"I cannot conceive of any vital disaster happening to this vessel. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that."

Captain E.J. Smith, the ill-fated master of the Titanic, often boasted that he had lead a rather uneventful life at sea. After the White Star Liner Adriatic completed her maiden voyage in 1907, he said the following:

When anyone asks me how I can best describe my experience in nearly forty years at sea, I merely say, uneventful. Of course there have been winter gales, and storms and fog and the like. But in all my experience, I have never been in any accident... or any sort worth speaking about. I have seen but one vessel in distress in all my years at sea. I never saw a wreck and never have been wrecked nor was I ever in any predicament that threatened to end in disaster of any sort.

Captain Smith then went on to utter some rather fateful words. While maintaining that modern shipbuilding had become perfect, he stated that if any sort of disaster did occur that there would be enough time to save every soul aboard before the ship sank.

I will go a bit further...I will say that I cannot imagine any condition which could cause a ship to founder. I cannot conceive of any vital disaster happening to this vessel. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that.

Five years later, Captain Smith was tragically proven wrong when the Titanic went down in the icy North Atlantic - taking him down with her to the depths.

References: "Disaster At Last Befalls Capt. Smith," New York Times, April 16, 1912.