Slashdot Mirror


Animated Simulation Lets You Watch the Titanic Sink In Real Time (huffingtonpost.com)

An anonymous reader writes: You can watch the Titanic sink in real time thanks to an animated simulation created with Unreal Engine 4 to promote the upcoming game "Titanic: Honor and Glory." The HuffingtonPost writes, "This simulation includes the iceberg strike, the ship coasting to a halt in the North Atlantic about 20 minutes later, lifeboats lowered into the water and even scenes of flooding in the interior corridors." The animation will even give you a play-by-play of what was happening aboard the ship at specific times. What some may find especially eerie about the simulation is the lack of people. Some 1,500 people died when the Titanic sunk, but the simulation shows no people. You can watch the video here.

129 comments

  1. Well by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 5, Funny

    What some may find especially eerie about the simulation is the lack of people. Some 1,500 people died when the Titanic sunk, but the simulation shows no people.

    This seems a little Unreal to me.

    1. Re:Well by wonkey_monkey · · Score: 1

      You forgot the shades and the "YEEEEAAAAAH"

      --
      systemd is Roko's Basilisk.
    2. Re:Well by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What some may find especially eerie about the simulation is the lack of people. .

      I find disappointing the lack of a real sky. It coulda been done easily.

      Great work, though.

  2. I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    At least I can watch Leonardo DiCaprio's character die. That has to count for something.

    1. Re:I prefer it with people... by Mogster · · Score: 1

      Have to admit the Jack/Rose plot kinda ruined the movie in my opinion. But I think James Cameron & his crew did a pretty good job with the SFX on that one. Appeared pretty realistic especially on the big screen. Certainly better visuals than A Night to Remember, although that was a better movie

      --
      ACK NAK RST
    2. Re:I prefer it with people... by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      Well, the simulation is 2h 41min, but I prefer the 3h 14min James Cameron longer version, way more entertaining.

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    3. Re:I prefer it with people... by UnknownSoldier · · Score: 2

      True; I can't believe I'm "defending" him, but his acting has gotten way better over the years.

      * Aviator
      * Blood Diamond
      * Django Unchained
      * The Great Gatsby
      * Inception
      * What's Eating Gilbert Grape

    4. Re:I prefer it with people... by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      Jaaack...

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    5. Re: I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Doesn't surprise me at all. All nerds hate and despise love stories. They're too painful a remainder of what they will never have. :)

    6. Re:I prefer it with people... by Pezbian · · Score: 1

      Don't forget the Quaalude segment in The Wolf of Wall Street.

      --
      In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is king--and the two-eyed man is a heretic.
    7. Re: I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Yes a nerd version would have been jack and his hand. And it would have the nerd satisfying appeal that they'd both die at the end.

    8. Re:I prefer it with people... by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 1

      It's had to please everyone but they did a decent job trying. At the time, the owner of the local movie theatre commented that "Titanic" had brought back families to the cinema, grandparents taking their grandchildren to see a movie; something that had somehow died out in the 10 years prior.

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    9. Re:I prefer it with people... by Hognoxious · · Score: 2

      The James Cameron version is better for two reasons: Kate's left one and Kate's right one.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    10. Re: I prefer it with people... by stealth_finger · · Score: 2

      Yes a nerd version would have been jack and his hand. And it would have the nerd satisfying appeal that they'd both die at the end.

      Yeah, but a version filled with nerds probably would've fixed the ship and been on their way within an hour. Or at least had everyone think, this ship is slowly sinking and there aren't enough lifeboats, maybe I'd better go find something that floats.

      --
      Wanna buy a shirt?
      https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
    11. Re: I prefer it with people... by toonces33 · · Score: 1

      The nerds would have gotten the captain to slow down and avoid the collision in the first place.

    12. Re: I prefer it with people... by harperska · · Score: 1

      Only if the captain was also a nerd (in which case nobody would have had to try to convince the captain to slow down in the first place). Remember the nerd who tried to tell NASA to slow down but wasn't listened to, resulting in the Challenger disaster. The hubris of non-nerds who command nerds but don't feel the need to listen to those nerds is immense, and often with tragic consequences.

    13. Re:I prefer it with people... by 110010001000 · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Nothing says family movie like watching 1,200 people drown!

    14. Re:I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It would be too risky to make the "I'm the king of the world!" stunt, cause there's a huge pit right at the stern, with little room to walk around it to get to the extreme end. A young man could do it, but it would be dangerous.

    15. Re: I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A true nerd would also know that slowing down after the iceberg was spotted was one of the things that caused the disaster, and therefore would have told the first officer on watch to maintain speed to stay maneuverable and change course to avoid the collision. Alternatively, they could have slowed down or stopped well in advance of spotting the iceberg and also been fine.

    16. Re:I prefer it with people... by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      Have to admit the Jack/Rose plot kinda ruined the movie in my opinion. But I think James Cameron & his crew did a pretty good job with the SFX on that one. Appeared pretty realistic especially on the big screen. Certainly better visuals than A Night to Remember, although that was a better movie

      Actually, Cameron has admitted now that he knows more about the Titanic (as part of the 100th anniversary a few years ago) he seriously screwed up the sinking effects. Of course, given the movie was filmed nearly 15 years prior, I suppose it was excusable (Titanic came out in 1999 I believe). In one of those documentaries, Cameron wishes he could re-do that part of his movie now that he knows more.

    17. Re: I prefer it with people... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

      No, that would have no drama.

      A propper nerd version would have the protagonist fail to convince the captain to slow down.

