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Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea and the Shipwreck of the Titanic
From the national bestselling author of The Food Explorer, a fascinating and rollicking plunge into the story of the world’s most famous shipwreck, the RMS Titanic.
On a frigid April night in 1912, the world’s largest—and soon most famous—ocean liner struck an iceberg and slipped beneath the waves. She had scarcely disappeared before her new journey began, a seemingly limitless odyssey through the world’s fixation with her every tragic detail. Plans to find and raise the Titanic began almost immediately. Yet seven decades passed before it was found. Why? And of some three million shipwrecks that litter the ocean floor, why is the world still so fascinated with this one?
In Sinkable, Daniel Stone spins a fascinating tale of history, science, and obsession, uncovering the untold story of the Titanic not as a ship but as a shipwreck. He explores generations of eccentrics, like American Charles Smith, whose 1914 recovery plan using a synchronized armada of ships bearing electromagnets was complex, convincing, and utterly impossible; Jack Grimm, a Texas oil magnate who fruitlessly dropped a fortune to find the wreck after failing to find Noah’s Ark; and the British Doug Woolley, a former pantyhose factory worker who has claimed, since the 1960s, to be the true owner of the Titanic wreckage.
Along the way, Sinkable takes readers through the two miles of ocean water in which the Titanic sank, showing how the ship broke apart and why, and delves into the odd history of our understanding of such depths. Author Daniel Stone studies the landscape of the seabed, which in the Titanic’s day was thought to be as smooth and featureless as a bathtub. He interviews scientists to understand the decades of rust and decomposition that are slowly but surely consuming the ship. (She’s expected to disappear entirely within a few decades!) He even journeys over the Atlantic, during a global pandemic, to track down the elusive Doug Woolley. And Stone turns inward, looking at his own dark obsession with both the Titanic and shipwrecks in general, and why he spends hours watching ships sink on YouTube.
Brimming with humor, curiosity and wit, Sinkable follows in the tradition of Susan Orlean and Bill Bryson, offering up a page-turning work of personal journalism and an immensely entertaining romp through the deep sea and the nature of obsession.
On a frigid April night in 1912, the world’s largest—and soon most famous—ocean liner struck an iceberg and slipped beneath the waves. She had scarcely disappeared before her new journey began, a seemingly limitless odyssey through the world’s fixation with her every tragic detail. Plans to find and raise the Titanic began almost immediately. Yet seven decades passed before it was found. Why? And of some three million shipwrecks that litter the ocean floor, why is the world still so fascinated with this one?
In Sinkable, Daniel Stone spins a fascinating tale of history, science, and obsession, uncovering the untold story of the Titanic not as a ship but as a shipwreck. He explores generations of eccentrics, like American Charles Smith, whose 1914 recovery plan using a synchronized armada of ships bearing electromagnets was complex, convincing, and utterly impossible; Jack Grimm, a Texas oil magnate who fruitlessly dropped a fortune to find the wreck after failing to find Noah’s Ark; and the British Doug Woolley, a former pantyhose factory worker who has claimed, since the 1960s, to be the true owner of the Titanic wreckage.
Along the way, Sinkable takes readers through the two miles of ocean water in which the Titanic sank, showing how the ship broke apart and why, and delves into the odd history of our understanding of such depths. Author Daniel Stone studies the landscape of the seabed, which in the Titanic’s day was thought to be as smooth and featureless as a bathtub. He interviews scientists to understand the decades of rust and decomposition that are slowly but surely consuming the ship. (She’s expected to disappear entirely within a few decades!) He even journeys over the Atlantic, during a global pandemic, to track down the elusive Doug Woolley. And Stone turns inward, looking at his own dark obsession with both the Titanic and shipwrecks in general, and why he spends hours watching ships sink on YouTube.
Brimming with humor, curiosity and wit, Sinkable follows in the tradition of Susan Orlean and Bill Bryson, offering up a page-turning work of personal journalism and an immensely entertaining romp through the deep sea and the nature of obsession.
416 pages, Hardcover
First published August 16, 2022
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June 23, 2023
“Any other week and the ship nobody believed could sink would complete its maiden voyage and turn around for its ho-hum second one. Any other day and the iceberg would’ve been a mere fraction of its dangerous size. Any other hour and it would’ve been hundreds of feet away. But the ship waited for nothing, and the ice knew nothing to wait for, and the ingenuity of humans at the dawn of modern invention succumbed, rather incredibly, to the force of several crushed-up snowflakes as hard as rock…”
- Daniel Stone, Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated by the sinking of the RMS Titanic. I was five when the ship was discovered by Dr. Robert D. Ballard, and vividly remember the National Geographic special Secrets of the Titanic, which aired two years later.
As time went on, I read every book and article, watched every movie and documentary, and dwelled on every minute of the ship’s last night. The first time I ever connected to the internet – back when internet was capitalized, and you had to use America Online – I used it to search for Titanic minutiae.
In high school, I even wrote a novel about it. Six-hundred single-spaced pages. When I printed it out, I put it into a massive binder that my friends warily referred to as “the Manifesto.” Eventually, the computer I wrote it on was thrown away, meaning I have only that single hard copy as testament to four years of research and typing.
The wave crested with James Cameron’s film. After seeing it in the theater four or five times – but who’s counting? – I set the subject aside. Still, I maintain a fondness for the subject. It was the first historical event I truly studied, poring over deck plans, eyewitness accounts, and the testimony of two separate inquiries. Thus, when I came across Daniel Stone’s Sinkable, I couldn’t resist. After all, it wasn’t just another retelling of the world’s most famous maritime disaster, but promised an exploration of the people who were enchanted by it.
Having once been a card-carrying member of that club, I purchased this immediately, hoping – perhaps – to learn something about myself.
***
Sinkable is a hard book to explain. That being the case, the easiest thing to do is tell you what it is not.
This is not a book about the Titanic.
This is not about the design, construction, or sinking of the one-time largest moving object. It does not narrate the collision with an iceberg on the North Atlantic on April 14, 1912, or its plunge beneath the black waters in the early hours of April 15. There are no gripping personal details of families torn apart on the boat deck, as women and children were haphazardly loaded onto a grossly-inadequate number of lifeboats. There are no discussions of the controversies of the night: of the orders given when the iceberg was spotted; of the captain’s retreating presence during a botched evacuation; of the tensile strength of the steel used for the hull; of the mystery ship just visible in the distance, refusing to respond to the distress rockets bursting overhead.
In short, this is a Titanic book in which the Titanic is mostly absent. There is not even a cursory rundown of her fate, meaning that Sinkable is not only about obsessives, but assumes you already are one.
***
Now that the easy part is done, what is Sinkable’s purpose?
Well, Stone seems chiefly interested in Titanic’s corpse. Much of the early-going is spent discussing the ship’s two-mile journey from the surface of the North Atlantic to the bottom. Stone describes the enormous physical forces at play as 46,000 tons of steel, wood, and glass plummet through eternal darkness. He is also quite interested in the process of decay, as the mighty hulk is whittled away by forces that are still only partially understood.
Once the Titanic has turned from ship into wreck, there arises the inevitable question of salvage. As Stone notes, there are some three million sunken vessels scattered around the earth, containing a great deal of wealth. Unsurprisingly, it did not take long for people to start dreaming of retrieving the Titanic’s contents.
Some even wanted to bring the Titanic itself back to the oversea world.
***
The imaginative – if wholly ridiculous – plans to raise the Titanic form whatever spine Sinkable possesses. Stone focuses on three men in particular: Charles Smith, who believed that magnetism was the answer; Texas oil magnate Jack Grimm, who threw endless cash at the problem; and pantyhose factory worker Doug Wooley, who claimed to own the wreck itself.
Ultimately, Wooley is revealed as the lead actor of this piece. His storyline is woven into the entirety of the book’s length, with Stone checking in on him, leaving him, and then returning once again. As Stone candidly acknowledges, he began Sinkable with the premise that Wooley was the character of a lifetime, the kind of eccentric iconoclast that journalists live to find.
This, to me, is a miscalculation.
In Stone’s defense, though, it probably seemed like a slam dunk when he started. Like Michael Scott declaring bankruptcy in The Office, Wooley apparently believed that all he had to do to own the Titanic is say that he owned the Titanic. Maritime law is incredibly arcane, and the law of salvage has bedeviled people far smarter, and with more advanced degrees, than Doug Wooley. Suffice to say, however, wreck ownership requires more than empty claims, endlessly repeated.
This did not stop the media – which should have known better – from periodically amplifying his assertions, and giving Wooley a strange following. To Wooley’s credit, he leveraged this into some international travel, broadening his experiences and boosting his ego. Nevertheless, Wooley is a sad figure, and Stone waits until the very end of Sinkable to finally admit this.
Centering Wooley feels like punching down, and though Stone absolutely refuses to mock him, mockery is the natural consequence.
