Stuff and Things

Carpathia received Titanic’s distress signal at 12:20am, April 15th, 1912. She was 58 miles away, a distance that absolutely could not be covered in less than four hours.

(Californian’s exact position at the time is…controversial. She was close enough to have helped. By all accounts she was close enough to see Titanic’s distress rockets. It’s uncertain to this day why her crew did not respond, or how many might not have been lost if she had been there. This is not the place for what-ifs. This is about what was done.)

Carpathia’s Captain Rostron had, yes, rolled out of bed instantly when woken by his radio operator, ordered his ship to Titanic’s aid and confirmed the signal before he was fully dressed. The man had never in his life responded to an emergency call. His goal tonight was to make sure nobody who heard that fact would ever believe it.

All of Carpathia’s lifeboats were swung out ready for deployment. Oil was set up to be poured off the side of the ship in case the sea turned choppy; oil would coat and calm the water near Carpathia if that happened, making it safer for lifeboats to draw up alongside her. He ordered lights to be rigged along the side of the ship so survivors could see it better, and had nets and ladders rigged along her sides ready to be dropped when they arrived, in order to let as many survivors as possible climb aboard at once.

I don’t know if his making provisions for there still being survivors in the water was optimism or not. I think he knew they were never going to get there in time for that. I think he did it anyway because, god, you have to hope.

Carpathia had three dining rooms, which were immediately converted into triage and first aid stations. Each had a doctor assigned to it. Hot soup, coffee, and tea were prepared in bulk in each dining room, and blankets and warm clothes were collected to be ready to hand out. By this time, many of the passengers were awake–prepping a ship for disaster relief isn’t quiet–and all of them stepped up to help, many donating their own clothes and blankets.

And then he did something I tend to refer to as diverting all power from life support.

Here’s the thing about steamships: They run on steam. Shocking, I know; but that steam powers everything on the ship, and right now, Carpathia needed power. So Rostron turned off hot water and central heating, which bled valuable steam power, to everywhere but the dining rooms–which, of course, were being used to make hot drinks and receive survivors. He woke up all the engineers, all the stokers and firemen, diverted all that steam back into the engines, and asked his ship to go as fast as she possibly could. And when she’d done that, he asked her to go faster.

I need you to understand that you simply can’t push a ship very far past its top speed. Pushing that much sheer tonnage through the water becomes harder with each extra knot past the speed it was designed for. Pushing a ship past its rated speed is not only reckless–it’s difficult to maneuver–but it puts an incredible amount of strain on the engines. Ships are not designed to exceed their top speed by even one knot. They can’t do it. It can’t be done.

Carpathia’s absolute do-or-die, the-engines-can’t-take-this-forever top speed was fourteen knots. Dodging icebergs, in the dark and the cold, surrounded by mist, she sustained a speed of almost seventeen and a half.

No one would have asked this of them. It wasn’t expected. They were almost sixty miles away, with icebergs in their path. They had a respondibility to respond; they did not have a responsibility to do the impossible and do it well. No one would have faulted them for taking more time to confirm the severity of the issue. No one would have blamed them for a slow and cautious approach. No one but themselves.

They damn near broke the laws of physics, galloping north headlong into the dark in the desperate hope that if they could shave an hour, half an hour, five minutes off their arrival time, maybe for one more person those five minutes would make the difference. I say: three people had died by the time they were lifted from the lifeboats. For all we know, in another hour it might have been more. I say they made all the difference in the world.

This ship and her crew received a message from a location they could not hope to reach in under four hours. Just barely over three hours later, they arrived at Titanic’s last known coordinates. Half an hour after that, at 4am, they would finally find the first of the lifeboats. it would take until 8:30 in the morning for the last survivor to be brought onboard. Passengers from Carpathia universally gave up their berths, staterooms, and clothing to the survivors, assisting the crew at every turn and sitting with the sobbing rescuees to offer whatever comfort they could.

In total, 705 people of Titanic’s original 2208 were brought onto Carpathia alive. No other ship would find survivors.

