Assalamualaikum, and welcome back to Orange Shots.
The Titanic was the ship of dreams.
The Titanic sank in 1912.
It was hit by an iceberg.
The iceberg caused so much damage
that the Titanic ended up sinking.
The Titanic had a sister ship known as the Britannic
which was also built in the dry dock of Belfast.
But 3 years later, the Britannic,
united with here sister ship at the bottom of the sea.
It also sank,
The only difference being, the Titanic sank in the Atlantic,
and the Britannic sank in the Mediterranean sea.
What's so interesting about the Britannic is
a lot of the crew onboard the ship were Titanic survivors
who had witnessed the Titanic sink
and now some of them saw the Britannic sink.
The Britannic was built after the Titanic
and she had more safety features compared to the former.
The Britannic also had a double hull
meaning if something damaged the ship's hull's exterior,
water still wouldn't enter the ship.
The Britannic also had more lifeboats,
more compared to the crew.
Despite that,
the Britannic sinks in the Mediterranean sea on 21 November, 1916.
Why did all of this happen?
Despite having so many safety features,
despite having a double hull, why did the Britannic sink?
Today's video is about these very facts.
Stay with me, you're watching Orange Shots.
My name is Zahid Nisar. Let's start.
The Britannic was built exactly in the same dry docks as the Titanic.
This vessel was built in 1910.
Britain's largest vessel, in fact, the world's largest vessel was the Britannic
because the Titanic had already sunk by then.
The Belfast dry docks where both of these vessels were built
was the world's biggest dry docks.
The important thing to note is:
this was all during World War I.
Germany was already causing a lot of harm to the allied forces and allied countries.
A lot of merchant ships were discharged of their services,
so that they could bring the injured British soldiers - as well as ones from the allied forces
who couldn't fight on the field anymore -
back to their motherland.
Considering the benefits of the ship's size and its carrying capacity,
they thought they'd be able to accommodate more soldiers.
At that time, the Britannic had turned into a hospital ship.
In the first world war, Britain faced defeat against Turkey at Gallipoli.
A lot of injured British soldiers were brought to Greek island of Kea.
The Britannic was then responsible
for bringing the Soldiers back from Kea back to Britain.
The year is 1916, and it's the 21 of November.
It's 8 in the morning and it's time for breakfast.
Everybody is relaxed, competely relaxed.
Suddenly, there's an explosion at the front of the ship.
The forward boiler rooms start flooding.
Meaning, water starts coming into the forward boiler room.
The ship is completed rattled from its forward to its aft.
There's a strong vibration,
and the crew working in the forward boiler room starts to panic.
Just as the captain finds out about the explosion
he runs in his pyjamas towards the bridge.
The first order he gives when he reaches the bridge is
that all the watertight compartments be shut.
But the water ingress is too strong, it goes from point A, to B, to C way too quickly
but the crew is successful at shutting the ship's watertight compartments.
The ship's engine is turned off, and investigations begin.
Keep in mind that the Britannic had sunk in a matter of 55 minutes.
The captain didn't know that they had only 55 minutes left for survival.
But keeping in mind the Titanic's incicent, and the ongoing world war,
the captain sends out orders the emergency sirens to be set off.
He also orders for all the lifeboats to be swung out,
for the passengers to be called out of their compartments
to sit in the lifeboats,
and to wait for the signal to abandon ship.
The crew's response is excellent.
Everybody just gets out of their cabins,
they get into the lifeboats, and wait for the next orders.
Everyone's in the lifeboats, the lifeboats are ready
but the ship's captain doesn't give the signal abandon ship yet.
He thought that if the ship was struck by a mine,
there was still ample time to save the ship.
The ship slowly starts to trim forward
and lists heavily to starboard.
Starboard means, the ship's right side,
meaning the ship is listing to the side.
Around 8:27, the captain starts to think the ship could be saved.
The plan he devises to save his ship is that
he decides to navigate the ship forward
since they're already 3 nautical miles away from Kea.
He turns the ship, turns on the engine,
and plans to beach the ship.
Beach means to lay a ship ashore.
Of course, after this, the ship won't be able to sail again
but the ship's passengers and crew could be saved.
That day, 1065 passengers were present on the ship.
2 people out of them are especially important.
One of them Archie Jewell, a seaman on lookout duty,
and Violet Jessop, a stewardess.
These two were special because
they had survived the Titanic sinking.
Now, they were faced with the same situation on the Britannic.
5-6 minutes after the captain's orders to beach the ship,
they get the news that boiler rooms 5 and 6 have also begun to flood.
Boiler rooms 5 and 6 had already been made watertight,
their doors had already been shut.
What caused them to flood?
When the situation was assessed, it became obvious that
the explosion at the ships forward part,
had caused the ship to twist slightly.
And due to that slight twisting,
although the doors of the watertight compartments were shut
but they weren't completely shut.
Water was still entering the watertight compartments through the corridors.
When more water entered the ship,
the ship started to sink a bit further.
The portholes (the windows) on the ship's lower deck were open.