More importantly, none of these three men – Smith, Grimm, or Wooley – are truly Titanic obsessives. Oh, they certainly said the words, and boasted about all their research. But none of them – at least in Stone’s account – appeared to possess basic knowledge, such as the distinct possibility that Titanic broke up on the surface, a possibility widely known as of 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912.
***
There is a hummingbird quality to Sinkable. Stone will briefly alight upon a topic before flying off to the next one. While this means that coverage is superficial, it creates an undeniable momentum. Throughout the book, Stone touches on other sinkings, other salvage operations, and on advances in deep-sea exploration. This is interesting stuff, and Stone is a really good writer.
But this could’ve been better if it had attempted to find people who cared about the ship, rather than with the money and fame they could get by finding it. Stone doesn’t really distinguish between love and greed when it comes to those dedicated to the Titanic.
***
Having been given no help, I had to decide on my own why the Titanic has gripped me for decades.
The most obvious reason is that it’s a damn good story, pregnant with symbols and meanings and layers. In one of its most famous headlines, the satirical newspaper The Onion rightly declared: “World’s Largest Metaphor Hits Iceberg.” It’s a rich vein to tap for discussions on corporate arrogance, class stratification, national origin, and gender roles.
There is also the unique timeframe of the sinking. Most disasters happen quickly; this one took hours, and was set to music. It’s not hard to imagine the utter discombobulation of being awoken from a deep sleep with a rap on the door and someone telling you to put on a lifebelt. To transition from warm bed to frigid night, with a band playing, with rockets hissing into the sky, with gunshots splitting the night. The kaleidoscopic confusion must have overwhelmed. Yet, the stately pace of the sinking meant that those who could not find a seat in a lifeboat had to really think about a hard question: How am I going to meet the end?
In this way, Titanic serves as a warning. Not of hubris or overreliance on technology or of outdated regulations, but of finiteness and mortality. The older I get, this is what stands out most.
Many people study disasters in the hope of reordering chaos. There is the sense that you learn from this thing in the past, and then you prevent it in the future. But disaster comes for us all, in one way or another. Sooner or later we will all find ourselves on a sinking ship, with the last lifeboat already gone. The Titanic saga suggests we should prepare ourselves accordingly.
- Daniel Stone, Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic
For as long as I can remember, I’ve been fascinated by the sinking of the RMS Titanic. I was five when the ship was discovered by Dr. Robert D. Ballard, and vividly remember the National Geographic special Secrets of the Titanic, which aired two years later.
As time went on, I read every book and article, watched every movie and documentary, and dwelled on every minute of the ship’s last night. The first time I ever connected to the internet – back when internet was capitalized, and you had to use America Online – I used it to search for Titanic minutiae.
In high school, I even wrote a novel about it. Six-hundred single-spaced pages. When I printed it out, I put it into a massive binder that my friends warily referred to as “the Manifesto.” Eventually, the computer I wrote it on was thrown away, meaning I have only that single hard copy as testament to four years of research and typing.
The wave crested with James Cameron’s film. After seeing it in the theater four or five times – but who’s counting? – I set the subject aside. Still, I maintain a fondness for the subject. It was the first historical event I truly studied, poring over deck plans, eyewitness accounts, and the testimony of two separate inquiries. Thus, when I came across Daniel Stone’s Sinkable, I couldn’t resist. After all, it wasn’t just another retelling of the world’s most famous maritime disaster, but promised an exploration of the people who were enchanted by it.
Having once been a card-carrying member of that club, I purchased this immediately, hoping – perhaps – to learn something about myself.
***
Sinkable is a hard book to explain. That being the case, the easiest thing to do is tell you what it is not.
This is not a book about the Titanic.
This is not about the design, construction, or sinking of the one-time largest moving object. It does not narrate the collision with an iceberg on the North Atlantic on April 14, 1912, or its plunge beneath the black waters in the early hours of April 15. There are no gripping personal details of families torn apart on the boat deck, as women and children were haphazardly loaded onto a grossly-inadequate number of lifeboats. There are no discussions of the controversies of the night: of the orders given when the iceberg was spotted; of the captain’s retreating presence during a botched evacuation; of the tensile strength of the steel used for the hull; of the mystery ship just visible in the distance, refusing to respond to the distress rockets bursting overhead.
In short, this is a Titanic book in which the Titanic is mostly absent. There is not even a cursory rundown of her fate, meaning that Sinkable is not only about obsessives, but assumes you already are one.
***
Now that the easy part is done, what is Sinkable’s purpose?
Well, Stone seems chiefly interested in Titanic’s corpse. Much of the early-going is spent discussing the ship’s two-mile journey from the surface of the North Atlantic to the bottom. Stone describes the enormous physical forces at play as 46,000 tons of steel, wood, and glass plummet through eternal darkness. He is also quite interested in the process of decay, as the mighty hulk is whittled away by forces that are still only partially understood.
Once the Titanic has turned from ship into wreck, there arises the inevitable question of salvage. As Stone notes, there are some three million sunken vessels scattered around the earth, containing a great deal of wealth. Unsurprisingly, it did not take long for people to start dreaming of retrieving the Titanic’s contents.
Some even wanted to bring the Titanic itself back to the oversea world.
***
The imaginative – if wholly ridiculous – plans to raise the Titanic form whatever spine Sinkable possesses. Stone focuses on three men in particular: Charles Smith, who believed that magnetism was the answer; Texas oil magnate Jack Grimm, who threw endless cash at the problem; and pantyhose factory worker Doug Wooley, who claimed to own the wreck itself.
Ultimately, Wooley is revealed as the lead actor of this piece. His storyline is woven into the entirety of the book’s length, with Stone checking in on him, leaving him, and then returning once again. As Stone candidly acknowledges, he began Sinkable with the premise that Wooley was the character of a lifetime, the kind of eccentric iconoclast that journalists live to find.
This, to me, is a miscalculation.
In Stone’s defense, though, it probably seemed like a slam dunk when he started. Like Michael Scott declaring bankruptcy in The Office, Wooley apparently believed that all he had to do to own the Titanic is say that he owned the Titanic. Maritime law is incredibly arcane, and the law of salvage has bedeviled people far smarter, and with more advanced degrees, than Doug Wooley. Suffice to say, however, wreck ownership requires more than empty claims, endlessly repeated.
This did not stop the media – which should have known better – from periodically amplifying his assertions, and giving Wooley a strange following. To Wooley’s credit, he leveraged this into some international travel, broadening his experiences and boosting his ego. Nevertheless, Wooley is a sad figure, and Stone waits until the very end of Sinkable to finally admit this.
Centering Wooley feels like punching down, and though Stone absolutely refuses to mock him, mockery is the natural consequence.
More importantly, none of these three men – Smith, Grimm, or Wooley – are truly Titanic obsessives. Oh, they certainly said the words, and boasted about all their research. But none of them – at least in Stone’s account – appeared to possess basic knowledge, such as the distinct possibility that Titanic broke up on the surface, a possibility widely known as of 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912.
***
There is a hummingbird quality to Sinkable. Stone will briefly alight upon a topic before flying off to the next one. While this means that coverage is superficial, it creates an undeniable momentum. Throughout the book, Stone touches on other sinkings, other salvage operations, and on advances in deep-sea exploration. This is interesting stuff, and Stone is a really good writer.
But this could’ve been better if it had attempted to find people who cared about the ship, rather than with the money and fame they could get by finding it. Stone doesn’t really distinguish between love and greed when it comes to those dedicated to the Titanic.
***
Having been given no help, I had to decide on my own why the Titanic has gripped me for decades.
The most obvious reason is that it’s a damn good story, pregnant with symbols and meanings and layers. In one of its most famous headlines, the satirical newspaper The Onion rightly declared: “World’s Largest Metaphor Hits Iceberg.” It’s a rich vein to tap for discussions on corporate arrogance, class stratification, national origin, and gender roles.
There is also the unique timeframe of the sinking. Most disasters happen quickly; this one took hours, and was set to music. It’s not hard to imagine the utter discombobulation of being awoken from a deep sleep with a rap on the door and someone telling you to put on a lifebelt. To transition from warm bed to frigid night, with a band playing, with rockets hissing into the sky, with gunshots splitting the night. The kaleidoscopic confusion must have overwhelmed. Yet, the stately pace of the sinking meant that those who could not find a seat in a lifeboat had to really think about a hard question: How am I going to meet the end?
In this way, Titanic serves as a warning. Not of hubris or overreliance on technology or of outdated regulations, but of finiteness and mortality. The older I get, this is what stands out most.
Many people study disasters in the hope of reordering chaos. There is the sense that you learn from this thing in the past, and then you prevent it in the future. But disaster comes for us all, in one way or another. Sooner or later we will all find ourselves on a sinking ship, with the last lifeboat already gone. The Titanic saga suggests we should prepare ourselves accordingly.
November 5, 2022
How many ships are still lying on the ocean floor around the world? It has been estimated at the astounding number of over three million. And what is the most famous? Of course, it is the Titanic, which sank in 1912 and wasn't found until 1985. But this book isn't about the sinking but about what happened afterward......how the Titanic changed the world and how the world longed to desperately piece it back together.