      However when the iceberg is spotted and the captain orders the ship to attempt to evade the nerdy protagonist would know that was a mistake, and would either contramand the captain's order or bypass the steering and take the Titanic directly into the iceberg. This decision would have been foreshadowed in the first act with a technical description of the titanic's watertight chambers. which the daring and clever protagonist realized meant that while the Titanic lacked the agility to evade the iceberg it would not be sunk by a head on collision, but does risk sinking if a glancing impact punctures multiple compartments along the length of the ship.

    18. Re: I prefer it with people... by degantyll · · Score: 1

      Damn it, this whole nerd movie sound a hell lot better.

    19. Re:I prefer it with people... by kyjellyfish · · Score: 1

      What's so great about her feet??

    20. Re:I prefer it with people... by RespekMyAthorati · · Score: 1

      Leo is a terrific actor.It was the Titanic script that was lame.
      Cameron is a master of action, but he can't write dialogue worth shit.

    21. Re:I prefer it with people... by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      Their proximity to her ears.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  3. Honor and glory? by kuzb · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I'm sorry, but there was little of either in that disaster. It sounds like they're trying to make it out like some kind of heroic war story instead of the unmitigated disaster that it was. The only upside is that many of the people who were killed were among the wealthiest elite of the time, and that it lead to improved safety regulations as a result of who died. I don't understand why they keep trying to put some kind of heroic spin on something that was a combination of gross incompetence and insufficient safety precautions.

    It's well known that corners were cut when building the titanic - particularly with the rivets which metallurgical analysis confirmed were cheaply made and weak due to large amounts of iron slag in the composition of the metal. The crew was operating at night in a stretch of water that was well known to contain icebergs and had claimed a recorded 20 ships already. Essentially they were operating blind. Lookouts failed to spot it, either due to environmental conditions, pure laziness, or overconfidence in the ship design - we may never really know.

    --
    BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
    1. Re:Honor and glory? by rmdingler · · Score: 4, Insightful

      It sounds like they're trying to make it out like some kind of heroic war story instead of the unmitigated disaster that it was.

      We romanticize the past, of course, because the present is so often unremarkable, but we have such high hopes for the future.

      --
      Happiness in intelligent people is the rarest thing I know.

      Ernest Hemingway

    2. Re:Honor and glory? by CaptainDork · · Score: 1

      Plus, the ship was not compartmentalized. I served on an aircraft carrier, and a hole in one part of the ship would not allow water to breach the entire ship.

      Nowadays, we have double hulls and stuff.

      The story of the Titanic is a tale of reactive safety measures implemented only after much learning, much like the tales that gave us mandatory fire exits, extinguishers, sprinklers, smoke detectors, and capacity limits in buildings.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    3. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Sure beats "Baltimore Riots: Honor and Glory" or . . . you know.

    4. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Plus, the ship was not compartmentalized. I served on an aircraft carrier, and a hole in one part of the ship would not allow water to breach the entire ship.

      The Titanic WAS compartmentalized. Not as well as an Aircraft carrier, perhaps, but it did have compartments meant to mitigate flooding problems.

      Too many of them were breached, for reasons uncertain, though it is speculated that the side-on collision with the iceberg was the problem, and a head-on strike would have caused a lesser problem.

      Nowadays, we have double hulls and stuff.

      The story of the Titanic is a tale of reactive safety measures implemented only after much learning, much like the tales that gave us mandatory fire exits, extinguishers, sprinklers, smoke detectors, and capacity limits in buildings.

      The Olympic and the Britannic (Titanic's sister ships) were actually modified after the sinking, to include a double hull and more lifeboats, among other things.

      Didn't save the Britannic, which was struck by a naval mine, but I suppose it did help delay the sinking. The film about that ship wasn't as popular.

    5. Re:Honor and glory? by s.petry · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The only upside is that many of the people who were killed were among the wealthiest elite of the time

      Why the fuck is that an upside?

      There is an argument to be made that if the wealthy had not died safety regulations would not have been enacted and enhanced. If it's only "those" people that died it's easy to overlook.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    6. Re:Honor and glory? by Krishnoid · · Score: 1

      It sounds like they're trying to make it out like some kind of heroic war story instead of the unmitigated disaster that it was.

      You know, a war game.

    7. Re:Honor and glory? by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      Titanic most certainly was compartmentalized but the walls only went somewhat above the water line. great for holes under or near waterline that weren't wider than four compartments, that 300 foot hole kind of pooped their party though. they should have hit that iceberg head on instead of turning to port.

    8. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If only there were a second half of that sentence to answer your question.

    9. Re:Honor and glory? by Jesus_666 · · Score: 1

      I understand the title not as a reflection on how heroic the story is but rather on the hubris of the builders. Honor and glory was what they were after, not what anyone got.

      Of course I could be wrong and it could still be a completely inappropriate game. Time will tell.

      --
      USE HOT GRITS WITH STATUE OF NATALIE PORTMAN (NAKED AND PETRIFIED)
    10. Re:Honor and glory? by Catmeat · · Score: 2

      >It's well known that corners were cut when building the titanic - particularly with the rivets which metallurgical analysis confirmed were cheaply made and weak due to large amounts of iron slag in the composition of the metal. The crew was operating at night in a stretch of water that was well known to contain icebergs and had claimed a recorded 20 ships already. Essentially they were operating blind. Lookouts failed to spot it, either due to environmental conditions, pure laziness, or overconfidence in the ship design - we may never really know.

