Titanic CER

Jack’s Daring Survival
The Titanic set sail from Southampton, England on April 10, 1912 with approximately 2,224 passengers and crew aboard. As it headed across the North Atlantic toward New York, it struck an iceberg during the night of April 15th. The ship that was thought to be unsinkable went down, along with most people on board. Due to an inadequate number of lifeboats, only about 700 people survived the freezing seas until the Carpathia picked them up many hours later. One of those survivors was seventeen-year-old John “Jack” Thayer. He was a high school senior from Pennsylvania, returning with his parents from a trip to Paris. When the Titanic struck the iceberg, Jack didn’t feel any great impact but just a cool breeze through the porthole of the family’s first-class cabin. While his parents got ready for bed, Jack put a coat on over his pajamas and went to see if there was any excitement out on the deck. When he noticed chunks of ice on the deck, he returned to his cabin to summon his parents. The three of them noticed the ship leaning slightly, so they dressed in their warmest clothes and put on their lifebelts. In the confusion of the crowd heading toward the lifeboats, Jack became separated from his parents. Instead, he paired up with a man named Milton Long to decide how to evacuate the sinking ship. By this point, most lifeboats had been launched with women and children. The two remaining lifeboats caused a free-for-all of fighting to get onboard. Jack and Milton were unable to make it through the crowd to the lifeboats. They watched over the side of the ship for a few moments to see that it was, indeed, sinking quickly. Some people nearby began jumping from the stern of the ship. Jack, a strong swimmer, suggested they do the same, but Milton was unsure of his own swimming ability. Eventually, however, the two had no choice but to jump over the side of the ship. Not wanting to be pulled under by the suction of the sinking ship, Jack jumped as far as he could. Milton did more of a slide down the side of the ship, never to be seen again. His body was later recovered and sent to his family in Massachusetts. Jack later described his experience in the frigid water after jumping from the Titanic: The ship seemed to be surrounded with a glare, and stood out of the night as though she were on fire.... The water was over the base of the first funnel. The second funnel, large enough for two automobiles to pass through abreast, seemed to be lifted off, emitting a cloud of sparks It looked as if it would fall on top of me. It missed me by only twenty or thirty feet. The suction of it drew me down and down struggling and swimming, practically spent. Jack rose to the surface and pushed his way through the floating wreckage to come upon an overturned lifeboat. One of the men balancing atop the overturned hull pulled Jack aboard, along with about twenty-five other men. From there, Jack was able to see the final moments of the Titanic and many of its passengers and crew. We could see groups of the almost fifteen hundred people aboard, clinging in clusters or bunches, like swarming bees; only to fall in masses, pairs or singly, as the great part of the ship, two hundred and fifty feet of it, rose into the sky, till it reached a sixty-five- or seventy-degree angle. Here it seemed to pause, and just hung, for what felt like minutes. I looked upwards - we were right under the three enormous propellers. For an instant, I thought they were sure to come down on top of us. Then, with the deadened noise of the bursting of her last few gallant bulkheads, she slid quietly away from us into the sea. The Titanic had sent out distress signals beginning around midnight, but the nearest ships were hours away. As the Carpathia headed toward the scene of the sinking, survivors in the water screamed for help and tried to swim toward the few lifeboats on the water. Jack described it as, “one long continuous wailing chant,
from the fifteen hundred in the water all around us.” Those in the lifeboats rowed away from them, afraid of being overcome and sunk. The cries lasted only a short time, as those in the water soon succumbed to hypothermia. Although the Carpathia began picking up its first survivors around 3:30 am, Jack had a much longer night. For several hours, he clung to the overturned lifeboat, either balancing on top or grasping its sides from the water. It’s possible that the exertion of doing so raised his temperature enough to keep him alive. In time, lifeboats 4 and 12, after some hesitation, came near to pick up the survivors on the overturned lifeboat. Jack and the others were finally rescued by the Carpathia at 8:30 am. Jack was reunited there with his mother, but his father had not survived.