The search (and plans of "rescue") of the ship began almost immediately after the sinking and there were some eccentric and colorful characters who came up with impossible plans to raise the wreck, even though no one knew where it was. Obsessed people spent millions of dollars searching and building devices to raise the Titanic to no avail. Using the last position reported before the sinking was really not particularly helpful since the time it took to sink was questionable and no one knew about the strong currents that prevailed two and a half miles down. It was also accepted knowledge that the sea bed was perfectly flat and that the ship was in one piece.
The author introduces us to what the sea really looks like at deep depths and that the decades of rust and decomposition are slowly but surely consuming the ship. Of course, as science progressed to allow Bob Ballard to find the ship, other problems arose..........treasure hunters!
A fascinating history of not just the Titanic but also of the mysteries of the deep seas. Recommended.
The search (and plans of "rescue") of the ship began almost immediately after the sinking and there were some eccentric and colorful characters who came up with impossible plans to raise the wreck, even though no one knew where it was. Obsessed people spent millions of dollars searching and building devices to raise the Titanic to no avail. Using the last position reported before the sinking was really not particularly helpful since the time it took to sink was questionable and no one knew about the strong currents that prevailed two and a half miles down. It was also accepted knowledge that the sea bed was perfectly flat and that the ship was in one piece.
The author introduces us to what the sea really looks like at deep depths and that the decades of rust and decomposition are slowly but surely consuming the ship. Of course, as science progressed to allow Bob Ballard to find the ship, other problems arose..........treasure hunters!
A fascinating history of not just the Titanic but also of the mysteries of the deep seas. Recommended.
August 16, 2022
Daniel Stone’s “Sinkable” is a well-written work of non-fiction about RMS Titanic and various attempts to find and salvage her after her 1912 sinking.
Potential readers should be aware that “Sinkable” is not a re-telling of the night of the catastrophe. It does not attempt to describe the events leading up to or causing Titanic’s demise.
Instead, it covers a wide range of topics related to Titanic as a shipwreck, and to marine salvage and underwater exploration and archaeology—everything from the ocean’s composition, to the effects of depth, pressure, and salinity, to the resurrection of other “wrecks” (including the SS Great Britain, Soviet submarine K-129, and even NASA’s “Challenger”), to the law of the sea, salvage, and “finds,” to the state of technology related to mapping and exploiting the oceans’ floors, to mention just a few.
“Sinkable” also describes the various attempts to find and salvage Titanic, both real and unreal, as well as the hucksters, dreamers, and serious individuals behind those attempts, and the conflicts between them and those who believe that Titanic and her lost passengers and crew should be left in peace.
I both enjoyed “Sinkable” and thought it a good learning experience. Kudos to Daniel Stone (a former Newsweek White House Correspondent and writer for National Geographic) for a very interesting story, very well told.
Potential readers should be aware that “Sinkable” is not a re-telling of the night of the catastrophe. It does not attempt to describe the events leading up to or causing Titanic’s demise.
Instead, it covers a wide range of topics related to Titanic as a shipwreck, and to marine salvage and underwater exploration and archaeology—everything from the ocean’s composition, to the effects of depth, pressure, and salinity, to the resurrection of other “wrecks” (including the SS Great Britain, Soviet submarine K-129, and even NASA’s “Challenger”), to the law of the sea, salvage, and “finds,” to the state of technology related to mapping and exploiting the oceans’ floors, to mention just a few.
“Sinkable” also describes the various attempts to find and salvage Titanic, both real and unreal, as well as the hucksters, dreamers, and serious individuals behind those attempts, and the conflicts between them and those who believe that Titanic and her lost passengers and crew should be left in peace.
I both enjoyed “Sinkable” and thought it a good learning experience. Kudos to Daniel Stone (a former Newsweek White House Correspondent and writer for National Geographic) for a very interesting story, very well told.
November 20, 2022
This book covered many topics I really knew nothing about- how boats sink, why boats are deliberately sunk, just how mindblowingly many ships are sitting at the bottom of our ocean and what sorts of other disturbing things are down there too (cough: chemical warfare that the US deliberately chucked in there…). I went down the rabbit hole approximately 756274.7 times while reading this and I have a long list of topics I now want to read about. I really enjoyed this book overall, but definitely was left wanting in terms of info about the actual Titanic wreck- we spend 80% of the book searching for the wreck, and when it's actually found, you really don’t get much detail. Would have loved to have pictures in this book too.
June 23, 2023
I obviously picked this up in light of the recent OceanGate scandal/tragedy (the company is even mentioned in the book!) and something that was heavily emphasized, and stuck with me, is how utterly DIFFICULT it is to get to the Titanic. And it’s certainly not something to take lightly or cut corners on.
Very interesting read about shipwrecks/ships in general though and fuel to your obsessive fire if you love learning about the Titanic.
Very interesting read about shipwrecks/ships in general though and fuel to your obsessive fire if you love learning about the Titanic.
May 4, 2022
I tried but I kept picking it up and putting it down and nothing about the narrative drew me in. The cover, the title, and the topic were the three things that made me think it was a cool fit to read through Netgalley, however right from the start the jumbled delivery of both the Titanic story while also telling comparative stories about specific elements of other shipwrecks is then buried beneath conversations about the science of sinking ships which is then buried beneath the conversations about Stone's research and meeting various people about the subject which is buried beneath unnecessarily kitschy titles for the chapters that don't get to the heart of the delivery of information that made him interested in writing about the topic.
I couldn't keep my interest unfortunately.
I couldn't keep my interest unfortunately.
June 11, 2023
“After the full story of the ship is written, the oddest part will turn out to be not that it sank, but that sinking actually lengthened its life.”
More thoughts to come.
More thoughts to come.
January 21, 2023
This was a great story by Daniel Stone, he explains how there has been over 3 million shipwrecks in the ocean. But with all those million shipwrecks people are still obsessed with the Titanic that happened in 1912.
September 21, 2022
There were some interesting gems and things obviously I didn’t know, but I was pretty bored.
August 9, 2024
I’m not completely convinced the author answered the question of why culturally we’re all so obsessed with the Titanic but I did learn a lot about shipwrecks and the people that spend their lives finding, sinking and raising them.
Read
July 2, 2023Interesting musings not on the Titanic itself but why we are so fascinated by it
November 1, 2022
I loved this book!! As the title would suggest, this book focuses almost entirely on The Titanic after its sinking. While the focus is the Titanic, Stone uses the Titanic to explain a lot of other facts and history around shipwrecks, salvage, what effect wrecks have on the ocean and vice versa, and I found it all fascinating. Would highly recommend for Titanic buffs, ocean lovers, or people who like weird history (there are a lot of weird shipwreck stories out there). The downside is I may be too afraid to get on a boat ever again.
Read
July 1, 2022Cool shit.
July 13, 2023
Daniel Stone take a novel perspective in covering the well-trodden story of RMS Titanic – beginning just after the steamer slipped beneath the icy Atlantic. The Titanic was never the largest or most deadly shipwreck of its time and yet it still stands as a defining event of the early 20th century. Why?
Stone explores the wreck's outsized presence in our history and culture by tracking some of the unique characters who became intertwined with its legacy. People with no connection to the ship when it was afloat nevertheless obsessed over the wreck, whose location and condition were a mystery for nearly 75 years.
Along the way, Stone does what I love most in nonfiction and uses the subject of Titanic to branch out and explore myriad fascinating nooks of science and history. From the physics and chemistry of shipwrecks to horrific tales of ocean tragedies I'd never heard, Sinkable was a gift to the curious from cover to cover.
Stone explores the wreck's outsized presence in our history and culture by tracking some of the unique characters who became intertwined with its legacy. People with no connection to the ship when it was afloat nevertheless obsessed over the wreck, whose location and condition were a mystery for nearly 75 years.
Along the way, Stone does what I love most in nonfiction and uses the subject of Titanic to branch out and explore myriad fascinating nooks of science and history. From the physics and chemistry of shipwrecks to horrific tales of ocean tragedies I'd never heard, Sinkable was a gift to the curious from cover to cover.
December 11, 2022
“Obsession” is the correct word for me. From 1994 until 2000 I wanted anything and everything ‘Titanic.’ A wishlist I’d written my Aunt for Christmas in 1995 asked her for a model of the doomed liner (inspired by Alec Guinness’ model from the VHS copy of Raise the Titanic! I owned). I didn’t get the model- which was probably for the best. In my adult years I tried my hand at the old Revell kit that I’d wanted and found the vintage, staid injection-moulding to be an unrewarding task of coping with hull warpage, bent masts, and flash from mold wear.
The model never came together.
Literally.
The deck wouldn’t stay down, one of the bow hatches was incomplete and had a hole, one half of the forward funnel was slightly shorter than it needed to be…
Sinkable reminded me of that kit. The cover, the title, and the description fascinated me, but the contents couldn’t come together.
