Visits Are Damaging Titanic

Painting by Ken Marschall, courtesy of Madison Press Books

Submarines frequently crashing into the Titanic and crushing the deck is a big problem. The explorer who found her in 1985 is working on a treaty to protect her and establishing rules for visiting.

From: Guardian: Visits damaging Titanic


The explorer who found the remains of the Titanic nearly two decades ago has complained about the damage done by visitors and souvenir hunters.

"We saw numerous cases where submarines had struck the Titanic ... oval shapes where they had landed and crushed the deck," Mr Ballard said in a telephone interview.

He is working on a treaty designating the ship an international maritime memorial and establishing rules for visiting without causing damage.

Titanic's remains has become a popular place to visit after she got discovered in 1985. As we all know, she went down with more than 1,500 people in 1912 after colliding with an iceberg.


And now souvenir hunters are bugging her and giving her headaches. Why can't they just leave her alone?

[edit on 2006/4/30 by Hellmutt]

This is a nice slides video.


"Titanic Tragedy"

The interior include some photos inside the Olympic

Wow.. I can't believe that people do this :\
It's an artifact.. an historic boat! We need to make sure nothing happens to it and collect the most of it (for researches) before we break it!

oh well!
Thanks for posting!

Its a ship wreck.
That stuff isn't doing anybody any good laying on the bottom of the sea. This is stupid. Bring that stuff up, put it in a museum, or auction it off and give the proceeds to the poor.

Why leave it there just so future generations can plunder the booty.

If someone wants to expend the money and energy to recover this stuff, good for them. Mel Fisher was allowed to get rich of the Atocha and Santa Margarita.

I know...I don't have a sentimental bone in my body. That's my view on the matter.



[edit on 5/5/2010 by Sparky63]

This is sad, very sad indeed. As a titaniic buff myself, I do hope they find a way to at least protect it from submarine damage. Robert Ballard should of claimed rights to protect the ship when he discovered it. That ship is also a part of my family history and I feel a great connection to it.

reply to post by Hellmutt


Are we sure this isn't a bit of much ado about, uh....nothing?

Nearly a century, now, she has been down there, rotting away. I really doubt there will be much of anyting left, even barring any further disturbances by Humans, in another few decades....

Certainly, LEAVE THE WRECK alone, absolutely...because it is not only a shipwreck but also a tomb.

However, some careful, detailed studies could still be carried out, to ascertain for certain the circumstances of her 'death'....altough, I believe that most questions of that sort have been answered, by now.

At least, from the several documentaries I have viewed, over the last several years, that is my impression.


A MAJOR finding, to help explain the mystery, involved the metallurgy of the steel and iron she was constructed with ( terrible, metalurgically, is the consensus --- full of impurities ) along with the (unknown, at the time) effects of the cold water on the steel's tensile strength....just TWO things I recall, off top of my head, from the TV shows.

Oh, one other aspect was in the design, itself, based on studies made of her sister ships, the HMHS Britannic and Olympic.

en.wikipedia.org...

reply to post by weedwhacker

My sentiments exactly, it won't be there much longer whether humans interfere or not.

Regarding the causes for the disaster, those are the same reasons I recall, the steel properties, (not just the hull, but also the rivets) and the design of the compartments didn't isolate them from flooding each other like they expected..

Plus the third cause was human factors: The captain didn't see any need to travel at a cautious speed even though he knew about the possibility of icebergs, so he was probably going too fast for the conditions and the warning technology they had. It reminds me of a drivers training course I had where they advised that seeing distance=stopping distance, not a bad idea when you think about it for ships or cars. I think the Titanic disaster as well as some car crashes result from not following this simple rule.

i'm a mega-titanic buff and side with those who wish it left alone.it is considered not only a ship wreck, but it's also a grave AND a memorial to all persons invovled that night. same as jackin with a loved-one's burial site. chippin' their headstone and knockin holes in their coffin and what not...

the other fatality was reversiving the engines in addition to trying to turn. either one of those choices alone would have turned out better than the combination of the two.

S

[edit on 5-5-2010 by contrafear]

[edit on 5-5-2010 by contrafear]

reply to post by Arbitrageur


Yes...Captain Smith suffered from a typical Human trait --- hubris.

He took a calcualted risk, betting that his course was sufficiently south enough to be iceberg-free. He also hoped, on the maiden voyage, to set a sort of record for the crossing, in terms of time....(now, that may be an urban legend, but it sounds good a sany explanation). White Star may have played a role, too, in hoping for good publicity...

( I fear I might be channeling the James Cameron movie, now...others who are moe expert can feel free to pop in, and correct if needed.... )

I say we just rebuild it to the exact specifications (I'm sure they still have the blue prints).

and then send it out to sea again, but equip with a mounted automatic laser cannon capable of obliterating an iceberg.

Problem solved.