Speed Queen Tragedy

Early indications

• July 17, 1904: near catastrophe occurred with 3,000 passengers aboard. She began listing to port by about 12 to 15 degrees. The water ballast was adjusted to correct the list, but then a worse list to starboard occurred, estimated to reach 20 to 25 degrees. Water began coming through the aft starboard gangways, flooding the main deck with a foot and a half of water.
  • After relocating the passengers, whose concentration on the starboard side of the ship had likely contributed to the listing problem, and shifting the ballast again by adding water to the port tanks, the list was soon corrected. If the ship had capsized, she would have continued over until she rested keel up in the water. The loss of life would have been devastating.
  • This incident occurred in full view of South Haven and the public was alarmed. On July 26, 1904, a request was made to lower her capacity to 2,800 souls. Another incident occurred on Sunday, August 5, 1906 with 2,530 passengers on board, again caused by a concentration of passengers on one side of the ship. It is important to note that other than these few incidents, the ship’s safety record was consistently satisfactory.

• July 1, 1912: the Eastland had a severe listing of approximately 25 degrees while loading passengers in Cleveland. Although the list was corrected, passengers were very concerned and some did not return from Cedar Point on her and opted for the more conventional train.

1914: Final Warning A.A. Schantz

Schantz was the general manager of the Detroit and Cleveland Navigation Company. He is well known for his prophetic remarks during the La Follette Seaman’s Act testimony in which he petitioned against increasing lifeboat requirements for Great Lakes vessels. He stated that the additional weight requirements would cause many Great Lakes vessels to become top heavy and prone to capsizing. (eastlandmemorial.org).

Iatrogenic modifications

During the winter, the St. Joseph-Chicago Steamship Company decided to outfit the Eastland with six additional life rafts and 3 additional lifeboats in June 1915 while the ship was in for other repairs. Since the law was not yet in effect, the Eastland was granted a license to carry 2,500 passengers, even though the Seaman’s Act would have restricted the Eastland to about 1,200 passengers

Other than the lifesaving equipment, the modifications performed on the Eastland for the 1915 season also included the rearrangement of certain compartments for usability, and the replacement of decking with tons of concrete in the ‘tween deck dining room and the main deck near the aft gangways. This modification in particular reduced the metacentric height of the ship.

Its “top-heavy condition was now amplified and precarious at best when fully loaded.”

Disaster strikes

On Saturday, July 24, 1915, the passenger ship Eastland was docked in downtown Chicago on the Chicago River preparing to depart for a Lake Michigan cruise to Michigan City, Indiana for a Western Electric employee picnic. Soon after 2,500 passengers boarded the ship it began to list. First to starboard, then to port while still moored to the wharf. The Eastland rolled onto its side, spilling passengers into the river and trapping others underwater in the interior cabins, mostly women and children. The disaster claimed 844+ lives. This tragedy remains relatively obscure in American history, even though it resulted in the largest death toll of any single disaster occurring in the continental United States in the twentieth century.

At 6:30 a.m., preparations began for loading. The river was fairly calm. There was no wind and the skies were partly cloudy. By this time, 5,000 people had already arrived and were waiting to board, so when the gangplanks were lowered, people rushed onboard so that they would not be denied the chance to ride the Eastland. The majority of those preparing to board the ships were actual employees of Western Electric. Because the company picnic was an important social event, a great many of the employees in attendance were young, single adults in their late teens or early 20’s.

At 6:40, passengers began boarding the ship. At 6:41 a.m. the ship began to list to starboard (towards the wharf), but this was not unusual due to a large concentration of boarding passengers who had not yet dispersed throughout the ship and were lingering on the starboard side. But, as the list hindered the continuation of loading slightly, the Eastland’s Chief Engineer, Joseph Erickson, ordered the port ballast tanks to be filled enough to help steady the ship. By 6:51, the ship evened out.

