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Quick answers
When and where did Titanic sink?
The ship struck an iceberg at about 23:40 on 14 April 1912 and sank at about 02:20 on 15 April in the North Atlantic. The British Wreck Commissioner’s report placed the loss at 41°46′N, 50°14′W.
How many people died?
Lord Mersey’s court recorded 1,490 lives lost. Other 1912 tallies ran higher; modern compilers often cite about 1,500 of roughly 2,200 aboard. About 710 people reached Carpathia. Figures still differ because crew and steerage lists were incomplete.
What did the official inquiries conclude?
Both the United States Senate inquiry and the British Wreck Commissioner found that the ship was driven too fast in an ice region, that lookout and wireless practice were inadequate, and that lifeboat capacity and loading failed the people on board. The British report dated 30 July 1912 blamed the collision on excessive speed.
Why were there too few lifeboats?
Board of Trade rules then scaled boatage to gross tonnage, not to the number of souls. Titanic’s twenty boats were legal. After 1912 the rule of boats for all became the political and then the treaty standard under SOLAS.
Was the ship officially called unsinkable?
No classification society certified Titanic as unsinkable. Trade-press and White Star publicity stressed watertight subdivision. The word stuck in English headlines after the wreck and became a lesson about marketing, not a hidden design stamp.
When was the wreck found?
On 1 September 1985 a joint expedition of the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and IFREMER located the wreck in two main pieces at about 3,800 metres. The United States later passed the RMS Titanic Memorial Act 1986 to treat the site as a memorial.
The story is a maiden commercial crossing, not a battle. White Star sold speed, scale and comfort on a route already thick with ice reports in April.
What turned a collision into a global case was the mismatch between legal boatage, wireless custom and the number of people the Olympic-class liners had begun to carry.
Beats
- A Belfast liner for the North Atlantic
Titanic was the second Olympic-class ship, built at Harland & Wolff for the Southampton–New York trade. Thomas Andrews sailed as the yard’s guarantee-group lead. J. Bruce Ismay, White Star’s chairman, was also aboard.
- Ice warnings on a clear night
Sunday 14 April brought a flat sea and a sky without moonlight. Ice messages reached the wireless room; not all reached the officers as a single plotted field. The ship stayed near full speed.
- The side-grazing blow
At about 23:40 the lookouts reported ice close ahead. The helm and engine orders did not clear the berg. Water entered forward compartments along the starboard side. Andrews told Smith the ship had only a short time.
- Boats away, rockets unread
Officers began loading boats after midnight. Many left underfilled. Distress rockets and CQD/SOS calls went out. Californian’s wireless was off. Carpathia answered and ran north.
- Dawn lists and two inquiries
Carpathia landed survivors in New York on 18 April. Senator Smith opened hearings the next day. London’s wreck court followed in May. The public story hardened around class, boats and a chairman in a lifeboat.
The night is remembered as romance and hubris. The record is a navigational and regulatory failure dated to 14–15 April 1912 and closed by two governments the same year.
Public-record encyclopedia. Not legal advice. Not a how-to. Graphic detail is withheld. Wars belong in a separate atlas.