Imperial Earth

On that day, he had been a boy on a distant world; but he could still remember when, after her three-hundred-and-fifty-year maiden voyage, the

Titanic had at last reached New York.

THE GHOST FROM THE GRAND BANKS

“They never built another one like her; she marked the end of an age-an age of wealth and elegance which was swept away, only two years later, by the first of the World Wars. Oh, they built faster and bigger, in the half century before air travel closed that chapter for all time. But no ship ever again matched the luxury you see around you now. It broke too many hearts when she was lost.”

Duncan could not believe it; he was still in a dream. The magnificent Grand

Saloon, with its vast mirrors, gilded columns, and ankle-deep carpet,

was opulent beyond anything he had ever imagined, and the sofa into which he was sinking made him almost forget the gravity of

Earth. Yet the most incredible fact of all was that everything he saw and touched had been lying for three and a half centuries on the bed of the

Atlantic.

He had not realized that the deep sea was almost as timeless as space. “All the damage,” the speaker had explained, “was done on that first morning.

When she sank, two and a half hours after the spur of ice ripped open the starboard hull, she went down bow first, almost vertically. Everything loose tumbled forward until it was either stopped by the bulkheads, or else smashed through them. By miraculous good luck-and this tells you how superbly she was built-all three engines remained in place. If they had gone, the hull would have been so badly damaged that we could never have salvaged her…. “But once she reached the bottom, three kilometers down, she was safe for centuries. The water there is only two degrees above freezing point; the combination of cold and pressure quenches all decay, inhibits all rust.

We’ve found meat in the refrigerators as fresh as when it left Southampton on April 10, 1912, and everything that was canned or bottled is still in perfect condition.

“When we’d patched her up-a straightforward job, though it took a year to plug all the holes and reinforce the weak spots-we blasted out the water with the zero-thrust cold rockets the deep sea salvage people have developed. Naturally, weather conditions were critical; by good luck, there was an ideal forecast for April 15, 2262, so she broke surface three hundred and fifty years to the very day after she sank. Conditions were identical-dead calm, freezing temperature-and you won’t believe this, but we had to avoid an iceberg when we started towingl

“So we brought her to New York, pumped her full of nitrogen to stop rusting, and slowly dried her out. ~Io problems here-the underwater archaeologists have preserved ships ten times older than Titaydc. It’s the sheer scale of the job that’s taken us fourteen years, and will

take us at least ten more. Thousands 175 of pieces of smashed furniture to be sorted out, hundreds of tons of coal to be moved-almost every lump by hand.

“And the dead… 158 so far. Only a few people were trapped in the ship.

Those in sealed compartments looked as if they had been drowned yesterday.

In the sections the fish could reach, there were only bones. We were able to identify several, from the cabin numbers and the White Star Line’s records. And that story you’ve heard is quite true: we found one couple still in each other’s arms. They were married-but each to someone else. And the two other partners survived; I wonder if they ever guessed? After three and a half centuries, it doesn’t much matter…. “Sometimes we’re asked-why are you doing this, devoting years of time and millions of so lars to-salvaging the past? Well, I can give you some down-to earth practical reasons: This ship is part of our history. We can better understand ourselves, and our civilization, when we study her.

Someone once said that a sunken ship is a time capsule, because it preserves all the artifacts of everyday life, exactly as they were at their last instant of use. And the Titanic was a cross-section of an entire society, at the unique moment before it started to dissolve.

“We have the stateroom of John Jacob Astor, with all the valuables and personal effects that the richest man of his age was taking to New York. He could have bought the Titanic-a dozen times over. And we have the tool kit that Pat O’Connor carried when he came aboard at Queenstown, hoping to find a better living in a land he was never to see. We even have the five sovereigns he had managed to save, after more years of hardship than we can ever imagine.

“These are the two extremes; between them we have every walk of life-a priceless treasure trove for the historian, the economist, the artist, the engineer. But beyond that there’s a magic about this ship which has kept its name fresh through all the centuries. The story of the

Titanies first and last voyage is one that has to be told anew in every generation, lest men forget the workings of fate and chance.