I listened to a conversation a while back that I really couldn’t believe was even happening. The subject was distress signals. Specifically — SOS. The two participants that started the discussion disagreed as to what SOS meant… one said it meant “Save Our Ship,” the other was sure it meant “Save our Souls.”
I guess I just pretty much assumed that everyone knew that it doesn’t mean anything. I suppose because it’s made up of three letters, it’s natural to assume SOS is an acronym. However it was never meant to stand for anything.
In Morse code, SOS is made up of three dots, three dashes, and three more dots (••• – – – •••)
The Marconi Yearbook of Wireless Telegraphy and Telephony, published in 1918, gives an explanation of the meaning, or really the lack of meaning, behind the letter choices: “The signal [SOS] was adopted simply on account of its easy radiation and its unmistakable character ‚ and — it could not be misinterpreted as being a message for anything else. There is no special significance in the letters themselves….”
So SOS was chosen as a distress signal because it was easy to understand in Morse code and not likely to be confused with other signals. It also has the added benefit that it is a series of letters that reads the same backwards and forwards. And — SOS looks the same upside down as it does right side up, making it an ideal series of letters to view from the air if written on a beach or in the snow.
The SOS signal was established as an International Distress Signal on October 3, 1906 by an agreement made between the British Marconi Society and the German Telefunk organization at the Berlin Radio Conference. The signal was formally introduced on July 1, 1908.
The first time the ‘SOS’ signal was used in an emergency was on June 10, 1909 when the Cunard liner SS Slavonia was wrecked off the Azores. Two steamers received her signals and went to the rescue.
Prior to the introduction of the ’SOS’ signal, the CQD signal was devised by the Marconi Company and was intended to mean “All Station — Urgent,” but was popularly misinterpreted as “Come Quick — Danger” or “Come Quickly Down.” Even though “SOS” was formally put into use in 1908, it’s adoption by maritime stations was very slow. So slow, in fact that at time of the sinking of the Titanic on April 15, 1912, her radio operator (Harold Bride) used both the old “CQDistress’ and the then newer SOS signals.
In the late 19th and early 20th century, Morse code was the only way ships could communicate with one another while at sea. Wireless operators could send messages from one ship to another using the telegraph and Morse code, and they all used shorthand ways to communicate important messages quickly.
In the early days of telegraphs, each country had its own distress signal. As we discussed, the new international signal, SOS, was agreed to in 1906, with the explanation that it seemed necessary to specify that indications concerning a case of distress should be given by means of conventional signals in order that they be understood by all stations. The problem was that many telegraph operators refused to adopt the new universal signal and stuck with their own signals for several years after SOS was adopted. That all changed with the sinking of the Titanic.
Because of the advancement in modern telecommunications, SOS and Morse code aren’t used often today. In 2007, the Federal Communications Commission eliminated the requirement that radio operators must know Morse code. The Navy and a few other agencies still use it, but it’s not their primary method of signaling distress anymore.
I guess I should mention that SOS isn’t universally used as a distress signal. For instance, if your pharmacist is filling a prescription from your doctor and the doctor has written s.o.s. or sos, he isn’t warning the pharmacist that you’re in dire trouble. In the medical field, sos is used when writing a prescription by indicating when his patient should take the drug or medication. Usually it means “as required,” or “as needed.” In case you’re interested, it’s derived from the Latin — “Si Opus Sit.”
My intent was to just discuss SOS signals, but one of the most famous SOS signals in history came from the RMS Titanic after it struck an iceberg in the Atlantic that ultimately led to its sinking. The ship struck the iceberg at 11:40 pm on the night of 14 April, 1912 and at around 2:20 am on the morning of 15 April, the Titanic disappeared beneath the surface of the Atlantic Ocean. The Titanic was the first transatlantic ship to send an SOS signal via radio.
Lloyd Detmer, who worked as a radio operator on USS Theodore Roosevelt received a strange SOS signal on April 15, 1972. Detmer hears on his headphones, an almost unintelligible voice asking for help for the passengers and crew of the sinking Titanic. When Detmer reported this to his superiors, he was ordered not to respond to the signal because it was believed to be someone’s joke.
But out of curiosity Detmer searched the military records of SOS signals and he discovered that other radio operator colleagues have received this SOS signal from the Titanic in 1918, 1924, 1930, 1936, 1942, 1948, and so on — every six years. Reading the radiograms of his colleagues he discovered that all of them have heard the voice of the first, and last, captain of the Titanic, Captain Edward Smith, asking for help. When this news became public, people started to ask questions. The mystery grew and many questions are unanswered. Many people believe the wireless telegraph machine on board the Titanic has been broadcasting distress calls. And in 2020, a federal judge in Virginia ruled that a salvage firm can retrieve the Marconi wireless telegraph machine that was used to broadcast distress calls from the sinking Titanic. The judge agreed that the telegraph is historically and culturally important and could soon be lost within the rapidly decaying wreck site. But the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which represents the public’s interest in the wreck site, fiercely opposes the mission. NOAA argued in court documents that the telegraph is likely surrounded “by the mortal remains of more than 1,500 people,” and should be left alone. The last I had heard, the expedition had been suspended awaiting resolution of some legal battles.
So if the issues are resolved and the telegraph is actually recovered, maybe we’ll have at least a partial answer to this mystery by 2026…
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