Talk:Wreck of the Titanic

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Wreck of the Titanic article.
This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic.
New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help.

Article policies

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: 1: 12 months

Wreck of the Titanic has been listed as one of the Engineering and technology good articles under the good article criteria. If you can improve it further, please do so. If it no longer meets these criteria, you can reassess it.

Article milestones
Date	Process	Result
October 28, 2012	Good article nominee	Listed

A fact from this article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "Did you know?" column on March 15, 2012.

The text of the entry was: Did you know ... that proposals to raise the wreck of the RMS Titanic (pictured) have included filling it with ping-pong balls, injecting it with 180,000 tons of Vaseline or turning it into an iceberg?

Canada: Newfoundland & Labrador / History Mid‑importance

	Canada portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Canada, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Canada on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.CanadaWikipedia:WikiProject CanadaTemplate:WikiProject CanadaCanada-related articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by WikiProject Newfoundland and Labrador.
	This article is supported by WikiProject History of Canada.

History Low‑importance

	History portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject History, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of the subject of History on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.HistoryWikipedia:WikiProject HistoryTemplate:WikiProject Historyhistory articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.

Ships

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Ships, a project to improve all Ship-related articles. If you would like to help improve this and other articles, please join the project, or contribute to the project discussion. All interested editors are welcome. To use this banner, please see the full instructions.ShipsWikipedia:WikiProject ShipsTemplate:WikiProject ShipsShips articles

Shipwrecks Mid‑importance

This article is within the scope of WikiProject Shipwrecks, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of shipwreck-related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ShipwrecksWikipedia:WikiProject ShipwrecksTemplate:WikiProject ShipwrecksShipwreck articles

Mid

This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

Shipwreck-related priority open tasks:

To Do

Lady Elizabeth (1879)
- Clean up typos Currently working on it-----Completed!
- Improve grammar
- Add any additions if needed Still adding more information
- Discuss desired additions -None

Transport: Maritime Low‑importance

	Transport portal This article is within the scope of WikiProject Transport, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of articles related to Transport on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.TransportWikipedia:WikiProject TransportTemplate:WikiProject TransportTransport articles
Low	This article has been rated as Low-importance on the project's importance scale.
	This article is supported by the Maritime task force (assessed as Low-importance).

Archaeology Mid‑importance

	This article is within the scope of WikiProject Archaeology, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Archaeology on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.ArchaeologyWikipedia:WikiProject ArchaeologyTemplate:WikiProject ArchaeologyArchaeology articles
Mid	This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

Text and/or other creative content from this version of RMS Titanic was copied or moved into The wreck of RMS Titanic with this edit on 3 September 2011 at 16:35 (UTC). The former page's history now serves to provide attribution for that content in the latter page, and it must not be deleted as long as the latter page exists.

It is requested that a vehicle diagram or diagrams be included in this article to improve its quality. Specific illustrations, plots or diagrams can be requested at the Graphic Lab.
For more information, refer to discussion on this page and/or the listing at Wikipedia:Requested images.

This article has been viewed enough times in a single week to appear in the Top 25 Report. The week in which this happened:

June 18 to 24, 2023

OceanGate expedition

I've started a draft for the June 2023 SAR for the lost submersible Titan to the wreck. At DRAFT: OceanGate Titanic Expedition , feel free to edit or move to article-space, as you'd like. It would probably be better to detail that expedition in a different article than here. -- 64.229.90.172 (talk) 20:21, 19 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

DSV Limiting Factor

The article mentions the wreck was visited by DSV Limiting Factor in August of 2019. However the Wikipedia page for that vessel has no mention of such an expedition despite listing several dives in the month of August of that year. Also, I would point out that the link for the page on DSV Limiting Factor, in this article, is incorrect. 97.96.252.165 (talk) 15:06, 21 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

US Postal Service claim on mail

I read somewhere (but now cannot find it) that during legal proceedings to decide ownership of artifacts, the US Postal Service filed a brief (or whatever it's called) with the court. They asserted that any mail found in the wreck is still US mail and should be turned over to them. My memory is that all parties agreed. Can anybody find information about this issue? 75.109.28.175 (talk) 20:17, 21 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Possible redirect?

I think a redirect from Titanic shipwreck to this article might be useful. Thoughts? Fork99 (talk) 22:46, 24 June 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Pronouns

As far as I can tell, this article used she/her for many years, at least since 2015. In this edit [1] an anonymous editor changed two instances in the lead, but left the rest of the article alone. So I would say we should revert the recent change and go back to she/her. GA-RT-22 (talk) 22:08, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I disagree. It sounds anachronistic and pretentious. This is an encyclopaedia, not a seafarer’s manual from 1850. Asperthrow (talk) 22:52, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The relevant guideline is WP:SHE4SHIPS. We can change to it/its, but not without first getting consensus on the talk page. GA-RT-22 (talk) 23:25, 16 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I’m aware. I’m seeking consensus for this. Asperthrow (talk) 19:00, 17 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The Titanic's article uses she/her pronouns.