At 12:20am April 15th, 1912, there was a miracle on the North Atlantic. And it happened because a group of humans, some of them strangers, many of them only passengers on a small and unimpressive steam liner, looked at each other and decided: I cannot live with myself if I do anything less.

So Carpathia was not a top-end luxury liner. Her reputation was for being Jolly Comfortable - she was very broad in her proportions, and not super-duper fast, and the result was that she didn’t rock so much on the waves and you couldn’t particularly hear/feel the engines. She was solid and dependable, and lots of people liked using her, but she therefore occupied a lesser niche than Titanic or Olympian or whatever - and crucially, as a result of that, she only had one radio operator on board. This means she only had radio ops for a certain window in the day, unlike Titanic, which had 24 hour radio ops.

So on that night, when Titanic went down, Carpathia’s wireless operator - one Harold Cottam - clocked off his shift at midnight, and went to bed. While he was getting ready for bed, though, he left the transmitter on for the hell of it, and therefore picked up a transmission from Cape Race in Newfoundland, the closest transmitting tower sending messages to the ships. They told him that they had a backlog of private traffic for Titanic that wasn’t getting through. So, even though his shift was over, and it was now 11 minutes past bloody midnight, and he just wanted to go to bed, Harold Cottam decided that nonetheless, he’d be helpful, and let the Titanic know they had messages waiting.

And that’s how he received the Titanic’s distress signal. In spite of no longer being on shift to receive it, and therefore in order to send Carpathia galloping to Titanic’s rescue, and thus saving 705 people.

All because Harold Cottam decided one night to be kind. 

Rostrum had ordered that no messages to the press be sent out of respect to the survivors, for they would have their privacy destroyed as soon as they reached New York. Cottam respected this order, even under extreme duress of fatigue, stress, and the knowledge that in some cases the bribes were almost three times his annual salary.

He eventually went to bed but not before working with one of the rescued Titanic’s radio operators, Harold Bride, to transmit as many messages as possible. Bride was injured (his feet had been crushed in a lifeboat) and had just passed the body of the second of Titanic’s radio operators aboard (Jack Phillips), so neither of them were really in the best shape to keep working, but they did.

There are probably sound reasons why not, one of which is probably that getting yet another ‘Titanic’ project greenlit is far easier - name recognition, pre-sold property, multiple conspiracy theories to play with (all discredited, but when did that stop the “History” Channel?)

Here are a couple of stories about ‘Carpathia’:

As @mylordshesacactus has already said, her boilers and engines were rated for no more than 14 knots and, when she managed 17.5 for the only time in her life it’s said (I hate the phrase but I have to use it) that the Chief Engineer hung his hat over the main pressure gauge so no-one - including himself - could see how far its needle was into the red.

Captain Rostron, a religious man, was seen on several occasions standing privately on the exposed bridge wing with his own hat raised and his mouth moving in silent prayer, and when daylight revealed the extent of the ice-field his ship had passed without harm, he only said “There must have been another Hand on the wheel than mine…”

There’s another problem-of-sorts about a screenplay set aboard ‘Carpathia’ - an astonishing lack of that easy dramatic tool, conflict. Captain Rostron decided he was going to the ‘Titanic’s assistance, and that was that. AFAIK not a single passenger or crewman - not one - questioned the wisdom of his decision either then or afterwards, even when…

…‘Carpathia’ headed at more than full speed, in the dark, through dangerous waters where an iceberg had apparently just sunk an “unsinkable” ship.

It’s easier to write - and sell - a story about pride, arrogance, stupidity, rich against poor and lives lost through hubris, than it is to write one about people who rallied round and did the right thing at the right time, not for reward but because it was the right thing to do.

Here’s Rostron and his officers…

…the ‘Carpathia’ stewards and cabin crew….

…some of her passengers…

…and some of the people they helped.

When it's too high for your elf rogue to jump

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“She will follow you, if you remain true to your purpose,” Persephone said, icy and beautiful, with asphodel in her hair, and embroidered on her dress. She sat beside her husband, Hades, and looked down on Orpheus, her face utterly unreadable, “But if you cast a single gaze upon her before she leaves the Underworld, she will be lost to you until time ends.”