      The Titanic's sister ship, the Olympic differed in detail, but was essentially a clone. The Olympic served on the North Atlantic run for two decades and was only retired in 1935. She gained the nickname "Old Reliable". - Picture of the two together

      This suggests that whatever people now say about the design, construction, or the metallurgy of the iron, by the standards of the time, the fundamental design of Titanic was sound and the construction was perfectly fine. She was sunk by a crap-load of bad luck and four compartments being breached - a set of circumstances the designers hadn't envisaged.

      BTW - "A set of circumstances the designers hadn't envisaged" seems to me what often happens when an airliner crashes. So we really shouldn't be feeling too superior about this.

    11. Re:Honor and glory? by Thanshin · · Score: 1

      Did you really just cut a sentence in half and quoted the first part to ask a question about the second?

      Holy dear mary mother of jeebus allmighty spaguetti unicorn! You must truly be so dumb they're using you as model for the perfect silicon sphere to be used as new kilogram definition.

    12. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The present is really no different from the past other than how we view it. Just as much quality literature and music and art is created, if not more, just as many historic events happen, but we don't realize it because it's not yet history.

    13. Re:Honor and glory? by JaredOfEuropa · · Score: 1

      The future used to be better. Technological advances, new ships, planes, rockets, having breakfast on the moon, visiting other worlds, and meeting friendly aliens. These days our outlook on the future is dismal: rogue technology, superviruses, epic natural disasters and global warming, armageddon, fascist corporation-run states and zombies. What happened?

      --
      If construction was anything like programming, an incorrectly fitted lock would bring down the entire building...
    14. Re:Honor and glory? by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      the ship was not compartmentalized. I served on an aircraft carrier, and a hole in one part of the ship would not allow water to breach the entire ship.

      It was compartmentalised, and it was punctured in more than one place.

      I hope you weren't operating anything more complicated than a mop.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    15. Re:Honor and glory? by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

      They would have been fine if they didn't brag it was unsinkable.

      --
      Wanna buy a shirt?
      https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
    16. Re:Honor and glory? by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      The future used to be better.

      Then we got here, and found out that human nature hasn't changed over this period, not in the slightest.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    17. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Please permit this bit of stylistic criticism.

      For something to be 'an unmitigated disaster' there can be no upside.

      Writing

      ... unmitigated disaster.

      followed immediately by...

      The only upside...

      is a bit distracting and detracts from the idea that you are attempting to convey.

    18. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Plus, the ship was not compartmentalized. I served on an aircraft carrier, and a hole in one part of the ship would not allow water to breach the entire ship.

      Nowadays, we have double hulls and stuff.

      The story of the Titanic is a tale of reactive safety measures implemented only after much learning, much like the tales that gave us mandatory fire exits, extinguishers, sprinklers, smoke detectors, and capacity limits in buildings.

      Shouldn't they let the aft sections of the ship to be flooded in order to stabilize it, so it didn't break in two?

    19. Re:Honor and glory? by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      "The only upside is that many of the people who were killed were among the wealthiest elite of the time, and that it lead to improved safety regulations as a result of who died."

      So you're one of those worthies who believes that all gains are ill-gotten. Some of those wealthy elite might have gone on to invent and discover things that would have increased the societal wealth available for your welfare payments.

    20. Re:Honor and glory? by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      Yes, the ship was struck a glancing blow that gashed the side of the hull, flooding several compartments at once. It was like that moment at Fukushima when the local fire department tried to connect one of its pumper trucks to the reactor coolant circulation as instructed, only to find that they were issued the wrong connector to attack their hose.

    21. Re:Honor and glory? by Jupix · · Score: 2

      Indeed. I'm not a naval historian but I believe Titanic sunk because of multiple factors, not just one or two.

      • Titanic was cruising too fast for the conditions.
      • There were more bergs than usual.
      • The sea was too calm to spot the berg before it was too late.
      • Titanic's rudder was too small to turn the ship in time.
      • Titanic's middle prop (driven by a steam turbine, not reciprocating engines) could not be reversed, which combined with the reversed outer props caused bad turbulence for the rudder, causing the ship to turn even slower.
      • The berg only barely punctured the fifth compartment, which eventually caused the ship to founder. Had it only been four compartments, the ship would've survived.

      And, the sinking became a legendary naval disaster because of many more factors.

      • Not enough lifeboats for everyone, which was entirely normal at the time.
      • Women and children only policy, which caused half-filled lifeboats to leave the ship.
      • Radio not being listened at all times while at sea, which caused the nearest ship to not hear Titanic's pleas for help. (The lights mentioned in the animation.)
      • Emergency signal rockets not being respected, which caused the same.

      There was a third Olympic-class vessel, called the Britannic, that sailed into a mine during WW1 and sunk. Because of favorable circumstances, only 30 people out of over 1000 on board were lost. Ships sink. What we have to do as a civilization is to do our best so that sinkings don't become disasters. The Titanic disaster prompted many actions toward that goal, which helped with Britannic also. And we are constantly improving and reminded about these things by events such as the sinking of the Costa Concordia.

    22. Re:Honor and glory? by oobayly · · Score: 1

      Well there's their problem, instead of attacking the hoses with fire axes, they should have hooked them up. Training has really gone down hill...

    23. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Bingo.

    24. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      It was never advertised as unsinkable and the designers never claimed it. Can this myth please die?

    25. Re:Honor and glory? by Penguinisto · · Score: 1

      Pretty sure that such an argument would be outweighed by the sheer number of dead (wealthy or not), combined with the fact that the newest, greatest, and biggest ship that mankind had built up to that point in time had just sank.

