Delving into Titanic’s secrets

Brought live by Discovery channel, the telecast was marred by the simultaneous Hindi voice-over and many scientific facts went the Titanic way without leaving a trace. Using a number of satellites, the internet and sophisticated pressure-sealed submersibles, seven nations have joined hands in a journey to the past and to the oceanbed in trying to tell the world the final moments of the mishap and plot once and forall the final journey of the Titanic.

Currently, scientists can only theorise, and guess the ship either fell like a stone to the ocean floor, or gently fluttered like a leaf. Using the cutting edge of marine forensic science techniques to calculate how the ill-fated liner fell to the bottom of the sea, scientists plan to use a robotic arm to pincer out samples from the seabed, which will later be analysed.

If the samples are heavily compacted, scientists will be able to prove that the vessel hit the floor with a thud. By taking geological samples and also studying the ground around the wreck, scientists hope to determine how hard the ship hit the sea floor. The technique developed at Southampton in England will be used to investigate any future sinkings.

More than 1,500 people perished on the liner’s maiden voyage from Southampton in 1912. The Titanic had been hailed unsinkable, but sank just three hours after hitting an iceberg off the coast of Newfoundland. The wreck of the Titanic was found 13 yearsago, and several explorations have been carried out on it since.

But the current expedition is also raising criticism from some of the families of Titanic survivors and relatives of the victims. They say the site is the grave for more than 1,500 people and are calling on the team to leave the Titanic alone. Some scientists and historians have questioned the reasons for this expedition and say that the venture is more commercial than scientific.

The International Congress of Maritime Museums says none of its member institutions will show the artifacts until it is clear the items will not be sold for profit.

And critics say the live television broadcasts follow suspiciously close to the worldwide frenzy over the Hollywood film about the ship.

The expedition leaders, however, maintain that their goal is to record as much detail as possible about the Titanic before nature rusts it away to smithereens; and the television broadcast, they say, will be educational and aims to raise public awareness about animportant piece of nautical history.The Titanic went down the night an iceberg holed her through in five different compartments. She flooded, began to break into two and sank beneath the calm, cold sea. From that instant, she passed from the status of minor novelty to cultural icon and mythic symbol, according to the Discovery website.