I'm not a sailor by any means, but from all I have seen/read (mainly Hollywood I am afraid), it seems that his biggest booboo, as far as the Titanic goes, was failing to SLOW DOWN when entering a known area of iceburgs. Wanting some type of speed record was his undoing, and of course all of the passengers and crew. Seems like poor judgement to me...

This still happens. Shipping schedules are very tight, every hour not moving cargo is wasted. Combine that with traditional captain-crew dynamics and the vagaries of navigation on the sea and you get lots of accidents, for a scary look:

http://www.cargolaw.com

Also, as mentioned in Gonzales' Deep Survival book, Normal Accidents by Perrow is a good read about how complex systems, such as ships, nuclear plants and the space shuttle are prone to catastrophic accidents just because they are tightly coupled, dynamic systems. There are lots of examples where ships steered INTO each other.

Did bow thrusters or anything similar exist then?

Or am I missing the point again.

So we measure his screw ups in the hundreds of thousands of dollars rather than billions? Judging by the context of his time, his track record was menace and certainly not the one I'd want for the captain of my new flagship on her maiden voyage.

Put generously, he was a klutz. I don't want a klutz operating on me, either.

Here's some factors to know...

Captain Smith operated the latest technology and still had a much higher accident rate than those others who were safely navigating in the same waters and under the same conditions.

He was valued by White Star Line because of his abiity to schmooze with the 1st class passengers, not for his attention to details or his leadership abilities.

Bow Thrusters are a fairly new invention and are completely useless when moving forward at 3 MPH or faster, with the exception of the Trolling Motor design on the Fast Frigates (Oliver Hazard Perry class). US Navy crews refer to this system as "Impulse Power". US Coast Guard crews on Icebreaking Tugs (Katmai Bay class) also refer to their Hull-Air Lubrication Systems, in open water, as "Impulse Power". That's another story.

Aids to Navigation (AtoN) systems still fail, get towed off station by vessels that hit them, and are sunk when run over. No Deck Officer ever completely trusts a floating AtoN.

Celestial Navigation is not that difficult, especially when one does it 4 - 6 times a day. Yes, south of Cuba, we used it regularly until GPS became a fact of life around 1984-5. This was due to having only 1 good Loran-C line (30,000/Raymondville, Tx) south of Cuba.

I started sailing around 1973 as a fisherman, over 10 years on Icebreaking Tugs, Buoy Tenders, Corvettes, and Patrol Boats. I have been in towboats since Dec 1999. I have sailed the North Atlantic, Gulf of Mexico, Carribbean Sea, The Mediterranean Sea,and the Black Sea, the Intra-Coastal Waterway, the Great Lakes, and the Western Rivers. My duties have NEVER been uneventful and probably are worth writing about (if I could remember everything).

I bow to your superior experience. My own experience is limited to small craft (sail and power) on the Great Lakes, South Jersey Shore, and Florida (Atlantic Coast). I've taken sun sights from the decks of sailboats and have never found it easy, and quite frankly heaved a huge sigh of relief when GPS units became truly affordable. I still have my reservations about your position that Smith really had it no tougher than modern captains do, but you've certainly got the sea time on your side.

I did once represent (yes, I'm a lawyer) a boat owner who put his boat on a low harbor breakwall in the middle of a dark and rainy night, and lost two of his passengers, including his best friend of 20+ years. We were able to show that the harbor entrance lights were not functioning as indicated on the latest charts. Wind and currents were unusually strong and this was before GPS was widely available. He was found guilty of negligent homicide, which I always felt was harsh. Maybe my view of Smith is affected by that experience.

My impression was that he felt that Smith had it as good as everyone else OF THAT ERA, and was not comparing him to modern captains...

The problem there consists of being judged by people who weren't in that situation. Which is what I am doing here, but I'm not sending anyone to prison over it. When someone has a consistent track record of accidental incidents, it is not an accident. Everyone who sails will find themslves in predicaments from time to time, it's how they handle those incidents that separates them from being an incident or a non-incident.

We responded to a distress call in Escambia Bay 1 night after we had anchored due to zero visibility (fog). We covered 32 miles of inland waters in 3 hours with a 100ft Buoy Tender (USCGC RAMBLER), passing through bridges and chokepoints with Radar and Lookouts. We arrived at the Boeing 727 crash site without incident and went to work. If we had hit a bridge, we would have been screwed (Capt would have gone to Courts Martial) for obeying orders. We made it by following the Rules of the Road & by the Grace of God, so nothing was said.

Sometimes errors can not be seen soon enough or corrected fast enough to avoid disaster, but that doesn't happen at a somewhat steady rate as in the case of Capt. Smith.

My point of this post is that proper planning, monitoring & constant situational awareness is required @ all times, in all endeavors. A little humility can keep one from converting minor errors into a disaster. Don't be too proud to say this was a mistake and to take action to correct the situation. Like reducing speed when transiting through an area that is known to have icebergs.

I apologize if I'm coming off as condescending or another so-called "expert", for I'm one who sees a photo of a shipwreck and thinks-"there but for the grace of God, go I". None of us are perfect.

If you don't mind my asking, what is the source for this information? The reason I ask is that your post hints that Smith was at fault in all of these incidents but upon closer inspection it doesn't actually say that. I would like to know the full details of each before passing judgement. For example, the times when he ran his ship aground, was he forced to do so to avoid a collision? When his ship did collide with another how do we know that one or more of the other captains were not at fault? Were any of these incidents the result of mechanical failure? If I remember right, never before had there been any ships that even approached the size of Olympic and Titanic. There was bound to be some sort of learning curve with vessels that big, at least when trying to maneuver around a tight harbor. In that respect Smith was a guinea pig of sorts.

Of course none of this detracts from your main point: complacency kills. And by 1912 it definately appears that Smith had lost his edge.

I had no idea he had such a history of poor seamanship. How did he ever keep his job with the White Star Line? He must have known someone or married into the right family.