It seems the book began, primarily, as a story about Doug Woolley. Woolley, who while far from the most colorful, or the most eccentric, or even the most harebrained of Titanic’s would be salvagers is certainly among the last, if not the last of those who began tilting at windmills before the ship’s wreckage was actually located. Woolley might be an interesting figure for armchair psychologists (and Stone dabbles intermittently here) but for me, at least, I wasn’t interested in him at all.
There are also some bizarre turns of phrase that are repeated. “In typical British fashion…” is a phrase repeated at least twice at different points in the text which wasn’t really witty the first time.
Worse though Stone makes some very noticeable errors and incorrect interpretations. For one he describes the scuttling of the German High Seas Fleet as an attempt to deny the British a weapon with which to attack Germany- a curious explanation since the scuttling happened after the Armistice ended the First World War, and the Germans in a last act of saving face scuttled their ships to prevent their dispersal amongst the Allies.
Another describes Moby-Dick as a fictional account of the wreck of the whale ship Essex which is not the case. The Essex inspired the climax of Moby-Dick but it’s not correct to call the novel a fictional account of that disaster.
Still another is his allegation that “women and children first” was a creation of the Victorian elite to stamp out women’s suffrage. While it may have been used as such it’s a conspiratorial explanation for what was a chivalric ideal, but one that did actually occur. It was a phrase inspired by the wreck of the HMS Birkenhead in 1852. The crew of the Titanic in fact would have referred to “women and children first” as The Birkenhead Drill.
He states that the USS Maine at the time of her sinking was a little known armored cruiser. While she was certainly obsolete by the time of her commissioning she was hardly little known to the public. The Maine was a major step for the United States Navy which had not constructed comparable warships to European navies in nearly 30 years. Her designation of an armored cruiser is also a little debatable. She was reclassified as a second-class battleship and given the Navy classification of BB-2 for “battleship.”
A particularly tone deaf comment described the sinking of the Principe Umberto as being quickly forgotten because “military casualties seemed not to warrant the same public outrage as civilian lives.” The ship sank with a great loss of life to be sure but its overshadowing in the New York Times probably has less to do with a callousness than a relatively unremarkable loss of life in the midst of a wider war. The same day this liner was torpedoed the Russian Army captured 200,000 Austro-Hungarian prisoners. Two days later the Battle of Asiago began which led to nearly 30,000 deaths on the Italian and Austro-Hungarian sides. Less than a week later tensions on the Mexican-American border led to a skirmish. The paper’s headlines following the ship’s sinking focused on the Republican nominee for President true, but space was also devoted for the heavier land casualties of the Great War.
Later, he incorrectly refers to the fictional element from Raise the Titanic! as “byzantium” instead of “byzanium.”
HMAS Sydney is incorrectly described as a “battlecruiser.”
Now, in a rare moment of insight Stone brings up something he refers to as ‘the macabre tour’ which instantly captured my attention. There lies the germ of a truly interesting concept- one that’s teased on the cover, the title and exactly what afflicted me in the ‘90s with Titanic. But, Stone, frustratingly, does nothing with this concept. Instead he meanders about never entirely satisfying his book’s promise. It was just interesting enough to encourage me to carry on reading it. But, Titanic-like, it never arrived to its destination.
The model never came together.
Literally.
The deck wouldn’t stay down, one of the bow hatches was incomplete and had a hole, one half of the forward funnel was slightly shorter than it needed to be…
Sinkable reminded me of that kit. The cover, the title, and the description fascinated me, but the contents couldn’t come together.
It seems the book began, primarily, as a story about Doug Woolley. Woolley, who while far from the most colorful, or the most eccentric, or even the most harebrained of Titanic’s would be salvagers is certainly among the last, if not the last of those who began tilting at windmills before the ship’s wreckage was actually located. Woolley might be an interesting figure for armchair psychologists (and Stone dabbles intermittently here) but for me, at least, I wasn’t interested in him at all.
There are also some bizarre turns of phrase that are repeated. “In typical British fashion…” is a phrase repeated at least twice at different points in the text which wasn’t really witty the first time.
Worse though Stone makes some very noticeable errors and incorrect interpretations. For one he describes the scuttling of the German High Seas Fleet as an attempt to deny the British a weapon with which to attack Germany- a curious explanation since the scuttling happened after the Armistice ended the First World War, and the Germans in a last act of saving face scuttled their ships to prevent their dispersal amongst the Allies.
Another describes Moby-Dick as a fictional account of the wreck of the whale ship Essex which is not the case. The Essex inspired the climax of Moby-Dick but it’s not correct to call the novel a fictional account of that disaster.
Still another is his allegation that “women and children first” was a creation of the Victorian elite to stamp out women’s suffrage. While it may have been used as such it’s a conspiratorial explanation for what was a chivalric ideal, but one that did actually occur. It was a phrase inspired by the wreck of the HMS Birkenhead in 1852. The crew of the Titanic in fact would have referred to “women and children first” as The Birkenhead Drill.
He states that the USS Maine at the time of her sinking was a little known armored cruiser. While she was certainly obsolete by the time of her commissioning she was hardly little known to the public. The Maine was a major step for the United States Navy which had not constructed comparable warships to European navies in nearly 30 years. Her designation of an armored cruiser is also a little debatable. She was reclassified as a second-class battleship and given the Navy classification of BB-2 for “battleship.”
A particularly tone deaf comment described the sinking of the Principe Umberto as being quickly forgotten because “military casualties seemed not to warrant the same public outrage as civilian lives.” The ship sank with a great loss of life to be sure but its overshadowing in the New York Times probably has less to do with a callousness than a relatively unremarkable loss of life in the midst of a wider war. The same day this liner was torpedoed the Russian Army captured 200,000 Austro-Hungarian prisoners. Two days later the Battle of Asiago began which led to nearly 30,000 deaths on the Italian and Austro-Hungarian sides. Less than a week later tensions on the Mexican-American border led to a skirmish. The paper’s headlines following the ship’s sinking focused on the Republican nominee for President true, but space was also devoted for the heavier land casualties of the Great War.
Later, he incorrectly refers to the fictional element from Raise the Titanic! as “byzantium” instead of “byzanium.”
HMAS Sydney is incorrectly described as a “battlecruiser.”
Now, in a rare moment of insight Stone brings up something he refers to as ‘the macabre tour’ which instantly captured my attention. There lies the germ of a truly interesting concept- one that’s teased on the cover, the title and exactly what afflicted me in the ‘90s with Titanic. But, Stone, frustratingly, does nothing with this concept. Instead he meanders about never entirely satisfying his book’s promise. It was just interesting enough to encourage me to carry on reading it. But, Titanic-like, it never arrived to its destination.
January 6, 2023
This was neat! Shipwrecks terrify me!
July 13, 2024
The fact that you'd be as likely to find a color TV at the bottom of the sea as you would a viking axe is gonna forever live rent free in my skull
August 19, 2024
loved every minute of it! this was so so interesting
September 4, 2023
Edit 9/3/23: Downgrading to one star because I found MORE things wrong. Apologies for not including page numbers, I no longer have the book in front of me.
First, while listening to L.A. Beedles's Unsinkable podcast, where she reviewed this book (btw highly recommend for all Titanic people to take a listen to it), she mentioned that Stone talks about how the six Chinese survivors were ignored and had to fight for years to be included in the Titanic story, and then pointed out that this is untrue. None of them were supposed to be going to America in the first place due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, and so none of them mentioned that they were on the ship. Credit to Beedles for that one; I'm not super well versed in the journey of the Chinese survivors, which is probably because The Six still isn't widely available for streaming.
The other thing was something I thought of at the time of reading and dismissed as so hopelessly stupid it couldnt possibly be in the book, but it is, and it's now REALLY bothering me. At some point, Stone talks about the possibility of an officer suicide (a highly debated topic in the Titanic community) and comes to the conclusion that it would be plausible, which it is, because in the efforts to get Collapsibles A & B down from the roof of the Officer's quarters, one of them would, for some reason, have had to cut the lines securing the funnel to the deck, directly causing the fall of the first funnel. And leading to guilt, I guess? I mean, it would, if it had happened, but obviously it didn't and I can't believe I didn't write about this when I finished the book.
First off, this would have been impossible, because those lines were made of steel, not rope. Nobody in their right mind, even in 1912, was attaching steel funnels to the deck with rope. You can't cut them even if you somehow needed to.
Also, I don't know what purpose this would even have served. Those collapsibles were designed to be taken down from the deck with ample room to not get caught on the lines connected to the funnel, and it seems unlikely that the steel lines would have been in the way to begin with. Obviously both Collapsible A & B made it to the deck without getting stuck (though A did get broken and both kind of crashed). I don't know why this would even be a thing. It reads as if Stone read something about how a lifeboat (which wasn't A anyway) had to be cut from its lines and somehow thought this meant cutting the funnel lines instead of just cutting the ropes connecting the lifeboat to the davit. Which requires a level of ignorance about this subject that means you REALLY shouldn't be writing a book about it if you think that. I mean, all you have to do is watch the movie and you'll see them cutting the lines in question.
