JA606 member HenryKunt has spent over half a year on FM12 and 13

Elizabeth Shutes served as a family governess on board Titanic and was 40 years old at the time; she was among the passengers quickly ordered to the Sun Deck after the ship hit an iceberg.

Elizabeth Shutes served as a family governess on board Titanic and was 40 years old at the time; she was among the passengers quickly ordered to the Sun Deck after the ship hit an iceberg.

Collyer, a second-class passenger who was 31 years old, later described her panicked search for her husband: “There was scarcely anyone who had not been separated from husband, child or friend. Was the last one among the handful saved? … I had a husband to search for, a husband whom in the greatness of my faith, I had believed would be found in one of the boats. He was not there.”

Eva Hart was seven years old at the time of the Titanic disaster. A second-class passenger with her parents, Eva lost her father in the tragedy. She went on to live a vibrant life, and spoke frequently about the sinking of Titanic and her approach to life.http://www.ja606.co.uk/pages/smileys/

“People I meet always seem surprised that I do not hesitate to travel by train, car, airplane or ship when necessary. It is almost as if they expect me to be permanently quivering in my shoes at the thought of a journey. If I acted like that I would have died of fright many years ago—life has to be lived irrespective of the possible dangers and tragedies lurking round the corner.”

Jack watched the unthinkable befall what was supposed to be the unsinkable. All the more poignant was that his father, also called John Thayer, was among the 1,514 who perished in the seas in the early hours of April 15, 1912.

"We could see groups of the almost 1,500 people still aboard, clinging in clusters or bunches like swarming bees; only to fall in masses, pairs or singly, as the great after-part of the ship, 250 feet of it, rose into the sky, till it reached a 65 or 70-degree angle," he recalled.

That the 17-year-old boy even lived to tell the tale defied the odds. For while 710 people, mainly female passengers, of the 2,224 aboard survived, almost all of them had escaped in lifeboats launched before the ship went down. Only about 40 who were thrown or jumped into the sea were rescued - and Jack was among them.

"About one in every 36 who went down with the ship was saved, and I happened to be one," he noted.

He had said goodnight to his parents at about 11.45pm when he felt the ship sway slightly, veering to port "as though she had been gently pushed", before the engines suddenly stopped.

He and his father went upstairs to explore. The passengers remained calm, even when to their disbelief, one of the "unsinkable" ship's designers - with whom the Thayers had spent several evenings - told them he believed it would not survive an hour.

He and his father went upstairs to explore. The passengers remained calm, even when to their disbelief, one of the "unsinkable" ship's designers - with whom the Thayers had spent several evenings - told them he believed it would not survive an hour.

By 2.15am, the sinking liner was tilting sharply out of the water. "We were a mass of hopeless, dazed humanity, attempting, as the Almighty and Nature made us, to keep our final breath until the last possible moment," he noted of the mood.

The vessel then reared up and, amid a rumbling roar and muffled explosions, he decided to jump. "I was pushed out and then sucked down. The cold was terrific. The shock of the water took the breath out of my lungs.

"Down and down, I went, spinning in all directions. Swimming as hard as I could in the direction which I thought to be away from the ship, I finally came up with my lungs bursting, but not having taken any water."

Falling debris dragged him under water again and when he fought back to the surface, he came up against an overturned lifeboat. Too exhausted to haul himself, the men already clinging to it pulled him up.

To his shock, the other lifeboats, some of which had plenty of space, never returned to try and rescue those - very possibly including his father - calling for help in the water because of fears they too would be swamped.

"The most heartrending part of the whole tragedy was the failure, right after the Titanic sank, of those boats which were only partially loaded, to pick up the poor souls in the water. There they were, only four or five hundred yards away, listening to the cries, and still they did not come back. If they had turned back several hundred more would have been saved."

The Carpathia, a Cunard liner, had received wireless messages and was by now heading towards them. Thayer was on the last lifeboat to be rescued at about 7.30am, and at the top of the ladder, he saw his mother. Her joy was rapidly tempered. "Where's daddy?" she asked him "I don't know, mother," he replied.

FFS Knobby. Stop spamming FFS

at least the titanic stuff was entertaining

hope you die a horrible death

How can the people in the lifeboats ignore the cries when they were so close to them. despicable, they didnt deserve to be saved