There will be only a few people who have never heard of the name Titanic or don't know anything at all about the way she came to her tragic end. The legend and the mystique surrounding this ship has endured for 89 years, since she sank on that "Fatal Night" at 2.20 a.m. on Monday April 15th, 1912 on her maiden voyage with the loss of 1,523 lives after she brushed against an iceberg.

The Titanic broke in two and traveled 12,460 feet to the bottom of the North Atlantic ocean. There is also a third piece, part of the engine, within close range of the bow and stern. Until the mid 80's, the Titanic was left undisturbed, quiet in the rough waters.

No one else found the wreck until September 1st, 1985 when Dr. Robert D. Ballard led a team of researchers in an attempt to discover the Titanic. Ballard himself didn't take anything from the wreck, just taking photos and leaving two plaques in memory of the dead.

Why is it that the Titanic became famous? Was it the high death toll? Was it Titanic's magnificent splendour and famous passengers?
There have been other major shipping disasters, their death toll rivaling or exceeding the Titanic disaster:

• The 'Lusitania':
  The 'Lusitania' sank on May 7th, 1915 on its 202nd crossing of the Atlantic from New York to England, being loaded with meat, medical supplies, copper, cheese, oil and machinery, but she was also secretly loaded with munitions for Britain for the war. She carried 1,257 passengers, plus a crew of 702 and was under the command of Captain William Turner. With the coast of Ireland in site - about 17 kilometers away from Queenstown (Cobh) - she was torpedoed by the German U-boat 'U-20'. She sank in 18 short minutes taking 1,195 lives - 123 of them American. The 'Lusitania' was almost as richly decorated as the Titanic and it too carried some world famous people. A number of Americans were aboard, including the wealthy Alfred Vanderbilt and noted theatre producer Charles Frohman.
  The wreck of the 'Lusitania' was found by Dr. Robert D. Ballard.
  The 'Lusitania' docked in New York .
• The German battleship 'Bismarck':
  Also worthy of note is the sinking of the German battleship 'Bismarck' on May 27th, 1941. Following intense attack in the Atlantic ocean from British planes and four major British warships, it went under with the loss of some 2,100 men.

  H.M.S. 'Hood': May 24th, 1941 - Britain's largest battle cruiser, (44,600 tons) sunk by the German battleship 'Bismarck', commanded by Admiral Lütjens and captained by Captain Ernest Lindemann. In an early morning action in the Denmark Strait, between Iceland and Greenland, the 'Bismarck', accompanied by the cruiser 'Prince Eugen' (Captain Helmuth Brinkmann), were enroute from Bergen in Norway to the Atlantic when they intercepted the HMS 'Hood' , the HMS 'Prince of Wales' and six escorting destroyers. From 26,000 yards, the 'Bismarck' scored a direct hit in the magazine causing the 112 tons of explosives to blow up. The battleship, commanded by Vice Admiral Sir Lancelot Holland, went down in about four minutes. Of a crew of 1,419 (95 officers and 1,324 ratings and Royal Marines) there were only three survivors.

  The H.M.S. 'Hood'

  German battleship 'Bismarck': May 27th, 1941 - Hitler’s greatest warship, fully loaded she weighed 50,153 tons. After her encounter with the HMS 'Hood' she headed for St.Nazaire, the only port on the coast of France with a dry dock big enough to hold her. An order was given by Churchill to “Get the Bismarck”. The hunt for the battleship dominated the world’s press, the chase lasting four days and covering 1,750 sea miles. Spotted by a Coastal Command Catalina flying boat, her position was reported to the Royal Navy ships. Finally, on May 27th, the mighty battleship met her end after 277 days of war service. Severely damaged by salvos from the battleships HMS 'King George V' and HMS 'Rodney', she was finally sent to the bottom, about 1,000 kms west of Brest, by torpedoes from the cruiser HMS 'Dorsetshire'. Casualties amounted to 2,097 officers, men and cadets lost. There were 115 survivors, picked up by the HMS 'Dorsetshire' and the destroyer 'Maori'. In 1989, the wreck of the 'Bismarck' was found by Dr. Robert D. Ballard. She lies intact at 4,600 metres (15,000 ft.)

