Duration indicates whether the ship sank quickly or slowly. WCF order indicates whether the captain gave the WCF order. (In the analysis, no and not known are treated as if the order was not given.) Voyage refers to the number of calendar days between departure and the sinking.Eight hypotheses are tested. The first and main hypothesis (H1) is that women have a survival advantage over men in maritime disasters. Previous research on the Titanic has found, in line with the notion of WCF, that women have a survival advantage over men, whereas evidence from the Lusitania disaster indicates no difference in survival rates between men and women (, ). There are, however, several reasons to believe that men have better survival prospects than women, if they do not engage in self-sacrificing helping behavior. The most important argument would be that men are physically stronger than women. In the evacuation of a sinking ship, success is typically determined by the ability to move fast through corridors and stairs, which is often made difficult by heavy list, congestion, and debris. Other traits that may enhance survival prospects, such as aggressiveness, competitiveness, and swimming ability, are also more prevalent in men (, –), whereas for example resistance to cold water may benefit either sex (–). Accordingly, if men try to save themselves, we expect women to have a relative survival disadvantage. We would, however, expect women’s survival chances to improve if men comply with the norm of WCF. Hence, an observed survival advantage of women is regarded as supporting evidence of behavior being governed by the WCF norm. A small survival disadvantage for women is difficult to interpret, as it can either indicate that the WCF norm has helped women from a potentially larger disadvantage or that the norm has not been upheld. However, if we observe a substantial survival disadvantage of women we regard it as evidence that compliance with the WCF norm is exceptional in maritime disasters., Similarly, social proximity is likely to be higher on ships with a more intimate atmosphere. We, therefore, also test an alternative formulation of H6, H6.1, that the relative survival rate of women is higher when the ship is small (carrying fewer people than the average-sized ship in the sample, 686 people)., Men were much more likely than women to survive, because they were more likely to have the strength to get out of the sinking ship and into the life rafts (and also because they were slightly less likely to freeze to death while awaiting rescue)..