I missed that. Could you link to it?
Post #51 - but when responding to me in future don't remove my name from the quote or I won't get notification you responded and may not see it. Just an FYI.
I guess I'd have to go there and check it out myself. I'm not in a position to be able to do that now though. It may turn out that it shows the propeller from the Titanic was never put on the Olympic and it may show that it was.
It's also possible that the record was falsified shortly after the scam. The ink could be tested and it's date could probably be determined within a few years but not enough to rule out falsification. I don't see how looking at those records would be one hundred percent conclusive.
All of the records are there and many writers, researchers, historians and hobbyists have poured through them over the years. The only folks who don't bother seem to be the ones pushing the CT's. But all of this rather misses the point.
It seems to me that if White Star wanted to lose money in an insurance scam with the RMS Olympic they would have just used the RMS Olympic as the RMS Olympic. She had after all sailed to New York just days ahead of Titanic and was only about 500 miles away from Titanic on the return trip at the time of the sinking. Only someone engaging in pathological speculation trying to retrofit the evidence to fit a crackpot theory would come up with this silly switch plan.
Real people making real decisions in the real world would have dismissed such a proposal as crazy and unworkable from the outset (much like say,... planting malicious demolition devices in the World Trade Center prior to crashing airplanes into it).
The whole boats were switched fallacy is based on working the problem backwards using mislabeled photo's, misunderstood artifacts, a botched understanding of the timeline and a highly dubious and exceedingly implausible motive. Like all CT's this one is based on taking a few individual anomalies out of context, claiming that proves some vast plot that you cooked up then challenging others to prove you wrong rather than making a comprehensive case that can stand on its own based on everything we know.
Try working the problem from front to back for a change.
Lets say you are White Star president Bruce Ismay and you have decided (against all evidence) that Olympic is no longer economically viable because she suffered some moderate damage in a collision with a Royal Navy cruiser (which was successfully repaired). Even though we have zero evidence this is the case we will run with that for now.
Do you:
1. File an claim with your insurers, declaring the ship a constructive total loss due to the known damage, collect your claim and then sell the ship for scrap to make up the loss since the ship is under-insured.
2. Rig the ship to suffer a catastrophic accident, preferably in port or in dockyard where she will sink and/or catch fire, ideally with as few people aboard as possible to reduce collateral damage and litigation opportunities.
3. Concoct an elaborate plan where you switch the ship with the Titanic that of necessity has to include:
A. Weeks of expensive yard time for both vessels to make the alterations necessary for each to look like the other
B. Paying off the thousands of workers in the yard to not say anything as well as ships company
C. Pay off anyone in Belfast with a camera not to take pictures of the process.
D. Pay off anyone in Belfast who might have noticed that the two ships switched berths overnight while no one was looking.
Then drive the clandestinely re-named Olympic into an iceberg field in the middle of the night hoping it will hit one AND hoping the ship (considered unsinkable remember) will sink from it - all with thousands of potential litigants on board. And oh yeah, you, Bruce Ismay book passage on the ship knowing it is going to sink and knowing there are insufficient lifeboats for everyone aboard. All this of course while the Olympic,...er, excuse me, the "real Titanic" is just a few hundred miles away crossing the Atlantic in the other direction.
IF you picked #3 I hope you have a good justification.
I mean, if you want to get rid of Olympic for insurance money, why not just get rid of Olympic for insurance money? Why the massively convoluted, complex, ridiculously expensive, very high risk and massively implausible switch plan? Of the above options is that
really the one you would do if it was
you making the calls?
