Ship Carrying Picnicking Employees Capsizes, 844 Perish
Jakarta, CNBC Indonesia – What should have been a joyful outing turned to grief within minutes. Thousands of employees and their families who were set to enjoy a holiday together instead became victims of one of the deadliest maritime disasters in United States history.
A total of 844 people died after the SS Eastland capsised while still moored at its dock on 24 July 1915, exactly 111 years ago today.
That morning, rain poured over Chicago. Even so, enthusiasm did not wane. Thousands of Western Electric Company employees and their families had gathered since dawn for the company’s annual picnic. They were scheduled to sail across Lake Michigan towards Michigan City, Indiana, a distance of 92 km.
The thousands of passengers were to be carried by five chartered vessels, one of which was the SS Eastland, already renowned as the fastest passenger vessel on the American Great Lakes. Yet one thing people failed to realise was that the Eastland harboured a serious, long-standing problem.
Citing Britannica, the ship had poor stability and had nearly capsised several times on earlier voyages. It was from here that the catastrophe began.
At around 06.30 local time, passengers began boarding. Shortly afterwards, at 06.41, the Eastland began listing to starboard. The crew attempted to correct this by taking water into ballast tanks to restore balance.
The effort briefly succeeded. The ship righted itself, but only momentarily. The Eastland listed again, this time to port. Despite this, boarding continued until the vessel carried 2,500 people.
Once at maximum capacity, the ship rocked several times from side to side before suddenly losing balance by more than 25 degrees. Water began pouring in through windows and doors that were now below the river’s surface.
As a result, in less than an hour since the first passenger boarded, the ship rolled over completely onto its port side. The speed of the event left many passengers with no time to save themselves.
“As the boat listed, the people on the upper deck were thrown off like ants swept from a table,” wrote Chicago Herald reporter Harlan Babcock, quoted by the History website.
Some were trapped inside cabins, while others were crushed by furniture and the ship’s structure. Many victims drowned in the river, which in reality was not far from the dock’s edge. It was for this reason that the death toll was so high. In total, 844 people died, 70% of them young people under the age of 25.
In the subsequent investigation, a federal court revealed that the tragedy was triggered by a combination of factors, chief among them modifications to the SS Eastland that made the vessel increasingly top-heavy. Before the disaster, the ship had been fitted with additional lifeboats and rafts to comply with new regulations requiring every vessel to carry lifeboats for all passengers.
Ironically, the addition of this safety equipment increased the weight at the top of the ship, exacerbating the stability problems the SS Eastland had possessed from the start. The situation was worsened by the large numbers of passengers boarding simultaneously that morning. To this day, the sinking of the SS Eastland is remembered as one of the deadliest maritime disasters in US history.