The Technology

Just days after the Titanic tragedy, plans were developed to find the ship. In fact, the same year, the Astor, Widener and Guggenheim families contracted a salvage company to find it, but the technology was not advanced enough for such an endeavor.

The technology needed to find and explore the ship in such deep and treacherous waters would not arrive until the late 1970s when Texas oil magnate Jack Grimm began the first serious, scientifically based expedition to find Titanic. It launched three expeditions in the 1980s, but ultimately failed due to bad weather, equipment problems and other factors.

In 1985, a new search for Titanic began under the leadership of U.S. marine biologist Dr. Robert D. Ballard, who also has dove the Michigan Great Lakes. It took more than a month before anything was discovered, and on the morning of Sept. 1, 1985, the video monitor began displaying images of a huge, manmade object on the ocean bottom. The Titanic had finally been discovered.