More than a year after the loss of the Titan submersible and its five passengers, a new expedition to the wreck of the Titanic and its immediate surroundings brought new high-definition images to the surface as the legendary ocean liner continued to decay.
After 14 years, RMS Titanic Inc., the company that holds the legal rights to the Titanic, returned to the famous wreck to collect over 2 million images and hours of footage using unmanned submersibles.
A major objective of the month-long expedition was mapping the debris field around the wreck to locate valuable artifacts scattered across the sea floor.
According to the company, the Titanic was amply decorated with fine art. On its 1912 maiden voyage, the “unsinkable” passenger ship hit an iceberg and broke in half, claiming 1504 lives, sinking to the ocean floor, and scattering artifacts and debris over a relatively wide area.
Though many of the valuables were made of organic materials and have since perished after many decades submerged in the hostile North Atlantic environment, the company was happy to announce that it had managed to map “countless artifacts” for future recovery.
The most significant discovery was probably a 2-foot-tall bronze statuette of the Roman goddess Diana, known as “Diana of Versailles.” The figure sat atop the fireplace mantle in the First Class Lounge, which was torn open during the calamity.
“Following 112 years on the ocean floor and a brief sighting in 1986, she is still resting upright among miles of debris,” the company said in an Instagram post. “Like the eternal Roman deities, she is timeless—and she is rediscovered thanks to Expedition 2024.”
Unfortunately, the ship itself will not be timeless.
The most shocking revelation concerns the Titanic’s iconic forecastle deck, immortalized in John Carpenter’s 1997 eponymous silver screen classic.
Footage taken on July 29 revealed that a 15-foot piece of the ship’s bow railing on the port side was gone.
The missing part was found lying as one piece on the sea floor, directly below where it once was.
“We are saddened by this loss and the inevitable decay of the ship and the debris,” RMS Titanic Inc. said in a statement on its website. “Although Titanic’s collapse is inevitable, this evidence strengthens our mission to preserve and document what we can before it is too late.”
The company said that it would conduct a more thorough review of the ship’s deterioration in the coming months.
The Titanic Expedition 2024 left port on July 15 to spend 20 days at the site and returned to Providence, Rhode Island, on Aug. 9. It involved world-renowned scientists, oceanographers, naval architects, microbial biologists, metallurgists, historians, and other experts.
The expedition was the company’s ninth visit to the wreck since 1987, almost 40 years ago.
In June 2023, a submersible visited the wreck and collapsed under the high pressures at deep sea level, killing all five onboard. The precise cause of the accident is still under investigation. The family of one of the victims, French explorer Paul-Henri Nargeolet, has since filed a lawsuit, accusing the vessel’s manufacturer and operator of gross negligence.