Watch | Titanic’s first full-sized 3D digital scan reveals wreck as never seen before

London, United Kingdom

The most famous shipwreck has been revealed to the world like never before. Titanic's first full-sized digital scan, has been created through deep-sea mapping. The ship today lies at a depth of 3,800m (12,500ft) in the Atlantic.

The scanned pictures provide the entire ship's unique 3D view making it appear as if the water has been drained away. Experts hope that the scanned images will shed light on exactly how the tragic ship sank in 1912.

More than 1,500 people lost their lives after the giant ship was struck by an iceberg while it was on its maiden voyage from Southampton to New York.

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"There are still questions, basic questions, that need to be answered about the ship," said Parks Stephenson, a Titanic analyst, while speaking to BBC News.

He added that the model was "one of the first major steps to driving the Titanic story towards evidence-based research - and not speculation."

After the wreck was discovered in 1985, the Titanic has been explored extensively. However, since the ship is huge in size, cameras are always able to show snapshots of parts of the decaying ship and not the whole thing.

‘Titanic’s wreck has stories to tell’

The latest scan captures the wreck entirely, revealing to the world Titanic's complete view. The ship lies in two parts, with the stern and bow separated by about 800m (2,600ft). The broken vessel is surrounded by a huge debris field.

A deep-sea mapping company Magellan Ltd and Atlantic Productions carried out the scan in summer 2022. Atlantic Productions is also making a documentary about the project.

Magellan's Gerhard Seiffert, who guided the planning for the expedition, stated that it is the largest underwater scanning project which he had ever undertaken.

"The depth of it, almost 4,000m, represents a challenge, and you have currents at the site, too - and we're not allowed to touch anything so as not to damage the wreck," Seiffert explained.

"And the other challenge is that you have to map every square centimetre - even uninteresting parts, like on the debris field you have to map mud, but you need this to fill in between all these interesting objects,” he added.

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Submersibles, which are controlled by a team remotely, surveyed the length and breadth of the wreck for more than 200 hours and clicked more than 700,000 images from every angle to create an exact 3D reconstruction.

Parks Stephenson, who has been studying the Titanic, said he was "blown away" when he first saw the scans.

"It allows you to see the wreck as you can never see it from a submersible, and you can see the wreck in its entirety, you can see it in context and perspective. And what it's showing you now is the true state of the wreck,” he added.

“There is still much to learn from the wreck, which is essentially the last surviving eyewitness to the disaster. She has stories to tell,” he added.