Titanic Fanatic

[lady cop]

i've had an abiding interest in the Titanic tragedy for most of my life.......here is a new item that caught my eye. anyone else here interested in Titanic legend and lore? ~~(sorry, i don't know why blue links don't work)~~~
Scientists Make Titanic DiscoveriesMonday, December 05, 2005

FALMOUTH, Mass. — Undersea explorers said Monday that the discovery of more wreckage from the Titanic suggests that the luxury liner broke into three sections — not two, as commonly thought — and thus sank faster than previously believed.
"The breakup and sinking of the Titanic has never been accurately depicted," Parks Stephenson, a Titanic historian, said at a conference at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute.
The ocean liner that was billed as "unsinkable" by its owner struck an iceberg on its maiden voyage and went down in the North Atlantic on April 14, 1912. About 1,500 people were killed.
Undersea explorer Robert Ballard located the bulk of the wreck in 1985, at a depth of 13,000 feet and about 380 miles southeast of Newfoundland. He declared that the ship had broken into two major sections, and that is the way the sinking was portrayed in the 1997 movie about he catastrophe.
However, the latest expedition, sponsored by the History Channel, found two hull pieces, each roughly 40 feet by 90 feet and lying about a third of a mile from the rest of the wreck. The explorers said the location of the wreckage indicates that the ship's bottom came off the ship intact — constituting a third major piece — and later broke in two.

[ComfortablyNumb]

It's a fascinating story.

Weird that the hull was like that, I always believed the thing about sealed compartments being flooded which tilted the whole ship.

Can't quite picture what happened now.

We had a great programme on the BBC a couple of years back when they showed the wreckage - it was spooky. Like a graveyard.

[The Red One]

I love the Titanic story. I read, listen, watch everything I can about it.

[lady cop]

the pic here is a rather grim takeoff on the silly movie, note the skeletons riding the bow. i read in recent years that it has been determined that rivets popped, as well as brittle fracture of the hull. i am very interested in the human interest stories of the passengers, wealthy and the poor in steerage.

[lady cop]

Originally Posted by The Red One

I love the Titanic story. I read, listen, watch everything I can about it.

have you ever read walter lord's 'a night to remember"? it was an old movie also. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

A Night to Remember (1958) A Night to Remember - Cast, Crew, Reviews, and Amazon.com: A Night to Remember: Books: Walter Lord

[The Red One]

No I haven't but I will definately look for it or see if the hubby can find it and get it where he works at. He works at a print on demand factory. Thanks for the suggestion! How long have you been a police officer?

[lady cop]

Originally Posted by The Red One

No I haven't but I will definately look for it or see if the hubby can find it and get it where he works at. He works at a print on demand factory. Thanks for the suggestion! How long have you been a police officer?

the book is a definitive work......... i've been a certified LEO for a number of years, i started out busting shoplifters undercover. but that's another thread!

[lady cop]

from today's CNN, more information...............Historian: 'It turns out the Titanic was more merciful'...

[Valerie100]

I've always been fascinated in the Titanic disaster myself. Did you know that there was a fictional book aboard the Titanic that detailed a ship's accident much like the actual sinking of the Titanic, itself? It was written in the late 1800's. I've heard this story and also watched it on Unsolved Mysteries, also.

I've heard -- and I don't know how true that this is -- that there was an Egyptian mummy onboard the Titanic when it sunk. Disturbed Egyptian tombs are supposed to have curses upon them.

There was also a worker aboard the Titanic who had survived two other oceanliner tragedies, only to end up dying in the Titanic disaster. That's fate, huh?

[Nearman]

Hello; I have been interested in the Titanic for quite some time and thought I may be able to contribute something.The novel by author Morgan Robertson, published in 1898, contained many very remarkable parallels to the actual case history of the Titanic disaster, some of which were that his fictional ship was named the "Titan", that she had a sister ship named the "Gigantic", which was actually the first choice for the Titanic"s sister ship, later renamed "Brittanic"[after the disaster], Titan and Titanic were both driven by three screws [propellers] which was not common at the time, length and tonnage of both were approximately the same,both struck an iceberg on their starboard side [in April!!] both carried about 2200 passengers [which was not their full capacity] and both had lifeboats for only half the passengers on board.He also wrote that her sister ship, Gigantic, struck a mine and sank bow first, exactly what happened to Brittannic during WW I....Almost unbelievable, but true.
I believe Ballard was aware of the broken center sections of the Titanic wreck, he mentions them in his book "Discovery of the Titanic" and they are sketched as part of the debris field in Charles Pellegrino"s excellent book "Ghosts of the Titanic".
Walter Lord dismisses the theory of "brittle steel" as a myth in his sequel book to "A Night To Remember".., "The Night Lives On"...indeed the engineers at Harland and Wolff shipyards still regard the Titanic as "the finest ship we ever built".Evidently the quality of the steel was equal to the technology of the day.
I personally find two aspects of the story particulary fascinating...if any of the following events that occurred that night would not have happened the ship probably would not have sunk or so many lives lost; a moonless very dark night, a virtually flat calm sea,the fact that the very first iceberg seen when entering a very large field of bergs was aimed directly at the bow and was by all accounts a "blue"or recently capsized berg,misplaced and undelivered iceberg warnings that the Captain was unaware of,the fact that a coalfire weakened firewall gave way that might have held the ship afloat longer.. perhaps indefinately..,and a complacent [or ignorant] Captain of a ship less than ten miles away did not react in any way to the information relayed to him that eight distress flares were being fired from a ship nearby that shortly disappeared.Also, the true story of Benjamin Guggenheim changing into his finest evening wear "to go down like a gentleman"appeals to me..,as does Mrs.Isador Strauss refusing to enter a lifeboat and choosing to die with her husband instead..Hope this may be of interest to someone................