Navigational Inconsistencies of the SS Californian

[Samuel Halpern]

A new article of mine dealing with a number of navigational inconsistencies reported in the logbook of the SS Californian for April 14, 1912, has been posted on my website. It is called "Navigational Inconsistencies of the SS Californian," and is in PDF format. It can be downloaded from HERE.

In particular, I show that Californian's reported noontime position for April 14, 1912, was slightly in error, a result of a simple entry error when her longitude was recorded. After correcting for this small error in longitude we find all calculated dead reckoning (DR) positions from 9:40 a.m. to 10:21 p.m. fall neatly into place for the reported course headings she was put on, and consistent for the speed that she was making that day. We also show that her logbook entries for that day, which were later written up, were not in agreement with several wireless messages she sent out, and offer direct evidence that the DR stopping point derived in this paper agrees with the actual position that Capt. Lord sent to Capt. Gambel of the Virginian before receiving back official word about Titanic on Monday morning.

 

[Michael H. Standart]

Downloaded. Looks like you have some interesting stuff here, Sam. I'll be looking forward to reading it in greater detail.

 

[Jim Currie]

Hello Sam!

Enjoyed your article.

Have a few comments (of course!)

When Lord gave his position at time of turn, 9-40am, it was the target he was aiming for - The Corner -42N..47W. Obviously that's where he thought he was and made an educated guess that he had arrived there at 9-40am. His Noon position would be accurate since conditions for sights were perfect. It would have been determined by his 2nd and 3rd officers. I would be surprised to learn that he actually participated in taking those Noon sights. That was not the normal practice.

Stewart would not amend that particular 9-40 DR in retrospect - nobody ever does!

The air/sea temperature graph is fine but if it was illustrating a south setting cold current - that current was extremely narrow.
Californian was stopped during the period of the lowest temperatures. The Labrador Current is fairly broad and would probably have been well below the surface in those latitude - certainly below the immediate surface. What Lord's men were measuring was ice melt and 'refrigerator door' syndrome. i.e. he was in close proximity to melted ice and floating ice therefore the air and immediate surface water temperatures would be very close to each other . The sudden rise in temperatures between 0400hrs and Noon on the 15th give a classic illustration of this. Incidentally, at 28F. he would be getting buckets of 'brash' - slush and little bits of ice. Anyone who has been anchored in the St. Lawrence in spring time will bear witness to this.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

Welcome back Jim.

>>...The Corner 42N..47W. Obviously that's where he thought he was and made an educated guess that he had arrived there at 9-40am. <<

Yes, I agree. The uncertainty was in latitude, not longitude. As I wrote:

"Now it can be argued that Capt. Lord believed he really reached the corner at 9:40 a.m. when he changed Californian’s course to the west ...In all
likelihood, a sun sight would have been taken in the early morning hours when the sun was well to the east to accurately determine their longitude. From that, and the known course heading and speed of the ship, Capt. Lord would have expected to be at the longitude of the corner, 47° 00’ W, by 9:40 a.m."

You said that "Stewart would not amend that particular 9-40 DR in retrospect - nobody ever does!" But he apparently amended other DR positions in the log book taken at 6:30 pm and 7:15 pm based on an alleged pole star sight at 7:30 pm. That was the point I was making.

>>The sudden rise in temperatures between 0400hrs and Noon on the 15th give a classic illustration of this. <<

The sudden rise in temp was in air temp, not water. And they were not for the same location. The latter was for lat 41° 33'N.

Cheers,

 

[Jim Currie]

Hello Sam!

The time of 0940 am for turn was, and as you point out, derived from earlier sights.
For the same reason as I believe Titanic was east of the 47th meridian, I believe that Californian turned early and had not reached the longitude of 47W by 0940 am. I think both ships were effected by the weather and current for the 4 hours prior to turning.
Normally, sights would be taken just after 9 am. However, it is more than likely that Stewart took a set of star sights some 4 hours earlier, at dawn


I followed you on the Pole Star item Sam. I just do not visualise a C/O of the experience of Stewart not taking full advantage of the conditions for taking a sight of Polaris - particularly when his ship was virtually sailing along a parallel of latitude. Of all the star sights he could have taken, Polaris was the most appropriate given his course. You mention them steering a course a degree or two south of due west. I'm sure you appreciate that the variation was constantly changing as they went west and the deviation error from the deviation card was only good for the time it was calculated at a much earlier date. To these contributing factors, add the fact that they were steering by a magnetic compass card and you have conditions which will not accurately reflect the subsequent course made good.