      Fun factoid: only a near-literal couple of first-class children drowned, and the only first-class women who died had stayed behind voluntarily (refused to leave husbands, one died because she lost track of a kid, etc). Most of the first-class men died out of chivalry (they knew the math, decided to make room for the women, etc.)

      Oh, and this was after the hype that it was fitted with the latest in safety engineering (read: watertight bulkheads), and that maritime experts everywhere were pronouncing the ship as being anywhere from incredibly hard to impossible to sink.

      --
      Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    26. Re:Honor and glory? by CaptainDork · · Score: 1

      They should have been compartmentalized. Per your own post, 50% compartmentalization is equal to zero compartmentalization.

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    27. Re:Honor and glory? by CaptainDork · · Score: 1

      Because your remarks insult me and my mates, I will now sing to you, the "Navy Him:"

      "Him, him, fuck him."

      --
      It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
    28. Re:Honor and glory? by s.petry · · Score: 1

      Pretty sure that such an argument would be outweighed by the sheer number of dead (wealthy or not), combined with the fact that the newest, greatest, and biggest ship that mankind had built up to that point in time had just sank.

      If you really believe such a thing, you lack any knowledge in the history humans and civilizations. Ignorance is at least curable, assuming you are not so mentally deranged as to believe your ignorance is superior to knowledge. Sadly that position has become the most prevalent, but perhaps you are an exception to the norm.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    29. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Indeed. I'm not a naval historian but I believe Titanic sunk because of multiple factors, not just one or two.

      • Titanic was cruising too fast for the conditions.
      • There were more bergs than usual.
      • The sea was too calm to spot the berg before it was too late.
      • Titanic's rudder was too small to turn the ship in time.
      • Titanic's middle prop (driven by a steam turbine, not reciprocating engines) could not be reversed, which combined with the reversed outer props caused bad turbulence for the rudder, causing the ship to turn even slower.
      • The berg only barely punctured the fifth compartment, which eventually caused the ship to founder. Had it only been four compartments, the ship would've survived.

      And, the sinking became a legendary naval disaster because of many more factors.

      • Not enough lifeboats for everyone, which was entirely normal at the time.
      • Women and children only policy, which caused half-filled lifeboats to leave the ship.
      • Radio not being listened at all times while at sea, which caused the nearest ship to not hear Titanic's pleas for help. (The lights mentioned in the animation.)
      • Emergency signal rockets not being respected, which caused the same.

      Yeah, all that plus the Hubris. They started calling for help only ONE hour after the collision [the same hubris that would kill R.F. Scott days later in Antarctica]

    30. Re:Honor and glory? by marciot · · Score: 1

      If you RTFF (Read the F'ing FAQ), you'll learn the Honour and Glory was the name of the clock from the Grand Staircase.

      Question - Why not use “Honour”, the British spelling, instead of “Honor”?
      Answer - While we are aware that Titanic was a British Ship and the “Honour and Glory” name for the clock from the Grand Staircase was spelled as such, we had our reasons for using a different spelling. There’s already something Titanic-related called “Titanic - Honour and Glory”, In addition to that, “Glory” refers to the ship itself, but “Honor” refers to the story, and the project is being developed by a mostly North American team.

    31. Re:Honor and glory? by Applehu+Akbar · · Score: 1

      So has autocorrect.

    32. Re:Honor and glory? by Penguinisto · · Score: 2

      So in other words you have no rebuttal at all but felt affronted enough to howl in response. Got it.

      Here, let me help you out a bit:

      The motivation as to why it was built (to make $$$$$$ off the emigrant trade), and the very money-grubbing publicity surrounding that was impossible to miss. Now, in order to attract those dollars (and basically operate as a bulk people-mover), the steerage accommodations were actually far better than anything (steerage-wise) up to that time. The ship and its sisters were hyped rather excessively... and the first of the series (RMS Olympic) had already been in operation for awhile.

      The hype for Titanic (and White Star Line) was ratcheted up further after a couple of spectacular (but non-fatal) accidents that occurred on Olympic, and the opulence was ratcheted up because reviews of the Olympic said that (paraphrased) the ship was rather nice, but rather blah... so they really went to town on Titanic to attract the wealthy in order to get even more hype. All that said, White Star knew full well that their majority source of income wouldn't come from the moneyed, but from the horde of emigrants down in steerage.

      As a result? By the time it launched, it was billed as the biggest (it was), best (it was), and safest (well sort of) ship afloat.

      So yeah, when it sank, naturally the public was thrilled, fascinated, and appalled all at once. Sure, a few big names bit the big one (Mr. Astor and Maj. Archibald Butt, among a few others), but the really big outcry came from the sheer numbers: lifeboat space for only half (at best), pushing full-speed in water full of icebergs that were known to eat ships alive at that time of year, and oh yeah - yellow journalism that (much like today's media) just loved a good, hard drama. Read the papers of the time - the editorials focused mostly on the safety issues for the emigrant trade, and excoriated White Star Lines (and specifically JP Morgan + J. Bruce Ismay) for their "criminal" negligence - doubly so for their little policy of forcing steerage passengers to wait for everyone else to get in a lifeboat first.

      As further supporting evidence, the dead nobs were mostly portrayed as heroes, but not much outcry was caused by their specific deaths (at least outside of their families). The closest that their class caused in outcry was strictly moral in nature - specifically concerning Mr. Guggenheim's 18-year-old pregnant mistress (who was among the survivors).

