Titanic
Another reason so few people survived was that the radio was off on the SS Californian, the ship closest to the Titanic. The Californian crew did not hear about the accident. Also, the Titanic did have flares but they were white. Back then (and still now), red meant emergency and other colors were used for identification (White = White Star Line). The Californian and other ships saw the flares but they didn't think of the flares as distress signals. Another ship, the SS Carpathia, did hear about the accident and collected all 705 survivors.