LETS DO HISTORY: Titanic was 100,000 years old and originally weighed 75million tonnes
Do you remember that The Titanic was sunk by a mega-iceberg that started its lethal voyage weighing 75million tonnes.
Using computer modelling, Professor Grant Bigg also worked out the area where it was born.
And he reckons it was formed from snow that fell 100,000 years ago...aeons before causing the most famous maritime disaster in history.
His findings will be revealed today at the Cambridge science festival.
Prof Bigg, from Sheffield University, used observations taken in 1912, when the liner was lost on its maiden voyage and earlier. He added modern data about ocean currents and winds.
These pointed to the frozen Goliath probably originating in a small cluster of glaciers in southwest Greenland.
When the Titanic, the largest vessel in the world, sank on April 15 killing 1,517, the berg was estimated at 400ft long and up to 100ft above the water, giving it a mass of 1.5m tonnes.
But the collision happened at a latitude of 41 degrees north, meaning it had floated from Greenland to a point further south than Cornwall, and must have been melting for months. Based on the shrinkage of similar icebergs, Prof Bigg estimates it began life 1,700ft long, with a mass of 75m tonnes.
Using computer modelling, Professor Grant Bigg also worked out the area where it was born.
And he reckons it was formed from snow that fell 100,000 years ago...aeons before causing the most famous maritime disaster in history.
His findings will be revealed today at the Cambridge science festival.
Prof Bigg, from Sheffield University, used observations taken in 1912, when the liner was lost on its maiden voyage and earlier. He added modern data about ocean currents and winds.
These pointed to the frozen Goliath probably originating in a small cluster of glaciers in southwest Greenland.
When the Titanic, the largest vessel in the world, sank on April 15 killing 1,517, the berg was estimated at 400ft long and up to 100ft above the water, giving it a mass of 1.5m tonnes.
But the collision happened at a latitude of 41 degrees north, meaning it had floated from Greenland to a point further south than Cornwall, and must have been melting for months. Based on the shrinkage of similar icebergs, Prof Bigg estimates it began life 1,700ft long, with a mass of 75m tonnes.
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