A lack of preparation and adequate safety measures caused chaos following the collision.
"The boats were swung out—slowly, for the deckhands were late in reaching their stations; there had been no boat drill, and many of the crew did not know to what boats they were assigned."
Explanation:
From the text of "R.M.S. Titanic", it can be seen and inferred that the chaos that occurred on the Titanic in the aftermath of the collision was mainly down to a lack of preparedness on the part of the ship's staff.
This was evidenced by the part of the text shown in the answer where the deckhands had been late to their stations and had gone through no boat drills which are very necessary things when a boat is on the high seas as the threat of sinking is never truly far off.
