When was the wreckage of the titanic first discovered

Seventy-three years after it sank to the North Atlantic ocean floor, a joint U. The sunken liner was about miles east of Newfoundland in the North Atlantic, some 13, feet below the surface. Efforts to locate and salvage the Titanic began almost immediately after it sank.

But technical limitations—as well as the sheer vastness of the North Atlantic search area—made it extremely difficult. American oceanographer and former Navy officer Robert D. Ballard , who was based out of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, led his first search expedition in , which was unsuccessful. In , along with French oceanographer Jean-Louis Michel, Ballard again set out to locate the wreck, this time with an experimental, unmanned submersible called the Argo , developed by the U.

The Argo traveled just above the ocean floor, sending photographs up to the research vessel Knorr. The next day, the body of the ship was discovered nearby.

It had split in two, but many of its features and interiors were remarkably well-preserved. Hundreds of thousands of bits of debris were scattered in a 2-square-mile radius around the ship. The wreck was subsequently explored by manned and unmanned submersibles, which shed new light on the details of its sinking. The Titanic is now routinely explored, and several thousand artifacts have been recovered.

During subsequent dives in and near the Galapagos Rift, Ballard helped discover hydrothermal vents , which led in turn to the discovery of the amazing plants that grew around these vents. Scientific analysis of these plants led to the discovery of chemosynthesis, a process in which plants use chemical reactions rather than sunlight to get energy. However many shipwrecks Ballard explored and however much of the ocean floor he mapped, Ballard never forgot about the Titanic.

Everest in my world—one of those mountains that had never been climbed. Over the years, there had been several teams that had set out to find the wreckage of the famous ship; three of them had been funded by millionaire oilman Jack Grimm.

On his last expedition in , Grimm had taken an underwater picture of what he believed to be a propeller from the Titanic ; others believed it was only a rock. The hunt for the Titanic was to continue, this time with Ballard.

But first, he needed funding. Given Ballard's history with the U. Navy, he decided to ask them to fund his expedition.

They agreed, but not because they had a vested interest in finding the long-lost ship. Instead, the Navy wanted to use the technology Ballard would create to also help them find and investigate the wreckage of two nuclear submarines the USS Thresher and the USS Scorpion that had been mysteriously lost in the s.

Amazingly, Ballard maintained the secrecy of his mission even as he built the technology and used it to find and explore the remains of the USS Thresher and the remains of the USS Scorpion. While Ballard was investigating these wreckages, he learned more about debris fields, which would prove crucial in finding the Titanic. Once his secret mission was complete, Ballard was able to focus on searching for the Titanic.

However, he now had only two weeks in which to do it. It was late August when Ballard finally began his search. He had invited a French research team, led by Jean-Louis Michel, to join this expedition. While previous expeditions had used close sweeps of the ocean floor to search for the Titanic , Ballard decided to conduct mile-wide sweeps in order to cover more area. He was able to do this for two reasons. Read full article.

More content below. Robert Ballard. Ross McGuinness. In this article:. United States Navy officer, oceanographer and underwater archaeologist. The port bow railing of the Titanic lies in 13,ft of water off the coast of Newfoundland, Canada. The port bow railing of the wreck of the Titanic. The Titanic leaving Southampton on its maiden voyage in AP Photo.

Story continues. Oceanographer Robert Ballard led the team that discovered the wreckage of the Titanic in PA Images via Getty Images. A boiler from the wreck of the Titanic lies on the ocean floor off Newfoundland. Our goal is to create a safe and engaging place for users to connect over interests and passions.

To make matters worse, not all of the lifeboats were filled to capacity during the desperate evacuation of the doomed ship. Hundreds of people may also have died inside the ship as it sank, most of them immigrant families in steerage class, looking forward to a new life in America. Along with the lives lost, something else went down with the Titanic: An illusion of orderliness, a faith in technological progress, a yearning for the future that, as Europe drifted toward full-scale war, was soon replaced by fears and dreads all too familiar to our modern world.

Test your knowledge of the famous ship. Wireless radio! Everything seemed so wondrous, on an endless upward spiral. Then it all came crashing down. All rights reserved. Scientists expect the erosion of the Titanic to continue. Share Tweet Email. Why it's so hard to treat pain in infants. This wild African cat has adapted to life in a big city. Animals Wild Cities This wild African cat has adapted to life in a big city Caracals have learned to hunt around the urban edges of Cape Town, though the predator faces many threats, such as getting hit by cars.

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