The exact location of the Titanic wreck on the map. Secret of the ocean. How they searched and found the legendary Titanic. How was it really?
And this fact is not surprising, because at the time of construction and commissioning, the "" was one of the largest airliners in the world. Its first voyage, which is also its last, took place on April 14, 1912, because the ship, after a collision with an ice block, sank 2 hours 40 minutes after the impact (at 02.20 on April 15). Such a large-scale disaster has turned into a legend, and in our time the causes and circumstances of its occurrence are discussed, feature films are made, and researchers continue to study the remains of the liner located at the bottom and compare them with photographs of the ship taken in 1912.
If we compare the model of the bow shown in the photo with the remains that now lie on the bottom, it is difficult to call them identical, because the front part of the ship was heavily immersed in silt during the fall. This sight greatly disappointed the first researchers, since the location of the wreckage did not allow for an inspection of the place where the ship hit the ice block without the use of special equipment. A torn hole in the hull, clearly visible on the model, is the result of a blow to the bottom.
The remains of the Titanic are at the bottom Atlantic Ocean, they lie at a depth of about 4 km. The ship cracked during the dive and now two of its parts lie at the bottom, at a distance of about 600 meters from one another. Within a radius of several hundred meters near them there are numerous debris and objects, including a huge piece of the ship's hull.
The researchers managed to make a panorama of the bow of the Titanic by processing several hundred images. If you look at it from right to left, you can see the winch from the spare anchor, which sticks out directly above the bow edge, then the mooring device is noticeable, and next to it is an open hatch leading to hold No. 1, from which breakwater lines go to the sides. The lying mast, under which there are two more bilge hatches and winches for lifting cargo, is clearly visible on the inter-superstructure deck. The captain's bridge used to be located on the front of the main superstructure, but now it can only be found on the bottom in parts.
But the superstructure with the captain's and officers' cabins and the radio room is well preserved, although it is crossed by a crack that was created at the site of the expansion joint. The visible hole in the superstructure is where the chimney is located. Another hole behind the superstructure is a well where the main staircase Titanica. The large ragged hole located to the left is the site of the second pipe.
Photo of the main anchor on the port side of the Titanic. It remains a mystery how he did not fall down when he hit the bottom.
Behind the Titanic's spare anchor is a mooring device.
Even 10-20 years ago, on the mast of the Titanic one could see the remains of the so-called “crow’s nest”, where the lookouts were located, but now they have fallen off. The only reminder of the crow's nest is the hole in the mast through which sailors looking out could get to the spiral staircase. The tail located behind the hole was once a bell mount.
Comparative photos of the Titanic deck where the lifeboats were located. On the right you can see that the superstructure on it is torn in places.
The Titanic staircase that adorned the ship in 1912:
Photo of the remains of the ship, taken from a similar angle. Comparing the two previous photos, it is difficult to believe that this is the same part of the ship.
Behind the stairs there were elevators for 1st class passengers. Only individual elements remind of them. The sign, which can be seen in the photo on the right, was located opposite the elevators and pointed to the deck. It is this inscription that points to deck A (the letter A, made of bronze, has fallen off, but traces still remain).
Deck D, 1st class lounge. Although most of The wooden trim has been eaten away by microorganisms; individual elements reminiscent of the grand staircase have been preserved.
The 1st class lounge and restaurant of the Titanic, located on Deck D, had large stained glass windows, which have survived to this day.
This is exactly what “” would look like together with the largest modern passenger airliner, which is called “Allure of the Seas».
It was put into operation in 2010. Several comparative values:
- Allure of the Seas has a displacement 4 times greater than that of the Titanic;
- the modern record-breaking liner has a length of 360 m, which is 100 m longer than the "";
- maximum width 60 m compared to 28 m of the shipbuilding legend;
- the draft is almost the same (almost 10 m);
- the speed of these ships is 22-23 knots;
- the number of command staff of “Allure of the Seas” is more than 2 thousand people (the “servants” are 900 people, mostly stokers);
- the passenger capacity of the modern giant is 6.4 thousand people (in the case of 2.5 thousand).
Titanic is the largest and most luxurious liner of its time. They did not hesitate to call him unsinkable, and he really seemed like that. He set off on his maiden voyage at noon on the tenth of April from the English port of Southampton. The final destination was to be American city NY. But, as you know, the Titanic did not reach the shores of the United States...
Titanic's collision with an iceberg
On April 14, 1912, the liner was rushing across the North Atlantic at full speed (at a speed of 22.5 knots, which was almost the maximum speed). There were no signs of tragedy, there was complete calm. An orchestra was playing on the upper deck in a restaurant with a beautiful interior. Rich people from the first class drank champagne, walked under open air and enjoyed the wonderful weather.
Late in the evening of April 14, at 23:39, two lookouts (as sailors are officially called who observe the situation from a convenient position during a voyage) noticed an iceberg directly ahead and reported this by phone to the bridge. Officer William Murdock immediately ordered “Left Handle.” In this way he tried to prevent a collision.
But the multi-ton ship could not turn instantly, although in this case every second was worth its weight in gold - the block of ice was getting closer. And only after about half a minute the Titanic’s bow began to tilt to the left. Ultimately, the visible part of the iceberg missed the ship without hitting the starboard side.
The Titanic managed to turn two points, this was enough to prevent a head-on collision, but the liner still could not completely escape from the ice block - it ran into its hidden part, which was under water. This contact lasted approximately nine seconds. As a result, six holes were formed - all of them were below the waterline.
Contrary to popular belief, the iceberg did not “cut” the bottom of the liner. Everything was a little different: due to strong pressure, the rivets on the casing burst, the steel sheets bent and gaps appeared between them. Water began to penetrate into the compartments through them. And the penetration speed, of course, was enormous - more than seven tons per second.
The iceberg bent the ship's hull, causing the seal to be compromised
Further chronology of the tragedy
Most of the passengers on the upper deck did not initially feel any threat. The stewards serving snacks to the tables in the restaurant noted only the slight clink of spoons and forks on the tables. Some of the passengers felt a slight jolt and rattling noise, which quickly ended. Some people thought that the propeller blade had simply fallen off the ship.
On the lower decks, the first consequences were more noticeable: the local passengers heard an unpleasant grinding and rumble.
