In April 2012, historian Paul Louden-Brown told TheJournal.ie: "Under Admiralty Law which the US, Britain, and other major maritime nations adhere to, a vessel lying in international waters is effectively without ownership and no one can actually stake a claim on it."
Louden-Brown added that, because the Titanic was registered in the UK and owned by a US company, it does not have an official owner.
Now it turns out that the Titanic will stay where it is, at least for now, as it is too fragile to be raised from the ocean floor. The acidic salt water, hostile environment and an iron-eating bacterium are consuming the hull of the ship.
The ship had been split into two pieces some 2,600ft apart, with the stern (the back of the hull) left largely unrecognisable but the bow (the front) remarkably intact.
Where is the Titanic wreckage? The ship was near Newfoundland, Canada, when it sank. It was just about 400 miles off the coast. Most of the Titanic wreckage remains about 350 miles off the coast of Newfoundland, according to NOAA.
There are no survivors of the Titanic alive today
The very longest-living person to have survived the Titanic died on the 31st of May 2009. Her name was Elizabeth Gladys 'Millvina' Dean, and she was just two months old when she boarded the Titanic with her family.
There are fears that during retrieval, the Titanic wreck would disintegrate into pieces, making it impossible to have something concrete by the time the remains reach the sea surface. There are documented reports that metal-eating bacteria has already consumed most of Titanic's wreckage.
While we cannot know for sure how he spent his final moments, it is known that Captain Edward Smith perished in the North Atlantic along with 1517 others on April 15, 1912. His body was never recovered.
What is clear, though, is that almost all of the missing bodies have been dissolving and will continue to do so until their eventual disappearance. Not only because of the salt water but also because of ocean animals and bacteria in the area, which feed on human tissues such as skin.
It is unclear how long the Titanic will remain intact at the bottom of the ocean. By one estimate, UNESCO has said it is expected to disappear by 2050. Research expeditions to the site have been ongoing since its discovery, while tourism opportunities are a more fledging -- and luxury -- opportunity.
Shortly before midnight on April 14 it struck an iceberg 1 300 miles (4 000 km.) northeast of New York and sank in just two hours and 40 minutes.
"But it will never come out," Daniel Stone wrote in "Sinkable: Obsession, the Deep Sea, and the Shipwreck of the Titanic." "Not only is the exposed steel on the upper bow too brittle for even the most industrious crane operation, but the mud has also acted as deep-sea quicksand for longer than most humans have been ...
It takes eight hours and $250,000 to get to what remains of the R.M.S. Titanic some 380 miles off the coast of St. John's, Newfoundland. On Sunday, five people got into the submersible Titan to make that journey.
Robert Ballard, in full Robert Duane Ballard, (born June 30, 1942, Wichita, Kansas, U.S.), American oceanographer and marine geologist whose pioneering use of deep-diving submersibles laid the foundations for deep-sea archaeology. He is best known for discovering the wreck of the Titanic in 1985.
After a series of court battles, an American company, RMS Titanic Inc (RMST), emerged as the owner of the salvage rights, allowing it to keep possession and put on touring display the 5,900 artefacts it has lifted from the ship during six dives.
Lying in international waters, the wreck was previously not protected by explicit legislation.
The average lifespan of an iceberg in the North Atlantic typically is two to three years from calving to melting. This means the iceberg that sank the Titanic "likely broke off from Greenland in 1910 or 1911, and was gone forever by the end of 1912 or sometime in 1913."
Of the 337 bodies recovered, 119 were buried at sea. 209 were brought back to Halifax. 59 were claimed by relatives and shipped to their home communities. The remaining 150 victims are buried in three cemeteries: Fairview Lawn, Mount Olivet and Baron de Hirsch.
Fewer than 250 people in the world have visited the shipwreck at the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean since its discovery in 1985. Among them is the film director James Cameron, who directed the 1997 movie Titanic. Eight-day Titanic diving tours for tourists conducted by OceanGate cost $250,000 per guest, the BBC reported.
Captain Smith having done all man could do for the safety of passengers and crew remained at his post on the sinking ship until the end. His last message to the crew was 'Be British.'"
Social and legal responsibility
The tradition says that the captain should be the last person to leave their ship alive before its sinking, and if they're unable to evacuate the crew and passengers from the ship, the captain will choose not to save himself even if he has an opportunity to do so.
Captain's last words
The ship's captain Edward Smith went down with his vessel and his last words were poignant. He said: "Well boys, you've done your duty and done it well. I ask no more of you. I release you.
Efforts to locate and salvage the Titanic began almost immediately after it sank. But technical limitations—as well as the sheer vastness of the North Atlantic search area—made it extremely difficult.
The 1996 expedition controversially attempted to raise a section of the Titanic itself, a section of the outer hull that originally comprised part of the wall of two first-class cabins on C Deck, extending down to D Deck.
These actions include: 1) alternating the thrust of the ship's wing screws and advancing the centerline screw to increase the turning response of the ship; 2) allowing the ship to ram the iceberg head- on; 3) counter-flood the aft end of the stricken ship to reduced the rate of water intake by 4.5 hours; 4) employing ...