“Thank you,” Orpheus said, desperately grateful. His fingertips ached, blistered and bleeding as he played his plea to the gods who had no reason to give him what he requested of them. The return of his beloved wife, who had fled for her life, and lost it trying to escape. “Your Majesties, thank you. I will write a thousand songs in your honor.”

“You had best go,” Hades said, the first words he had spoken since Orpheus arrived. “The journey is long, and fraught with danger. It will not be easy.”

Orpheus took the dismissal for what it was, bowed again, and made his way out of the grand, dark, pillar-lined hall. Here and there, flowers sprouted up through cracks in the stone, the mark of the queen who was only here half the year, and must be dearly missed when she was gone.

Maybe his plea, and the mercy he received in return, made more sense than he thought. Surely there were none who understood the longing for a beloved spouse better than the king and queen of the underworld.

Hades’ warning struck him, and Orpheus fought with himself, with the urge to look back and make sure Eurydice was there, following behind him. The gods were fond of their tricks and traps, but they rarely lied outright.

Well, he hoped they didn’t, anyway.

On and on he went, out of the grand, black-stone palace, into the sprawling, twilight orchards beyond. It was beautiful and peaceful. Sprawling gardens filled the warm air with the scent of citrus flowers and herbs. Fireflies winked their green-gold lights everywhere, and danced in clouds around the hazy ghosts who walked and laughed together. Off in the distance, he heard music and longed to join.

But no. He was here with a goal, and everything here would tempt him, or frighten him, or try to distract him from his purpose.

And he had to have faith in Euridice. She was behind him. Persephone said she would be, and he could only trust, because to look back for her would be to lose her.

When they came to the River Lethe, Orpheus began to fear. After all, the River of Forgetfulness was no small challenge, and he wasn’t fool enough to think that it would not test him, although he would, at least, not have to ford it. There was a bridge, although it was not what Orpheus might call ideal. A rickety thing of woven branches and rough wood, it cracked under his feet, but it held.

It wasn’t until he made it across, that Orpheus heard a faint sound. The sound of a foot on the bridge, barely there, as if from far away, but only a step behind him.

That sound, that faint sound, gave him hope. Euridice was there. She was with him. The gods had not lied, or broken their bargain.

It also gave him an idea.

Music had gotten him this far. Perhaps it would take them just a few steps further.

His fingers ere too damaged to keep playing, but there was nothing wrong with his voice, and so, hopefully, he started on a song he wrote long ago, when he first fell in love with his wife, and heard her lovely voice.

It was a song for two, and he would be lying if he didn’t admit how frightened he was, how his heart caught, when he came to the end of his verse, and hers began.

For a heartbeat, a single heartbeat, he thought she would not, could not reply, but then her sweet, warm alto filled the air, a little tense, a little afraid, but as true as ever.

Orpheus would have wept at the sound.

The song wasn’t a long one, but he started another as soon as it ended, and another, and another. Together, they sang their way through Tartarus. Through the tortured, evil dead who howled around them and tried to drag him off the narrow path that sometimes faded to almost nothing under his feet. The gods had not told him what had happened if he left the path, but then, they didn’t have to. He knew the legends of those who left the path.

The path turn back to a road until the sky light with flame and they came to another river, this one deep, and angry, and blazing with fire.

The River Phlegethon. The river if fire, that bordered Tartarus, and imprisoned the lost souls within.

Orpheus was glad that Euridice had started them on battle songs of coming home almost an hour before, or his courage, shaken form hours of walking through the tortured dead, might have failed him. The bridge here was stone, but as fragile, as frail, and as frightening. Pebbles rolled off the sides when Orpheus stepped onto the thin stone, and his voice broke as he stumbled to his knees. In harmony with him, Euridice gasped, but she didn’t stop singing. Didn’t stop promising she was there.

Together, they made it across, into the slums of the undistinguished dead.