At exactly midnight, Thomas Andrews, the man who designed the Titanic, came to the bridge. He had to assess the nature and severity of the damage that occurred. After reporting on what had happened and examining the ship, Andrews told everyone present that the Titanic would definitely sink.
Soon the ship began to list noticeably. The 62-year-old captain of the ship, Edward Smith, gave the order to prepare the boats and begin convening passengers for evacuation.
And the radio operators, in turn, were ordered to send SOS signals to all nearby ships. They did this for the next two hours, and only a few minutes before the complete sinking did Smith relieve the telegraph operators from work.
Several ships received distress signals, but almost all of them were too far from the Titanic. At 00:25, the Carpathia ship received a message about the tragedy on the Titanic. It was located 93 kilometers from the crash site. Immediately, the captain of the Carpathia, Arthur Rostron, sent his ship to this area. "Carpathia", rushing to help people, managed to develop that night a record speed of 17.5 knots - for this purpose, all electrical devices and heating were turned off on the ship.
There was another ship that was even closer to the Titanic than the Carpathia - only 10 nautical miles (equivalent to 18.5 kilometers). Theoretically, he could help. We are talking about the Californian liner. The Californian was surrounded by ice, and so its captain decided to stop the ship - it was planned to start moving again only the next morning.
At 23:30, the Titanic's radio operator Phillips and the Californian's radio operator Evans communicated with each other. Moreover, at the very end of this dialogue, Phillips rather rudely asked Evans not to clog the airwaves, since at that moment he was transmitting a signal to Cape Race (this is a cape on the island of Newfoundland). After that, Evans simply turned off the power in the radio room and went to bed. And 10 minutes later the Titanic collided with an iceberg. After some time, the Titanic sent the first distress signal, but the Californian could no longer receive it.
On top of that, there were no red emergency flares on the Titanic. Confidence in the ship's unsinkability was so high that no one bothered to take the red rockets with them. Then it was decided to fire volleys with ordinary whites. The hope was that the crew of the nearby ship would realize that something was wrong with the Titanic. Californian officers actually saw white rockets, but they decided that they were just some kind of fireworks display. A fantastic series of misunderstandings!
At half past one in the morning, passengers began to be seated in boats. It immediately became clear that there were not enough places for everyone. There were twenty boats on board and their total capacity was 1,178 people.
By order of Captain Smith, his assistant Charles Lightoller, who controlled the evacuation process on the left side of the liner, only children and women were taken into the boats. Men, according to the captain, were obliged to remain on the ship until the last minute. But William Murdoch, another of Smith’s assistants, who led the evacuation on the starboard side, gave places in the boats to men when women and children were absent from the line of those gathered.
At approximately 02:15, the bow of the liner suddenly dropped down and the rest of the ship moved forward. A large cold wave swept across the decks, many people were simply carried overboard.
At about 02:20, the Titanic completely disappeared under the ocean water. The liner was so huge that it took 160 minutes to sink.
After the stern was completely submerged under water, hundreds of people swam to the surface. They floated in the icy water among all sorts of things from the ship: wooden beams, pieces of furniture, doors, etc. Many tried to use all this as a floating device.
The ocean water temperature that night was −2°C ( sea water does not freeze at this temperature due to the concentration of salt in it). A person here died from severe hypothermia within half an hour on average. And many of those moving away from the sunken ship on boats heard the heartbreaking screams of those who did not have enough space in the boats...
At approximately 04:00, the Carpathia appeared in the area of the sinking Titanic. This ship carried 712 people on board and then set course for New York. Among those rescued, 394 people were women and children, 129 people were men, and another 189 people were ship crew members.
The number of deaths in this shipwreck was, according to various sources, from 1,400 to 1,517 people (the exact figure is difficult to say, because there were many stowaways on the Titanic). Thus, 60% of passengers from first class cabins managed to escape, 44% from second class cabins, 25% from those who bought third class tickets.
Characteristics of the Titanic
When commissioned, the Titanic was 269 meters long and about 30 meters wide. The height of the liner was also impressive: from the waterline to the very top boat deck there were 18.5 meters (and if you count from the keel to the top of the first pipe , then it would be 53 meters altogether). The draft of this liner was 10.5 meters, and the displacement was 52,310 tons.
Titanic in 1912 in the port of Belfast (this is where it was built)
The liner was driven by several four-cylinder steam engines and a steam turbine. At the same time, steam for them, as well as for all kinds of auxiliary mechanisms, was produced in 29 boilers. It is worth specially noting that not one of the ship’s thirty mechanics survived. They remained in the engine room and kept the steam units running until the last minute.
The role of propulsion on the Titanic was performed by three propellers. The diameter of the central propeller was 5.2 meters and had four blades. The propellers located at the edges had a larger diameter - 7.2 meters, but they had three blades. Propellers with three blades could make up to 80 revolutions per minute, and the central one - up to 180 revolutions per minute.
There were also four pipes sticking out above the upper deck, each 19 meters high. The Titanic had a double bottom and had sixteen sealed compartments. They were separated by watertight bulkheads. According to calculations, the ship would remain afloat even if any two compartments or four consecutive compartments at the bow or stern were flooded. But on the night of the tragedy, the iceberg damaged five compartments - one more than permissible.
Crew and passengers
It is known that during the tragic voyage, the ship’s crew included many people who had not undergone special training: stewards, stokers, stitchers (these were the people whose task was to bring coal to the fireboxes and throw ash overboard), cooks. There were very few qualified sailors - only 39 sailors and seven officers and mates. Moreover, some of the sailors had not even had time to become well acquainted with the structure of the Titanic, since they were accepted into service just a few days before sailing.
It’s worth telling a little about the passengers. The passenger composition was extremely varied - from mendicant emigrants from Sweden, Italy, Ireland, sailing for better life V New World, to hereditary millionaires such as John Jacob Astor IV and Benjamin Guggenheim (both deceased).
Benjamin Guggenheim put on his best tailcoat and began drinking whiskey in the hall - this is how he spent the last hours of his life
In accordance with the cost of the purchased ticket, there was a division into three classes. For those who sailed in first class, a swimming pool and a training room were provided physical culture, a sauna, a squash court, an electric bath (a kind of “ancestor” of a solarium) and a special section for pets. There was also a restaurant, elegantly furnished dining rooms, and smoking rooms.