Considering the most likely suspect in the suicide question, I have to add this to the ongoing list of First Officer Murdoch slander, which is really just getting insultingly long at this point. Though the idea that he would have cut the funnel lines knowing full well that would cause the funnel to fall just ascribes a level of stupidity to him that's more insulting than the bribery scene in the movie. At least that one makes sense for Cal.
Original Rant below, but seriously, fellow Titanic people, avoid this one.
RANT AHEAD
HARD A STARBOARD
I think perhaps people who are obsessed with the Titanic are not the audience for most Titanic books, which sounds unusual, but it is true, because there are plenty of books about this ship (obviously...) and only a few of them are geared toward the serious obsessives who actually care about things like what the floor tile patterns looked like and what angle exactly the stern got to before the ship broke in two.
But then of course, we all read all of them, because what else are we going to do? So this review is for any other serious Titanic people who may have stumbled across this book and thought "Finally, a new angle!" Because that's what I thought too.
If you think this book is largely about the Titanic's cultural history, you are going to be mostly wrong. This isn't a historiographical account of the afterlife of a ship that never had much of a life to begin with. Which is a shame, because that would be an interesting read. This book purports to talk about the obsessives who gave the Titanic her afterlife and kept her from being forgotten, but really, mostly what it concentrates on is the years and decades that were devoted to the idea of finding the wreck and then raising it, along with a complete history of how oceanographic research and underwater research technology improved, along with all sorts of other wrecks. Which isn't exactly what I was expecting, which is perhaps on me. I suppose the story of Titanic as a wreck is only interesting because it is so unlike other wrecks, both in its cultural weight and what it represents.
But to me, the story of everyone obsessing over finding the wreck really isn't a big part of the story, because I was born after the discovery, and so the ship and the shipwreck have always sat side by side in my head. There was never a time for me when Titanic was ever going to be anything other than two mangled pieces of steel sitting two and a half miles down into the ocean. As this book makes clear, everyone else had decades of imagining the ship in supposedly pristine condition (and in one piece) before their imaginings were brutally torn apart in 1985.
This concentration on wreck finding is framed by the author's framing device of the story of Doug Wooley, the man who claims he owns the Titanic wreck, which I thought was an odd choice. Quite frankly, until this book, I had forgotten that there was someone who claimed he owned it. In the constant arguing in the Titanic community over whether anyone should be visiting and salvaging from the wreck site, pretty much no one ever brings this guy up, because he is completely irrelevant to any serious scholarship done about the ship, and isn't exactly the ambassador we want to present to the world.
The author says this himself, that he did none of the work, knew nothing about how to do any kind of deep ocean exploration, and yet somehow continued to insist he was the most important person in the Titanic's afterlife.
This is not the only time the author chooses the blowhards to highlight as examples of Titanic obsessives. In addition to Wooley, Jack Grimm, who claimed to find the wreck in the early 80s and the guy who is still supposedly trying to build the Titanic II are given ample page space. Dr. Ballard, who discovered the wreck, isn't portrayed in the most flattering light, which...I mean, look at everybody else you're highlighting.
James Cameron is barely even mentioned, even though by rights, he fits right in. Here's a guy who decided he liked the Titanic, proceeded to convince Hollywood to fund his dives to the wreck by making a movie, proceeded to go drastically overbudget on said movie, built a nearly full size Titanic replica, sank it and then continued to dive to the wreck, absolutely unable to let his obsession go.
But unlike the other useless arrogant white men in this book, Cameron actually did something. He made a billion-dollar blockbuster masterpiece, advanced underwater exploration technology by leaps and bounds, proceeded to discover things about the Titanic through his dives that no one thought we would ever know, so...I guess if you actually contribute something to the world you don't get highlighted in a book about Titanic obsessives?
I'm just salty because I'm well aware this is a weird subculture, and I don't think most of the normal people who are in this world deserve to be attached to the weirdos this ship brings out of its long-eaten-away woodwork.
Relatively normal, anyway. I do know that we all looked at a ship that, after all, failed to do its only job even one time, and went 😍😍😍😍😍 .
The wider Titanic community isn't actually full of ignorant, arrogant useless jerks who just want to cash in on a famous name. One of the few things I liked about this book was that it highlights just how much other shipwrecks are important for what they carry (whether that is something valuable, like gold or jewels, or something dangerous like nuclear warheads or fuel that is dangerous to the ecosystem they're in). With Titanic, you don't usually get that. Her value is in her story, and for most of us, when talking about wreck exploration, we're more likely to get excited about the possiblity of finding the swimming pool than anything actually valuable.
A nice highlight was how the Titanic Historical Society opened its archives to Jacques Cousteau, helping him locate the wreck of Titanic's sister ship, Britannic, because sharing info isn't usual among wreck finders, concerned with salvage rights. This was, unfortunately, the only time one of the legitimate Titanic organizations gets a mention in this book. Which is just...disappointing. There are any number of Titanic obsessives who would be willing to talk (and talk...and talk) for hours about what draws them to this ship and this story.
A study of what, exactly, it is about this ship would be fascinating, though I suspect the question can never really be answered. I learned about Titanic before I could read, and I have never grown tired of her. I can't explain why. She finds her way in and grabs you before you know it, and then suddenly you're rattling off lifeboat numbers and time stamps as if they're imprinted in your brain.
I suspect I could forget most of what I know and I could still tell you Titanic hit the iceberg at 11:40 PM on April 14, 1912. It is a fact I know so deeply I don't remember ever not knowing it.
Which leads me to my other major complaint, which is the sheer number of Titanic facts that are incorrect (those of you who had read a Titanic review of mine, you knew this was coming). I don't know how someone could write a book about Titanic obsessives and not realize we are all insufferably pedantic, but apparently you can.
(As a sidenote, the insistence on accuracy isn't actually because we want to be annoying. It is because this is the most famous ship in history, and there is a lot of both mis- and disinformation out there, so in order to find our way around stuff that is badly researched nonsense trying to cash in on the name, we basically have to fact check everything all the time to tell each other which books, documentaries, etc are actually worth checking out and which are useless.)
So here, in order, are a list of incorrect "facts":
"It was a tragedy, one of many in an uncertain era, that happened to kill mostly rich people."
NO, IT DIDN'T. Titanic FAMOUSLY killed mostly not-rich people, because most of her passenger complement were third-class passengers emigrating to the US who, EVEN MORE FAMOUSLY, were unable, and in some cases prevented, from going up to the Boat Deck until the last boats had been launched. If you count the crew, which accounted for by far the worst loss of life, the vast majority of Titanic's death toll were working class people.
It is true that the rich who died on Titanic were incredibly famous, and died very dramatically, which is why they tend to be the stories people know. They were the Musks, the Bezos's, the Zuckerbergs of their day, and look, I'm not immune. I have a very hard time imagining Elon Musk refusing to part from Grimes with a "where you go, I go", or Bezos dressing in his best, prepared to go down as a gentleman, or Zuck putting his wife and children calmly in a lifeboat and stepping aside to allow someone else to take the limited seats. I expect they'd be more like this:
The First Class men of Titanic, whatever their faults, earned their places in history. But they were the outliers, and this is something anyone who lives with this story on a daily basis keeps in mind.
"Bigger air pockets in the stern, occupied by first class cabins, smoke rooms, and the grand staircase..." The Grand Staircase was not in the stern. The Aft Grand Staircase was, but without making that clear, you know everybody is going to picture the showstopper that is the main Staircase. Aside from the plans, which show you exactly where the Grand Staircase was, the gaping hole where the staircase used to be is the favored entry point today for bots and ROVs to enter the wreck, which alone proves it is in the bow, because there simply isn't an entry point in the stern at all.
"The men rowing each lifeboat rowed harder and harder..." this is a little pedantic even by Titanic standards, but there were not enough men to row each boat. In quite a few boats, the women were the ones rowing.
"The Carpathia...had sent the first reports of the Titanic in danger..." uh, no she didn't. Titanic was N by NW of Carpathia's position, so was closer to New York to start with, and Carpathia's wireless was not powerful enough to reach land. The New York based wireless operators the author talks about here picked up Titanic's distress calls directly, because Titanic's wireless was much more powerful, particularly on a cold, clear night.
"...scientists conducted a metallurgical analysis...and determined that the original rivets were brittle and prone to break under stress." The idea that Titanic's steel was somehow faulty is repeated several times throughout this book, and this has been debunked. Titanic's steel was perfectly within standards for the time. Today, we would not use it to build a ship (nor would we use rivets when welding exists), but White Star was not cutting corners by using bad steel. Olympic did perfectly well with the same steel, I might point out.