Here, they were followed, although not closely. The dead could not touch them. Not marked as they were by Cause under the authority of the queen herself, but they gathered near, listening to the songs, and whispering amongst themselves. Orpheus raised his voice louder, afraid to lose Euridice in the crowd. She answered him, strong and clear, and only a step behind him, always.

After what seems like hours more, Orpheus found his voice beginning to give out, but he sang on determinedly, unwilling to give up when victory was so close to hand.

At last, finally, they came to the last river in their journey.

So wide he could not see the other side, the Styx spread out like an ocean, and on the shore, the sandy shore, was a single boat.

“I wondered if you would make it back this way,” Chiron greeted Orpheus with a cackling laugh that was mostly hidden by his thick beard and hood. He had ferried Orpheus across only a day before, paid with one of the three gold coins Orpheus brought with him. “The ferry is not free, Bard.”

“I know,” Orpheus said hoarsely, his first spoken words since he left the palace. He dug in his purse and pulled out the coins he kept, carefully packed with the thinnest hope, and how proffered with more of the same. “A coin for each of us, to see us back to the land of the living.”

“Nice to see one of you heroes has the sense to pack for the trip,” Chiron said, begrudgingly impressed. He took the coins and nodded to the boat. “You’re not out, yet.”

“I know,” Orpheus agreed. It was a warning, he knew. They weren’t out, and until they were, he did not dare look back. Could not make sure that Eurydice made it into the boat as well. “Thank you, Ferryman.”

“Get in the boat, boy.”

He got in the boat.

On through the unmarked grey waters they sailed, with barely the lap of waves against the side of the narrow boat to show their passing.

With nothing to do but wait, Orpheus cast his mind over the many sailing songs he knew, chose Eurydice’s favorite, another duet, and started to sing.

Chiron’s laughter punctuated Eurydice’s voice when she joined. In, on time and on key as ever.

Hours passed, as they passed songs back and forth, flirting and joking as they sang silly songs, and bawdy ones, and ones of coming home after a long time at sea.

Through it all, the Ferryman behind him never stopped chuckling. It might have been frightening, but Orpheus thought that maybe it was a compliment too. That his laughter was in celebration of cleverness that rarely crossed his path.

When they came to the far shore, the boat nudged into the sand, and Orpheus caught himself, right before he looked back to thank Chiron for his service.

“You paid me, boy,” the Ferryman said from somewhere behind him. “don’t spoil it with thanks. Go on.”

Orpheus went.

The air was fresher, here. They were close, and now the songs shifted to those of love newly discovered. Not all were duets, but any song would be sung in harmony, and so they tangled their voices together and kept walking.

It wasn’t until Orpheus felt sunlight on his face that he realized, he was out. Out of the Underworld and back where he started this daring, foolish, hopeful journey.

He went to turn, but Euridice’s voice raised sharply, and she cut her loving song off for one of warning, a song for children, to teach them not to trust all they saw.

And Orpheus remembered.

The game was not done. Not until she took her final step into the weak, late winter sunshine.

So he kept walking. Kept singing. Kept hoping.

Until at last, the song faded, and a voice he mourned for, as hoarse as his own, spoke from just behind him.

“We’ll have to write a duet about this.”

And all Orpheus could do was laugh as he turned around, at last, to see his wife standing there, just a single step out of the Underworld, and smiling with tears of joy in her eyes.

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Good because you still have to go to work. No we're not paying you extra. Yes we're doubling grocery prices. No you don't qualify for disability. Or healthcare. Or a home.

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If everything starts tasting like rotting meat for the rest of your life, it's probably something else. If you experience brain fog or you forget things constantly or you're tired all the time after even minor physical activity, it's just because you're lazy. Yes every other virus you ever get will also be increasingly worse but that's just a coincidence. Those viruses just happen to be exponentially worse now.

Plus, those few weeks during the lockdown were terrible for my mental health. I just can't keep living like that, so we have to go back to normal life, which now involves people biting each other and twitching uncontrollably and rotting visibly.