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Tarfumes.com - Titanic's Last Secrets
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List Price: $20.99
Our Price: $9.99
Your Save: $ 11.00 ( 52% )
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
Manufacturer: Twelve
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Average Customer Rating:  
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Binding: Kindle Edition
Dewey Decimal Number: 910.91634
Format: Kindle Book
Label: Twelve
Manufacturer: Twelve
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 336
Publication Date: 2008-10-01
Publisher: Twelve
Release Date: 2008-10-01
Studio: Twelve
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Editorial Reviews:
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After rewriting history with their discovery of a Nazi U-boat off the coast of New Jersey, legendary divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler decided to investigate the great enduring mystery of history's most notorious shipwreck: Why did Titanic sink as quickly as it did? To answer the question, Chatterton and Kohler assemble a team of experts to explore Titanic, study its engineering, and dive to the wreck of its sister ship, Brittanic, where Titanic's last secrets may be revealed. Titanic's Last Secrets is a rollercoaster ride through the shipbuilding history, the transatlantic luxury liner business, and shipwreck forensics. Chatterton and Kohler weave their way through a labyrinth of clues to discover that Titanic was not the strong, heroic ship the world thought she was and that the men who built her covered up her flaws when disaster struck. If Titanic had remained afloat for just two hours longer than she did, more than a thousand people would have lived instead of died, and the myth of the great ship would be one of rescue instead of tragedy. Titanic's Last Secrets is the never-before-told story of the Ship of Dreams, a contemporary adventure that solves a historical mystery.
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Spotlight customer reviews:
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Customer Rating:
Summary: Mystery solved once and for all!!!
Comment: Being a big fan of the History Channel's "Deep Sea Detectives" series, I was already quite familiar with the work of divers John Chatterton and Richie Kohler. The weekly television series, which aired from 2003-2006, offered viewers a brief synopsis of the circumstances surrounding the sinking of a particular vessel and chronicled Chatterton and Kohler's painstaking efforts to resolve various questions surrounding that incident. For nearly a century now, people across America and around the world have been fascinated by the sinking of the luxury liner Titanic off the coast of Newfoundland in April of 1912. In 2005, an extraordinary team of 17 individuals, including Chatterton and Kohler,was assembled with the expressed purpose of determining once and for all the answer to this question: Why did Titanic sink as quickly as it did? For everyone involved, determining the answer to this simple question would be the biggest challenge of their professional lives. Utilizing Russia's unique MIR-2 submersible vehicle the team was able to accomplish miraculous things with very severe time contraints. What they discovered on the ocean floor astonished them and will likely jolt you as well. But what the divers, scientists and engineers strongly suspected could not be proven without one more perilous dive. Forget everything you thought you knew about why this tragedy took place. Brad Matsen has chronicled it all in "Titanic's Last Secrets". This is a riveting book that will hold your attention from cover-to-cover. Guaranteed!
While Matsen certainly does a workmanlike job of chronicling the exploration of the wreck of the Titanic in 2005 and the subsequent dive to its sister ship "Britannic" about a year later, "Titanic's Last Secrets" is about so much more. Through painstaking research, Matsen has been able to piece together the facts about how this ship was constructed. You will be introduced to some of the men who actually designed Titanic including Thomas Andrews who tragically lost his life on Titanic that night and to Bruce Ismay who at the time of the tragedy was CEO of the White Star Lines, the company that owned the doomed vessel. Mr. Ismay was also on board but managed to survive by jumping into one of the 16 available lifeboats. You will also discover quite a bit about Harland and Wolff, the shipyard where Titanic was built and become privy to some of the decisions that were made regarding the materials used in the construction of this ship. Therein lies a clue to what happened that night. Now as is so often the case in situations like this a person turns up seemingly out of nowhere with irrefutable evidence that confirms without a shadow of a doubt the facts of what really took place on that frigid April night so many moons ago. Brad Matsen will tell you all about Tom McCluskie and just what it was that he brought to the table. The sad reality is that had Titanic remained afloat for just two hours longer than she did as many as two thousand more people may have been saved.
I found "Titanic's Last Secrets" to be among the best written and most enjoyable books I have read this year. This is a story of courage and tenacity on the part of those so determined to discover the truth about this tragedy. Much like the assassination of JFK, the mystery surrounding Titanic seems to hold almost an universal appeal to audiences of all ages. As such, I think "Titanic's Last Secrets" would be a terrific gift idea. Highly recommended!