"The sundeck was on top, he explained." EXCUSE ME?? The Titanic was not a cruise ship. The uppermost deck on Titanic was called the BOAT Deck because it is where the lifeboats were. Not much sun to take on the North Atlantic in April.
"...at least one early film..." There was more than one early film. There were THREE in 1912 alone, and one in 1929, another in 1933...you get the picture. These are known quantities. All but the earliest still exist. This also belies the author's point that the Titanic was not popular prior to the 1950s, when clearly, there was plenty of interest. The 1950s is simply the first great revival of interest, and the beginning of serious study and the first historical societies dedicated to her.
"After a half century, the two halves of Titanic remained in decent shape." The stern was never in decent shape to start with, considering it basically exploded on the way down. The author mentions this in other parts of the book, so I don't know why this pronouncement was made at all.
"Even if there were enough lifeboats, they had to be closer to the water, which would make the ship's famous black abdomen look like it was wearing a skirt." This only applies to cruise ships. On an ocean liner, lifeboats are still higher up, to avoid the larger swells encountered in the North Atlantic. Look at the Queen Mary 2, her lifeboats are definitely higher than the black hull. (They are still lower down than Titanic's were, but QM2 is quite a bit taller than Titanic to start with). In this section, the author also states that "global regulations of cruise ships had transformed since 1912" which just irritates me because it insinuates that Titanic was a cruise ship, which she was not. She was an ocean liner. Cruise ships didn't exist in 1912.
I don't have a quote for this one, but throughout the book the author talks about the rust on Titanic's wreck, which just grew progressively more annoying because THERE IS NO RUST ON THE WRECK. There is no oxygen that far down, and so metal cannot oxidize. There are rusticles, which look like rust, but are actually products of iron-eating bacteria, which the author shows very well that he knows, so why he continually kept referring to actual rust is beyond me.
Perhaps, in a book about people obsessed with the Titanic, the author should have talked to some of us, because we would undoubtedly have told him which facts were incorrect, and would perhaps be portrayed in the book less as weirdly obsessed rich cranks with pie in the sky dreams and more just as people who learned about a ship that tragically sank on its first voyage, and couldn't forget it.
First, while listening to L.A. Beedles's Unsinkable podcast, where she reviewed this book (btw highly recommend for all Titanic people to take a listen to it), she mentioned that Stone talks about how the six Chinese survivors were ignored and had to fight for years to be included in the Titanic story, and then pointed out that this is untrue. None of them were supposed to be going to America in the first place due to the Chinese Exclusion Act, and so none of them mentioned that they were on the ship. Credit to Beedles for that one; I'm not super well versed in the journey of the Chinese survivors, which is probably because The Six still isn't widely available for streaming.
The other thing was something I thought of at the time of reading and dismissed as so hopelessly stupid it couldnt possibly be in the book, but it is, and it's now REALLY bothering me. At some point, Stone talks about the possibility of an officer suicide (a highly debated topic in the Titanic community) and comes to the conclusion that it would be plausible, which it is, because in the efforts to get Collapsibles A & B down from the roof of the Officer's quarters, one of them would, for some reason, have had to cut the lines securing the funnel to the deck, directly causing the fall of the first funnel. And leading to guilt, I guess? I mean, it would, if it had happened, but obviously it didn't and I can't believe I didn't write about this when I finished the book.
First off, this would have been impossible, because those lines were made of steel, not rope. Nobody in their right mind, even in 1912, was attaching steel funnels to the deck with rope. You can't cut them even if you somehow needed to.
Also, I don't know what purpose this would even have served. Those collapsibles were designed to be taken down from the deck with ample room to not get caught on the lines connected to the funnel, and it seems unlikely that the steel lines would have been in the way to begin with. Obviously both Collapsible A & B made it to the deck without getting stuck (though A did get broken and both kind of crashed). I don't know why this would even be a thing. It reads as if Stone read something about how a lifeboat (which wasn't A anyway) had to be cut from its lines and somehow thought this meant cutting the funnel lines instead of just cutting the ropes connecting the lifeboat to the davit. Which requires a level of ignorance about this subject that means you REALLY shouldn't be writing a book about it if you think that. I mean, all you have to do is watch the movie and you'll see them cutting the lines in question.
Considering the most likely suspect in the suicide question, I have to add this to the ongoing list of First Officer Murdoch slander, which is really just getting insultingly long at this point. Though the idea that he would have cut the funnel lines knowing full well that would cause the funnel to fall just ascribes a level of stupidity to him that's more insulting than the bribery scene in the movie. At least that one makes sense for Cal.
Original Rant below, but seriously, fellow Titanic people, avoid this one.
RANT AHEAD
HARD A STARBOARD
I think perhaps people who are obsessed with the Titanic are not the audience for most Titanic books, which sounds unusual, but it is true, because there are plenty of books about this ship (obviously...) and only a few of them are geared toward the serious obsessives who actually care about things like what the floor tile patterns looked like and what angle exactly the stern got to before the ship broke in two.
But then of course, we all read all of them, because what else are we going to do? So this review is for any other serious Titanic people who may have stumbled across this book and thought "Finally, a new angle!" Because that's what I thought too.
If you think this book is largely about the Titanic's cultural history, you are going to be mostly wrong. This isn't a historiographical account of the afterlife of a ship that never had much of a life to begin with. Which is a shame, because that would be an interesting read. This book purports to talk about the obsessives who gave the Titanic her afterlife and kept her from being forgotten, but really, mostly what it concentrates on is the years and decades that were devoted to the idea of finding the wreck and then raising it, along with a complete history of how oceanographic research and underwater research technology improved, along with all sorts of other wrecks. Which isn't exactly what I was expecting, which is perhaps on me. I suppose the story of Titanic as a wreck is only interesting because it is so unlike other wrecks, both in its cultural weight and what it represents.
But to me, the story of everyone obsessing over finding the wreck really isn't a big part of the story, because I was born after the discovery, and so the ship and the shipwreck have always sat side by side in my head. There was never a time for me when Titanic was ever going to be anything other than two mangled pieces of steel sitting two and a half miles down into the ocean. As this book makes clear, everyone else had decades of imagining the ship in supposedly pristine condition (and in one piece) before their imaginings were brutally torn apart in 1985.
This concentration on wreck finding is framed by the author's framing device of the story of Doug Wooley, the man who claims he owns the Titanic wreck, which I thought was an odd choice. Quite frankly, until this book, I had forgotten that there was someone who claimed he owned it. In the constant arguing in the Titanic community over whether anyone should be visiting and salvaging from the wreck site, pretty much no one ever brings this guy up, because he is completely irrelevant to any serious scholarship done about the ship, and isn't exactly the ambassador we want to present to the world.
The author says this himself, that he did none of the work, knew nothing about how to do any kind of deep ocean exploration, and yet somehow continued to insist he was the most important person in the Titanic's afterlife.
This is not the only time the author chooses the blowhards to highlight as examples of Titanic obsessives. In addition to Wooley, Jack Grimm, who claimed to find the wreck in the early 80s and the guy who is still supposedly trying to build the Titanic II are given ample page space. Dr. Ballard, who discovered the wreck, isn't portrayed in the most flattering light, which...I mean, look at everybody else you're highlighting.
James Cameron is barely even mentioned, even though by rights, he fits right in. Here's a guy who decided he liked the Titanic, proceeded to convince Hollywood to fund his dives to the wreck by making a movie, proceeded to go drastically overbudget on said movie, built a nearly full size Titanic replica, sank it and then continued to dive to the wreck, absolutely unable to let his obsession go.
But unlike the other useless arrogant white men in this book, Cameron actually did something. He made a billion-dollar blockbuster masterpiece, advanced underwater exploration technology by leaps and bounds, proceeded to discover things about the Titanic through his dives that no one thought we would ever know, so...I guess if you actually contribute something to the world you don't get highlighted in a book about Titanic obsessives?
I'm just salty because I'm well aware this is a weird subculture, and I don't think most of the normal people who are in this world deserve to be attached to the weirdos this ship brings out of its long-eaten-away woodwork.
Relatively normal, anyway. I do know that we all looked at a ship that, after all, failed to do its only job even one time, and went 😍😍😍😍😍 .
The wider Titanic community isn't actually full of ignorant, arrogant useless jerks who just want to cash in on a famous name. One of the few things I liked about this book was that it highlights just how much other shipwrecks are important for what they carry (whether that is something valuable, like gold or jewels, or something dangerous like nuclear warheads or fuel that is dangerous to the ecosystem they're in). With Titanic, you don't usually get that. Her value is in her story, and for most of us, when talking about wreck exploration, we're more likely to get excited about the possiblity of finding the swimming pool than anything actually valuable.
A nice highlight was how the Titanic Historical Society opened its archives to Jacques Cousteau, helping him locate the wreck of Titanic's sister ship, Britannic, because sharing info isn't usual among wreck finders, concerned with salvage rights. This was, unfortunately, the only time one of the legitimate Titanic organizations gets a mention in this book. Which is just...disappointing. There are any number of Titanic obsessives who would be willing to talk (and talk...and talk) for hours about what draws them to this ship and this story.
