Eastland Steamer

Danielle Lacko

MEP-200-01

March 2, 2001

Topics of Discussion

Background What Happened Causes Results of Disaster

Background

Commissioned in 1903 Occurred July 24, 1915

at 7:30 AM Western Electric Picnic Occurred on the Chicago

River (downtown) It was docked

What Happened

6:40 passengers started boarding 6:41 ship began to list starboard 6:48 port ballast 2 and 3 were partially filled 6:53 ship lists to port- starboard ballast 2 was

partially filled 7:07 water was emptied from port ballast 3 7:10 no more passengers allowed on board 7:10-7:15 listing to port increased to 10-15 degrees

What Happened

7:16 tried to fill starboard ballast 2 and 3 7:18 ship righted itself 7:20 port list returned- water came on ship- stopped

the engines 7:23 list became worse 7:27 list reached angle of 25-30 degrees 7:28 list reached 45 degrees 7:30 capsized

What it looked like

Causes

Metacentric Height Ballast System Management/Human Error

Metacentric Height

WHAT IS IT???

Measure of stability of a ship in the water

Positive, negative, zero metacentric height

Positive Height

-The Ship’s Metacenter isabove the center of gravity -Righting arms are created-The ship rights itself

Negative Height

-Center of gravity isabove the metacenter-Negative righting arms-Ship capsizes

Zero Height

-Metacenter and centerof gravity at the same point-No righting arms-Stays at incline

Metacentric Height

Original design had a metacentric height of 18 inches

60ft of length taken away (lower metacentric height)

Another deck added (top-heavy) Thought it was for freight Addition of Ellis and Eaves Draft

System (speed) and McCreery System of Air-Conditioning (cooling)

Metacentric Height cont.

Sleeping compartments taken out Concrete added (15-20 tons) Addition of lifeboats due to sinking

of the Titanic (LaFollette’s Seaman’s Act)

There was an easy inclination test to measure and calculate the height- never done

Ballast System

WHAT IS IT???

Large tanks at the bottom of a ship Used to stabilize the ship by

emptying and filling tanks with water

Ballast System cont.

Eastland had twelve tanks Water was pulled into pipe Connected to a manifold Into desired tank The tanks were different sizes

Problems with the Ballast System

There were no gages- time was used

Same manifold used for water to leave ballast tanks

Water couldn’t be pumped from tanks on one side to the other

Slow process of opening and closing different tank valves

Errors During the Disaster

6:48 port ballast 2 and 3 filled- dangerous due to negative height Free surface effect Shifted list to port side

7:07 water emptied from port ballast 3 Didn’t empty port ballast 2 Still weight below center of gravity

7:16 starboard ballast 2 and 3 wouldn’t fill

Management/Human Error

New Chief Engineer in 1915, Joseph Erickson He was used to working on ships with a long

metacentric height No one discussed addition of lifeboats with him He was not told that the changes may have

cause the metacentric height to be negative with a heavy load

He didn’t know the capacity had been increased He didn’t know the ship should be handled

differently

Results 841 passengers died-

more passengers than died on Titanic (829)

22 families were wiped out

Worst disaster in terms of loss of life in history of Chicago

Morgue was set up in the Armory because there were so many dead that needed to be identified

What it looked like

Another View

Why people died

People were stuck in the lower decks

They were crushed or drowned

References American Red Cross. Eastland Disaster Relief. Chicago,

Illinois: American Red Cross, 1918. Bowen, Dana Thomas. Lore of the Lakes. Cleveland, Ohio:

Freshwater Press Inc., 1969. Davis, Lee. Man Made Catastrophes. New York, New York:

Facts on File Inc., 1993. “Engineer’s Report Blames Eastland Disaster on Poor Design,

Overloading and Mishandled Ballast.” Engineering Record 21 Aug. 1915: 221-222. Griggs, John. “Excursion to Death.” American Heritage Feb.

1965: 32-35. Hilton, George W. Eastland Legacy of the Titanic. Stanford,

California: Stanford University Press, 1995. “Probable/Possible Causes.” Eastland Disaster Historical

Society. Home Page. 1998-2001 < http://www.eastlanddisaster.org/causes.htm>.

References “The Eastland Disaster of 1915”

<http://www2.novagate.net/~bonevelle/eastland/background.html>

“The Capsizing of the ‘Eastland’.” Engineering News 29 July. 1915: 225-227.

“Chicago Historical Information.” Chicago Public Library. December 1996 <http://cpl.lib.uic.edu/004chicago/disasters/eastland_photos.html> 

“Photos.” Chicago Historical Society. 1998-2001 <http://www.eastlanddisaster.org/postcards.htm>