Customer Rating:
Summary: Excellent Investigation Into the Titanic, it's investigation and Sinking
Comment: It's amazing that nearly 100 years after the sinking of the Titanic we are still talking about its sinking and the what and where and why it matters. Chatterton and Kohler do a wonderful job of proposing a new theory and one that wasn't explored yet, but somehow manages to explain why the Titanic went down so quickly. The poor design and choice of low grade steel all conspired to make the Titanic one of the worst disasters in seafaring history.
I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys this topic and would like to learn more about it.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Titanic's Last Secrets
Comment: Brad Matsen's book, "Titanic's Last Secrets" is one of the most engrossing versions of that disaster that has been written since Walter Lord's seminal work in 1955: "A Night to Remember." The startling new information about why Titanic sank so quickly after striking an iceberg on the night of April 14-15, 1911 is almost overshadowed by Matsen's masterful narrative of the final hours of both the ship and its 1,490 victims.
Like many others, as a young man I became fascinated by the Titanic story after reading "A Night to Remember." The wild coincidences, the occult-like confluence of events that were necessary for the disaster to occur fired my imagination as they have others for generations. The question of why this collision at sea resulted in so monumental a tragedy has never been fully answered. Basically, Matsen's book examines the theory that grievous mistakes were made in the design and cost-cutting measures of both Titanic and her sister, Olympic by Harland and Wolff's chief marine architect, Thomas Andrews and White Star's J. Bruce Ismay; mistakes which made the disaster inevitable, with or without an iceberg. Because of these mistakes, Titanic split apart at an angle of only about 11 degrees rather than the dramatic 45 degree angle depicted in James Cameron's motion picture and in most of the paintings and drawings of her "final plunge." Consequently, according to Matsen's book, the ship's death was far more sudden and unexpected than has been previously believed.
"Titanic's Last Secrets" frankly starts rather slow, with an initial section introducing a crew of divers who would go down and inspect Titanic's hull to see if the theory might be true. The dialogue between the principal divers, John Chatterton and Richie Kohler, tends to be trite and often pointless. Chatterton comes across as a prima donna who loses his temper when he doesn't get his way and must be appeased by Kohler. Their dives in Russian submersibles to inspect Titanic's hull are interesting but nothing to win a Pulitzer with.
Then, with the beginning of section II, "Dreams," the reader is treated to one of the finest and most gripping accounts ever written of Titanic's conception and tragic life.
Almost all books about the sinking follow Lord's work: a chronological account of Titanic's voyage, the sinking, interviews with survivors and the aftermath. Fortunately, Matsen assumes that the readers of his book are already familiar with the basic details. Zooming off in an original direction, he uses the much-reviled president of White Star Lines, J.Bruce Ismay, as his eyes in the ship in addition to the doomed Captain Smith and Andrews. The result is an entirely new perspective on the disaster.
"Titanic's Last Secrets" is full of technical details but doesn't leave out the human element. In fact, it is Matsen's fresh approach to this oft-told story that brings to life the tragedy in all of its original vividness.
This is not a book that is limited only to those whom Matsen terms "Titaniacs;" the fanatics who, like their counterparts whose hobby is the Kennedy assassination, seem much more interested in looking at the trees than the forest. Rather, this also is a book for people who have read Lord's "A Night to Remember," Robert Ballard's works or "National Geographic Magazine," or who have seen James Cameron's motion picture and consequently, who have been as profoundly moved by this tragedy as were many of those who stood waiting in vain for the great ship on New York City's docks almost 100 years ago.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Good Read
Comment: The story of the Titanic always fascinated me ever since I read a "Night To Remember" when I was young and from time to time pick up a book on the subject or catch a show on Discovery. I really enjoyed "Shadow Divers" so I picked this one up.
It is not quite as good as Shadow Divers, which was very compelling, but still a very good read about how Chatterton and Kohler went about to find more information about the Titianic sinking and what could have actually happened based on what they found.
As a someone who has am interest in Titanic, I enjoyed the book and the ideas it presented.
Customer Rating:
Summary: More personal journey than details of wreck
Comment:
I was really anticipating reading a good update on what happened to Titanic. Unfortunately, a lot of this book is relegated to the authors journey and struggles in trying to get to the shipwreck. There are a few good chapters, but a complete dearth of illustrations or pictures to help document the issues raised. A decent hypothesis, but I was left wanting more objective information, rather than conjecture.
disappointing.
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