By the way, the service in third class was also decent, better than on some other transatlantic ships of that time. The cabins were bright and comfortable, they were not cold and quite clean. The dining room served not very sophisticated, but quite acceptable dishes, and there were special decks for walking.
The rooms and spaces of the ship were strictly divided according to classes. And passengers, say, third class were forbidden to be on the first class deck.
"Titanic" in books and films
The terrible events that happened on the Titanic in April 1912 served as the basis for many literary works, paintings, songs and films.
The first book about the Titanic was written, paradoxically, long before its sinking. The little-known American writer Morgan Robertson published the story “Futility, or the Death of the Titan” back in 1898. It described the supposedly unsinkable ship Titan, which crashed on an April night after colliding with an iceberg. There were not enough lifeboats on the Titan, and therefore many passengers died.
The story did not sell well at first, but after the 1912 incident, interest in the book increased sharply - there were quite a lot of coincidences between the events described in the story and the real sinking of the Titanic. And key specifications The fictional "Titan" was similar to the characteristics of the real "Titanic" - a truly amazing fact!
Morgan Robertson and his story, where the sinking of the Titanic was to some extent predicted
And the first feature film about the tragedy was released in May of the same 1912 - it was called “Rescue from the Titanic.” It lasted 10 minutes, was silent and in black and white. The main role here was played by Dorothy Gibson, an actress who herself ended up on the Titanic on that ill-fated night and found her salvation in boat number seven.
In 1953, director Jean Negulesco turned to the theme of the tragic voyage of the Titanic. According to the plot, on the Titanic a husband, wife and their two children are sorting things out among themselves. And everything seems to be getting better, but then the liner hits an iceberg and begins to sink to the bottom. The family has to endure separation, the wife and daughter sail away on a boat, the son and father remain on the sinking ship. The film, by the way, received one Oscar in the same 1953.
But the most famous film about the sinking of the liner is James Cameron's Titanic, which appeared in theaters (and then on DVD) in 1997. It won as many as eleven Oscar awards and for a long time was considered the highest-grossing film in history.
Authoritative experts on the sinking of the Titanic (for example, historian Don Lynch and marine artist Ken Marshall) took part in preparing the script and creating the scenery for Cameron’s film. Collaboration with respected experts made it possible to convey some episodes of the crash quite reliably. Cameron's Titanic sparked a new wave of interest in the history of the liner. In particular, after the release of the film, the demand for books and exhibitions related to this topic increased.
Discovery of the Titanic at the bottom of the Atlantic
The legendary ship lay at the bottom for 73 years before it was discovered. More specifically, it was found in 1985 by a group of divers led by oceanographer Robert Ballard. As a result, it turned out that under the enormous pressure of the water, the Titanic (the depth here was about 4000 meters) fell apart into three parts. The wreckage of the airliner was scattered over an area with a radius of 1.6 kilometers. Ballard and his associates first found the bow of the ship, which, apparently due to its large mass, had sunk deeply into the ground. Food was found 800 meters away. The remains of the middle part were also spotted nearby.
Between the large elements of the liner at the bottom, one could also see small objects testifying to that era: a set of copper cutlery, unopened wine bottles, coffee cups, door handles, candelabra and ceramic children's dolls...
Later, several expeditions to the remains of the Titanic were carried out by the RMS Titanic company, which legally had the rights to fragments of the liner and other artifacts associated with it. During these expeditions, more than 6,000 objects were recovered from the bottom. They were subsequently valued at $110 million. These items were exhibited in thematic exhibitions or sold at auction.
But why wasn’t the Titanic lifted up completely? Alas, this is impossible. Experts have found that any attempt to raise the hull of the liner will lead to its destruction, and therefore it will most likely remain at the bottom forever.
Documentary film "Titanic": The Death of a Dream"
Titanic is a ship that challenged higher powers. A miracle of shipbuilding and the largest ship of its time. The builders and owners of this giant passenger fleet arrogantly declared: “The Lord God himself cannot sink this ship.” However, the ship launched on its maiden voyage and did not return. It was one of the largest disasters, forever etched in the history of navigation. In this topic I will talk about the most key points related to the Titanic. The topic consists of two parts, the first part is the history of the Titanic before the tragedy, where I will tell you about how the ship was built and went on its fateful voyage. In the second part we will visit the bottom of the ocean, where the remains of a drowned giant lie.
First, I will briefly talk about the history of the Titanic's structure. There are a lot interesting photos ship, which depicts the construction process, mechanisms and assemblies of the Titanic, etc. And then the story will tell about the tragic circumstances that were destined to happen on this fateful day for the Titanic. As always happens when major disasters, the Titanic tragedy occurred due to a series of mistakes that coincided on one day. Each of these mistakes individually would not have entailed anything serious, but all together they resulted in death for the ship.
Titanic was laid down on March 31, 1909 at the shipyards of the Harland and Wolf shipbuilding company in Belfast, Northern Ireland, launched on May 31, 1911, and underwent sea trials on April 2, 1912. The ship's unsinkability was ensured by 15 watertight bulkheads in the hold, creating 16 conditionally watertight compartments; the space between the bottom and the second bottom flooring was divided by transverse and longitudinal partitions into 46 waterproof compartments. The first photo shows the Titanic slipway, construction is just beginning. 
The photo shows the laying of the Titanic's keel
In this photo, the Titanic is on the slipway next to the Olympic, its twin brother
And these are the huge steam engines of the Titanic 
Giant crankshaft 
This photo shows the turbine rotor of the Titanic. The huge size of the rotor stands out especially against the background of the working 
Titanic propeller shaft 
Ceremonial photo - the Titanic hull is completely assembled 
The launching process begins. The Titanic slowly sinks its hull into the water 
The giant ship almost left the slipways 
Titanic's launch is successful 
And now the Titanic is ready, the morning before the first official launching in Belfast 
The Titanic was officially launched and transported to England. The photo shows the ship in the port of Southampton before its fateful voyage. Few people know, but during the construction of the Titanic, 8 workers died. This information is available in a selection of interesting facts about the Titanic. 
This is the last photograph of the Titanic taken from the shore in Ireland. 
