I wonder if the Titanic disaster has any lessons to teach us today. Let me ask some questions and make some observations and see what you think.

First, what would you imagine the computation would be to determine the number of life boats the Titanic should have before she set sail? Now, that might sound like a “no-brainer.” Your common sense would say there should be enough life boats to accommodate the passengers and crew. But that’s not how life boat capacity was calculated. Somebody in some regulatory office somewhere decided that any vessel more than 10,000 tons in weight should be OK if it had 16 life boats on board. Sixteen!

Now, the Titanic had, counting collapsibles, 20. So it exceeded the minimum number required. But there were 2,223 people on board and room for a maximum of 1,100 on those boats.

Now, I’m sure at the time there was a way to monkey with the numbers and make this sound like it was adding up. Whatever. We know now that there weren’t enough life boats and the shortfall could be figured out by an operation of grade school math.

Next question. If you were the Titanic’s captain and you were warned that there might be ice bergs on your route and you found yourself steaming along on a night where conditions would make it difficult to see ice bergs in your path, what would you do? Again, common sense would say — slow down! If there may be something dangerous ahead and you’re not sure you can see it, for Pete’s sake, ease off the gas a little bit.

Know how fast the Titanic was going when she glanced off that ice berg? She was traveling at her normal cruising speed. No doubt the folks at the controls had real good reasons for overlooking the warning signs. But, according to the British maritime inquiry, the loss of the Titanic was “due to a collision with an ice berg, brought about by the excessive speed at which the ship was being navigated.” In retrospect we have to ask, “What was the big darn hurry?”

OK, last question. If you were a passenger on the Titanic and got the word to “abandon ship,” what would you do? Again, common sense would say, at a minimum, you would ask questions, like exactly where are the life boats in case the crew is right about how much trouble you’re in. But, according to some accounts, many of the passengers heard the alarms, looked around, didn’t see any reason for concern and simply ignored the warnings. In fact, the first life boat off the ship had a capacity of 40 and only 12 people were aboard. No doubt some of the passengers and crew held back because they were bound to stand aside for women and children. Heroes often find themselves in this spot. They have to put their lives on the line because of someone else’s errors.

So, that brings us back to my question. Is there anything we can learn today from the Titanic disaster? How about this? We ought to be suspicious when people start monkeying with numbers. Our safety might be at stake. We have a right to expect things to add up.

Next, people at the controls have an obligation to slow down if they’re warned there might be unseen dangers in the waters ahead. And we, as passengers, have an obligation to take safety measures of our own if we hear alarms.

Here’s one more point — for what it’s worth. Some experts say the Titanic would have been better off taking that berg head on rather than try some tricky maneuver when it was already too late.

Well, April 15 (in addition to being tax day) is the 98th anniversary of the day the Titanic went down. If we can’t learn anything else from this tragedy, we can learn this: Nothing is unsinkable if the people in charge don’t use their heads.

Oh, by the way, April 18 is the 55th anniversary of Albert Einstein’s death. According to Einstein, “In a healthy nation there is a kind of dramatic balance between the will of the people and the government, which prevents its degeneration into tyranny.” I may not understand physics, but I get this.

I’m Hink and I’ll see ya.