SS Californian: Captain Stanley Lord, Eight Rockets, and the Titanic

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Built by Caledon in Dundee and completed in 1902, the Leyland Line cotton carrier SS Californian was the largest ship yet built in the city, and moving her boilers crushed roads and burst water pipes. In April 1912 she carried no passengers when Captain Stanley Lord stopped her in an ice field at 10:20 p.m. on April 14. Wireless operator Cyril Evans warned nearby ships, and the Titanic's Jack Phillips, working Cape Race, replied keep out, standard shorthand for a busy channel. Evans shut down at 11:35 p.m. and went to bed, as there was then no rule for round the clock radio watch.

Third Officer Charles Groves saw a large ship stop, and between midnight and 2 a.m. Second Officer Herbert Stone and apprentice James Gibson watched eight white rockets. Lord, told by speaking tube, asked if they were company signals and ordered more Morse lamp signaling but never woke Evans. The US and British inquiries condemned him, and Leyland dismissed him. After Robert Ballard's 1985 discovery showed the Titanic sank 13 miles from her broadcast position, a 1992 reappraisal found the ships were beyond each other's horizon but the rockets were visible, and that the Californian could not have arrived before the sinking.

The Californian had 35 first class berths: 10 pounds to Boston, 50 back to Liverpool.
Her scrap log for the night was destroyed and the official log mentioned no rockets.
Crew members leaked the story to New England newspapers after she docked in Boston.
In November 1915 she was torpedoed by U-34 and later U-35 but stayed afloat on an even keel.
A French patrol boat finally scuttled her 34 hours after the first hit, in 10,000 feet of water.

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