HUNDREDS DROWN IN CABINS
Had there been time, hundreds who went down with the ship would have survived. A thousand men and women who had been asleep awoke too late to scramble to the decks. They were crushed or mangled by the bow of the Storstad, injured by splintered timbers or overwhelmed in the terrific rush of water.
It is probable that scores who were asleep were killed instantly, but hundreds perished while feebly struggling for doorways, or while trying for a footing on sloping decks. The terror and confusion of the few minutes, while the Empress staggered, listed and sank, can hardly be put in words. The survivors themselves could not describe those minutes adequately.
In the brief space of time between the shock of the collision and the sinking of the liner there was little chance for systematic marshaling of the passengers. Indeed, everything indicates that hundreds of those on the steamer probably never reached the decks.