      Finally, note that both inquiries (US Congress and UK Board of Maritime Trade) never focused on the richies as their motivation or their source of outcry. Now whether that was for show or not is debatable, but facts are facts, and 100+ years on (and only one living survivor left - she was an infant at the time), that's all we have to work with.

      TL; DR: The rich corpses were mere icing on what became a very big and very dramatic cake.

      Now, if you have a rebuttal that proves your particular argument that dead money was the primary motivator, cool - let's see if you can grow up this time and articulate it.

      --
      Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    33. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      The heroes (in the modern sense) of the story are the crew of the Carpathia, https://www.waterlinkconnect.com/Account/AccountConfirmation?userName=lgerberlamotte%2bdealertest2%40gmail.com&token=1dGmnCQA7dLS30JNGyfKQw2

      Who received the Titanic's distress call via radio and steamed at er than ratted full speed through those same dangerous waters in a not supposedly unsinkable ship to rescue the passengers of the sinking Titanic. Thanks to them the lack of lifeboats was the primary cause of death, rather than the completely irrelevant detail it would have been if the boats had been left to drift on the currents overnight.

      The Titanic's owners and crew are on the other hand the very model of a Greek tragic hero. A mighty ship, the grandest of her era and trimumph of modern science, brought low by hubris.

    34. Re:Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      They needed a minimum number of unfooded compartments to maintain buoyancy. The puncture was already pushing that limit, so flooding enough aft compartments to stabilize the ship would have sunk it.

      Though, acting quickly they might have kept the ship level and sinking slowly rather than letting it break up and sink fast, which if it delayed the inevitable for 2 more hours would have meant the Carpathia's arrival would have given them access to more lifeboats and a ship to evacuate to. This is by the way how lifreboats were intended to be used and why the nimumum legal requirement (which Titanic exceeded) was so much lower than the compliment of the crew and passangers. It was expected that you'd use the lifeboats to evacuate to a rescuing ship and would therefore have that ship's lifeboats at your disposal as well, and that otherwise you'd be screwed anyway (an open boat on the ocean is not fun times).

    35. Re:Honor and glory? by s.petry · · Score: 1

      Let me help _YOU_ out, and show you the level of ignorance you are displaying. How workers died building railroads? How many died building the Pyramids? How many peasants died to feed the nobles? How many died building sky scrapers? How many impoverished people died mining coal? How many poor people died as soldiers on any side of a war? The overwhelming majority of those deaths were preventable if people were concerned with worker safety over money for some Lordlings and their brethren.

      You are simply repeating an argument that negates 99.99999999% of all history! Which is the same shit line of thinking we see in certain political camps. *gasp* I am so shocked!

      Blah blah, go read a book you ignorant twat. If you refuse to educate yourself sit in your sandbox and keep the world safe from the likes of you. Your uneducated opinion provides no realistic value to anyone.

      --

      -The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.

    36. Re:Honor and glory? by Penguinisto · · Score: 1

      You're arguing from a populist (and certainly emotional) standpoint that has no basis in fact. You even drag out old tropes which have little-to-no basis in fact just to eke out something that someday may resemble a point: You see, railroads, skyscrapers, and the Pyramids were built by hired labor, not slaves. Same with mining coal. Nobody made them do it at gunpoint (or spear-point, or sword-point, etc). Peasants were of course a bit more constrained, but (outside of the occasional accident that had bugger-all to do with nobles) they didn't die merely by producing goods and services (hell, most of them died of disease and warfare.)

      Here's a poser for you - if it weren't for that capital and the concentration/organization of same, humankind would be doing... what? Most likely we'd all still be doing the hunter/gatherer thing. Meanwhile, you'd be bitching about how Jorm three caves over has four bearskin coats and three women to mate with, while no woman would give you the time of day in your one threadbare secondhand coat made of rabbit skins... ...but your misery would be all his fault, now wouldn't it?

      But hey - please continue flailing about... this is actually mildly entertaining. Just promise that you don't froth at the mouth too much during the next Young Communists meeting, eh? ;)

      --
      Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    37. Re:Honor and glory? by kuzb · · Score: 1

      I hope you're right. This would work a whole lot better as a cautionary tale.

      --
      BeauHD. Worst editor since kdawson.
    38. Re:Honor and glory? by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Ignorance is at least curable, assuming you are not so mentally deranged as to believe your ignorance is superior to knowledge.

      God, I know one person that applies to...

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    39. Re:Honor and glory? by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      Not in most cases of ships getting a hole. Just because they were silly and sideswiped an iceberg you have to get all bitchy about it...

    40. Re:Honor and glory? by toddestan · · Score: 1

      The Titantic was compartmentalized. It could survive any four of them being breached (out of sixteen). Five were breached when she struck the iceberg, so the ship filled with water and sank. Designs are better now, but in any design if you breach enough of the compartments the ship is going to sink.

  4. Far more people died in WW I and II by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Wars were the #1 non natural cause of death in the 20th century. This accident is nothing in comparison, why are so many people doing such a big story about this?

    The Nazis killed millions of Jews. They have starved whole Russian cities to death. The two nuclear bombs the Americans deployed have cost 200 thousand Japanese lifes. The Russians have sunk ships with refugees on them when WW II was already decided. The British have killed hundreds if not over a thousand of peaceful protesters for indian independence in amritsar in 1919.

    Cigarettes are a far bigger threat from that time than this old ship, and they are still killing people today.

    1. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by Registered+Coward+v2 · · Score: 1

      Very true. The deaths from war pale compared to those from natural causes such as heart disease and other natural but preventable causes.

