After resting on the ocean floor, split and rusting, for nearly three-quarters of a century, a great ship seemed to come alive again. The White Star liner Titanic, which struck an iceberg and sank on its maiden voyage in 1912, carrying more than 1,500 passengers to their death, has been celebrated in print and on film, in poetry and song. But last week what had been legendary suddenly became real. As they viewed videotapes and photographs of the ship, millions of people around the world could sense her mass, her quiet and the ruined splendor of a lost age.
Watching on television, they joined the undersea craft Alvin and Jason Jr.(J.J.) as they toured the wreckage of the luxury liner, wandering across the decks past corroded bollards and peering into the officer’s quarters. Views of the railings where doomed passengers and crewmembers stood evoked images of the moonless night 74 years ago when the great ship slipped beneath the waves.
The two-minute videotape and nine photographs, all in color and shot 12.500 ft. under the North Atlantic, were a tiny sample of 60 hours of video and 60,000 stills acquired during the twelve-day exploration. They are released at a Washington press conference conduced by Marine Geologist Robert Ballard, 44, who led the teams from an institution that found the Titanic and then revisited it.
Recounting the highlights of what has already become the most celebrated feat of underwater exploration, Ballard revealed some startling new information. His deep-diving craft failed to find the 300-ft. cut that, according to legend, wan torn in Titanic when the ship plowed into the iceberg. Instead, he suggested, the collision had buckled the ship’s plates, allowing water to pour in. He also brought back evidence that the ship broke apart not when she hit bottom, as he had thought when viewing the first Titanic images, but as she sank; the stern, which settled on the bottom almost 1,800 ft. from the bow, had swiveled 180 on its way down.
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