The first days of the voyage were successful for the ship, there were no signs of trouble, the ocean was completely calm. On the night of April 14, the sea remained calm, but icebergs were visible in some places in the sailing area. They did not embarrass Captain Smith... At 11:40 in the evening, a cry was suddenly heard from the observation post on the mast: “An iceberg is right on course!”... Everyone knows about further events that took place on the ship. The “unsinkable” Titanic failed to resist water element and went to the bottom. As already mentioned, many factors turned against the Titanic that day. It was a fatal misfortune that killed the giant ship and more than 1,500 people 
The official conclusion of the commission investigating the causes of the sinking of the Titanic stated: the steel used to sheath the hull of the Titanic was of low quality, with a large admixture of sulfur, which made it very brittle at low temperatures. If the casing were made of high-quality, tough steel with a low sulfur content, it would significantly soften the force of the impact. The metal sheets would simply bend inward and the damage to the body would not be so serious. Perhaps then the Titanic would have been saved, or at least would have remained afloat for a long time. However, for those times this steel was considered the best, there was simply no other. This was only the final conclusion; in fact, a number of other factors occurred that did not allow us to avoid a collision with the iceberg 
Let us list in order all the factors that influenced the sinking of the Titanic. The absence of any of these factors could save the ship...
First of all, it is worth noting the work of the Titanic's radio operators: the main task of the telegraph operators was to serve especially wealthy passengers - it is known that in just 36 hours of work, the radio operators transmitted more than 250 telegrams. Payment for telegraph services was made on the spot, in the radio room, and at that time it was quite large, and tips flowed like a river. Radio operators were constantly busy sending telegrams, and although they received several messages about drifting ice, they did not pay attention to them 
Some criticize the lookout's lack of binoculars. The reason for this lies in the tiny key to the binoculars box. A tiny key that opened the cabinet where the binoculars were kept could have saved the Titanic and the lives of 1,522 dead passengers. This should have happened if not for the fatal mistake of a certain David Blair. Keyman Blair was transferred from service on the “unsinkable” liner just a few days before the ill-fated voyage, but he forgot to give the key to the binocular locker to the employee who replaced him. That is why the sailors on duty at the observation tower of the liner had to rely solely on their eyes. They saw the iceberg too late. One of the crew members on watch that fateful night later said that if they had binoculars, they would have seen the ice block earlier (even if it was pitch black) and the Titanic would have had time to change course.”
Despite warnings about icebergs, the captain of the Titanic did not slow down or change the route, so confident was he that the ship was unsinkable. The speed of the ship was too high, due to which the iceberg hit the hull with maximum force. If the captain had ordered the ship's speed to be reduced in advance, upon entering the iceberg belt, then the force of the impact on the iceberg would not have been enough to break through the Titanic's hull. The captain also did not make sure that all the boats were filled with people. As a result, far fewer people were saved 
The iceberg belonged to a rare type of so-called. “black icebergs” (overturned so that their dark underwater part reaches the surface), which is why it was noticed too late. The night was windless and moonless, otherwise the lookouts would have noticed the whitecaps around the iceberg. The photo shows the same iceberg that caused the sinking of the Titanic. 
There were no red rescue flares on the ship to signal distress. Confidence in the ship's power was so high that no one even thought of equipping the Titanic with these missiles. But everything could have turned out differently. Less than half an hour after meeting the iceberg, the captain’s mate shouted:
Lights on port side, sir! The ship is five or six miles away! Boxhall clearly saw through his binoculars that it was a single-tube steamer. He tried to contact him using a signal lamp, but the unknown vessel did not respond. “Apparently, there is no radiotelegraph on the ship, they couldn’t help but see us,” Captain Smith decided and ordered helmsman Rowe to signal with emergency flares. When the signalman opened the box with the missiles, both Boxhall and Rowe were dumbfounded: the box contained ordinary white missiles, not emergency red ones. “Sir,” Boxhall exclaimed in disbelief, “there are only white rockets here!” - Can't be! - Captain Smith was amazed. But, convinced that Boxhall was right, he ordered: “Shoot the whites.” Maybe they'll realize we're in trouble. But no one guessed, everyone thought it was a fireworks display on the Titanic 
The cargo-passenger steamer California, on a London-Boston flight, missed the Titanic on the evening of April 14, and a little over an hour later it was covered in ice and lost speed. Its radio operator Evans contacted the Titanic at about 11 p.m. and wanted to warn about the difficult ice conditions and that they were covered in ice, but the Titanic’s radio operator Philippe, who had just had difficulty establishing contact with Cape Race, rudely interrupted him: “Leave me alone!” I'm busy working with Cape Race! And Evans “fell behind”: there was no second radio operator on the California, it was a difficult day, and Evans officially closed the radio watch at 23:30, having previously reported this to the captain. As a result, all the blame for the biased investigation into the sinking of the Titanic fell on the captain of the California, Stanley Lord, who proved his innocence until his death. He was acquitted only posthumously after Hendrik Ness, captain of the ship Samson, testified... 
On the map the place where the Titanic sank
So, the night of April 14-15, 1912. Atlantic. On board the fishing vessel "Samson". "Samson" returns from a successful fishing trip, avoiding encounters with US ships. On board are several hundred slaughtered seals. The tired crew rested. The watch was kept by the captain himself and his first mate. Captain Ness was in good standing with his owners. The voyages of his ship were always successful and brought good profits. Hendrik Ness was known as an experienced and risk-taking captain, not too scrupulous about violating territorial waters or exceeding the number of animals killed. “Samson” often found himself in foreign or forbidden waters, and he was well known to US Coast Guard ships, with whom he successfully avoided close acquaintance. In a word, Hendrik Ness was an excellent navigator and a gambling, successful businessman. Here are the words of Ness, from which the whole picture of what is happening becomes clear:
“The night was amazing, starry, clear, the ocean was calm and gentle,” Ness said. “The assistant and I chatted, smoked, sometimes I went out of the control room onto the bridge, but I didn’t stay there for long - the air was absolutely freezing.” Suddenly, accidentally turning around, I saw two unusually bright stars in the southern part of the horizon. They surprised me with their brilliance and size. Shouting to the watchman to hand over the telescope, I pointed it at these stars and immediately realized that these were the masthead lights of a large ship. “Captain, I think this is a coast guard ship,” the mate said. But I thought about it myself. There was no time to figure it out on the map, but we both decided that we had entered the territorial waters of the United States. The meeting with their ships did not bode well for us. A few minutes later a white rocket flew over the horizon, and we realized that we had been discovered and were being asked to stop. I still hoped that everything would work out and we would be able to escape. But soon another rocket took off, and after some time a third... Things turned out badly: if we had been searched, I would have lost not only all the loot, but also, possibly, the ship, and we would all have gone to prison. I decided to leave.
