Dear All,
One of the problems about who did what on the Bridge before the iceberg was hit, is that everybody wanted to miss it! - mind you a natural instinct for us all really... whether car, ship, or anything else. In those days hitting things with ships was frowned upon and considered 'bad form' - partic. on a maiden voyage - (and anyone involved would most probably never get any significant sea job again), so, even though hitting it head on would have been a better solution, it's a case of damned if you did and damned if you didn't.
If all engines were indeed placed full astern, it was not the best move, but, however, it is understandable. There were so many parameters with this event, and indeed the voyage as a whole obviously.
The heating of coal in bunkers is well known, and is caused by numerous things. As to the Titanic, this theory has been known for a long while, and was brought to the fore at the Enquiry. The adding of water to such a fire can indeed make things far worse, leading to a gas explosion of significant proportions. The bunker in effect becoming a very large example of a gas producer. This theory had led to an inspection of as much hull as was possible, with the view to seeing if there were tell tale indicators of hull rupturing in the vicinity of the bunkers by a gas explosion. They did find indicators - a TV prog. that I taped quite a while ago but I will see if I can find it again!
As to rivets etc., well, I agree with what someone else on here said, that any modern ship of similar size, belting a similar sized immovable object in the same way would go the same way. As to old iron and steel versus modern iron & steel, there is good argument that the 'old' was better in quite a few ways/uses. I have an 1880's 5' long 'jumper' (a hand bar rock drilling tool for slate quarries), I have never been able to damage it despite lot's of heavy use - and it doesn't seem to rust either! It bends only slightly under very heavy load (and I mean heavy), but it always returns to straight. It has a lovely ring, and the chances of getting anything of similar quality today of the same dia. is very remote.
An interesting subject all in all.
Regards, Bernard