You mention a south-setting current. As you know I do not subscribe to that. The graph of Lords temperature reading only tell us that late in the afternoon of the 14th.April, the sea and air temperature began to fall then levelled out for a period of about 8 hours before rising again.
This period of low but level temperatures for sea and air exactly coincides with the period when Californian was stopped or working within the field ice.The significance I take from early part of the graph and the sudden plunge in water temperature from around 58F suggests that I am right about these two ships passing through an area of warm water. That points to the Gulf Stream. Titanic cleared the warm water that night around 9pm when she was around 60 miles to the east of the ice. At 4pm on the 14th., Californian also cleared it. This suggests that the Gulf Stream was flowing as shown in this sketch:

As for the difference in air temperature between 8 pm on the 14th and Noon on the 15th. I know these are for different locations. In fact, if we ignore latitude (we're talking about a south setting current) then if there was a cold current there, it was little more than 10 miles wide. Hardly the Labrador Current?
These temperatures tell us very little except for the dramatic change 60 odd miles to the east of the ice. They were not taken in a scientific way.
Between midnight and 4 pm, the next day, the water was taken from the surface of a calm sea strewn with ice. I would expect that to give a temperature of 32F the temperature of melted ice. Below 28F the sea would not melt so a value of that is highly suspect.
As for the air temperature, I reiterate my example of an open fridge door. The calm air round a ship locked in ice is most certainly going to be close to 32F. However, when the wind began to blow after 4 pm, the air temperature would rise very quickly. Since it was from the north, it was most probably a warm front crossing the area from the west. No big mystery there!
As for the sea remaining cold - it certainly would since it was late on the 15th before they cleared all the floating ice.

Had a great holiday touring Europe by car. Now I know why we should have GPS in our cars. Try translating 'one way system' in half a dozen different languages. Got some good pictures from Band of Brothers country..

 

[Samuel Halpern]

>>That points to the Gulf Stream. <<

Not unreasonable for that location. But dropping down to near freezing just 45 miles to the west suggests to me more than just leaving Gulf stream waters. In another 45 miles the water reached the fresh water freezing point, a good 25 miles before coming up to the pack ice.

 

[Jim Currie]

The 25 miles you refer to can easily be explained Sam.

If you have a look at locations of the various rafts of pack ice, you will see that an area to the immediate north and south of latitude 42-00N, and extending eastward for at least 27 miles was influenced by ice. There would be a great deal of melt ice on the surface in that area.
I quote from the Trautenfels' report given 17 hours before Californian arrived in the same area.

"April 14, 5:05 A.M., latitude 42° 01' N., longitude 49° 53' W., passed two large icebergs about 200 feet long and 40 feet high.
April 14, 5:40 A.M., latitude 42° 01' N., longitude 50° 06' W., to 8 A.M., latitude 41° 40' N., longitude 50° 22' W., passing along a field of heavy, closely packed ice, with no openings in the field. The ice field could be seen extending far to the northward. During this time sighted about 30 large bergs."

and from the SS Paula possibly 5 hours later and a mere 10 hours before the arrival of Californian:

"April 14, forenoon, from latitude 41° 58' longitude 49° 30' W., till 41° 56', 49' 52', heavy pack ice (one field).

This second report, gives conditions in the area 27 miles east from Lord's DR Longitude of 50-07'W and fits perfectly with Lord's reported temperature drop in surface water.

 

[Doug Criner]

Sam, are these the valid conclusions for your info?


Californian was likely about 3 deg (3 miles) south and therefore that much closer to Titanic when stopped in ice.

There are reasons be suspicious of some of Californian's log entries.

 

[Doug Criner]

I think it's very possible that star shots might have been taken at dawn before the turn - and that the 9:40am DR was based on that. It's possible they could have taken a sun shot, too, in the morning, but sun shots, other than at noon, take a bit more math to reduce. And, the navigator would want to take star shots first, before sunrise. Then he'd have to wait for sun to rise high enough to accurately measure and flip down the sun filter down over the sextant's telescope. Rather than fumble around with a sun shot, I suspect most navigators might bag-it, and go inside and work out his star shots.

