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• 1909 - April 11, 1912

  • 1909

    Construction begins on the Titanic at the Harland and Wolff shipyard on Queen's Island in Belfast, Ireland. The slipway used to build the Titanic is the biggest ever constructed, taking up three of the existing slipways at the shipyard. Construction results in 246 injuries and eight deaths.

  • May 31, 1911

    The Titanic hits the water for the first time in front of about 100,000 spectators. The ship is then towed out to a spot where her engines, funnels and other parts can be installed and the interior finished.

  • April 2, 1912

    

    The first sea trial of the ship involves 12 hours of testing. The ship is sailed at different speeds, turned and stopped. Overall it goes about 125 kilometers (80 miles) during the tests and returns to Belfast to have the paperwork signed declaring the ship seaworthy.

    Credit: U.S. National Archives and Records Administration/Wikimedia Commons

  • April 10, 1912

    

    The Titanic sets off on its maiden voyage from Southampton in England to New York City.

    As the ship leaves the dock, it is so big that it pushes many of the smaller ships up and then down into the trough of its wake. One ship, the New York, breaks away from its cables as it is pulled into the wake, almost colliding with the Titanic. It takes about an hour to get the New York under control and the Titanic out of the docks.

    The ship picks up additional passengers in Cherbourg, France, and later that evening sets out for Queenstown, Ireland.

    Credit: Wikimedia Commons

  • April 11, 1912

    The Titanic makes a safe stop in Queenstown, Ireland to pick up more passengers and mail, and then at 1:30 P.M. heads out across the Atlantic Ocean toward New York.

• April 14, 1912

  • The Titanic gets warnings from other ships that there is ice drifting around Newfoundland:

    9 A.M.

    Captain, Titanic:
    Westbound streamers report bergs, growlers and field ice in 42’ N., from 49’ to 51’ W., April 12.
    Compliments Barr

  • 1:42 P.M.

    Capt. Smith, Titanic:
    Have had moderate variable winds and clear fine weather since leaving. Greek steamer "Athinai" reports passing icebergs and large quantity of field ice today in latitude 41.51 north, longitude 49.52 west.... Wish you and Titanic all success.
    Commander

  • 1:45 P.M.

    "Amerika" passed two large icebergs in 41.27 N., 50.8 W., on April 14

  • 9:40 P.M.

    From “Mesaba” to “Titanic” and all east-bound ships:
    Ice report in latitude 42º N. to 41º 25’ N., longitude 49º W to longitude 50º 30’ W. Saw much heavy pack ice and great number large icebergs. Also field ice. Weather good, clear.

  • 11:00 P.M.

    Titanic begins to receive a sixth message about ice in the area, and radio operator Jack Phillips cuts it off, telling the operator from the other ship to “shut up.”

  • 11:40 P.M.

    

    Frederick Fleet, the lookout in the crow’s nest, spots an object ahead, rings the warning bell three times, and calls down to the bridge to say “iceberg right ahead!” William Murdoch, the first officer on duty, gives the command to turn the ship hard.

    Thirty-seven seconds later, the Titanic hits the iceberg on its starboard side. The ice bashes several holes along the side of the ship. After 10 minutes, the water pouring in is 4.3 meters above the keel in the forward compartments.

    Credit: Wikimedia Commons

• April 15, 1912

  • 12:15 A.M.

    

    Phillips types out “CQD”—the international distress call at the time—“MGY” the Titanic's call letters, and the ship's position. Captain Edward John Smith orders the crew to get the lifeboats and begin boarding women and children first.

    Credit: Wikimedia Commons

  • 12:20 A.M.

    Lifeboats begin to be lowered from the deck into the water. The noise of the steam escaping from the vents on the deck is so loud that the man in charge of directing lifeboat operations has to use his hands to give directions.

  • 12:25 A.M.

    The Carpathia, a ship nearby, is alerted to the emergency. Its captain, Arthur H. Rostron, wires that he is coming to their rescue. The Carpathia is only 93 kilometers away.

  • 12:45 A.M.

    Phillips switches from using CQD to SOS, the new international distress signal. This is only the second time the SOS code has been used since its approval. Another officer begins to send up distress rockets to try and alert other ships.

  • 2:20 A.M.

    The last of the Titanic disappears under the water. The U.S. puts the death toll at 1,517 passengers and crew, the British at 1,503. Final figures cannot be known because official counts are done only after a ship reaches its destination to account for stowaways and passenger movement at ports.

  • 4:00 A.M.

