Experts explain the reason why people are still fascinated with the Titanic over one hundred years later

It was over a hundred years ago since the sinking of the Titanic ship but people are still fascinated by the disaster. The disaster claimed the lives of over 1,500 passengers and crew people on board.

The Titanic has now claimed five more lives from the passengers on board the Titan submersible. In a press conference on Thursday the rescue crew announced that all five passengers Stockton Rush, Hamish Harding, Paul-Henri Nargeolet, Shahzada Dawood and his son Suleman Dawood on board were lost after the vessel imploded.

On April 15 1912 the Titanic nicknamed the ‘unsinkable-ship’ sank. It was on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York. After hitting an iceberg the ship broke in two parts and sank 12,00ft down to the bottom of the ocean. 

The wreckage was discovered in 1985 off the coast of Newfoundland. Many shipwrecks have been lost in history without any sign of anything which has made people even more fascinated with it. 

The fascination of the history of our ancestors gives the emotional connection for people that lost family members in the disaster. Elderly people that were alive at the time of the event have passed down their stories through the generations. 

According to The Washington Post researchers believe that the fascination is a result of a human interest in the passengers’ stories and the unique circumstances surrounding the shipwreck.

Expert Don Lynch from the Titanic Historian Society explains:“People are fascinated by the Titanic today for the same reasons they’ve always been.”

“The largest ocean liner in the world, on its maiden voyage, supposedly unsinkable, loaded with some of the most famous names of the day, hits an iceberg all on its own, and then sinks so slowly there is a lot of time for drama and heroism to be acted out. If it was written as fiction, no one would believe it could have actually happened.” 

The Titanic story was turned into a Hollywood movie, directed by James Cameron who himself has been down to the wreckage many times. It has also been made into a TV series, countless documentaries and many books. 

Stephen Cox, a retired professor of literature at the University of California at San Diego and author of ‘The Titanic Story: Hard Choices’, Dangerous Decisions explained the following: “Usually if a ship is going to sink, it sinks pretty quickly. Titanic lasted for two hours and 40 minutes, which is as long as a Shakespeare play.”

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration a team recovered approximately 1,800 conserved artefacts that have been recovered from the wreckage. Many of these items have been given to history museums with a few being sold to the public with people wanting to own a piece of history. 

Many scientists and experts have dedicated their lives to understanding exactly what happened, why it happened and if the disaster could have been avoided. The same questions people will be asking about the Titan submersible catastrophe.