      --
      I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
    2. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      Wars were the #1 non natural cause of death in the 20th century. This accident is nothing in comparison

      Indeed. We shouldn't care about driving safely, terrorism or earthquakes, the number of yearly deaths being so low in comparison.

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    3. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by Dutch+Gun · · Score: 5, Insightful

      In case you missed it, we've paid a bit of attention to WW2 as well over the years. Also, funny you mention the atomic bombs, since those were relatively minor killers compared to firebombings and other deaths in that war from far more mundane sources. Now why would you specifically mention those?

      It's because, like it or not, you've just aptly demonstrated that the circumstances surrounding deaths are as important or even more important than the numbers. It's not logical, but damned if humans have ever been logical. I'd presume that some of the reaction to Titanic was the fact that this ship represented one of the biggest, most visible technological achievement of humankind, so to have her sink on her maiden voyage was a bit of a shock to the psyche of the average citizen.

      But really, more to the point, Titanic is a compelling story, in the same vein of classic Shakespearean tragedies. Man's hubris challenges God/nature ("God himself could not sink this ship"), and after a perfect storm of events and mistakes, man is proven to be quite fallible, with tragic consequences for the innocent souls on board. There are many individual stories as well. The stoic, grim professionalism that saw the ship's orchestra continue to play when their own doom was at hand. The gentleman and his manservant who adorned their tuxedos, declaring that they would "meet their end as gentleman." The woman who refused to be evacuated without her husband, and insisted her maid take her own place in the lifeboat.

      How could these stories not capture the hearts of people?

      --
      Irony: Agile development has too much intertia to be abandoned now.
    4. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by Solandri · · Score: 1

      Also worth noting: The 1918 Spanish Flu killed more people than WWI, possibly more people than WWII. And unlike the typical flu which mostly kills young children and the elderly, most of the Spanish Flu deaths were young adults. (It caused the body's immune system to overreact, meaning people with the stronger immune system were more likely to die from it.)

    5. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Also worth noting: the term 'Spanish' is a misnomer. The media focus was skewed by WWI so it wasn't 'Spanish' at all.

    6. Re:Far more people died in WW I and II by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      >How could these stories not capture the hearts of people?

      I Think its because in all the examples you quoted, all these people sound like fucking retards?

  5. My first though was by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Why are they still spending money on this. My second was "Wow, the thousands of man hours" of mechanical or electrical engineering, physics, archaeology, graphic design, and several other -ologies that went into producing this. My third thought was how much expertise went into this and how little of it will be passed,due to the amazing level of detail, along to future projects. My fourth though was I should of logged in instead of ACing this, my last AC was +5 informative.

    1. Re:My first though was by stealth_finger · · Score: 1

      Why are they still spending money on this. My second was "Wow, the thousands of man hours" of mechanical or electrical engineering, physics, archaeology, graphic design, and several other -ologies that went into producing this. My third thought was how much expertise went into this and how little of it will be passed,due to the amazing level of detail, along to future projects. My fourth though was I should of logged in instead of ACing this, my last AC was +5 informative.

      Don't worry, this one won't.

      --
      Wanna buy a shirt?
      https://www.redbubble.com/people/stealthfinger/shop?asc=u
  6. The movie was wrong about it breaking in half? by dpbsmith · · Score: 1

    The movie suggested that the "Titanic" wasn't strong enough to support half its weight, levered and elevated, unsupported in the air. In the movie, the ship snapped in two (without the pieces fully separating).

    This would have happened somewhere around 2:40 in the simulation video.

    I guess this is just another illustration that Titanic buffs disagree with each other.

    This professor's simulation indicates it did break--but not the way Cameron's movie showed!

    1. Re: The movie was wrong about it breaking in half? by Nidi62 · · Score: 1

      I believe Cameron admitted recently in a televised special that current research suggests the Titanic actually broke in half when it was already submerged and headed to the bottom. However when the film was made the prevailing theory was the break in 2 on the surface. You can't really fault the movie for that.

      --
      The only thing necessary for evil to triumph is for it to be pitted against a slightly greater evil
    2. Re: The movie was wrong about it breaking in half? by ACDChook · · Score: 2

      I believe the current idea is that the upper decks tore apart, but the bow and stern remained connected by the keel. It was only during the descent that the twisting between the two halves finally tore the much stronger keel apart fully.

    3. Re:The movie was wrong about it breaking in half? by Alioth · · Score: 1

      It does actually happen in the simulation video, at about 2:40. (2.39:27 to be exact).

  7. The Titanic was another shining example by plopez · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Of what happens when you leave safety up to the private sector.

    --
    putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
    1. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      Their "real-time iceberg detection via satellite imagery" didn't work well?

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    2. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      In that case you may see (for a short time) giant Russian planes flying the skies.

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
    3. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Does that make the Flint, Michigan water system an example of what happens when you leave safety up to government?

    4. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Those are the same thing.

    5. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by Penguinisto · · Score: 2

      Of what happens when you leave safety up to the private sector.

      Funny thing - this ship was fully compliant with government regulations at the time, including the specific rule governing the number of lifeboats it was required to carry.

      --
      Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
    6. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by KGIII · · Score: 1, Troll

      I suppose then Stalin's incarcerations, that resulted in millions of deaths in the labor camps, are what happens when you leave safety up to government? Or is that only convenient when you want to use it to try to demonstrate a point that you feel is important?

      --
      "So long and thanks for all the fish."
    7. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

      I don't think it counts as a safety breach if you kill them on purpose.

      --
      Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
    8. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by DerekLyons · · Score: 1

      Of what happens when you leave safety up to the private sector.

