Changes in safety practices after the sinking of the RMS Titanic Changes in safety practices after the sinking of the RMS Titanic The sinking of the RMS "Titanic" resulted in the following changes in maritime policy. Alexander Carlisle, Harland and Wolff's general manager and chairman of the managing directors, suggested that "Titanic" use a new, larger type of davit which could give the ship the potential to carry 48 lifeboats; this would have provided enough seats for everyone on board. However, the White Star Line decreed that only 20 lifeboats would be carried, which could accommodate about 38% of those on board when the ship was filled to capacity. At the
Wreck of the RMS Titanic which will follow ours." However, within only two weeks of the discovery, a British insurance company claimed that it owned the wreck, and several more schemes to raise it were announced. A Belgian entrepreneur offered trips to "Titanic" for $25,000 a head. Spurred by Ballard's appeals for the wreck to be left alone, North Carolina Congressman Walter B. Jones, Sr. introduced the RMS Titanic Maritime Memorial Act in the United States House of Representatives in 1986. It called for strict scientific guidelines to be introduced to govern the exploration and salvage of "Titanic" and urged the United States Secretary of