He ordered to turn off all the lights and give full speed. For some reason we were not followed. After some time, the border ship disappeared altogether. (This is why witnesses from the Titanic claimed that they clearly saw a large steamer in the distance, leaving them. The ill-fated California at that time was sandwiched in ice and was not visible from the Titanic at all.) I ordered a change of course to the north, we were going at full speed and only slowed down in the morning. On the twenty-fifth of April we dropped anchor off Reykjavik in Iceland and only then did we learn about the Titanic tragedy from newspapers delivered by the Norwegian consul.
During the conversation with the consul, it was as if I had been hit on the head: I thought: weren’t we at the scene of the disaster then? As soon as the consul left our board, I immediately rushed to the cabin and, looking through the newspapers and my notes, realized that the dying people saw us not as the Californian, but as us. This means that it was us who were called to help with rockets. But they were white, not red, emergency ones. Who would have thought that people were dying very close to us, and we were leaving them at full speed on our reliable and large “Samson”, which had both boats and boats on board! And the sea was like a pond, quiet, calm... We could save them all! Everyone! Hundreds of people died there, and we saved stinking seal skins! But who could know about this? But we didn’t have a radiotelegraph. On the way to Norway, I explained to the crew what happened to us and warned that all of us had only one thing left to do - remain silent! If they find out the truth, we will become worse than lepers: everyone will shy away from us, they will kick us out of the fleet, no one will want to serve with us on the same ship, no one will give us a hand or a crust of bread. And none of the team took any oath.
Hendrik Ness spoke about what happened only 50 years later, before his death. However, no one can be directly blamed for the sinking of the Titanic. If the rockets had been red, he would certainly have rushed to help. In the end, no one had time to help. Only the steamer "Carpathia", developing an unprecedented speed of 17 knots, rushed to the aid of the dying people. Captain Arthur H. Roston ordered the preparation of beds, spare clothing, food, and quarters for the rescued. At 2 hours 45 minutes, “Carpathia” began to encounter icebergs and their fragments, large ice fields. Despite the danger of a collision, the Carpathia did not slow down. At 3 hours 50 minutes on the Carpathia they saw the first boat from the Titanic, at 4 hours 10 minutes they began to save people, and by 8 hours 30 minutes the last living person was picked up. In total, Carpathia saved 705 people. And “Carpathia” delivered all those rescued to New York. The photo shows a boat from the Titanic
Now let's move on to the second part of the story. Here you will see the Titanic at the bottom of the ocean in the form in which it remained after the tragedy. For seventy-three years the ship lay in its deep underwater grave as one of the countless evidence of human carelessness. The word "Titanic" has become synonymous with adventures doomed to failure, heroism, cowardice, shock and adventure. Societies and associations of surviving passengers were created. Entrepreneurs involved in the recovery of sunken ships dreamed of raising a superliner with all its countless riches. In 1985, a team of divers led by American oceanographer Dr. Robert Ballard found it, and the world learned that under the enormous pressure of the water column, the giant ship broke into three parts. The wreckage of the Titanic was scattered over an area with a radius of 1600 meters. Ballard found the bow of the ship, deeply buried in the ground under its own weight. Eight hundred meters away from her lay the stern. Nearby were the ruins of the middle part of the hull. Among the wreckage of the ship, various objects of material culture of that distant time were scattered all over the bottom: a set of kitchen utensils made of copper, wine bottles with corks, coffee cups with the emblem of the shipping line." White Star", toiletries, door handles, candelabra, kitchen stoves and ceramic doll heads that little children played with... One of the most stunning underwater images that Dr. Ballard's movie camera captured was a broken sloop beam hanging limply from the side of the ship - a silent witness to a tragic night that will forever will remain on the list of global disasters. The photo shows the wreck of the Titanic, taken by the Mir submersible 
Over the past 19 years, the hull of the Titanic has undergone serious destruction, the reason for which was not sea water at all, but souvenir hunters who are gradually plundering the remains of the liner. For example, the ship’s bell or mast lighthouse disappeared from the ship. In addition to direct plunder, damage to the ship is caused by time and the action of bacteria, leaving behind only rusty ruins
In this photo we see the Titanic's propeller 
Huge ship anchor 
One of the Titanic's piston engines 
Preserved underwater cup from the Titanic 
This is the same hole that formed after the encounter with the iceberg. Perhaps, in addition to weak steel, the rivets between the sheets of metal failed, and water poured into 4 compartments of the Titanic, leaving no chance of salvation. There was no point in pumping water out; it was equivalent to pumping water from ocean to ocean. The Titanic sank to the bottom, where it rests to this day. There is talk of raising the Titanic to the surface in order to set up a museum, meanwhile various souvenir lovers continue to take the ship apart piece by piece. How many more secrets does the Titanic keep? It is unlikely that anyone will answer this question in the near future. 
The remains of the ship rest in silence and darkness - a giant puzzle of rusty steel fragments scattered along the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. It is readily eaten by bacteria and fungi; this is a haven for them. Bizarre colorless creatures prowl around. Since the wreck was discovered in 1985 by a researcher from the National Geographical Society Robert Ballard and the French oceanographer Jean-Louis Michel, deep-sea robots and manned vehicles periodically visited here. They aimed a sonar beam at the Titanic, took a couple of photographs, and sailed away.
IN last years American director James Cameron, French submariner Paul-Henri Narjolet and other researchers brought increasingly clear and detailed photographs from the wreck site. And yet we looked at the Titanic as if through a keyhole - all we could see was what the spotlights illuminated underwater vehicle. Never before have we been able to look at thousands of disparate fragments as a whole. Finally the opportunity presented itself.
A trailer equipped with the latest technology is parked in the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution parking lot. In the trailer, William Lang hunches over a sonar map of the Titanic's wreck. It took months of painstaking work to assemble this mosaic. The ghostly landscape resembles the surface of the Moon - the bottom is dotted with crater-like depressions. These are traces of large fragments of melting icebergs that have fallen to the bottom for thousands of years.
“Never before have we been able to look at thousands of disparate fragments as a whole. Finally, such an opportunity presented itself.