I don't know why they wouldn't have tried to take star shots at dawn, assuming it was clear, especially with the turn coming up. That would give a better fix, even if they were primarily concerned with longitude - and shooting several celestial objects shouldn't take more than a couple of minutes longer than just the sun, assuming the quartermaster or another officer were available to write down the times and altitudes.

Jim, you said it would be normal to take shots around 9am. Why? Star shots are usually only made in twilight, when the horizon is sharply visible through the sextant's telescope. Rather than fool with a sun shot at, say, 9:00am, I think they'd just wait until noon. If, for some reason, they missed their dawn star shots, then Yes, I would expect them to try a couple of sun shots sometime in the morning, maybe one ahead of the turn and another at noon.

 

[Doug Criner]

Pole Star thoughts:

Sam's article ponders how the first officer "verified" the 10:21pm position worked out by Lord. Well, that position, assuming is was really worked out, had to have been a DR position, based on the first officer's reported 7:30pm pole star shot, right? My assumption would be that the first officer's "verification" was just to check Lord's arithmetic and plots used in computing the 10:21 DR. Whether that constitutes verification to Sam, only he can answer.

But, now back to the 7:30pm Pole shot by the first officer. I wonder, along with Sam, why he didn't take a usual round of 5 or so star shots. In my ancient celestial navigation experience, the navigator would decide which stars to shoot maybe a half hour before going outside and beginning to shoot - selecting stars based on getting a good fix (along different axis) and selecting stars that would be easy to find. I find it troubling to believe that a navigator would just shoot Polaris especially since the last star shot, other than a noon sun shot, was at least 12 hours earlier.

I can't attest to the practice aboard Californian or other ships of the time, but I wouldn't expect that a navigator would cavalierly walk around: "Oh, there's Canopas, I'll shoot that; there's Polaris, why not?", etc. Even if at the time latitude was of particular interest, I would have expected a round of shots, not just Polaris. Even if the navigator is, for some reason, only interested in latitude, several star shots gives a much better fix. What if the Polaris shot is boogerd up somehow? That won't be known with just a Polaris shot, but will become obvious with a round of shots.

Sam mentions that reducing Polaris isn't a whole lot simpler than for other stars. There are a couple of fewer steps, but it still requires pencil and paper and punching the Almanac's Polaris tables

Shooting, say, five stars shouldn't take more that a few minutes. All the laborious paperwork can be done inside, after shooting, at the navigator's relative leisure. And, the navigator would have worksheets (called "gouges" in the Navy) already to go to simplify the reductions.

Disclosure: I don't have recent experience with celestial navigation. (Who does?) So, I referred to Bowdich to refresh my knowledge.

 

[Jim Currie]

Hello there Doug. Welcome to the 'bridge'.

Just to clarify a point. My initial use of the word 'sights' in the following excerpt is generic.

"Normally, sights would be taken just after 9 am. However, it is more than likely that Stewart took a set of star sights some 4 hours earlier, at dawn".

It was common practice on a British merchant ship for the 2nd and 3rd officers and Apprentices (if any)to take morning sights of the sun (if visible) just after breakfast - around 9am. Among other things; at that time the Longitude would be calculated as well as the estimated time of when the sun would be due south of the ship - Noon time ship.
These calculations would be run-up to Noon when everyone, including possibly the Master, would participate in 'Noon sports' and the ship's Noon position would be calculated. For those who don't know it - this was done by measuring the exact angular height of the sun above the horizon at the exact moment it was exactly due south of the ship. and combining this knowledge with information found at time of the 9 am sights.

What everyone must remember is that all the positions calculated by DR or by actually taking sights of heavenly bodies in this story could not be accurately plotted on the chart in use but would remain on an individual's work book or 'sight book' as it was called in the MN. The scale of the chart they were using made plotting a bit of a token gesture since the pencil mark would be at least a mile wide on such a scale.

