Titanic 1912
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Marker: recorded wreck position (Steam era).
Key facts
| Name | Titanic | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Year lost | 1912 | Wikidata P576 dissolved/abolished/demolished date |
| Era | Steam era | derived from year |
| Ship type | four funnel liner | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Cause of loss | Ice | Wikidata P828 has cause (on P793 event): iceberg |
| Nationality / flag | United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland | Wikidata P8047 country of registry |
| Sea / ocean | North Atlantic Ocean | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Position | 41.7325, -49.9469 | Wikidata P793 significant event, coordinate qualifier (CC0) |
About the wreck
RMS Titanic was a British ocean liner that sank in the early hours of 15 April 1912 after striking an iceberg on her maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City. Of the 2,208 passengers and crew aboard, approximately 1,500 died (estimates vary), making the incident one of the deadliest peacetime sinkings of a single ship. Titanic, operated by White Star Line, carried some of the wealthiest people in the world, as well as hundreds of emigrants from the British Isles, Scandinavia, and elsewhere in Europe who were seeking a new life in the United States and Canada. The disaster drew public attention, spurred major changes in maritime safety regulations, and inspired a lasting legacy in popular culture. It was the second time White Star Line had lost a ship on her maiden voyage, the first being RMS Tayleur in 1854.
Titanic was the largest ship afloat upon entering service and the second of three Olympic-class ocean liners built for White Star Line. The ship was built by the Harland and Wolff shipbuilding company in Belfast. Thomas Andrews Jr., the chief naval architect of the shipyard, died in the disaster.
Diving & visiting
Titanic was long thought to have sunk in one piece and, over the years, many schemes were put forward for raising the wreck. None came to fruition. The fundamental problem was the sheer difficulty of finding and reaching a wreck that lies over 12,000 feet (3,700 m) below the surface, where the water pressure is over 5,300 pounds per square inch (37 megapascals), about 370 standard atmospheres. A number of expeditions were mounted to find Titanic but it was not until 1 September 1985 that a Franco-American expedition led by Jean-Louis Michel and Robert Ballard succeeded.
The team discovered that Titanic had in fact split apart, probably near or at the surface, before sinking to the seabed.
Location
- Recorded position: 41.7325, -49.9469 (Wikidata P793 significant event, coordinate qualifier (CC0); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: North Atlantic Ocean
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Titanic (revision 1375768600), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “Wreck”; condensed by selecting paragraphs and trimming at sentence boundaries; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
Nearby wrecks
- U-1229 1944 · 156 km
Browse more: Open ocean wrecks · North Atlantic Ocean · Steam era