
A never-before-seen view of the Titanic was shared
CONNECTICUT: A never-before-seen view of the Titanic luxury cruise ship that sank in 1986 has been shared by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI).
An 80-minute display was shared on the institution’s YouTube that recounted some of the extraordinary achievements of the expedition led by Robert Ballard.
The expedition saw the wreckage of the giant ship for the first time since it hit a large chunk of ice in the Atlantic Ocean before sinking about 2 hours later.
“We came in on the right side of the bridge beam. And the first thing I saw out of the gloom at 30 feet was this wall.
“This giant wall of riveted steel that rises over 100 feet above us. I never looked down on the Titanic. Nothing was small,” Ballard said.
The RMS Titanic sank while en route from Southampton, England to New York, in the Atlantic Ocean.
A total of 1,517 passengers and crew members became victims of the tragedy on the White Star Line ship.
Technical problems as well as the vast search area in the North Atlantic made it impossible to locate the wreck.
By 1985, WHOI developed new imaging technologies, including Argo, a camera sled that was towed from the Knorr research vessel and captured the first pictures of the vessel under more than 12,400 feet of water.
The footage was released to mark the 25th anniversary debut of the Academy Award-winning film, ‘Titanic’.
Ballard said that he was surprised by the size of the ship, the eerie atmosphere and seeing for himself the shoes of the victims who died in the tragedy.