Fateful Oversight: Missing Key Could Have Prevented Titanic Disaster
Titanic's final journey on April 14, 1912, has remained memorable in history as a grand ship that lost battle against an iceberg, the Mirror reported. Yet, one man could have possibly stopped this disaster from taking place and saved many lives on that fateful day.
Second Officer David Blair was set to be part of Titanic's crew, but was removed at the last minute. Tragically, he took with him the key of the locker that contained the ship's binoculars, Mirror reported. As per an official investigation conducted by White Star Line authorities, the binoculars could have prevented the disaster.
The crew reportedly saw the iceberg on their path but it was too late for them to turn the ship around. If officials on the ship had binoculars, then the iceberg could have been noticed earlier, and the disaster might have been prevented, Mirror reported.
Blair was replaced by senior officer, Henry Wilde, from the sister ship RMS Olympic, primarily because of the latter's experience with big liners.
The change was last minute, and reportedly disappointed Blair, which he shared in a postcard to his relative.
In the card, Blair wrote, "Am afraid I shall have to step out to make room for the chief officer of the Olympic. This is a magnificent ship, I feel very disappointed I am not to make her first voyage," the Mirror reported. Wilde perished along with the ship.
Blair kept the locker key with him for a long time, the Mirror reported. He passed on the key to his daughter Nancy, who ultimately donated it to the British and International Seamans Society in the 1980s.
In 1995, Blair took his last breath, the Mirror reported. In 2007, the key was auctioned and bought by a Chinese jeweler for £90,000 ($117671.85 at today's rate).
Blair was a decorated navy man and had been awarded medals for his rescue efforts in another ship, the Mirror reported. He had been given the King’s Gallantry medal for jumping into the Atlantic to rescue a crewman.
Murray Shaw, 78, a retired Derby teacher bought a set of nine medals awarded to Blair, from a dealer, seven years ago. Shaw put Blair's OBE for war service and sea gallantry medal, which the teacher acquired all that time ago, up for sale at Derbyshire's Hansons Auctioneers, in 2018.
"If the key was worth £90,000, I feel this rare set of medals belonging to Titanic crew member David Blair, the man who forgot the key, should be worth just as much," Shaw shared, the Mirror reported.
Adrian Stevenson, an expert at Hansons, finds it captivating that a man's mistake of not turning in the key, might have caused this drowning, the Mirror reported. "It is a fascinating story. It is astonishing to think that Mr Blair may have unwittingly caused the Titanic to sink by simply forgetting to hand in a key," he said.
Stevenson does believe that the whole incident happened because of the rush of the last-minute replacement and was not at all intentional. He cited the medals, Blair received for his rescue efforts, as a testament to his respectable nature.
"His medals show he was a man of honor who put others before himself, but the haste of the last-minute change of plan meant the key was forgotten and the binoculars could not be accessed," Stevenson shared.