At 6:53, the ship began to list again, this time to port. When the list reached 10 degrees, Erickson ordered the starboard ballast tanks to be partially filled. The list was straightened temporarily, but, as passengers were loading at an approximate rate of 50 per minute, the passenger count had reached capacity by 7:10. At this time, the ship began to again list to port. The port ballast tanks were emptied, but the port list increased to approximately 15 degrees by 7:16. Within the next few minutes, the ship straightened again, but the port list resumed at 7:20, at which time water began coming into the ship through the gangway openings on the port side. Even so, no great panic occurred among the passengers. In fact, some began to make fun of the manner in which the ship was swaying and leaning.

While this was occurring, the gangplank was closed and most passengers on the ship migrated to the port side where they had a view of the happenings on the river rather than a view of the wharf. By 7:23, the list had become so severe that the crew directed passengers, many of whom were on the ship’s upper decks, to move to the starboard side. However, by 7:27, the list had reached an angle of 25 to 30 degrees. More water began to flow into the ship from openings in the port side, as chairs, picnic baskets, bottles, and all sorts of items began to slide across the decks.

At 7:28, the list had reached 45 degrees. At this point, many of the crew began to realize the seriousness of the situation. Many more passengers were now on the port side of the ship, securing bench seating for their families and settling in for the trip. The furnishings, piano, dishes, iceboxes, lemonade stand and appliances fell over with loud crashes and slid across the decks. The passengers began to panic. Many began to crawl out of gangways or other openings on the starboard side as the Eastland gently continued to list to port until it finally settled on its port side at 7:30.

Some passengers who had pulled themselves to safety were fortunate to find themselves standing on the starboard hull of the Eastland. Others who were not so lucky were trying to stay afloat in the currents of the river. Others were trapped within or under the Eastland. One eyewitness described the scene:

“I shall never be able to forget what I saw. People were struggling in the water, clustered so thickly that they literally covered the surface of the river. A few were swimming; the rest were floundering about, some clinging to a life raft that had floated free, others clutching at anything that they could reach–at bits of wood, at each other, grabbing each other, pulling each other down, and screaming! The screaming was the most horrible of all.”

THE RESCUE
Other boats in the area and people nearby began helping with rescue operations immediately. Some onlookers dove into the river or jumped onto the boat to help those who were struggling while others threw wooden planks and crates into the water to help people stay afloat. The crews of other ships were pulling people out of the water, dead and alive. By 8 a.m., all survivors had been pulled out of the river. Ashes from the fireboxes of nearby tugboats were spread over the starboard hull of the Eastland so rescue workers would not slip on the wet and slick surface as they carried the dead and injured from the side of the Eastland. Workers used cutting torches to cut holes in the side of the hull to pull out survivors as well as dead. The screams coming from those inside the ship were disturbing the onlookers. By the time the holes were cut in the hull, many who had been alive at the time the ship rolled had since drowned. A great effort was expended to remove the dead from inside the ship as divers had to go underwater within the hull to retrieve bodies.

 

The total dead rose to 844 men, women and children. Eight hundred and forty one were passengers, two were from the Eastland’s crew, and one was a crew member of the Petoskey who died in the rescue effort. Although the Titanic, which sank over three years prior in 1912, had a higher total death toll of 1,523, the Titanic actually had a lower death toll of passengers than the Eastland as crew deaths of the Titanic totaled 694.

Anecdote

Rumors of past instability still followed the Eastland. As a result, The Eastland Navigation Company placed a half-page newspaper advertisement in the Cleveland Plain Dealer and the Cleveland Leader on August 9, 1910. The ad read, in part: “. . .there are thousands of people who know absolutely nothing about boats, the rules and regulations for their running, and inspection and licensing of the same by the U. S. Government. In the hope of influencing this class of people there have been but into circulations stories to the effect that the Steamer Eastland is not safe.” The ad also offered a five thousand dollar reward to anyone who could “bring forth a naval engineer, a marine architect, a shipbuilder, or any one qualified to pass on the merits of a ship who will say that the Steamer Eastland is not a seaworthy ship, or that she would not ride out any storm or weather any condition that can arise on either lake or ocean.” There is no record showing that anyone ever came forward to claim the reward.

References

The Eastland. Eastland Memorial Society. https://web.archive.org/web/20090122125939/http://www.eastlandmemorial.org/eastland2.shtml