      Funny thing - this ship was fully compliant with government regulations at the time, including the specific rule governing the number of lifeboats it was required to carry.

      Ayup. And the number was so small not because of any perfidy on the part of the government or influence from the private sector either.
       
      Prior to the loss of Titanic it was presumed (not unreasonably based on experience) that if a ship was lost near the coast, it only needed enough lifeboats to make a few a trips between the ship and shore. Equally it was presumed that if you were lost further out from the coast, especially in the middle of the ocean, you were basically fucked. It simply wasn't practical to equip a liner with enough lifeboats with sufficient food and drinking water (anywhere from several weeks to several months) for all the passengers to have a shot at survival. And the odds weren't good that heavily loaded boats that small would survive open ocean conditions long enough to fetch up on the coast even so.
       
      Titanic
      shattered those assumptions because she had a radio. Now you could call for help, and expect to get it. In the heavily traveled North Atlantic, help might only be a few hours away. Now if you could get off the ship, in many places in the world you need only survive for hours or days at most.
       
      The problem isn't that the regulations were insufficient. Nor that the regulators or operators were corrupt. It's simply that the regulations hadn't caught up with the new capabilities offered by new technology. They hadn't even realized the new capabilities existed.

    9. Re:The Titanic was another shining example by plopez · · Score: 1

      So what? They violated common sense. Because safety was too expensive.

      --
      putting the 'B' in LGBTQ+
  8. This Titanic was lucky by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

    Nobody was aboard.

    --
    Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
  9. Another equally entertaining video by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nGA-GCq7JWM

    1. Re:Another equally entertaining video by hcs_$reboot · · Score: 1

      This is funny! I like it from 9:59:00 as there is only one minute left to watch!

      --
      Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
  10. This game was predestined by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The game unfortunately only has one ending.

  11. Building a better future for VR by Dashiva+Dan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    I imagine in a year or so content creators will start producing VR "Experiences" like this, where a couple of thousand people from all over can spend a few hours/days in VR being "one of the passengers/staff on the Titanic" and have it run as an event, where you're actually in the middle of it.
    And from there the possibilities are endless - The moon landing? JFK's assassination (or whoever's version of it) - Sure there'll be tons of fictional worlds and experiences, but a big part of it will be recreating historical experiences for both entertainment and education.
    The old "simulation" games like Rome: Total war or even Assassins creed (and Civ, of course) will have a whole new level of immersion to work with. Gonna be exciting.

    --
    "lt;dr" is the correct response to most of my posts.
    1. Re:Building a better future for VR by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "couple of thousand people" don't you mean "couple of dozen people". The way VR is picking up we will all be surpriced if it does not go the way of the 3D-TV.

    2. Re:Building a better future for VR by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      do i really have to wear a fucking headset ?

      Can i just run it on my normal monitor ?

    3. Re:Building a better future for VR by WallyL · · Score: 1

      It's 2016, where's my holodeck?!

    4. Re:Building a better future for VR by Dashiva+Dan · · Score: 1

      It's 2016, where's my holodeck?!

      right here

      --
      "lt;dr" is the correct response to most of my posts.
  12. Real time = rendering on the spot by hooiberg · · Score: 1

    The whole thing about real time would be that I can download the boundary conditions of the simulation, and generate the rendering from that on the spot.
    This is a prerendered film. Might have taken a month to render it, for all we know.

    1. Re:Real time = rendering on the spot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Simulation != amusing video. Where the heck is the FEM simulation of the boats structures and hull? and iceberg? Where are the boyancy calculatios and water inflow models?

      Simulation smimulation!

      PS. Boaty McBoatface NOW! Don't chicken out!

    2. Re:Real time = rendering on the spot by Lonewolf666 · · Score: 1

      Also, allow the user to drive the ship and try different speeds and angles crashing into the iceberg.

      The most likely way it happened historically can remain as preset default.

      --
      C - the footgun of programming languages
  13. Missing one thing by Tablizer · · Score: 1

    Allow one to place politicians where one chooses and this could be a big seller.

    1. Re:Missing one thing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      We've already seen this: GOP debates

  14. Horrible etiquette by tgibson · · Score: 0

    You can watch the Titanic sink...

    Goddammit! Why the hell wasn't there a warning that a spoiler was in the first sentence!?!?

  15. Just share the resources, Mr ISIS, okay?? omg... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    By the time making animations using high tech shit smart phones that produce animations in real time turn into a trend, nobody's mind will ever grow older than a slug's mind.

  16. RMS Olympic by westlake · · Score: 1
    With all the talk of brittle steel, rivets et. al., RMS Olympic was a virtual twin to the Titanic and remained in service for 24 years.

    On 9 October 1912 White Star withdrew Olympic from service and returned her to her builders at Belfast to be refitted to incorporate lessons learned from the Titanic disaster 6 months prior, and improve safety. The number of lifeboats carried by Olympic was increased from twenty to sixty four and extra davits were installed along the boat deck to accommodate them. Also, an inner watertight skin was constructed in the boiler and engine rooms, to create a double hull. Five of the watertight bulkheads were extended up to B-Deck, extending to the entire height of the hull. This corrected a flaw in the original design, in which the bulkheads only rose up as far as E or D-Deck, a short distance above the waterline. This flaw had been exposed during Titanic's sinking, where water spilled over the top of the bulkheads as the ship sank and flooded subsequent compartments. In addition, an extra bulkhead was added to subdivide the electrical dynamo room, bringing the total number of watertight compartments to seventeen. Improvements were also made to the ship's pumping apparatus. These modifications meant that Olympic could survive a collision similar to that of Titanic, in that her first six compartments could be breached and the ship could remain afloat.

