What happened to the wreck of the Titanic?

Answer 1

Nothing's happened to it, it's still there, 2 and a half miles down on the bed of the North Atlantic, split in two and with the two halves about a third of a mile apart from each other, facing in opposite directions. Between the two parts lies a massive debris field of hull fragments, fixtures & fittings, machinery, furniture, personal effects, and a huge quantity of coal. The stern section is devastated, having more or less been blown apart when it hit the sea bed and with the decks collapsing down upon each other- it actually looks quite grotesque.

In 1929, there was an undersea earthquake in the vicinity of the wreck site, and there were fears that this may have destroyed the wreck, but this turned out not to have been the case.

Since it's discovery by Dr.Robert Ballard and his team in 1985, successive raids have been made on the wreck by salvagers, who have brought up a considerable number of items such as the telemotor wheel mounting, the foremast running light, Captain Smith's megaphone, pieces of hull, utensils and cutlery, sealed bottles of champagne, and (disgustingly) even some passenger's belongings such as shoes and hairbrushes. Ballard has always condemned the removal of items from the wreck site other than the occasional piece of coal- the salvagers have been quite ruthless and disrespectful in their treatment of what is essentially a mass grave, damaging the crow's nest and breaking pieces of the deck caulking off. The most notorious raid was by a French team in 1987, which recovered a safe that was opened live on American TV in a show hosted by the late Telly Savalas (who should have known better than to get involved). The Titanic victims had the last laugh though- the safe was completely empty!!

Robert Ballard campaigned to get the wreck site protected as a grave site by the United States Government, and in 1996 this was done. It is now illegal to remove any further artefacts from the Titanic, and all items that have already been recovered cannot be sold privately- they have to either remain on display in museums, be kept in storage, or returned to the wreck site. You do still occasionally find bits of coal or deck caulking for sale on eBay, but these can't really be considered artefacts- they're either fuel or small particles of a much larger structure.

James Cameron, director of the film Titanic, launched his own exploration of the wreck and filmed it in a documentary callled Ghosts Of The Abyss. He found out that parts of the interior of the main section are actually better preserved than was thought, including the First Class Smoking Room.

However, Ballard and other marine archaeologists have expressed concern in recent years that the Titanic is deteriorating faster than expected, and have called upon it to be protected by UNESCO- however, it's difficult to know quite how this can be achieved given the immense depth at which she lies. However, one thing is quite certain- she will never be raised. Apart from the fact that she is a protected grave site, it would be all but technically impossible, as she is so huge a vessel and now in such a fragile state. She will lie where she is forever, slowly rotting and disintegrating over the Centuries until in the end, only a heap of rust will remain.

Answer 2

It failed