Sinking of the RMS Titanic



The sinking of the luxury ocean liner RMS Titanic occured on its maiden voyage on 15 April 1912 (TV: The Invasion of Time) four hours after colliding with an iceberg at around 11:40 pm (AUDIO: The Wreck of the Titan) whilst crossing the Atlantic Ocean. (PROSE: The Left-Handed Hummingbird) According to one account, the iceberg was actually the Monk's TARDIS. (COMIC: Follow That TARDIS!)

Background
Constructed out of 46,000 tons of steel, wood, and glass, the Titanic was 9 storeys high, nearly 900 feet long, and 90 feet wide. It could host up to 3,500 passengers and crew (AUDIO: The Wreck of the Titan) and was noted as being the largest steamship of its time, carrying 2,223 passengers on its fateful voyage. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler) It was famously called "unsinkable", (TV: Robot, The End of the World) Its captain was Edward J Smith. Lieutenant William McMaster Murdoch was the First Officer of the Titanic. Wallace Hartley served as bandmaster aboard the ship. (AUDIO: The Wreck of the Titan)

Mrs Astor was among the passengers on the Titanic's maiden voyage. (COMIC: Revolutions of Terror), trapped on Earth in the early 20th century, also boarded the Titanic to avoid the upcoming First World War. He was unaware of its eventual fate at the time. (AUDIO: Mastermind)

In Southampton, the Daniels family planned to travel to the New World on the Titanic. A week before the Titanic was due to set sail, the Ninth Doctor arrived in the dead of night, with a wound on his head. The Daniels family nursed him back to health, and he stayed with them for a couple of days. During that time, the family told the Doctor of their travel plans. The day before the Titanic's launch, the Daniels family and their friend were photographed. After helping settle Arthur Daniels' debts with William Spence, the Doctor left the family in the dead of night, and stole their tickets for the Titanic. He left Connie Daniels a copy of The Time Machine along with a note saying that they would understand why he had stolen the tickets soon. (AUDIO: Battle Scars)

Sinking
While pursuing the Monk in the company of the Sleeze Brothers, the Seventh Doctor had tracked his TARDIS to the Atlantic Ocean in 1912. The Doctor's TARDIS materialised aboard the Titanic. As yet unaware of the vessel's identity, the travellers split up to search for the Monk; El Ape looked on the top deck with Deadbeat checking the engine rooms while the Doctor looked in the hold. The Doctor ascertained that the Monk was not in the hold before learning, to his dismay, that he was on the Titanic. He then caught up with Deadbeat and apprised him of the situation, the pair proceeding to intercept Al Ape.

Meanwhile, El Ape entered the bridge, where he held the crew members present at gunpoint and forced them to tie themselves up, allowing him to take the wheel. Finding that the Monk's TARDIS was disguised as an iceberg up ahead, El Ape took the ship's engines on a course full ahead, ramming the iceberg-shaped TARDIS thus causing the Titanic to sink. El Ape then caught up with his brother and the Doctor, who insisted that they leave. As El Ape opted to stay to capture the Monk, the Doctor and Deadbeat were forced to drag him back into the TARDIS which the Doctor took into the Time Vortex, leaving the Titanic to its fate. However, the consequences of the collision did not end there; the damage caused to the Monk's TARDIS forced it to land in Bermuda in 1945 where its now unstable dimensional interface caused it to implode, creating the Bermuda Triangle. (COMIC: Follow That TARDIS!)

At another point in his time stream, the Seventh Doctor travelled to the Titanic with Ace and Bernice Summerfield, tracking Huitzilin. They were on the ship when it collided with the iceberg. The Doctor noted that the event of its sinking was part of the Web of Time. As the ship sank, the Seventh Doctor stopped Huitzilin from acquiring the Xiuhcoatl. (PROSE: The Left-Handed Hummingbird)

Both John Hart and Jack Harkness appeared on the Titanic to claim a diamond that was lost during the disaster. John beat Jack to it, having put "the squeeze" on the heiress who owned the jewel. Taking a "trip down memory lane", the pair had sex in John's room, finishing with just seconds to go before the ship hit the iceberg. In that time, Jack used a fake tachyon meter reading to trick John, using the opportunity to lock John in his closet as he made off with both the diamond and John's vortex manipulator. John, however, was able to escape the disaster through use of a back-up jump bracelet which returned him to London in 1887 on the day of Queen Victoria's golden jubilee. (AUDIO: The Death of Captain Jack)

The Eleventh Doctor was on the Titanic shortly before he visited Klimtenburg. The voyage soaked one of his napkins. (PROSE: Plague of the Cybermen)

According to Coordinator Narvin, attempts were made to evacuate women and children first, as the Titanic sank. (AUDIO: Weapon of Choice)

The RMS Carpathia arrived at the scene of the sinking and took part in the rescue operation. (AUDIO: The Wreck of the Titan, COMIC: Revolutions of Terror) In a lifeboat, was among those managed to escape the sinking. (AUDIO: Mastermind)

Aftermath and legacy
On 17 April, the Daniels family read a newspaper with a headline depicting the Titanic's demise, realising then why the Doctor had taken their tickets for the voyage. (AUDIO: Battle Scars)

The Fourth Doctor commented that he did not like the word "impregnable" because it sounded too much like "unsinkable." When Harry Sullivan asked what was wrong with "unsinkable," the Doctor replied, "Oh, nothing, said the iceberg to the Titanic." (TV: Robot) The Doctor had an issue of the Daily Mirror newspaper describing the disaster, which he saw Borusa reading. On noticing this, the Doctor promised that he had nothing to do with the ship's destruction. (TV: The Invasion of Time) The Ninth Doctor told Jabe that he had once been on a ship that "they said was unsinkable". He "ended up clinging to [the] iceberg", commentating that "it wasn't half cold." (TV: The End of the World) The Tenth Doctor read a newspaper with a headline article about the sinking. (COMIC: Revolutions of Terror)

Following the sinking, measures were taken place to see that such an accident would not occur again. To that end, the International Ice Patrol was formed and future ships would have round-the-clock radio surveillance and lifeboats for everyone. As the Seventh Doctor noted to Cristián Alvarez, to prevent the Titanic disaster would condemn future passengers. (PROSE: The Left-Handed Hummingbird)

When asked by her teacher why the Titanic sank, Mels said it was because the Doctor didn't save it, and then called the teacher stupid for not knowing. This got her sent to the head teacher's office. (TV: Let's Kill Hitler)

Clive Finch would come across the family photograph of the Daniels family and their story of meeting the Doctor. He later relayed this information to Rose Tyler when she came to visit him on 5 March 2005, seeking information about the Doctor. (TV: Rose) Later in the 21st century, this same image was discovered by Adam Mitchell. (COMIC: Mystery Date)

Max Capricorn, the head of Max Capricorn Cruiseliners, constructed a starship replica of the Titanic for a voyage from Sto to Earth for the observation of "primitive cultures" on Christmas Day 2008. According to one of the Heavenly Host, the name of the replica was chosen as "the most famous vessel of the planet Earth". (TV: Voyage of the Damned)

The sinking of the Titanic was covered in the book Unexplained Mysteries and Disasters by Smedley B. Clarke, which was published by the 21st century. Deadbeat was reading a copy when he met the Seventh Doctor, which incidentally led to him being embroiled in the book's events. (COMIC: Follow That TARDIS!)

Behind the scenes
According to the "Earth-Skaro Timescale" of Terry Nation's Dalek Annual 1976, a total of 1,517 people drowned when the Titanic sank. Meanwhile, in Skaro-year 10,835, the Daleks had showered Earth's oceans with super-frost bombs which created giant ice-floes.