[QCWA] Re: 100th anniversary of the SOS signal; CQD was its predecessor

[Richard Rucker]

On Oct 26, 2006, at 10:47 AM, David Matthews wrote in reference to  
the article on the sinking of the Titantic found here: <http:// 
www.oceanliner.org/titanic_radio.htm>
>
> I'm completely baffled by one of the last sentences in the article:
>
> "...Titanic never ever incorporated a secret, in spite of what TV  
> people and over-anxious amateur historians would like their  
> audiences to believe..."
>
> In all of the accounts I've read or heard, I don't remember hearing  
> a suggestion of a "secret" that was significant in the sinking.  A  
> secret regarding what?
>
> 73 de K3MV

To look for a "secret" or "mystery" surrounding the sinking of the  
Titanic, I looked here:

<http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RMS_Titanic>

It has a section entitled "Alternative theories and curses" about the  
sinking, which I will let you peruse on your own.  It also contained  
this regarding the SS Californian, a nearby ship that didn't come to  
the rescue.  I found this a curious enough tale on its own,  
particularly when it is read together with the article cited above.   
First, the relevant paragraphs from wikipedia story:

"The SS Californian was nearby, but had stopped for the night because  
of ice, and its wireless was turned off because the wireless operator  
had gone to bed for the night.  Just before he went to bed at around  
11:00 PM, the Californian's radio operator attempted to warn Titanic  
that there was ice ahead, but he was cut off by an exhausted Jack  
Phillips, who sent back, "Shut up, shut up! I am busy, I am working  
Cape Race."

"When Californian's officers first saw the ship, they tried signaling  
it with their Morse lamp, but it never appeared to send a response.  
Later, they noticed Titanic's distress signals... and informed  
Captain Stanley Lord. Even though there was much discussion about the  
mysterious ship, which to the officers on duty appeared to be moving  
away before disappearing, the Californian did not wake its wireless  
operator until morning."


Now, consider again the story found at  <http://www.oceanliner.org/ 
titanic_radio.htm> slightly rearranged to make the point about the  
situation the first operator, 25 year old Jack Phillips, found  
himself in and the non-role played by the nearby SS Californian:

"At the moment Phillips was told to prepare for transmission of an  
emergency call, he was transmitting private telegrams from Titanic  
passengers to Cape Race, Newfoundland. To send a distress call, he  
had to change the frequency of his transmitter to 500 kc or, as it  
was called then, a wave length of 600 meters...

"Titanic was equipped with the largest Marconi transmitting set  
available, a five kilowatt set, and several receiving apparati...   
Before Phillips could send the distress signal, he had to adjust his  
complicated, bulky and noisy set...
"The first response to Phillips came from the German ship Frankfort.  
Communication between Titanic and Frankfort was initially clear and  
loud but then, almost immediately, turned sour and Phillips brushed  
Frankfort ruthlessly off... for two reasons:

(1) "The rivalry between firms providing steamship wireless equipment  
was sharp and ships with sets from different companies did not  
communicate with one another under normal circumstances."  The  
Titanic carried equipment from Marconi, and the Frankfort, Phillips  
believed, carried Telefunken or Siemens equipment...

(2)  "Phillips, as did everyone else on board, including Captain  
Smith, believed immediately following the collision that Titanic  
would remain afloat for hours and might not even sink at all."

Because of the unreliability of receiving equipment in those days,  
"Titanic had several receiving instruments. The most important was  
the receiver with the Fleming detector...  A second receiver was the  
so-called Multiple Tuner with a magnetic detector... A third receiver  
worked with a crystal detector..."

"Of the three receivers, the magnetic detector had the disadvantage  
that it needed the winding of a clockwork motor to move a braided  
iron wire through the detecting coils and past strong horseshoe  
magnets. If the iron wire did not move, nothing was heard in the  
headphones."

"Nearby, the Californian was equipped with just such a magnetic  
detector. The vessel’s sole wireless operator had signed off for the  
night. When his friend, third officer Groves, came in to surf the  
ether, the clockwork mechanism was either switched off or had run  
down. Groves did not know how to wind it up. So he heard nothing and  
gave up.

"Later, he learned that at the time he had tried to get the set  
working, MGY was sending frantic distress calls. It bothered him for  
the rest of his life that he had not been more adamant in persuading  
his expert shipmate to tell him how to activate the magnetic detector."

Maybe there's no mystery, but there is an extra twist to the tragedy  
that I had not appreciated before.

BTW, if you don't know (I didn't) what the prefixes, RMS and SS, on  
English ship names stand for, this is also from the wikipedia  
story:   "The Titanic could hold a total of 3,547 passengers and crew  
and, because it carried mail, its name was given the prefix RMS  
(Royal Mail Steamer) as well as SS (Steam Ship)."