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ABOARD THE JEAN CHARCOT – Yes, things really do go “bump in the night” out at sea. In this case it was my head. Ouch!
Rough seas last night almost rolled me out of my bunk. My head took a wallop against the bulk head, but I’m OK.
Wednesday morning could not be more glorious. We’re one-and-half time zones east of New York. The temperature is in the mid 60’s with a gentle breeze, and there’s an air of excitement as we near the site of the Titanic’s wreckage.
By Dwaine Scott/NBC News
Sunrise seen from the deck of the Jean Charcot in the North Atlantic enroute to explore the wreckage of the Titanic.
Among those onboard is Billy Lange from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. He was the first to spot the wreckage in 1985.
He says he could not have imagined back then that he’d return with the gear he has onboard, and for good reason: the high-tech, HD 3-D equipment he will deploy into the depths of the North Atlantic was not yet invented 25 years ago.
When the research team arrives at the wreck site, it plans to pause in silence to remember those who died. The team has brought flowers to toss into the same frigid waters where more than 1,500 souls were lost when the ship hit an iceberg and sank on April 15, 1912.
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Keeping an eye out for bad weather
The captain of the Jean Charcot research vessel has one eye on the ship’s weather charts and radar. Hurricane Danielle may move east of Bermuda and follow the warm waters of the Gulf Stream. The Gulf Stream could provide a highway for the storm to the spot we’re headed.
If there were an emergency order to evacuate, the research team says that its autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs), which are akin to a torpedo, could remain in the water-gathering data.
There is a remotely operated underwater vehicle (ROV) tethered to the Jean Charcot which would have to be retrieved and then we’d move as quickly as we can to safety.
Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.
If you’d like to follow some updates from the expedition team members, click on: facebook.com/RMSTitanicinc.
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Hi! FYI, Expedition Titanic is also posting live updates to Twitter: @RMS_Titanic_Inc
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Great coverage, thanks!
I'm sorry.. but can someone tell me why we are still .. going after peices of the Titanic? Were so facinated with this one, what about all the other sunken ships that must be out there?
Just wondering, I'm curious.
The story of this fabled but doomed ship continues to fascinate us 98 years since the tragic event occurred. That we now have such amazing technology at our disposal is asurance that the world will have a permanent visual record of the ship's remains before it ultimately dissolves into the waters that initially consumed it. The 1507 souls who perished that night could never have known how the tragedy captivated the world in the century that followed. Peace to them and to the current expeditiion.
Prometheus
Heather,
All famous shipwrecks have both an historical and a human perspective regarding the events that led to the loss of the ship and those aboard. The Titanic wreck fascinates because of the circumstances that surround it: namely the hubris involved in declarations that she was 'unsinkable', the fact that this was the world's largest most luxurious ship making her maiden voyage with many wealthy and famous people on board and mistakes made by the captain Smith who was making his last transatlantic trip after 50 years at sea. The tremendous loss of life led to changes in the way all passenger ships were designed and outfitted with regard to life jackets, equipment and lifeboats.
This expedition is not for retreival of artifacts, it is for the comprehensive documentation of the ship's fragile condition with high definition 3-D video so that the world will have a record of the ship before it dissolves into the seawater that is slowly claiming it. I'm sure that other famous wrecks such as the Bismarck and the Lusittania will be recoded in a similar fashion in the years to come.
Prometheus
Honestly are we fascinated by the true Titanic or the movie? The Titanic is history and we can't afford to be living in the past. How much more are we suppose to learn from this shipwreck other than she sunk, time to move on, comprende.
Will this expedition respect the Titanic's wreckage and debris field as a graveyard; and if it takes artifacts will it record their locations and conditions as would be done with an academic archaeological excavation?
I think the technology behind this is cool. But i was Titanic'd out after Cameron's films and all the specials since.
I really wish they could bring up a section of the ship to perserve it for all man kind to peer into what was one of the most historical ships, I myself am really fascinated with anything historic like this, to think they made something so fascinating back in the old glory days.
this is the problem with the world today, every thing is a graveyard to be perserved. for what? take the photos and that's that get that salvage off the bottom and not just this ship who's going out there and unless you have a sub and big money nobody is going to see anything but the movies and photos. you found it, yea it sank, people died. 100yrs ago. and in 200yrs someone will get funding from the gov. to go look at the same rust spot on the bottom just to see if it's still there, moving on........
I understand the reverence and historical significance bestowed upon the Titanic, but the unbelievable amounts of money that are being spent to continue to visit the wreckage, diagram it, photograph it, explore it, etc. is staggering. In a time where our country is further in debt than ever before, where other countries are experiencing the same financial woes, why are we spending such astronomical amounts of money to keep analyzing this wreck?? I belive the "mystery" has been solved long ago, we know why the ship sunk, we know how many lives were lost, we know what the entire ship looked like before and after the wreck. This money could be focused so much more effectively on researching things that are currently affecting society, like cancer research, AIDS research, finding a cure for these and other diseases. But instead we continue to spend millions on looking at a ship that wrecked decades ago. Ridiculous.