The Titanic Conspiracy: Secrets Beneath the Surface
Was the sinking of the Titanic truly an accident—or the result of something far more sinister? This episode plunges into the deep waters of history’s most famous maritime disaster, examining theories that challenge the official story. Could the doomed ship have actually been the Titanic’s sister vessel, the Olympic, swapped in an elaborate insurance fraud? Did powerful men on board meet their end to clear the way for the creation of the Federal Reserve? What about the eerie legend of a cursed Egyptian mummy supposedly on board? And what about the discovery of the Titanic wreck in 1985—an expedition that was actually a cover-up for a secret Cold War mission.
Takeaways:
- The RMS Titanic, often deemed unsinkable, faced catastrophic failure on a moonless night.
- A small oversight, namely the lack of binoculars, contributed to the ship's tragic fate.
- The sinking of the Titanic has led to various conspiracy theories surrounding its legitimacy.
- Some theories suggest that the ship that sank was actually the Olympic, disguised as Titanic.
- The alleged connection of the Titanic disaster to the creation of the Federal Reserve reveals historical intrigue.
- The Titanic's discovery in 1985 was, according to some, a cover for a secret military operation.
The Titanic Deception
Some of the legends discussed here feature in my book, the Titanic Deception.
What if the Titanic never struck an iceberg?
April 15, 1912—the "unsinkable" ship goes down. But was it truly an accident?
In the present, a senator survives an assassination attempt, thanks to a small-town doctor—who now knows too much. Enter Eden Black. What begins as a rescue mission spirals into a deadly conspiracy tied to a relic hidden in the Titanic’s wreck. From the British Museum to the ocean’s depths, Eden must uncover the truth before history’s greatest cover-up claims more lives.
A pulse-pounding thriller in the Amazon #1 Bestselling Eden Black series.
Read the Titanic Deception here
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When a priceless Picasso disappears in Paris, legendary thief Bernard Moreau is the prime suspect. But as two unlikely allies—Eden Black and Adriana Villa—hunt him down, the chase turns deadly. It’s a race through the shadowed streets of Paris, where every twist is as unpredictable as the city itself.
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Transcript
It's a moonless night in the North Atlantic.
Speaker A:The sea's unusually calm, like glass, survivors would later report.
Speaker A:The temperature drops below freezing.
Speaker A:But most of the passengers and crew aboard the RMS Titanic are warm in their cabins, unaware of what's about to happen.
Speaker A:In the first class dining room, the remnants of a 10 course dinner are being cleared away.
Speaker A:The string quartet has just finished playing Strout's Waltzes as the wealthy industrialists retire to the smoking room for brandy and cigars.
Speaker A:In the third class common area below decks, immigrants dreaming of American opportunity dance to lively folk tunes, their breath clouding in the cold air high above the ship, one of the lookouts squints into the darkness from his perch on the crow's nest.
Speaker A:The binoculars that should have been there are missing a small oversight that will soon prove catastrophic.
Speaker A:He's the first to see it, the towering mountain of ice rising six stories from the ocean.
Speaker A:Iceberg right ahead.
Speaker A:He shouts into the speaking tube.
Speaker A:He strikes the warning bell three times, but it's too late.
Speaker A:The largest and most luxurious ship ever built, the unsinkable pride of the White Star Line, is about to meet her fate.
Speaker A:The first officer orders a hard to starboard, desperately trying to avoid the collision.
Speaker A:For a moment, it seems the massive vessel might slip past the ice.
Speaker A:Then comes a sound that no passenger ever expected to hear.
Speaker A:Not a crash, but a strange scraping growl that runs along the starboard side.
Speaker A: am The: Speaker A:Could there be questions that have never been fully answered?
Speaker A:Or coincidences that just seem too perfect?
Speaker A:Was it truly an accident?
Speaker A:Or is there something more sinister going on here?
Speaker A:Hey, I'm Luke.
Speaker A:I'm an author of archaeological adventure novels.
Speaker A:I travel the world looking for stories to put into my books to share with you right here on the Adventure Story podcast.
Speaker A:With so many errors leading to the sinking of the most advanced ship of its day, it doesn't take a giant leap in logic to think that maybe, just maybe, what we're dealing with here is more than an accident.
Speaker A:I looked deep into this for my novel the Titanic Deception, and used a few of these theories as twists in my story.
Speaker A:There are several questions we need to ask, and the first and most compelling of them is whether the ship that sank was in fact the Titanic.
Speaker A:After all, it has been suggested that the sinking wasn't an accident and and that it was all an Elaborate insurance scam orchestrated by the White Star Line.
Speaker A:According to this theory, the ship that sank could have been the Titanic's slightly older sister ship, the Olympic, disguised as its now much more famous sibling.
Speaker A: The story begins in September: Speaker A:The impact severely damaged the Olympics hull, tearing a huge gash in her side and twisting the keel.
Speaker A:The repairs were not only expensive, but also threatened to delay the completion of her sister ship, the Titanic, as workers had to be diverted from one project to the other.
Speaker A:With the owners of both ships, the White Star Line, having invested the equivalent of $200 million in each of the ships, this could have been the end for their whole operation.
