University of Virginia Library

BULKHEAD DOORS PROBABLY OPEN

"The Titanic had bulkheads, plenty of them, for the rules of the British Board of Trade and of Lloyds are very specific and require enough compartments to insure floating of the ship though several may be flooded. She also had doors in the bulkheads, and probably plenty of them, for she was enormous and needed easy access from one compartment to another. It will probably never be known how fewof these doors were closed when she struck the iceberg, but the probability is that many were open, for in the confusion attending such a crash the crews have a multitude of duties to perform, and closing a door with water rushing through it is more of a task than human muscle and bravery can accomplish.

"A Lloyds surveyor in testing one of these hand-operated doors started two men on the main deck to close it. They

worked four hours before they had carried out his order. If all the doors on the ship had worked as badly as this one, what would have happened in event of accident?"