    At the same time, Olympic's B-Deck underwent a refit, which included extra cabins (the parlour suites which proved popular on the Titanic were added to the Olympic), more cabins were fitted with private bathing facilities, and a Cafe Parisian (another addition that had proved popular on the Titanic) was added, offering another dining option to first class passengers. With these changes, Olympic's gross tonnage rose to 46,359 tons, 31 tons more than Titanic's.

    RMS Olympic

    Problems with radio communication --- obsolete technologies, monopoly power, the need for regulation --- all became clear after the loss of Titanic. Ir is a fascinating story and one the geek should know better.

    Radio and the Titanic

    1. Re:RMS Olympic by Penguinisto · · Score: 1

      To be fair, the Olympic never scraped an iceberg.

      It did however drop a propellor blade and accidentally ram head-on into a British warship (HMS Hawke, I think?), though neither incident really tested the theory much.

      --
      Quo usque tandem abutere, Nimbus, patientia nostra?
  17. History lessons in Virtual Reality. by Pezbian · · Score: 1

    They might be onto something.

    Granted, it would be rather limited, but imagine virtually witnessing Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, or crossing the Delaware River with George Washington.

    --
    In a world of the blind, the one-eyed man is king--and the two-eyed man is a heretic.
    1. Re: History lessons in Virtual Reality. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Yeah....imagine *snore* boooooooring........ How about something actually exciting and historical ?

  18. rocking the boat by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    America is the Titanic and Trump is the iceberg. Let 'er rip.

  19. Hmmmm by BigBadBus · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Some Titanic enthusiasts are already pointing out errors, such as the rate of list and the time scale of the flooding; I can't speak for this having not seen the video but my analysis of how the ship sank is here. Personally I have doubts as one person who worked on the project is a known plagiarist and one of the authors is a cherry picker of data (he insists that the ship had a massive list to port when she went under but only one of the three survivors who was on the Titanic till the last mentioned it, and his evidence is suspect, like claiming he was in freezing cold water for hours without any ill effect whatsoever). BTW, my own Titanic stuff is on this page.

  20. Grammar by Buchenskjoll · · Score: 1

    The Titanic sank, it has sunk.

    --
    -- Make America hate again!
    1. Re:Grammar by OverlordQ · · Score: 1

      Some say it's still sinking to this day. All we know . . . it's called THE STIG!

      --
      Your hair look like poop, Bob! - Wanker.
  21. Re:There is hint of truth here by Hognoxious · · Score: 1

    It lost the data feed and the app displayed the icebergs at the default coordinates - a farm in Kansas.

    The devs wanted to put an error message about the data being unreliable but marketing said it would confuse the users and UX said it would spoil the flat look.

    --
    Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
  22. As a member of the American Middle Class by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm seeing it for real, in real time. No need for fancy VR.

  23. It sunk get over it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Titanic sank, get over it

  24. TL;SA by mccrew · · Score: 1

    Too long; skipped ahead

    --
    Hey, Windows users, there is no such thing as "forward" slash, there is only slash and backslash.
  25. Re:There is hint of truth here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Just when I was wondering why I keep coming here, you made my day.

  26. Very Interesting by Toad-san · · Score: 1

    Many of the details are fascinating .. but I'm not sure they got it all quite right. Nice details about the lifeboats, etc.

    But watch how the stern levels out after it breaks away from the bow. I read many reports that the stern went vertical, not horizontal.

  27. Nice by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

    But the "camera" direction was horrible. The close ups of the life boats were agonizing.

    --
    “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
  28. The sinking was intentional by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    That was the only iceberg in the area? Obviously somebody put it there.

  29. Not Accurate by corezz · · Score: 1

    Although impressive it still isn't quite accurate in some parts. For example this and many simulations still forget that Titanic stopped, but then resumed moving only to discover they were taking on even more water, then stopped again. It was this action that sped up the sinking.

    1. Re:Not Accurate by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      They addressed it in the video. Around 7:50.

  30. latency by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Real time? I have well over 100 year of latency.

  31. Honor and glory? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You might want to check out the documentary film called "Titanic At 100 - Mystery Solved" which proved that the rivets and metal were not at fault and that any similar ship of that era would have sunk much quicker. They did actual tests with actual metal that was forged at same time Titanic was built. Also, they added an extra belt of steal along both sides due incident with it's sister ship Britannic. The entire wreck site was photographed in 3D HD and they found all of the remaining parts of the ship. Had they hit iceberg head on, it would never have sunk. Tests showed that the forces the Titanic encountered were so high, that no ship could have survived, even ones built today.

  32. Time To Set Record Straight by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    For all of those talking about poor construction, faulty rivets, etc, may want to check out a documentary movie done by History Channel in 2012 called "Titanic At 100 - Mystery Solved" which documents a complete study of the Titanic about how and what really caused it to sink. Until I saw this, I was also a believer on faulty rivets, metal, and construction. The entire wreck site was filmed in HD and found every part of the Titanic, some pieces over 3 stories high. Using same methods to construct an aircraft after it has crashed, they were able to determine what actually happened when the Titanic hit the iceberg until the pieces hit the sea floor. Using actual steel and rivets used in it's construction, plus steel recovered, it was determined that the forces the Titanic encountered were so high, that nothing built then or now would have survived. In fact, they came to the conclusion that the Titanic stayed afloat longer then it should have due the extra steel belt that was added after an incident suffered by it's sister ship Britannic.