Speaker A:The solution, according to this theory, was ruthless.
Speaker A:To make the damaged Olympic look like the nearly completed Titanic and making sure all the rushed repairs were facing away from the port in Southampton, then orchestrate the sinking and collect the insurance money.
Speaker A:If the plan worked, the owners would end up with a payout and and still have the brand new ship that used to be called the Titanic, now the Olympic, ready for service.
Speaker A:Perhaps they'd intended a successful rescue operation to take place.
Speaker A:Or maybe they underestimated how long it would take for the stricken liner to surrender to the ocean.
Speaker A:Either way, the plan resulted in one of the worst maritime disasters of all time.
Speaker A:But let's think about it for a second.
Speaker A:Is this even possible?
Speaker A:The ships were nearly identical, built side by side in the Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast.
Speaker A:They shared the same basic design and their exteriors were virtually indistinguishable to the untrained eye.
Speaker A:All that needed to happen was the swapping of a few nameplates, changing some identifying details, repainting a couple of areas, and maybe, just maybe, no one would know.
Speaker A:The second question to ask who was on board and what might happen if they didn't get to New York safe and well.
Speaker A:Of all the theories surrounding the Titanic's sinking, perhaps the most intriguing is the alleged connection to the creation of the United States Federal Reserve System.
Speaker A:This theory suggests that the disaster was deliberately orchestrated to eliminate opponents of the Federal Reserve act, which would establish America's central banking system the following year.
Speaker A:At the centre of this theory are three of the era's wealthiest and most influential.
Speaker A:John Jacob Astor iv, America's richest man at the time.
Speaker A:Benjamin Guggenheim, the mining magnate, and Isidor Strauss, the co owner of Macy's department store.
Speaker A:All three of these men perished when the Titanic sank.
Speaker A:According to theorists, these men were powerful opponents of the Federal Reserve's creation, viewing it as an economic threat.
Speaker A:So if someone wanted the creation of the Federal Reserve to go ahead, then this was good news.
Speaker A:The theory gets even more intriguing when we consider J.P.
Speaker A:morgan's connection to the disaster.
Speaker A:Morgan, one of the most powerful bankers in history, was not only a driving force behind the Federal Reserve's creation, but also owned the parent company of the White Star Line and, and by extension, you guessed it, the Titanic herself.
Speaker A:And guess what?
Speaker A:Morgan had booked passage on the Titanic's maiden voyage, but cancelled at the last minute, claiming he was ill.
Speaker A:Could this just be a coincidence?
Speaker A:Or maybe something more?
Speaker A:Probably my favourite theory, though, and the wildest of the lot, is that the party responsible for for the sinking of the Titanic was an Egyptian mummy.
Speaker A:Okay, so I talked about this briefly during a recent episode on the cursed Egyptian Ghosts on the London Underground.
Speaker A:If you haven't heard it yet, make sure you do.
Speaker A:It's a good one.
Speaker A:But it's such a wild theory that I feel as though I can't help but circle back when I first came across this idea.
Speaker A:We were visiting Egypt a couple of years ago.
Speaker A:We took a guided tour to the Valley of the Kings just outside of Luxor, where the tour guide kept our interest for several hours, explaining how the tombs were built and the lives of the people inside.
Speaker A:Then he said, there's even a legend that a mummy from the British Museum was transported on the Titanic.
Speaker A:He went on to explain that by the early 20th century, people had started believing that mummies were able to bestow misfortune on those nearby.
Speaker A:Wanting to get rid of something so unlucky, the British Museum sold one of its collection to someone in New York and arranged passage across the ocean.
Speaker A:My mind was racing at this point and I saw a few of the scenes for my story, the Titanic Deception, right there in my mind's eye.
Speaker A:Later though, when I looked this up, it became pretty clear that the artifact that was supposed to get the blame for this never actually left the British Museum.
Speaker A:Hmm.
Speaker A:I do hate it when the truth gets in the way of a fun story.
Speaker A:That said, the Titanic was a big ship, so who's to know exactly what was in her many holds and various cabins?
Speaker A:The conspiracy theories surrounding the Titanic don't end with its sinking.
Speaker A: Even its discovery in: Speaker A:While the world celebrated Robert Ballard's historic finding of the wreck, the discovery was actually a real life cover for a classified Cold war operation.
Speaker A: In: Speaker A:The Navy was interested in understanding what happened to nuclear submarines when they deteriorate underwater, and they needed to do so without alerting the Soviets to their true intentions.
Speaker A:They gave Ballard advanced underwater surveillance equipment and funding with one condition.
Speaker A:He had to find and examine the submarines first.
Speaker A:Only then could he use the remaining time and resources to search for the Titanic.
Speaker A:Fortunately, he found the subs in time and managed to find the Titanic too.
Speaker A:There have since been suggestions that the submarine story itself is just another layer of COVID up, of course.
Speaker A:Could the real mission have involved recovering Soviet nuclear technology, searching for other classified materials, or even, dare I say it, the search for Atlantis?
Speaker A:Probably not.
Speaker A:But you do never know.
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