The Lessons of the General Slocum Disaster, 116 Years Ago
We should talk about swimming, and learning to do it. Given the big river cruise ship disaster here in China a couple years ago, and the Sewol Ferry capsizing in Korea before that, it’s clear that we all need to be able to swim.
Wait — Everyone can swim, right?
No, not really, and certainly not in China, where swimming remains relatively rare, even among young 21st-century professionals here in Shanghai.
In 2014 when Korean Sewol Ferry capsized, and after I saw it was also the 110th anniversary of the General Slocum Disaster, I wrote the message below to our employees urging them to learn to swim (it’s been updated a bit):
Team,
Many of you cannot swim. If you’ve discussed this with me, you know I greatly encourage you to learn to swim, for health, for fun and for your safety, and some of you are taking lessons. In many countries you can’t even graduate college without swimming because they know important this is.
We only have to look to the recent Korean ferry disaster to see how important swimming is. But I want to relay the story of a much bigger catastrophe, that happened on a fine summer day 111 years ago in New York City — the General Slocum Disaster.
Unless you study ship sinkings, you’ve probably never heard of the General Slocum, but it’s famous in maritime safety circles. Built in 1891, it was a side paddle steamer that ran the rivers in New York. It had many problems and bad management that certainly contributed to the disaster.
At that time New York had a very large German community of immigrants (New York was the 3rd largest German-speaking city in the world). Most Germans went to church and the big Lutheran church wanted to have hold their 17th annual summer picnic/party on Long Island, up the East River.
In June, 1904, they rented a big boat to take over 1,400 people to the island and party. The ship was the General Slocum. That’s its picture above, and at the link below.
On the river, the ship caught fire. It was a big wooden ship, so the fire spread quickly, and it was windy. The captain made some mistakes and many things were broken, such as fire hoses and life preservers.
But land was only 500 meters away, on both sides of a busy river, much like the Huangpu River here in Shanghai, or the Thames in London.
The people only had to jump off the boat and get to land —it was just 500 meters away!
But no one could swim. Almost all died. Over 1,000 people. Because they couldn’t swim.
Over 1,000 people died because they couldn’t swim …
Can you imagine 1,000 people dying in Shanghai in the Huangpu River? Or in the Seine in Paris or the Thames in London?
That’s what happened, in New York City, 113 years ago.
Don’t let that be you. Learn to swim.
See the Wikipedia Article
This article was originally published on LinkedIn.