 The owner of this .925 sterling silver men's pocket watch set it to New York time in anticipation of its safe arrival. |
 The porthole on the page to the right is one of 5,000 objects recovered from the Titanic wreck. When it hit the bottom, the steel sheets of the hull plating were bent, but the portholes remained intact, having jumped out of their “eye sockets.” |
 Most likely, this felt hat belonged to a businessman. In an era when people were “meet by their clothes,” a bowler hat was a sign of belonging to the class of doctors, lawyers or entrepreneurs. |
But if you look closely, you begin to distinguish creations human hands. On the computer screen, Lang hovers the cursor over a fragment of a map created by overlaying photographs with acoustic images - sonar data. He enlarges the picture until the bow of the Titanic appears on the screen in all its “glory”: where the first chimney once stood, there is now a gaping black hole. A hundred meters to the northeast, a detached manhole cover was buried in the muddy mud. All this can be seen in the smallest detail - in one fragment you can even see how a white crab scrapes its claws against the railing.
So, by moving the mouse across the screen, you can see everything that remains of the Titanic - every mooring bollard, every davit, every steam boiler. “Now we know exactly where everything is,” Lang says. “A hundred years passed, and finally the light came on.”
Bill Lang directs the Imaging and Visualization Laboratory at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. This is something like a state-of-the-art photo studio specializing in underwater photography. The inside of the laboratory is lined with soundproof panels, and the room is crammed with computers and high-definition television monitors. Lang participated in the famous Ballard expedition that discovered the remains of the Titanic, and since then everything Newest technologies he certainly experiences deep-sea photography in this underwater cemetery.
Next to the giant propellers of the Olympic liner - an almost exact replica of the Titanic - the workers of the shipyard in Belfast seem like midgets. Both sister ships were built in Belfast. The Titanic was rarely photographed, but we can judge the grandeur of its design from the Olympic. National museums Northern Ireland, Harland and Wolf Collection, Ulster Folk and Transport Museum
A guide to the sunken wreck is the result of the work of an expedition that sank to the bottom in August-September 2010. Millions of dollars were invested in this ambitious project. The survey was carried out by three underwater robots, which moved at different distances from the bottom surface along programmed trajectories. Stuffed with side-scan sonars, multi-beam sonars, and optical cameras that took hundreds of pictures per second, the robots combed the bottom over an area of 5x8 kilometers. The data obtained was subjected to careful computer processing, and here is the result: on a huge map high resolution sunken objects and features of the bottom relief are reflected in their relative position, indicating the exact geographical coordinates.
“This is a breakthrough,” says expedition leader, archaeologist James Delgado of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. - Previously, studying the remains of the Titanic was like exploring the center of New York at night in the pouring rain with a flashlight. Now we have a certain area with clear boundaries where everything can be examined and measured. Perhaps, over time, thanks to this map, people who, as it seemed to us, were silent for centuries when the icy waters of the ocean closed over them, will find a voice.”
What kind of magnet attracts us to the remains of the Titanic? Why, even 100 years later, does this pile of metal at a four-kilometer depth haunt people? Some are fascinated by the scale of the disaster. Others are haunted by the thought of those who were unable to leave the ship. The Titanic sank for 2 hours and 40 minutes, and this time was enough for 2,208 epic tragedies to unfold on its stage. Cowardice (there was a story about a gentleman who tried to board a boat while dressed in a woman's dress) coexisted with courage and self-sacrifice. Many turned out to be real heroes. The captain remained on the bridge, the orchestra continued to play, and the radio operators gave distress signals until the very end. And the passengers - almost all - behaved in strict accordance with the hierarchy of Edwardian society: social barriers turned out to be stronger than watertight partitions.
But the Titanic took with it more than just human lives. Along with the giant ship, the illusion of order and faith in scientific and technical progress, the desire to live, to move towards the future. “Imagine that you inflated a soap bubble, and it burst - this is the sinking of the Titanic,” says James Cameron. - In the first decade of the 20th century, it seemed that an era of prosperity had arrived on Earth. Elevators! Cars! Airplanes! Radio! People believed that nothing is impossible, that progress is endless, and life is like a fairy tale. But everything collapsed in an instant.”
It’s hard to imagine a more surreal picture: on the Las Vegas Strip, on one of the top floors of the Luxor Hotel, next to the strip show, an exhibition of relics from the Titanic has settled for a long time. They were recovered from the depths of the sea by the RMS Titanic, Inc. corporation, which since 1994 has had the exclusive right to lift objects from the sunken giant. Similar exhibitions were organized in another 20 countries around the world, and in total they were visited by more than 25 million people.
In mid-October last year, I spent a whole day at the Luxor, wandering among the artifacts: a chef's hat, a razor, pieces of coal, several perfectly preserved dishes from the service, countless boots and shoes, perfume bottles, a leather travel bag, a bottle of champagne with so much and untouched by the cork. These ordinary objects became unique, having made a long and scary journey to sparkling glass display cases. I walked through a dark, cold room - there was an “iceberg” with a freon cooling system on display, which you could touch. The sound of torn metal can be heard from the speakers, adding to the feeling of anxiety. And here is the pearl of the collection - a huge fragment of the Titanic’s hull, weighing 15 tons. In 1998, it was pulled out from the ocean floor using a crane.
The Titanic's rudder is buried in the sand, and propeller blades are visible on the sides. The badly mangled stern rests on the ocean floor 600 meters south of the bow, which has been photographed much more frequently. This image is a mosaic photo collage of 300 high-resolution photographs taken during the 2010 expedition.
The exhibition in Las Vegas was done with dignity, but over the past years, submarine archaeologists have repeatedly spoken unkindly about the RMS Titanic and its leaders. Robbers, grave desecrators, treasure hunters - all sorts of nicknames were found for them! “You don’t go to the Louvre and point your finger at the Mona Lisa,” Robert Ballard, an implacable fighter for the integrity of the Titanic, told me. “These people are driven by greed - look how many things they have done!”
The gaping stern reveals the Titanic's two engines. They are covered with orange growths - a waste product of bacteria that eat rusty iron. Once upon a time, these giants, the size of a four-story building, set in motion the most ambitious creation of human hands.
