Much can be learned about the voyages of a ship from its captain’s log—navigation, operation, safety, compliance, decisions made and followed—especially during critical events, whether sailing in calm or turbulent waters. Although the captain’s log of the Titanic was never recovered, a reconstruction of the hours before it sank reveals a series of decisions and circumstances that “sealed its fate.” Inter alia, it was “a tragic chain of errors on the part of the well-meaning crew, the pernicious influence of the ship’s haughty owner, who was aboard for the maiden trip, and a fatal overconfidence in the infallibility of early twentieth-century technology,” misreading the environment, and ignoring the warning signals that led to sinking of the Titanic.