"But, now back to the 7:30pm Pole shot by the first officer. I wonder, along with Sam, why he didn't take a usual round of 5 or so star shots"

It was not necessary! It was a slow ship(11 knots) on a westerly course. The weather had been and remained fine - no beam wind or course alteration had set them off course. They had had a very good Noon position and were happy with it. They were virtually sailing along a known parallel of latitude. Most of all, they were coming into an area where ice had been reported. Spending time working out a set of star sights in a warm wheelhouse, in gathering darkness with no one but the helmsman on the bridge was not an option! Actually the second Officer had taken a sight of the sun some time between 4 and 5-30pm that afternoon and Stewarts' Polaris sight was taken about 2 hours later. In all, in the 82 miles travelled from Noon that day, the position of Californian had been checked twice. Believe me, on that particular run that was shear unadulterated luxury!
I take it you are an ancient mariner like me. If so, think back and try and remember how quickly you could work a latitude by Polaris. If you had been ding it for as long as Stewart, I would guess 5 minutes at the outside. He would by simple arithmetic, pre-calculate the LHA of Aries then apply it to the Pole Star tables to get the correction to his observed altitude. Actually it was much simpler than the calculations for star sights since there was no need for lengthy trig. calculations using logarithms.

As for making a mess of his initial Polaris sight - my best guess is that Stewart would not have wasted time in the chart room trying something else. Although he did have a number of options open to him. his prime concern at that time would be with keeping a good look out.

 

[Samuel Halpern]

Hi Gents,

A few points I'd like to make:

1. Californian was NOT keeping to a line of latitude. The message to the Antillian for 6:30 PM proves that. It shows the intended course was a little south of west to make 42N in 51W. If they intended to keep the same latitude as at noon, then their DR for 6:30 would have shown that. It didn't.

2. The position given to the Virginian showed Californian 17 miles from the SOS position, not 19 to 20 as claimed by Lord at the inquiries. This 17 miles is consistent with a DR for 10:21 PM that is 3 miles south of the position they wrote in the logbook later on.

3. Stewart said he wrote up the log book for the 14th before noon on the 15th. I highly doubt that. There was too much going on searching the area and then cutting back across an icefield upon leaving the area before noon on the 15th. In the ice report sent to Olympic that Monday evening, they reported ice at the same location that was sent to Antillian the day before, not at the location that they later entered into the logbook which was keeping them to the same latitude as at noon.

I my opinion, those logbook entries were made much later on before getting to Boston. At that time the only one's who knew that Californian sighted distress signals during the middle watch were those on the Californian. The outside world had no idea yet, and I believe Capt. Lord wanted to keep it that way.

As far as morning sights are concerned, on April 14 the sun was due east a little before 7 AM. Stewart was on duty between 4 and 8. He would have had a good opportunity to get a prime vertical sight of the sun and get a good longitude line without worrying about any small latitude error in determining the altitude of the prime vertical intercept in order to find his longitude by chronometer. I would be surprised if he didn't take advantage of this.

Taking a round of star sights is certainly more precise in fixing your position. But it is very labor intensive. They did not use graphical methods back then. On large passenger vessels, with a bunch of junior officers about, you can afford to have one work up a bunch of star sights. On a relatively slow tramp steamer, I imagine it may not be necessary to be that precise. Longitude lines in the morning and evening, and a good noon position can get you across well enough.

>>Sam's article ponders how the first officer "verified" the 10:21pm position worked out by Lord.<<

Stewart was asked if he verified Lord's stopped position,

8814. Did you or not subsequently verify this position? - Yes.
8815. When did you verify it? - The next day.
8816. And did you find this position to be accurate? - Yes.

My question was just when the next day did he verify the stopped overnight position, and how did he verify it? I interpreted verification to mean taking some sights to fix your position, not just a check of the math. For example, did Stewart take another pole star sight in the AM? He made no mention of doing anything like that.

 

[Jim Currie]

"In his 1959 signed affidavit,
Stanley Lord wrote, “I steered this course [North 61° West (magnetic)] to make longitude 51° West in latitude 42° North on account of ice reports which had been received.”

Sam, I suggest to you this was patently untrue. Possibly the result of a memory mix-up but certainly not the true reflection of the sharp minded individual Lord was when in his prime in 1912. If any error in navigation was made, and if Lord did alter course to make good a direction south of due west then this was it!

Here's the report Lord had from Barr of the Caronia on the 13th of April:

"Westbound steamers report bergs, growlers, and field ice 42º north from 40º 51', April.

