Зал №19: Mukhtorov Boburmirzo, Jamshid Botirov, Laziz Alimov, Rakhimboyev Begoyim, Atajonov Ilxom

Death Factor #3: No Binoculars

The night of the collision was clear and still. Perched 50 feet (15 meters) above the forecastle deck, in a small open box called “the crow’s nest,” lookouts Frederick Fleet and Reginald Lee worked their two-hour shift. Inside the nest, Fleet and Lee had a large bell to grab general attention and a telephone to reach the captain’s bridge. What they did not have, however, was a pair of binoculars.

A hundred years later, with all the advances in modern technology, it is still hard to imagine any ship in the open waters with no binoculars. The Titanic, too, had a number of binoculars on board, but for much of the trip they were in a storage cabinet, locked up.

The key to the cabinet was held by Second Officer David Blair, who, in a last-minute leadership change decision, was asked to sit out the trip before the ship’s departure from Southampton. Leaving the Titanic in haste, Blair forgot to hand the key to his replacement. It is likely that the cabinet or its lock could be broken. However, nobody made the call.

Frederick Fleet, who survived the disaster, would later insist that if binoculars had been available, the iceberg would have been spotted in enough time to take evasive action.

By the time the iceberg was noticed, the ship was too close to avert disaster.

This was, quite literally, a case of overconfidence that was blinding.