Lifejacket Sells for $68,000

NEW YORK (Reuters) - An unused life jacket from the doomed Titanic ship sold for $68,500 in New York on Wednesday, Christie's auction house said.

The cork-filled life preserver -- still largely intact, but stained and torn in parts -- was thought to have been found by farmer John James Dunbar on the Halifax shoreline after the passenger ship sank off Newfoundland in April, 1912.

The liner sank during its maiden voyage from the British port of Southampton to New York when it hit an iceberg, causing some 1,500 people to die.

Christie's, which estimated that the life preserver would sell for $60,000 to $80,000, sold another Titanic life jacket last year in London for $119,000.

Maritime specialist Gregg Dietrich said the jacket -- believed to be one of six remaining -- appeared to have been unused because the shoulder straps were still intact. Titanic passengers tended to have had their life preservers cut off to ease removal from their damaged skin.

Dietrich said that the cork filling the jackets was so heavy that many of the survivors and victims of Titanic were found to have broken their jaws on them when they hit the water after jumping from the ship.

(Reporting by Michelle Nichols, Editing by Anthony Boadle)

Iceberg right ahead !

The iceberg that the TITANIC struck was a part of an ice flow drifting south from Greenland. It was uncommon to see ice in April and many ships had to stop a few times to avoid hitting icebergs. As ice traveled south, they melt. Some icebergs are so big, that most of the ice is underwater. The biggest recorded iceberg was as high as a 55 story building! One was measured as almost 400 feet above the surface of the waters. Ice has been seen as a potential threat to some ships since the TITANIC and ice damage to other vessels. In memory of the TITANIC, the government has made the International Ice Patrol which warns ships ahead of time if they are in a course for a threatening iceberg. In the iceberg seen above, there was red and black paint and pieces of metal which was found in the berg. The Arizona
crashed into an iceberg a short time afterward and it's bow was ripped off completely but luckily, no one was hurt. When the TITANIC struck the berg, it made small holes which allowed the water to flood in. Today, ice is very good for the enviroment. They have served as home for creatures, they help purify the air, and they make the sea a more beautiful place.

How the TITANIC sank

When the TITANIC sank struck the iceberg, it made the iron plates buckle and the rivets pop out. It made multiple gashes (not one long gash) and water leaked in. The TITANIC could hold water in up to two watertight compartments. She could even stay afloat with four. But, the gash stretched to the 6th watertight bulkheads and when the watertight doors closed, that only slowed down the sinking because the water went up over the bulkheads and spilled into the next and then the one after that dragging the ship to down lower, letting water come in, until the TITANIC was completely flooded. The TITANIC was doomed no matter how you sliced it. The weight of the water pulled her down by the head and the whole ship had been completely submerged by 2:20. The TITANIC still has mysteries like, what do the gashes look like? and Why did the steal buckle?. The holes that you see today in the bow were caused by the impact of the TITANIC hitting the bottom. The holes remain buried forever in the sediment.