Port Or Starboard

Even though this is a list about mistakes, we would like to point out that one of the biggest alleged mistakes in the film is actually not a mistake at all. Plenty of contemporary boaters watched Titanic and snickered to themselves when the ship is about to hit the iceberg. To try and miss the iceberg, an officer tells the helmsman, “hard to starboard,” and afterward, “hard to port.” After both orders, the helmsman does the opposite of what we believe is correct. Today, port is to the left and starboard is to the right. While Titanic appears to have goofed this up, they really nailed it on the head. In 1912, port was right and starboard was left. The reason they changed this was because boaters of the 1900’s were raised driving automobiles, so boats made the change to conform.