However, in recent years, RMS Titanic has undergone changes in management - and in the approach to business. The new leaders are not trying to lift as many objects as possible from the bottom - on the contrary, in the future it is planned to conduct archaeological research at the crash site. The corporation began to cooperate with research and development government organizations. The same 2010 expedition, during which scientists first photographed the entire complex of sunken wrecks, was organized, led and financed by RMS Titanic. The company has sided with those calling for the Titanic wreck to be turned into a maritime memorial. In late 2011, RMC Titanic announced plans to auction off its entire collection and associated intellectual property for a total value of $189 million—but only if a buyer could be found who agreed to abide by strict conditions imposed by a federal court. One of these conditions: the collection cannot be sold in parts.
RMC Titanic President Chris Davino invited me to the exhibit storage room. This treasure trove is hidden next door to a dog groomer in an unremarkable Atlanta neighborhood. The brick building is climate-controlled and a forklift maneuvers between the long rows of shelving, just like in a regular warehouse. The shelves are lined from top to bottom with boxes and crates, provided with a detailed description of the contents. There is so much to see here: dishes, clothes, letters, bottles, fragments of water pipes, portholes - everything that was raised from the bottom of the ocean over three decades. Davino headed RMS Titanic in 2009, taking on the difficult mission of helping the ill-fated enterprise start new life. “There are many interested parties in the Titanic case, and there are many disagreements between them, but for many years they were all united by their contempt for us. The time has come to reassess values. We realized that we can't just pick up artifacts and do nothing else. We should not fight with scientists, but cooperate,” says Davino.
Titanic: wreck site
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And it is not just words. Not long ago, government agencies like the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration did nothing but sue the RMS Titanic. Now yesterday's opponents are working together on long-term research projects, the goal of which is to create a protected conservation area at the crash site. "The trade-off between protecting the memorial and making a profit is not easy," admits maritime archaeologist Dave Conlin. - These businessmen had something to condemn for. But now they are worthy of respect.”
Scientists also liked the corporation’s decision to involve one of the world’s leading experts to analyze the 2010 images. Bill Sauder is a veritable walking encyclopedia on the subject. ocean liners Titanic class. Bill's title is project manager, but he prefers to call himself "the knowledge keeper about all sorts of things."
When we met in Atlanta, he, wearing thick glasses and looking like a gnome with a shaggy beard covering half his face, sat staring at the computer. On the screen were the wreckage of the Titanic's stern. During previous expeditions, the focus was almost always on the more photogenic bow, which lies to the north of the main body of remains. But Sauder suspects future research will shift toward the stern. “The nose looks cool, no doubt, but we’ve been there a hundred times already,” the scientist admits. “I’m much more interested in this junk on the south side.”
Bill tries to identify something in the pile of scrap metal. “Many people think that the wreck looks like the picturesque ruins of an ancient temple on a hill,” he says. - No matter how it is! They are much more reminiscent of an industrial dump: mountains of sheet metal, all sorts of rivets, spacers. Who will figure this out? Unless he’s a Picasso fan.”
Sauder enlarges the first image he comes across, and within a few minutes one of a thousand mysteries is solved. At the very top of the pile of rubble lies a twisted brass frame of a revolving door, apparently from the first class cabin. In general, you can sit on the “what is what” puzzle for more than one year. This is an incredibly labor-intensive job that only someone who knows every centimeter of the ship can handle.
At the end of October 2011, I attended a round table where James Cameron invited the most authoritative experts in the field marine research. In Manhattan Beach, California, in a film studio the size of an airplane hangar, Bill Sauder, RMC Titanic researcher Paul-Henri Narjolet, historian Don Lynch and marine artist Ken gathered among props salvaged from the filming of Titanic. Marshall, who has been involved with the Titanic for 40 years. They were joined by a naval engineer, an oceanographer from the Woods Hole Institution and two US Navy architects.
For the first time: a complete portrait of the legendary wreckage
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Cameron, by his own admission, is “so obsessed with the Titanic that he knows every rivet there.” The director has three expeditions to the crash site under his belt. He pioneered the development of a new class of small, remotely controlled robots that can film while detached from an underwater base and maneuvering through debris. Thus, for the first time, it was possible to photograph the interior of the Titanic with its luxurious Turkish bath and magnificent apartments (see “Walk on the Titanic”)
10 years ago, Cameron made a documentary about the remains of the German battleship Bismarck, sunk in 1941, and at the time of our meeting he was preparing to go down to the bottom alone, armed with a 3D camera. Mariana Trench. But the Titanic's spell continues unabated. “What we see down there at the bottom is a strange mixture of biology and architecture—I would call it a biomechanical environment,” says Cameron. - I think this is fantastic. It feels like the ship has plunged into Tartarus - into the kingdom of shadows.”
With two days at his disposal, Cameron decided to conduct something of a forensic examination. Why did the Titanic break in half? Where exactly did the body crack? At what angle did the debris fall to the bottom? “This is a crime scene,” Cameron says. - As soon as you realize this, you want to get to the bottom of the truth: how did this happen? Why was the knife here and the gun there?”
As you might expect, the experts immediately begin speaking in bird language. Without being an engineer, from all these “angles of incidence”, “shear forces” and “turbidity of the environment”, one thing can be understood: the last moments of the Titanic’s life were cruel, painful agony. You often hear that the waves “closed over the liner” and it “sank to the bottom of the ocean,” as if it had quietly and peacefully fallen into eternal sleep. Nothing like this! Based on the experience of many years of research, experts carried out computer modeling based on the finite element method. We now have a detailed understanding of the Titanic's death throes.
Late in the evening, at 23:40, the ship ripped open its starboard side on the edge of an iceberg. As a result, a 90-meter “laceration” was formed on the hull; six front waterproof compartments received holes and began to fill with water. From that moment on, the Titanic was doomed. But it is quite possible that his death was hastened by an unsuccessful attempt to put passengers into boats from a lower deck: the crew members opened the door to lower the ladder on the left side. As the ship began to list to port, it was no longer possible to overcome gravity and close the massive door again. The bow gradually sank down, and by 1:50 the water reached the open door and poured inside.
By 2:18 a.m., the Titanic's bow was filling with water and its stern was rising so high into the air that the propellers were exposed. Unable to withstand the monstrous pressure, the hull broke in half in the central part - just 13 minutes after the last boat left the Titanic.
Then Cameron stands up and demonstrates what it all looked like. Taking the banana in his hands, the director begins to break it: “Look how it bends and swells in the middle before it breaks - see?” The last thing to give in was the skin below - the double bottom of the vessel.
