If the Titanic had hit the iceberg head-on instead of scraping along its side, the outcome would likely have been worse rather than better. A head-on collision would have caused the ship to absorb the full force of impact abruptly, leading to a severe and sudden stop. This would have thrown passengers violently forward inside the ship, causing injuries or deaths even before flooding began

. Structurally, a head-on impact would have transmitted the force along the entire length of the ship’s hull. This could have split seams and burst rivets throughout the ship, opening multiple compartments to flooding. Unlike the side scrape, which damaged about 300 feet of the hull on the starboard side, a frontal collision would have compromised more compartments and caused the ship to flood much faster, potentially sinking in minutes rather than hours

. Though some suggest the Titanic might have survived flooding of up to four watertight compartments, the collision bulkheads were designed for ship-to- ship impact, not for hitting a massive, immovable iceberg. The iceberg’s stationary nature means the Titanic would absorb almost all the impact energy, increasing damage severity

. Numerical analyses estimate that a head-on collision would have brought the Titanic to a stop in about 3.7 seconds, crushing the bow up to 107 feet and causing catastrophic structural damage

. In summary, a head-on collision would likely have caused more extensive structural damage, faster flooding, and a quicker sinking, making survival less likely than the actual side scrape collision that occurred