    

    The Carpathia arrives at the site of the sinking. The surviving passengers and crew, 710 in all, board the ship and head for New York.

    Credit: Wikimedia Commons

• April 15-16, 1912

  • 

    News of the Titanic’s fate reaches the mainland, and thousands of people flood the offices of the ship company, White Star Line, trying to find out if their friends and family have survived the trip.

    Wikimedia Commons

• April 18, 1912

  • 9:30 P.M.

    

    Carpathia docks at Pier 54 in New York City before a crowd of people numbering 40,000, despite a heavy rain. Aid organizations have blankets and clothes for the surviving passengers. The Carpathia is quickly restocked to resume her trip to Fiume, Austria–Hungary, and her crew is given a bonus.

    Credit: Wikimedia Commons

• 1914 - 1970s

  • 1914

    Charles Smith, an architect, proposes to attach electromagnets to a submarine to pull the wreck of the Titanic from the bottom.

  • July 1953

    Risdon Beazley, a salvage company, set out on a secret mission to try and salvage the Titanic. Their ship was reported to have dropped explosives overboard to detonate on the seafloor, the idea being to blow up the hull and retrieve objects from the interior. Beazley fails to find the Titanic.

  • 1954

    Risdon Beazley tries to find, and blow up the Titanic again, and again fails.

  • 1960s

    Douglas Woolley, a hosiery worker, proposes to find the Titanic and raise it using nylon balloons attached to her hull. They abandon the plan after they cannot figure out how to inflate the balloons once they are attached to the hull.

  • 1970s

    More proposals surface for how to retrieve the Titanic, assuming it is found. One suggests pumping 165,000 metric tons of molten wax or Vaseline into the ship. Another proposes to encase the ship in a buoyant jacket of ice, turning her into an iceberg that would float. Another suggests filling her with Ping-Pong balls.

• 1980s

  • July 17, 1980

    Jack Grimm sets off from Florida to look for the Titanic, equipped with wide-sweeping sonar, and a pet monkey named Titan—although the scientists onboard demand he leave Titan behind. But despite their technology, they fail to find the wreck.

  • June 1981

    Grimm tries again to find the Titanic, this time with a more powerful sonar device. With it, they spot something that looks like a propeller. Grimm is convinced it is the ship, but the scientists on board have doubts.

  • July 1983

    Grimm returns for a third time to look again at the propeller. They find nothing.

  • 1984

    Researchers commissioned jointly by the U.S. Navy and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution set out to find and map two sunken nuclear submarines lost in the same area. They find that as a submarine sinks, parts and contents of the ship spread across a wide area into a debris field far larger than the size of the ship—a clue important for figuring out how the Titanic debris might have scattered.

  • July 1985

    The second expedition to map these nuclear submarines launches. The U.S. Navy agrees to let oceanographer Robert Ballard look for the Titanic in whatever time he has left after mapping the submarines. This gives him 12 days to find the wreck that has been lost for 73 years.

  • September 1, 1985

    

    Man-made debris begins to appear on the cameras, eventually leading Ballard and his team to the hull of the Titanic.

    Credit: Erik Charlton/Wikimedia Commons

  • July 1986

    Ballard returns to the Titanic with Alvin, a deep-diving submersible, and Jason, a remotely operated vehicle, to take pictures of the wreck.

  • 1987

    Two partners, John Joslyn and George Tulloch, found RMS Titanic, Inc., a company that will attempt to salvage and preserve the ship.

  • July 1987

    RMS Titanic, Inc., sends a $6-million expedition to dive down to the Titanic and salvage about 1,800 objects. Their removal from the wreck is very controversial.

• 1990s - 2010s

  • 1993

    A French administrator awards RMS Titanic, Inc., the rights to the objects recovered in 1987.

  • December 19, 1997

    Titanic, the Hollywood romance directed by James Cameron, is released in theaters. The blockbuster movie wins Academy Awards for Best Picture and Best Director and grosses more than $1.8 billion, making it the first film to ever crack the billion-dollar mark at the box office. It remains the highest grossing film in history until another Cameron film, Avatar, breaks the record in 2010.

  • 2003

    

    Another research ship, Russia's Akademik Mstislav Keldysh visits the Titanic to take more pictures.

    Credit: Lori Johnston, NOAA-OE/Wikimedia Commons

  • August 15, 2011

    After years of legal battling, a judge grants the title to items from the Titanic to RMS Titanic, Inc. The artifacts can be sold, but only to parties who would be able to care for them.

  • 4 April 2012

    The James Cameron movie Titanic makes a comeback in 3-D at select movie theaters.