A study of what, exactly, it is about this ship would be fascinating, though I suspect the question can never really be answered. I learned about Titanic before I could read, and I have never grown tired of her. I can't explain why. She finds her way in and grabs you before you know it, and then suddenly you're rattling off lifeboat numbers and time stamps as if they're imprinted in your brain.
I suspect I could forget most of what I know and I could still tell you Titanic hit the iceberg at 11:40 PM on April 14, 1912. It is a fact I know so deeply I don't remember ever not knowing it.
Which leads me to my other major complaint, which is the sheer number of Titanic facts that are incorrect (those of you who had read a Titanic review of mine, you knew this was coming). I don't know how someone could write a book about Titanic obsessives and not realize we are all insufferably pedantic, but apparently you can.
(As a sidenote, the insistence on accuracy isn't actually because we want to be annoying. It is because this is the most famous ship in history, and there is a lot of both mis- and disinformation out there, so in order to find our way around stuff that is badly researched nonsense trying to cash in on the name, we basically have to fact check everything all the time to tell each other which books, documentaries, etc are actually worth checking out and which are useless.)
So here, in order, are a list of incorrect "facts":
"It was a tragedy, one of many in an uncertain era, that happened to kill mostly rich people."
NO, IT DIDN'T. Titanic FAMOUSLY killed mostly not-rich people, because most of her passenger complement were third-class passengers emigrating to the US who, EVEN MORE FAMOUSLY, were unable, and in some cases prevented, from going up to the Boat Deck until the last boats had been launched. If you count the crew, which accounted for by far the worst loss of life, the vast majority of Titanic's death toll were working class people.
It is true that the rich who died on Titanic were incredibly famous, and died very dramatically, which is why they tend to be the stories people know. They were the Musks, the Bezos's, the Zuckerbergs of their day, and look, I'm not immune. I have a very hard time imagining Elon Musk refusing to part from Grimes with a "where you go, I go", or Bezos dressing in his best, prepared to go down as a gentleman, or Zuck putting his wife and children calmly in a lifeboat and stepping aside to allow someone else to take the limited seats. I expect they'd be more like this:
The First Class men of Titanic, whatever their faults, earned their places in history. But they were the outliers, and this is something anyone who lives with this story on a daily basis keeps in mind.
"Bigger air pockets in the stern, occupied by first class cabins, smoke rooms, and the grand staircase..." The Grand Staircase was not in the stern. The Aft Grand Staircase was, but without making that clear, you know everybody is going to picture the showstopper that is the main Staircase. Aside from the plans, which show you exactly where the Grand Staircase was, the gaping hole where the staircase used to be is the favored entry point today for bots and ROVs to enter the wreck, which alone proves it is in the bow, because there simply isn't an entry point in the stern at all.
"The men rowing each lifeboat rowed harder and harder..." this is a little pedantic even by Titanic standards, but there were not enough men to row each boat. In quite a few boats, the women were the ones rowing.
"The Carpathia...had sent the first reports of the Titanic in danger..." uh, no she didn't. Titanic was N by NW of Carpathia's position, so was closer to New York to start with, and Carpathia's wireless was not powerful enough to reach land. The New York based wireless operators the author talks about here picked up Titanic's distress calls directly, because Titanic's wireless was much more powerful, particularly on a cold, clear night.
"...scientists conducted a metallurgical analysis...and determined that the original rivets were brittle and prone to break under stress." The idea that Titanic's steel was somehow faulty is repeated several times throughout this book, and this has been debunked. Titanic's steel was perfectly within standards for the time. Today, we would not use it to build a ship (nor would we use rivets when welding exists), but White Star was not cutting corners by using bad steel. Olympic did perfectly well with the same steel, I might point out.
"The sundeck was on top, he explained." EXCUSE ME?? The Titanic was not a cruise ship. The uppermost deck on Titanic was called the BOAT Deck because it is where the lifeboats were. Not much sun to take on the North Atlantic in April.
"...at least one early film..." There was more than one early film. There were THREE in 1912 alone, and one in 1929, another in 1933...you get the picture. These are known quantities. All but the earliest still exist. This also belies the author's point that the Titanic was not popular prior to the 1950s, when clearly, there was plenty of interest. The 1950s is simply the first great revival of interest, and the beginning of serious study and the first historical societies dedicated to her.
"After a half century, the two halves of Titanic remained in decent shape." The stern was never in decent shape to start with, considering it basically exploded on the way down. The author mentions this in other parts of the book, so I don't know why this pronouncement was made at all.
"Even if there were enough lifeboats, they had to be closer to the water, which would make the ship's famous black abdomen look like it was wearing a skirt." This only applies to cruise ships. On an ocean liner, lifeboats are still higher up, to avoid the larger swells encountered in the North Atlantic. Look at the Queen Mary 2, her lifeboats are definitely higher than the black hull. (They are still lower down than Titanic's were, but QM2 is quite a bit taller than Titanic to start with). In this section, the author also states that "global regulations of cruise ships had transformed since 1912" which just irritates me because it insinuates that Titanic was a cruise ship, which she was not. She was an ocean liner. Cruise ships didn't exist in 1912.
I don't have a quote for this one, but throughout the book the author talks about the rust on Titanic's wreck, which just grew progressively more annoying because THERE IS NO RUST ON THE WRECK. There is no oxygen that far down, and so metal cannot oxidize. There are rusticles, which look like rust, but are actually products of iron-eating bacteria, which the author shows very well that he knows, so why he continually kept referring to actual rust is beyond me.
Perhaps, in a book about people obsessed with the Titanic, the author should have talked to some of us, because we would undoubtedly have told him which facts were incorrect, and would perhaps be portrayed in the book less as weirdly obsessed rich cranks with pie in the sky dreams and more just as people who learned about a ship that tragically sank on its first voyage, and couldn't forget it.
September 15, 2022
Listened to the audiobook
Content warnings: drowning, deaths at sea, maritime disasters, Atlantic slave trade
I was definitely one of those kids with a RMS Titanic obsession as a child, that honestly, had nothing to do with the Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet romance movie (didn’t want that until much, much later). The level of hubris and poor planning in the name of aesthetics is what captured many people’s attention, but for me, it’s the physics and aftermath that fascinated me. Humans are characters, but the focus here rests on shipwrecks in general, as a study, as a phenomenon, as a hobby, and some of the greatest tragedies that befell humans on the regular before air travel rose to prominence.
The specific lens that this book tells the tale of the fated voyage is strictly through the point of view of finding and uncovering shipwrecks. Entertaining, informative, and so focused on the final phase of a ship’s life time, rather than the story of a single ship’s demise.
I have a healthy fear of the open ocean. It’s too big, we don’t know what’s at the bottom of it, and good luck thinking you can bring anything back. Despite the thousands of maritime accidents that at one point were frighteningly routine, people’s attention zeroed in on this one. Why? Well, the primary reason is that thought hundreds of people died in the RMS Titanic disaster, hundreds also survived, and they had stories to tell. Plus, there were myriad technological and protocol developments that both improved the safety of ships, but also allowed for deep-sea treasure hunting to take off. The little details, such as how “women and children first” made great PR post-facto, but was never a true protocol to begin with, really make this a captivating read. Stone is as excited to share all he learns about ships and wrecks, and that enthusiasm is infectious.
One of the more art-imitating-life aspects of this account is just how invested and obsessed Stone himself seems to be in the stories of different disasters and sharing all he learned about the hydrodynamics and physics of wrecks themselves. The way it’s concentrated to specific tales and ships makes the otherwise dense science really accessible. Plus there are threads that tie up much later in the book, and Stone does a great job guiding us through the lifecycle of a ship, plus the environmental and greater effects.
A really fun read from an unexpected perspective, perfect for those of us obsessed with the ship of dreams at any point in our lives.
Content warnings: drowning, deaths at sea, maritime disasters, Atlantic slave trade
I was definitely one of those kids with a RMS Titanic obsession as a child, that honestly, had nothing to do with the Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet romance movie (didn’t want that until much, much later). The level of hubris and poor planning in the name of aesthetics is what captured many people’s attention, but for me, it’s the physics and aftermath that fascinated me. Humans are characters, but the focus here rests on shipwrecks in general, as a study, as a phenomenon, as a hobby, and some of the greatest tragedies that befell humans on the regular before air travel rose to prominence.
The specific lens that this book tells the tale of the fated voyage is strictly through the point of view of finding and uncovering shipwrecks. Entertaining, informative, and so focused on the final phase of a ship’s life time, rather than the story of a single ship’s demise.