Having come off the stern, the bow sank to the bottom at a rather acute angle. As it sank, it picked up speed, losing various parts: smokestacks fell off, the wheelhouse collapsed. Five minutes later, the bow hit the bottom with such force that lumps of muddy mud were fanned out in all directions, traces of which are still visible today.
The stern was inferior to the bow in hydrodynamics. As she went to the bottom, she tumbled and spun in a spiral. Near the fault line, the hull cracked again, and soon a large fragment of the hull broke away from the stern and completely collapsed, all its contents spilling out. The compartments burst under air pressure. The decks were falling on top of each other. The steel plating of the hull was torn at the seams. The deck of the poop deck was bent by a screw. Heavier objects like steam boilers sank like stones, and everything else was scattered in different directions. Before reaching the bottom, the stern turned into a pile of scrap.
Mark on history
Cameron sits down and pops a piece of banana into his mouth. “We are all sorry that the Titanic fell apart in such an undignified manner,” he concludes. “I would like it to rest on the bottom unharmed, like a ghost ship.”
“Hundreds of living people could have remained inside. 100 years have passed since then, but it is still unbearable to imagine this picture.”
I listened to all these discussions, and the question was in my head: what was the fate of the people who were still on board when the Titanic began to sink? Most of the disaster's 1,496 victims died of hypothermia while floating in icy waters wearing cork life jackets. But hundreds of living people could remain inside - for the most part these were third class passengers, families of emigrants traveling to America in search of a better life. What happened to them in this metal hell? What did they hear and feel? 100 years have passed since then, but it is still unbearable to imagine this picture.
St. John's, Newfoundland. On June 8, 1912, a rescue ship returned here, picking up the last body of a passenger from the Titanic. For many months after the tragedy, the waves washed beach chairs, pieces of wooden wall paneling and other items from the ship onto the shores of the island.
I hoped that from here I would be able to fly to the crash site on an International Ice Patrol plane. This organization was created after the sinking of the Titanic to monitor icebergs along ship routes in the Atlantic Ocean. But, alas, due to the storm, all flights were canceled, and instead I headed to a beer hall, where they began to treat me to local vodka, which is made from water from a melted iceberg. For added effect, the bartender threw a piece of ice into my glass, telling me that it was from the same Greenland glacier that created the ice block that sank the Titanic.
South of St. John's, a desert rock juts out into the sea - Cape Race. A few years before the Titanic disaster, Guglielmo Marconi built a radio station here. According to local legend, the first to receive a distress signal from a sinking ship was Jim Myrick, a 14-year-old assistant radio operator. At first, there was the then generally accepted call for help - CQD. After some time, Cape Race received a new signal, which had hardly been used before - SOS.
I came to Cape Race to talk with David Myrick, Jim's great-nephew, among the remains of old Marconi apparatus and detector radios. David is a naval radio operator, the last representative of a glorious dynasty. According to him, his grandfather did not like to talk about that tragic night, and only in his old age began to indulge in memories. By that time, Jim had become deaf, so family members had to communicate with him using Morse code.
"Titanic" outside and inside: virtual tour on the famous liner
We went out to wander near the lighthouse and, stopping at the edge of the cliff, looked down for a long time at the icy waves crashing against the rocks. A tanker was visible in the distance. Even further, on the Great Newfoundland Bank, according to ice survey data, new icebergs appeared. And already very far away, beyond the horizon, lay the remains of the most famous ship in history. I thought about the thousands of signals that have crisscrossed the airwaves over the past 100 years. In this silent ocean of radio waves, an innumerable number of voices merged into one drawn-out cry. I imagined that I could hear the voice of the Titanic itself. The crown of the creation of human hands, bearing such a proud name, he rushed at full speed towards the brave new world. But an ancient element stood in the way of the ship to deal him a fatal blow.
A team of American researchers using sonar images and more than 100,000 photographs taken by underwater robots created detailed map location of the wreckage of the famous Titanic. The map shows hundreds of pieces of the Titanic's wreckage after the ship broke in half, sank and sank to the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean. The two halves of the Titanic rest almost half a mile apart, and the wreckage is scattered over a radius of 3-5 miles. Two special autonomous robots were used for filming. Moving along a given coordinate grid at a speed of 3 miles per hour, they scanned the ocean floor with sonar around the clock. The resulting 130,000 high-resolution images were then stitched together on a computer to create a detailed map of the location of the wreckage.
For nearly three-quarters of a century, the Titanic's exact location on the ocean floor was a mystery. However, even when researchers discovered the Titanic wreck in 1985, they could not fully understand what exactly happened at that time. terrible night when the liner sank.
Now by examining the location of all the wreckage, researchers can answer questions about how the ship broke apart, how it sank down, and whether there was a fatal flaw in its design. This detailed mapping of the area of the ocean floor where the Titanic's wreckage landed provides new clues to what happened. According to Dirk Hoogstra, senior vice president of RMS Titanic Inc. (the company that owns the rights to recover property from the Titanic): “We now have a vision of the complete picture of the entire accident, which no one has ever seen. With the data we now have, we are able to reconstruct exactly how the crash occurred. These are amazingly innovative things."
For example, characteristic marks on the bottom indicate that the stern part sank, rotating. Falling to a depth of 2.5 miles, the stern gained quite a lot of speed and buried itself deeply in the ground. The bow of the Titanic, on the contrary, plunged vertically downwards, but “landed” quite softly. Of course, it was already well known that the two halves of the ship's hull rested almost half a mile apart. However, previous maps of the wreckage were incomplete. As Parks Stephenson said, famous explorer history of the Titanic, navigating using old maps was like being in a dark room with a weak flashlight, but now it’s as if the light was turned on in this room. Nothing like this has ever been done before. Newly mapped features include a huge tangle of deckhouse debris, a large piece of the ship's side, a hatch cover that blew off the bow, the ship's five huge steam boilers, a revolving door, and even a lightning rod from the mast.
Full details of the research will be shown on the History Channel in a two-hour documentary film. The premiere is dedicated to the centenary famous shipwreck and will take place on April 15.
Those wishing to learn more about the tragedy can visit the RMS Titanic Inc. website. On the site you will make a virtual expedition to the legendary sunken steamship. “Diving” to a depth of two and a half miles, you can use photographs, video materials and 3D computer graphics to study in detail everything that remains of the Titanic.(jcomments on)