914, thirteen countries adopted the world’s first International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea — SOLAS. The main changes were these:
- International standards were set for life-saving equipment such as lifeboats and life jackets
- Ships were required to keep a wireless watch around the clock, 24 hours a day
- Safety standards were set for the ship herself — her watertight compartments, fire protection, and the like
- The International Ice Patrol was established to monitor icebergs in the North Atlantic and warn ships
Because of the First World War, the 1914 version of the treaty itself never came into force, but country after country took its contents into their own national rules. SOLAS was then revised in 1929, 1948, and 1960, and the 1974 version remains the foundation of maritime safety around the world today.
What We Take for Granted Today
Today, when you board a passenger ship, it goes without saying that there are lifeboats for everyone. The evacuation drill held right after boarding is also a rule inherited from the SOLAS tradition.
The iceberg watch continues, too. The International Ice Patrol still tracks icebergs in the North Atlantic and passes the information to ships underway.
Without the Titanic tragedy, safety at sea might have remained a country-by-country patchwork of makeshift rules.
The sinking of a single ship rewrote the rules of the sea for the entire world.
References
- International Maritime Organization (IMO), “International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea (SOLAS), 1974”
- International Maritime Organization (IMO), “Focus on IMO: SOLAS, the International Convention for the Safety of Life at Sea, 1974”
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