I am unaware of any Wikipedia guidelines for consistency across closely related articles, but I don't support changing the pronouns unless they're changed on the Titanic's page. FunLater (talk) 13:50, 18 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Location might be wrong

In this edit [2] an IP editor changed the location from 370 nmi off Newfoundland to 325 nmi. I reverted because it says 370 nmi in two other places, one of which has a source citation, and the editor didn't touch those. The source is Gibson 2012, which I do not have a copy of.

I just checked the coordinates myself, and not only is the location 325 nmi off Newfoundland, it's also 370 statute miles, which suggests to me that whoever put in "370" may have been confused. To further muddy the waters, here is a source that says 400 nmi: [3] GA-RT-22 (talk) 19:33, 27 July 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Pressure at depth

The pressure at 12,500 feet is not over 6000 psi. See Talk:Titanic#Pressure at depth. GA-RT-22 (talk) 13:42, 14 December 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Pronouns/manual of style concerns

In a series of edits today, Fisher girl81 replaced feminine pronouns with neuter pronouns. Their stance is that using "she" and variations for an inanimate object is offensively sexist and outdated. In a discussion at their user talk page, they reiterated this stance and also claimed that feminine pronouns' use here is not in line with the manual of style's expectation of in-article pronoun consistency.

On the first matter, I agree that using feminine pronouns to refer to ships is an outdated form of speaking and writing. I also agree that it's sexist but I don't know if I feel as strongly about it as Fisher girl81. I also know it's not worth a back-and-forth here because the MOS isn't going to get changed as a result of what's happening at one article.

On the second matter, the issue regarding consistency is compelling. To my reading, a majority of pronouns used in this article to refer to the Titanic are neuter and given the manual of style's strong preference for consistency, a preference both MOS:SHIP and WP:SHE4SHIPS emphasize, feminine pronouns should be replaced. It's possible this article's writers have tried to split the difference by by using feminine pronouns to refer to the ship and neuter pronouns to refer to its wreck but even typing that out feels silly and such a consideration definitely isn't worth more than what the MOS says. (Not to mention, if ship/feminine and wreck/neuter is the unwritten rule, it's one this article violates plenty of times.)

Pinging users who have, either today or in the past, weighed in on this: @Asperthrow, CycloneYoris, Fisher girl81, FunLater, and GA-RT-22: thoughts? City of Silver 20:49, 13 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

I am not convinced feminine pronouns are outdated. They are still in use in many of the current (within the last year) sources I checked. I would prefer to stick with ship/feminine and wreck/neuter. I wouldn't say it's an unwritten rule, I would say it's written in the MOS. MOS does not specify she/her for things that are not ships, and a wreck is not a ship. GA-RT-22 (talk) 22:30, 13 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

@GA-RT-22: The MOS requests pronoun uniformity, which this article doesn't have. It matters that, contrary to your claim that "a wreck is not a ship," the MOS doesn't differentiate between ships and wrecks. I might not understand but are you saying that a ship undergoes some sort of rhetorical sex change once it sinks? On its face that reads as silly so unless we had a reliable source for it, I won't edit in accordance with that. This article contains several neuter pronoun references to the ship along with several feminine pronoun references to the wreck so no matter how this shakes out, it needs the sort of work Fisher girl81 was doing. I don't know about citing the unwritten rule I mentioned because that was a total guess on my part, it might not even exist, and even if it does there's no reason to pretend like it's part of any policy or guideline. City of Silver 02:33, 14 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

We've been through this. Please see https://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:Manual_of_Style/Archive_159 . Regards Aloha27 talk 00:24, 19 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Titanic

What strategy did Ballard use for finding the sunken ship? 2601:204:E701:9730:2DBE:A5A1:F04:3E9B (talk) 02:47, 21 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

That information can be found here Regards, Aloha27 talk 03:04, 21 February 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Collided v Allided

Re: the 2nd paragraph: I believe 'collided' should be changed to 'allided.' In maritime law, a collision is when two ships, both moving, strike one another. Allided is when a ship under power strikes a stationary object. The iceberg was not under power and adrift, therefore, the Titanic allided with the iceberg. Dan Bollinger (talk) 15:10, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]

Do you have a source that says Titanic allided with the iceberg? As far as I know you can only allide with a stationary object. The iceberg was adrift, not stationary. The source you cited last time you brought this up gives the examples of a bridge, pier, or dock. GA-RT-22 (talk) 15:41, 20 March 2024 (UTC)[reply]