The interesting things, the portholes on a ship are usually watertight.
Although they're made of glass,
water can't enter through them when they're shut.
They can withstand a lot of water pressure.
Since these portholes were open, more water kept flooding in.
The ship was in an even riskier situation.
The captain still hadn't noticed that
water was entering through the ship's portholes.
The only thing he noticed was the ship trimming forward,
and listing heavily to starboard.
He keeps navigating forward towards Kea,
just as the approach Kea,
the ship trims and lists even more.
During this, the ship's portside (back) propeller protrudes out of the water
Both the Titanic and the Britannic were built with two propellers.
One towards the starboard side, the other towards the port side.
The strange thing to note is that
although the captain had given orders for everyone to board the lifeboats,
the crew was in the lifeboats already,
but he hadn't given orders to lower the lifeboats and abandon ship yet.
Soon enough, some of the ship's crew,
without following any orders,
lowers it's lifeboat into the water at the ship's port side.
Now, the ship's port side propellor is protruding out of the water
this propellor sucks the lifeboat in,
and when that happens,
the people inside the lifeboat
literally get churned to bits.
The water's surface turns red from all the blood.
The captain at the ship's bridge doesn't notice this incident at all,
since he obviously hasn't given orders yet to abandon ship.
Another lifeboat present at the ship's port side notices what just happened,
and despite witnessing what just happened,
their lifeboat gets lowered into the water too.
"No chance trying to swim for it."
"One by one..."
The stewardess Violet Jessop is present on this lifeboat,
the same one who survived the Titanic sinking.
The lifeboat falls forcefully on the water surface,
shatters completely,
and many of the passengers on this lifeboat
get sucked into the same port side propellor.
While all this bloodbath is happening at the port side of the ship,
i.e., the crew lowering their lifeboats, getting sucked into the propellor
yet there are no updates of this incident at the bridge.
The captain doesn't know what is happening yet.
Time keep passing, and around 9:10 am,
the captain realises that the ship cannot be beached,
and he finally decides to stop the ship's engines.
Stopping the engines still doesn't do anything to stop the flooding,
keep in mind that the ship's forward region was damaged,
the other thing they were trying to be mindful of was that
that since the ship moving, more water was rapidly entering the forward region.
None of it was correct, water kept entering the ship at the same pace.
Around 9:15, the captain finally gives the order to abandon ship,
all the lifeboats get lowered.
The captain orders everyone at the bridge to board respective lifeboats
and leave.
Around 9:16 am, water reaches the ship's bridge,
a bridge is a ship's topmost living quarter, where the ship is navigated from.
Everyone has left the bridge except for the captain,
and the captain gets towards the starboard side, walks off into the water.
The passengers watching from their lifeboats
keep hoping that once the ship sinks,
it doesn't suck the captain in with it so he can be saved.
After swimming for 30 minutes in the water
a lifeboat finally rescues the captain.
Out of all the passengers, 30 passengers, due to the port side propellers,
were unable to survive, there was nothing left of them.
They were completely dismembered, identifying them was nearly impossible.
An important lesson to learn from this story is that
all the people working in the forward boiler rooms
did not follow orders.
After lowering their lifeboats into the water, they got sucked into the propellors.
Had they followed orders, they might've been saved.
Another thing to note is that the captain never gave orders to
open the ship's lower portholes for ventilation.
Who gave these orders and why,
will never be known.
The nurses that survived did say that
a doctor asked them to open all the portholes for ventilation
but they never named that doctor,
the one who ordered them to open the portholes.
All this excessive flooding made the ship sink faster into the sea.
Had these portholes not been opened,
the captain would've been able to beach the ship.
All the lives could've been saved.
The captain of this ship was Capt. Charles Bartlett
and he had 33 years of experience at sea.
Capt. Bartlett had already commandeered ships like this
with speeds similar to it
and with sizes similar to it as well.
The captain's 33 years of experience
was enough to to guarantee that he was well experienced.
But because of this mistake, because of orders ignored,
the captain's 33 years of experience wasn't enough
to save the crew, the passengers,
the doctors, the nurses, the stewards, everyone.
And through this incident, like her sister ship, the Titanic,
on the 21st of November, 1916,
the Britannic was united with her sister ship under the sea.
The wreck of the Britannic was also discovered,
and despite the explosion on the ship in 1916,
the British newspapers claimed that the ship was torpedoed.
However, the ship already had a hospital sign on it,
to denote that it was only carrying injured soldiers.
The Germans never targeted hospital ships.
And finally, when the wreck was discovered was assessed by divers
the ship really wasn't torpedoed. In fact, it was hit by a mine
which was laid by German U-boats a week earlier.
So, this was the Britannic and her journey
her fate written with the same pen as the Titanic.
The only difference: not as many lives were lost.
And this is where I end my video.
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Take good care of yourselves,
remember me in your prayers, with tons of love to my Orange Shots family,
and to-be Orange Shots family.
This is me, Zahid Nisar. You're watching Orange Shots.
Until my next video,
ALLAH Hafiz.