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It's actually well-known that there were fires in the Titanic's coal bunkers. I remember first reading about this way back in the mid 1990s (1995-1997) when I w
by qubex 8y ago
It's actually well-known that there were fires in the Titanic's coal bunkers. I remember first reading about this way back in the mid 1990s (1995-1997) when I was somewhat obsessed with the subject. It's also been speculated for just as long that the heat might've affected the hull's properties, though this runs counter to the argument that the cold water might've contributed to making the metal more brittle.
This is by no means extraordinary: coal bunker fires were rather common back in the age of steamships. It was even discussed at the various admiralty inquests into the loss of the vessel.
- cjrp 8y ago> ...though this runs counter to the argument that the cold water might've contributed to making the metal more brittle Why not both? Very high temperatures earlier in the crossing and then very low temperatures in the Atlantic.
- kijin 8y agoPerhaps even worse, very high temperatures on one side of a metal structure and very low temperatures on the other side at the same time.
- qubex 8y agoSince iron has good thermal conductivity, the cold water would act as a heat-sink. There could be a significant thermal gradient, I suppose...
- hinkley 8y agoSometimes they don’t go okay. I can’t seem to find the name but there was a town in Texas, coal delivery ship shows up with fire in storage. They dock, open the hatches, fresh oxygen causes the fire to spread. Then other boats catch on fire. Some explode. Throw shrapnel into town. By the time the fires are out, hundreds are reported dead, almost 40% of the town is left homeless.
- CapitalistCartr 8y agoThat sounds like the Texas City ammonium nitrate disaster in 1947. One of the biggest industrial explosions in history.
- kodablah 8y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster ? Maybe another because I don't see it related to coal or that the ship showed up with a fire per se as opposed to one happening on the ship while in port.
- dctoedt 8y agoYou might be thinking of the 1947 Texas City disaster, which killed nearly 600 people. The fire, and the subsequent explosion after failed fire-fighting efforts, were in a cargo hold containing ammonium nitrate, not coal. [0] [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_City_disaster
- rspeele 8y agoOk, which one of you fixed the missing curly brace in "{convert|10|mi}} away" right as I was about to?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]
- hinkley 8y agoI’m not sure what story I’m thinking of. The pictures and events don’t look right, but some Wikipedia lists about disasters don’t include anything else in Texas that’s the right size. The story I’m thinking of, the captain knew the coal was burning before he docked, and went into port anyway to try to salvage the cargo. The subsequent explosion was due to material on other boats. I may have heard about this around the Tianjin explosion but more likely when they were fighting the new coal depots on the west coast, someone brought it up while talking about coal self igniting.
- dragonwriter 8y ago> It's also been speculated for just as long that the heat might've affected the hull's properties, though this runs counter to the argument that the cold water might've contributed to making the metal more brittle. Does it? There's certainly materials where damage is made worse by rapid temperature transitions and/or a temperature differential across the material than by temperature extremes in one direction or the other alone. Excessive heat being bad doesn't mean that excessive cold is good, or vice versa, and neither conflicts with the idea that both together, close in time or simultaneously, aren't worse than either alone.
- abakker 8y agoI think theory with the cold was not related to temperature differential embrittlement, but sulfur embrittlement in the fabrication process. In the case of the steel in the titanic, the theory is that there was excessive amounts of suphur in the steel, which "coats" the grain boundaries between ferrite crystals in the steel and causes brittle failures. Modern steels add Manganese to counteract this effect. Sulphur embrittlement is worse at colder temperatures, but will not be effected by heating/cooling cycles unless the heating is so intense that you get past critical temperature and recrystallize the steel (~2300 F).
- LASR 8y ago> effected Affected. “Effected” is a real word. But if you don’t already know what it means, always use “affected”.