
Dead Reckoning - ca98am79
https://www.damninteresting.com/dead-reckoning/
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9nGQluzmnq3M
Every time I read one of these stories about extraordinary survival against
all odds, I wonder how many other stories there are that never made it out
because everyone involved died.

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warlog
Almost like there should be a name for that sort of, I guess you'd call it, a
bias?

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kgarten
You mean
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias)

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godelmachine
I was expecting it to be about -
[https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_reckoning](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_reckoning)

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9nGQluzmnq3M
Use of dead reckoning (or, rather, the lack of viable alternatives at the
time) is the reason the ship was wrecked.

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calahad
sublime use of "Ear regardless"

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NIL8
Good catch. I can hear the snort-laugh as he typed this dad joke.

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ctchocula
As someone who interacts too often with cat and dog lovers, my favourite part
of the story (spoiler alert):

> Communicating via gestures, the natives agreed to trade for some food—a
> small stockpile of mollusks. They returned some time later offering three
> sheep, which the Englishmen eagerly accepted for future meals. The natives
> also offered two dogs, which the Englishmen immediately roasted and ate.

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Freak_NL
From the quite interesting article:

> Captain Cheap, however, was promoted to post captain, […]

If I understand the term post-captain correctly, this was not an actual rank
to be promoted to. It just means that a captain's name was 'posted' on the
Navy's seniority list as having been assigned command of a vessel, rather than
holding the rank of captain without a command.

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pmyteh
Post Captain was the permanent rank of captain, equivalent to the modern rank
of Captain RN. Post Captains in the Royal Navy commanded ships of 20 guns and
up, and the rank and title were retained when on half pay without a ship.
Smaller sloops were generally commanded by a Commander (with the courtesy
title of Captain when commanding; equivalent to Commander RN).

Critically, promotion to Post Captain was at the discretion of the admiralty,
but onward to promotion to Rear Admiral and beyond was based strictly on
seniority, so the Post Captain promotion was the critical one.

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wifu
Interesting bit about one of the survivors:

> Byron went on to have a highly distinguished naval career, being promoted
> all the way to Vice-Admiral before he retired. One of his grandchildren grew
> up to be the famous poet Lord Byron; and one of Lord Byron’s children was
> Ada Lovelace, widely regarded as history’s first programmer.

