Monday 26 March 2012 – I watched the new ITV1 drama Titanic last night; I was interested to see if they writers would be able to add a new angle to this already well known story. Sadly thus far they are failing; the ITV drama was, in my opinion a poor cousin to the James Cameron movie. The storyline at times focussed upon members of the upper classes becoming embroiled in petty situations; add to this the rebellious well heeled daughter, who flouts propriety by kissing a boy she’s known a mere twelve hours. (Didn’t Kate Winslett do this?)
Despite its lacking originality, I shall persevere with it and hopefully the next three weeks will give us more than just musicians playing as the ship sinks, and lovers on makeshift rafts, that manage to find each other in the pitch black of a north Atlantic night.
I believe next week will focus upon the woeful lack of lifeboats on the ship; at the planning stage it was calculated the ship needed 64; more than adequate for the passenger capacity of 3547. During the build it was planned to reduce the number of lifeboats to 48, but as it was completed, it was thought the boats would make the upper class decks look cluttered, so only 20 were installed.
Being Stoke on Trent born, I shall be interested to see how they drama portrays Captain Smith. Captain Edward John Smith, was born in the city in 1850: (Well St, Hanley).
Captain Smith had 43 years of experience at sea, 32 of those were with the White Star Line, and 26 years experience of sailing the north Atlantic. His experience makes the sinking of the Titanic more tragic, and I certainly hope this new drama doesn’t portray him as an inadequate leader of men, or a bumbling fool.
To celebrate the centenary of the fated voyage a special plaque has been commissioned to be sited upon the house where Captain Smith was born. (The owners of the house have already hinted that this will increase their property’s value.)
One final thing is a lesser known fact, that from first sight of the iceberg to collision took just 30 seconds, making the impact unavoidable, as with the poor lighting ships had in 1912, would have made a much earlier sighting impossible.
(apologies for any typos or grammatical errors, I haven’t had time to revise this post)
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