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December 21, 2012
Q. “Women and children first,” ordered the captain in evacuating the sinking Titanic. Ultimately, 70 percent of the women and children were saved but only 20 percent of the men. Is such “chivalry at sea” typical of maritime disasters?
A. Actually, the Titanic was more the exception than the rule, according to the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. The expression “women and children first” was coined in connection with the 1852 shipwreck of the HMS Birkenhead and only became widely known after the 1912 sinking of the Titanic.
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