Page 8 - National Geographic - Whats Destroying Titanic 2004

FAli-ED N4ANEUVER Near midnight on April 14, 1912, a lookout in the crow's nest spots an iceberg dead ahead. Titanic is steered hard to port too late to avoid the floating ice, which rup- tures the ship's starboard side beneath the waterline. UNrHlt\iKABLE Watertight bulkheads fail to keep the sea from flooding one compartment after another and the bow plunges as it fills with water. Passengers desperately scramble aft as the stern is wrenched aloft. With the stern rising higher and higher, Titanic\ hull buckles in a weak area aft of the third funnel. UOW Do\r'JN The forward section of the ship breaks free and hurtles toward the bottom (right), where it plows into the seafloor and pushes up a wake of mud that conceals the iceberg damage (belowl. Despite the impact, the bow section remains relatively intact. The stern remains afloat for a time, with doomed passengers clinging to it in final moments of terror. Then it dives two and a half miles to the seabed. See an animation of this art depicting the sinking 0f Titanic al nationalgeographi c.com / magazine / 0412.