Lord had this prior warning of the ice ahead of him. Although he did not have a longitude for it, the report described it was at least 69 miles wide and immediately to the south of 42N. Why on earth then would Lord alter course toward it - and incidentally, in a direction away from his intended destination? As you know, the latitude of Boston is 42 degree 20'N.

Here's a rough sketch for anyone else who's interested:

The Captain of the Mount Temple had a similar warning and headed 'way south to avoid this same ice barrier.

"Before that, Californian reported her overnight
DR coordinates to Virginian from which Capt. Gambel was able to figure out that Californian was 17 miles from Titanic’s SOS position."

When did he do that? There's no evidence of it.
In the process Verbal of Mount Temple there is only one exchange recorded between Californian and Virginian and that was the one at 6 am giving the official position of Titanic. To give the ship's possition, Evans would need an official master's message - when did he send that? He was obviously only concerned with receiving the official CQD position of Titanic!
Evans the Californian's operator was sure about the 20 miles since he stated in evidence:
"Mr. EVANS.
I can only work on that we were about 20 miles away."
This was in answer as to how he knew Frankfurt was 40 miles away.

Stewart states that Californian started moving at 5-15am.. just at the time they received the first indication that something was wrong. They obviously stopped again to get verification of the CQD. They would have been making a southerly course at that time as well.

As for writing up the Abstract (official log book) That does not take long - particularly when it was only half a day's work and the ship had been stopped for at least 5 hours. Stewart would probably do that before taking part in Noon sights. It seems that all Californian's officers participated in that exercise. At that time,he would verify the stopped position by mental arithmetic. If the ship was making a westerly course this would be simple for him - just multiply 15 by the hours steamed to get the D. Long from Noon. 10.3 x 15 = 2 degrees 35 ' west of the Noon 14th position. After all it was just a DR anyway so no need for complications - no big deal.

 

[Paul Slish]

Greetings everyone. I haven't posted anything for a long time, but have been keeping up with all the posts.

As Captain Jim pointed out, when Captain Lord took over the watch from Chief Officer Stewart around 8 PM April 14th (Groves went on duty at 8 PM too, but Lord outranked him), Lord was most likely a lot more concerned about the dangers of ice than he was his exact latitude.

So the question to me is when did Lord find out about Stewart's latitude derived from Polaris?

As a former merchant navy captain, Jim, perhaps you can enlighten us who have not sailed.

Would Stewart have necessarily told Lord about the Polaris sight when Lord assumed command on the bridge? Where in the normal course of things would Stewart record the results of his Polaris shot?

Is it possible Lord didn't find out about the Polaris latitude until after Californian had reached the wreck site or a little later?

Lord did write to the Board of trade on August 10, 1912. Here is a quote from that letter.

"Dear Sir,

With reference to Lord Mersey's report on the Titanic disaster, he states Californian was 8 to 10 miles from the scene of the disaster.

I respectfully request you will allow me as Master of the Californian to give you a few facts which proves she was the distance away that I gave of 17 to 19 miles. April 14th 6.30 p.m. I sent my position to the Antillian and Titanic, this gives me 17 miles away, and you will see it was sent some hours before the disaster. April 15th about 6.30 a.m. gave my position to S.S. Virginian before I heard where the Titanic sunk, that also gave me 17 away. I understand the original Marconigrams were in court."

To me, I can't see why a man of Chief Officer Stewart's experience and diligence would not have taken some star sight or sights as it began to get dark. A ship heading about due west, it would make perfect sense to take a sight of Polaris for latitude.

The question seems to be exactly when did Captain Lord find out about the latitude derived from the Polaris sextant sight.

Norie's Tables list the latitude of Boston (Cambridge Observatory) as 42 22 48 N.

 

[Jim Currie]

Hello Paul!

"So the question to me is when did Lord find out about Stewart's latitude derived from Polaris?"

That's a good question.

