Women and children first in the life boat these days?

Actually, I was laughing at the previous posters comments about lawyers, the ACLU, and the general PC attitude of today. Let's be clear about that!!!

Titanic was an entirely serious matter. As a longtime student, I have the utmost respect for those lost of Titanic. Like I said in my post to answer the original question, women and children first is not the standard on ships anymore. It is less complicated to allow families to remain together and board lifeboats at the same time. Ships these days carry far more boat capacity than the ship needs.

I am not trying to be the "history police", but Officer Lightoller was in charge of the port side lifeboats while First Officer William Murdoch was in charge of starboard boats. Lightoller indeed practiced "women and children only" while Mordoch allowed men into the boats because many people were unwilling to leave. Regarding your statement about more first class men survived than third class children, I can't remember my figures and don't have my books in front of me, but I think only 50 men from first class survived and I feel certain that more than fifty third class children survived.

It is a common misunderstanding that first class was given preference while third class was deliberately kept below. This has been falsely portrayed in movies as well many times. It makes for fine drama. However, the thing you must understand is that Titanic was a brand new ship and her crew were not trained in boat drills or what to do with passengers in an emergency. Most of the crew were not aware of the danger the ship was in. The barricades between each class section of the ship were locked at all times. People were not allowed to roam freely between class section. It was largely a health precaution as well. The crew was never ordered to open the gates because there was no evacuation plan other than lowering boats to gangways in third class and loading the boats from there. It seemed like the fastest way as opposed to moving the passengers through the maze of passages through the ship. First class was physically located closest to the boats. They could simply follow the Grand Staircase up to the Boat Deck. Second class had reasonable access as well. Third class had their open space on the forward decks and the poop deck because it was large enough space for the crowd. Third class was supposed to evacuate from their gangways. That plan failed miserably. So many people died based on an unwillingness to leave until most of the boats were already gone. There was room for another 475 or so people in the half filled boats. One gallant man from first class that was plucked from the icy water recounted that just after the last boat was launched, the Titanic seemed almost empty. The men and officers felt relieved that all of the women and children seemed to be safely away and they had done their duty. Then suddenly swarms of people started pouring up from below and they realized what horrors were ahead.

I hope I haven't "gone on" too much, but I hope I have shed some light on some very common myths about this horrible disaster. I am afraid that the worst factors in the death toll were based on passengers and crew not knowing what to do or where to go and a lack of a clear sense of the danger. After all, everyone know the Titanic cannot sink. ;-)