Page 187 - British Inquiry into Loss of RMS Titanic Day 19 - 22

Gross Tonnage Minimum Minimum number of Total minimum cubic number of additional boats to be contents of boats boats to be readily available for required by columns placed under attachment to davits. 2 and 3. davits. 10,000 and under 12,000 16 - 5,500 12,000 and under 20,000 16 2 6,200 20,000 and under 35,000 16 4 6,900 35,000 and under 45,000 16 6 7,600 45,000 and upwards 16 8 8,300 That 8,300, your Lordship will see, is to compare with 5,500 at page 17 of the existing Rules. The Commissioner: Or it compares with the 10,000 in this Report. The Attorney-General: It does. The reason I am comparing the last is because that is what would apply to the “Titanic.” That is, of course, merely what is required for the attachment to davits. The Commissioner: What strikes one at once looking at this Report is this: in cases where the gross tonnage has increased more than four times, or about four times, the cubic contents of the boats required to be carried is only increased about one-half. The Attorney-General: Yes, not quite 50 percent. The Commissioner: About one-half. That strikes one on the face of it as singular. The Attorney-General: Your Lordship sees how it stands. The Commissioner: You see a corresponding increase in the number of boats, but not those under davits; they remain stationary. The Attorney-General: They are to be readily available for attachment to the davits, as your Lordship points out. Then the Report goes on: - “It is further recommended that all passenger vessels of 10,000 tons gross tonnage and upwards should be required to be fitted with wireless telegraphy apparatus. “4. That the Rules should be amended so as to admit of decked lifeboats of an approved type being stowed on top of one another or under an open lifeboat, subject to suitable arrangements being made for launching promptly the boats so stowed; “5. That the additional boats and rafts required under the provision of division (A.), class 1 (d) of the Life-Saving Appliances Rules shall be of at least such carrying capacity that they, and the boats required by columns 2 and 9 of the above Table, provide together three-fourths more than the minimum cubic contents required by column 4 of that Table; “6. That vessels divided into efficient watertight compartments to the satisfaction of the Board of Trade should (provided they are fitted with wireless telegraphy apparatus) be exempt from the requirement of additional boats and/or rafts. The Committee suggest in this connection that the Board of Trade should review the requirements designed to attain the standards as to watertight compartments at present enforced by them under Rule 12, having regard to the developments of shipbuilding since the report of the Committee on the spacing and construction of watertight bulkheads. “We have also had before us the Board’s further letter of the 17th May, enquiring whether, in the opinion of the Advisory Committee, it would be advisable to prescribe a maximum depth for lifeboats as compared with their breadth, and, if so, what that proportion should be. “In connection with this letter, we have been supplied by the Board of Trade with reports from