The answer probably lies in what went on at change of the Watch when Groves took over charge of the ship from Stewart. At that time, Stewart would have worked up an 8pm DR position for Californian from his Polaris sights. It would be in his work book and perhaps on a 'chitty' on the chart desk for Lord to see.
When handing over to Groves, he would give him the 8pm DR position, course, speed and latest compass error. The last was possibly checked earlier by a bearing amplitude of the setting sun. If there was any difference from the previous time the error was checked, Stewart would have adjusted the course accordingly. He would also draw Groves' attention to any special orders from Lord. Perhaps Groves would have seen these already in the Captains' night order book which would be in the chart room and which he would have to sign before coming on watch.
We don't know exactly when Lord came on duty but there would be no reason for Stewart to specifically mention the Polaris sight. Lord would have enough confidence in his second in command to trust him to take every opportunity to verify the ship's position. If Lord did talk to Stewart before the latter went off watch, he (Lord) would not need to ask Stewart if he got a 'good fix' - that would be patently obvious due to the prevailing conditions. It must be clearly understood that it is only a very unsure master who goes about checking up on every move made by his juniors. Lord did not come into that category. He was a first class, confidant seaman who clearly was good at his job.
However, his confidence was being rapidly eroded when he allegedly wrote this :

"I sent my position to the Antillian and Titanic, this gives me 17 miles away, and you will see it was sent some hours before the disaster."
6-30pm
When Lord gave Californian's 6-30 position to Antillian it was an hour later at 7-30 on the 14th. At 6-30pm, Titanic was probably 55 to 60 miles astern of her. In fact, at that time, Californian was close to 50 miles ENE of Titanic's CQD position.

He also goes on:

"April 15th about 6.30 a.m. gave my position to S.S. Virginian before I heard where the Titanic sunk, that also gave me 17 away."

I don't know where this transcription came from but I suggest that it was either an 'anxious' mistake by Lord himself or originally read:

'April 14th about 7-30pm. I sent my 6-30pm position to Antillian and Titanic. before I heard where the Titanic sunk.
April 15th about 6-30am gave my position to SS Virginian that also gave me 17 away.'

The only '17' involved with the position given to Antillian and Titanic is the difference in latitude between the CQD position of 41-46N and Californian's DR latitude at 6-30 pm on the 14th 42-03N - 17 minutes. Completely irrelevant!

Perhaps Lord got his 7-30pm and 6-30s mixed up? pm and am?

What we do know from the Process verbal of the Mount Temple is that Californian was in radio contact with Virginian at 6am and with Birma 25 minutes later at 6-25am. I cannot find any record of a radio conversation with Virginian around that later time.

"To me, I can't see why a man of Chief Officer Stewart's experience and diligence would not have taken some star sight or sights as it began to get dark. A ship heading about due west, it would make perfect sense to take a sight of Polaris for latitude. "

I'm not sure what you mean there Paul. However, under normal circumstances, Stewart would have taken a set of star sights but these were not normal circumstances. The ship was entering a danger area - growlers would be the problem - very hard to see in the gloom. Stewart would not want to be off the bridge for any length of time. hence, he would take the best option - a quick, reliable shot of Polaris.

The position I gave for Boston is a little offshore
to the east of the port where Lord would pick up the pilot.

To answer your question about Lord on the bridge.

The captain is always in command - on or off the bridge. He would not 'take over ' from Groves but be there as an extra set of eyes. He would let Groves run the minute by minute hours of the 8 to 12 Watch. However, Groves would be in no doubt as to who was really in charge of the ship.

When the ship came to rest after avoiding the ice, Lord would go into the Chart room and probably use the 8pm DR position worked by Stewart to determine the Dead Reckoning position of Californian when she stopped at that time.

There is always a problem when professionals are questioned by lay people. Gaps are created when lay people interpret answers given by professionals. The fault, as I see it, lies with the professionals. Too often they take people for granted and assume that lay people have a clear mind-picture of what is being described.
I do it myself all the time (Sam can vouch for that!) I describe something I have seen or done, assuming that the reader or listener can fill in those (irrelevant to me)gaps.

A classic example is the assumption by lay people that when seafarers state the ship turned at 'The Corner', their ship was physically at 42N..47W In fact, they are merely stating that they turned when they thought they had reached the target turning point.... only with GPS can we now accurately aim for that turning point and be fairly sure we got there and did not pass it.
Unfortunately too many people forget that although navigators were relatively good at mathematics, the ideal perfect mathematical solution rarely happened. The accuracy of their navigation instruments varied enormously as did the skill of those using them and the conditions under which they were used. Half a mile position accuracy was considered good. It follows that using mathematical exactitudes, while interesting, will not help to find answers but will merely turn up inaccuracies which create more questions.