I have a healthy fear of the open ocean. It’s too big, we don’t know what’s at the bottom of it, and good luck thinking you can bring anything back. Despite the thousands of maritime accidents that at one point were frighteningly routine, people’s attention zeroed in on this one. Why? Well, the primary reason is that thought hundreds of people died in the RMS Titanic disaster, hundreds also survived, and they had stories to tell. Plus, there were myriad technological and protocol developments that both improved the safety of ships, but also allowed for deep-sea treasure hunting to take off. The little details, such as how “women and children first” made great PR post-facto, but was never a true protocol to begin with, really make this a captivating read. Stone is as excited to share all he learns about ships and wrecks, and that enthusiasm is infectious.
One of the more art-imitating-life aspects of this account is just how invested and obsessed Stone himself seems to be in the stories of different disasters and sharing all he learned about the hydrodynamics and physics of wrecks themselves. The way it’s concentrated to specific tales and ships makes the otherwise dense science really accessible. Plus there are threads that tie up much later in the book, and Stone does a great job guiding us through the lifecycle of a ship, plus the environmental and greater effects.
A really fun read from an unexpected perspective, perfect for those of us obsessed with the ship of dreams at any point in our lives.
May 24, 2024
I really enjoyed this book. It's been a long time since I've had a book that I couldn't put down. Normally, I would give a book 5 stars for the fact it kept my interest like it did, but I'm giving it 4. The reason is that the author jumped around a lot. I found everything he wrote interesting, but at times, there was no rhyme or reason on how (or where) he would write his interesting tidbits. Many times, I thought to myself, "Where did this come from?". It's still an interesting read, and I would highly recommend it. Although, if you are expecting a book about the specifics of the night the Titanic sank, you may be disappointed. The story is more about what has happened since the sinking. Overall, I am happy I read it.
July 14, 2023
An interesting off angle view of the Titanic and its impact since the sinking. Many people became obsessed with it and what had happened. As it faded from memory, something always seemed to arise: the book and movie in the 1950s; other shipwrecks being discovered in the 1960s and on; the movie Titanic; etc. Part of the story follows a man who claimed he had the rights to the actual ship and his life built around that and his plans to raise the ship. There is also a brief mention of the company that built the recently lost Titan submersible. Lots of details on what happens to wrecks. A worthwhile read.
November 12, 2022
I am so basic that any mention of titanic gets me excited. This was definitely not the book I was expecting, but that’s a good thing. It is super interesting to explore peoples life long obsession with something that is literally impossible. Why do we dare to dream? Sometimes as an escape from a terrible reality, or maybe it stems from thoughts of being insignificant. This book was about the Titanic, but at the same time it wasn’t. I really enjoyed it.
March 11, 2024
A really interesting look at the history of the Titanic’s wreck and the (often ridiculous) plans to raise the ship from the ocean floor. This was a fairy entertaining read. I wish there was more about other shipwrecks and their history, but the Titanic sells books. Still, the author provides context and history behind other shipwrecks that litter the ocean floor. I’d like to see the author tackle more shipwrecks as he has a very entertaining and engaging writing style. An overall solid book.
March 13, 2023
Experts believe three million shipwrecks exist on this planet (from all time). The most famous? The Titanic. Second? Probably Columbus’ Santa Maria, which I didn’t even know has never been found. 🤯 And now I know why they call part of the west coast of Florida the “treasure coast”! 🏴☠️🪙🪙🚢
September 12, 2022
Thank you Penguin Random House Audio for the free audiobook: this week’s lakeside listening! A wide-ranging story about the Titanic — and its obsessives’ quixotic quest to unsink the sunken.
July 9, 2023
A wonderful comprehensive read! The writing style reminds me of Bill Bryson. I really enjoyed all I learned from this book.
December 8, 2022
fascinating read for those of us that never left our titanic phase
July 11, 2022
My thanks to both NetGalley and the publisher Penguin Group Dutton for an advanced copy of this book on both nautical history and the ideas and obsessions that drive people to search for meaning under the sea.
According to UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization there are over 3 million shipwrecks sitting at the bottom of the sea, give or take. Few of these are known outside the world of nautical studies, warships and treasure ships being among the more familiar. The one known best to more people and probably with more movies and songs, sorry SS Edmund Fitzgerald, is the RMS Titanic. Plunging to the depths of the Atlantic more than 100 years ago the Titanic has trended at various points as plans were made to find the final resting spot, resurface the liner, or even rebuild. Men with money, spent quite a bit looking for it, and when found, plans were of course made to make even more money from the wreck. One man even claims the boat is his, which shows the obsession that many have for a ship that didn't even complete its maiden voyage. In Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic, looks at the famed ship in its afterlife, a siren song that continues to enchant, even as time, pressure and water erode away everything but the legend.
The book is not only about the Titanic but about the sea and how dangerous, even now, sailing across the ocean can be. Money is a factor, giant freighters, laden with cargo containers, packed high, on seas that even today with forecasting and satellites can still turn rogue in a minutes time. The book then discusses the Titanic, and how quickly plans were made to resurface the boat by an American with gumption, money and electromagnets. The author then discusses how wrecks are found, and exploited by both legal and illegal means, and what makes wrecks so worth finding and the profit to be made. However it is always Titanic we return to, the millionaire who wanted to find it and the fame he hoped to win. The British man, who claims ownership of the wreck, since no one really told him no. And finally the discovery by Robert Ballard or the wreck, plans to make money from it, and what the sea is slowly erasing of the wreck.
A fascinating book that covered far more about nautical history, law, and what the sea can do and what draws people to the sea, and what lies below. A very well researched and well written account with many interesting and diverse characters. My favorite does have to be Doug Woolley who has spent the last 50 years claiming ownership of the Titanic, since no one really said no you can't. Woolley gives a person hope. The book is told in a very conversational style, not academic, and when a question arises about something, the answer is sure to appear in the next sentence. I book that I was sorry to see end.
I have read quite a few books on the Titanic, starting with Walter Lord's account of the sinking A Night to Remember, Clive Cussler's Raise the Titanic, even Arthur C. Clarke's The Ghost of the Grand Banks, the fiction books of course written before the wreck was found in pieces, thereby ruining the chances to return the Titanic to the surface and a fate of being a tourist trap. I enjoyed this book for the history, the science and I have to admit Doug Woolley. The man was a man not of greatness, but of great dreams. Why not claim the most famous shipwreck as his own. It might be worth a laugh, maybe a round at the pub. Maybe just maybe, it made his heart go on, and gave him something to live for.
According to UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization there are over 3 million shipwrecks sitting at the bottom of the sea, give or take. Few of these are known outside the world of nautical studies, warships and treasure ships being among the more familiar. The one known best to more people and probably with more movies and songs, sorry SS Edmund Fitzgerald, is the RMS Titanic. Plunging to the depths of the Atlantic more than 100 years ago the Titanic has trended at various points as plans were made to find the final resting spot, resurface the liner, or even rebuild. Men with money, spent quite a bit looking for it, and when found, plans were of course made to make even more money from the wreck. One man even claims the boat is his, which shows the obsession that many have for a ship that didn't even complete its maiden voyage. In Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic, looks at the famed ship in its afterlife, a siren song that continues to enchant, even as time, pressure and water erode away everything but the legend.
The book is not only about the Titanic but about the sea and how dangerous, even now, sailing across the ocean can be. Money is a factor, giant freighters, laden with cargo containers, packed high, on seas that even today with forecasting and satellites can still turn rogue in a minutes time. The book then discusses the Titanic, and how quickly plans were made to resurface the boat by an American with gumption, money and electromagnets. The author then discusses how wrecks are found, and exploited by both legal and illegal means, and what makes wrecks so worth finding and the profit to be made. However it is always Titanic we return to, the millionaire who wanted to find it and the fame he hoped to win. The British man, who claims ownership of the wreck, since no one really told him no. And finally the discovery by Robert Ballard or the wreck, plans to make money from it, and what the sea is slowly erasing of the wreck.
A fascinating book that covered far more about nautical history, law, and what the sea can do and what draws people to the sea, and what lies below. A very well researched and well written account with many interesting and diverse characters. My favorite does have to be Doug Woolley who has spent the last 50 years claiming ownership of the Titanic, since no one really said no you can't. Woolley gives a person hope. The book is told in a very conversational style, not academic, and when a question arises about something, the answer is sure to appear in the next sentence. I book that I was sorry to see end.
I have read quite a few books on the Titanic, starting with Walter Lord's account of the sinking A Night to Remember, Clive Cussler's Raise the Titanic, even Arthur C. Clarke's The Ghost of the Grand Banks, the fiction books of course written before the wreck was found in pieces, thereby ruining the chances to return the Titanic to the surface and a fate of being a tourist trap. I enjoyed this book for the history, the science and I have to admit Doug Woolley. The man was a man not of greatness, but of great dreams. Why not claim the most famous shipwreck as his own. It might be worth a laugh, maybe a round at the pub. Maybe just maybe, it made his heart go on, and gave him something to live for.
August 26, 2022
More a history of sunken boats including the Titanic--how the search and location for a shipwreck began and ended and what maritime laws and principles apply. Fans of maritime history or the Titanic itself will enjoy.
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