  The German battleship 'Bismarck'

• The 'Wilhelm Gustloff':
  On May 5th, 1938 Adolph Hitler launched the 'Wilhelm Gustloff', a propeganda cruise ship offering free vacations to hardworking factory workers.
  During WWII the 'Wilhelm Gustloff' was docked and served as a school for soldiers.
  At the end of WWII the 'Wilhelm Gustloff' was converted to a refugee ship and left the Baltic harbor of Gydnia (Gotenhafen) on January 30th, 1945 with almost 8,000 women, children and wounded soldiers. 376 women filled an empty swimming pool which served as a temporary dormatory.
  At shortly after nine o'clock in the evening, the 'Wilhelm Gustloff' was struck by three torpedoes from the Soviet submarine 'S-13' in the Baltic Sea between the Bay of Danzig and the Danish island of Bornholm. When the torpedos hit the 'Wilhelm Gustloff' the 376 women in the swimming pool where killed instantly. As the ship went down a few thousand people jumped into the frigid waters of the Baltic Sea. Convoy vessels were able to rescue only about 900 people from the sub-freezing Baltic waters.
  Bodies and wreckage floated onto German shores for almost a month later. The German government buried the dead in mass graves. Those gravesite's location is unknown. At least 5,400 people perished.
  
  The 'Wilhelm Gustloff' docked in Hamburg

• The 'General Steuben':
  Eleven days later, shortly after midnight on February 10th, 1945 the 'General Steuben' sank with a loss of 3,500 lives, making this the third worst maritime disaster in history. The same Soviet submarine 'S-13' that had attacked the 'Wilhelm Gustloff', and in almost the same location, sank the 'General Steuben' with two torpedoes. Crammed with as many as 5,000 wounded soldiers and refugees, the converted passenger liner sank in just seven minutes.
  The 'General Steuben'

• The 'Cap Arcona':
  Even more tragic is the case of the 'Cap Arcona', a 27,650-ton converted German passenger ship packed with evacuated concentration camp inmates. On May 3rd, 1945, just a week before the end of the war, it was sunk by fire from a British fighter-bomber as it was moored in Lübeck harbor. Some 5,000 persons, nearly all of them inmates, lost their lives. Only about 500 could be rescued.
  The 'Cap Arcona'

"I cannot imagine any condition that would cause a ship to founder. Modern shipbuilding has gone beyond that."
(Quote by: Titanic's Captain Edward John Smith)

Final resting place of the Titanic:

• Location: 1,000 miles due east of Boston, Massachusetts, and 375 miles southeast of St. John's, Newfoundland.
  
• Depth: 12,500 feet.
  
• Bow Section: 41°43'57" N, 49°56'49" W.
  
• Stern Section: 41°43'35" N, 49°56'54" W.
  
• Boilers: 41°43'32" N, 49°56'49" W.
  

The American author Morgan Robertson (1861 - 1915) published in 1898 the short fictional novel "Futility" in which a British passenger liner called the 'Titan' hits an iceberg and sinks on her maiden voyage without enough lifeboats in the month of April in the North Atlantic.

The fictional ship is eerily similar to the yet-to-be conceived Titanic in size, speed, equipment, numbers of passengers (both rich and poor), and those lost.
Both ships were British and sailed in April with a top speed of 24 knots. They had the same passenger and crew capacity of 3,000 but sailed with a little over 2,000. Also they were between 800 and 900 feet long and driven with triple propellers. Each also sank 95 miles south of the banks of Greenland.
Here's the most astonishing fact: both ships sank after being pierced by an iceberg on their starboard side.!.!.!

Kind of strange, don't you think? Especially when you remember that the novel was written 14 years before the Titanic disaster. When Robertson wrote "Futility", there were no ships anywhere near the size of the Titanic in use, or being built.
Robertson was trying to illustrate mankind's growing lack of respect for the forces of nature, and the increasingly dangerous reliance on technology with the novel.
The simularities between the real R.M.S. Titanic and Robertson's fictional S.S. Titan show up best in tabular form as shown below:

This website is dedicated to the eternal legacy of the RMS Titanic and to all of those who needlessly died one cold night in April, 1912...

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