Original subtitles

NARRATOR: The Titanic, the most famous ocean liner in history.

The story is so unbelievably jaw dropping.

She pushed the boundaries more than anybody else.

NARRATOR: Titanic was built to be the biggest, fanciest,

and fastest ocean liner ever.

We were so proud of our progress

and all of a sudden we have this wake up call that, you know,

things can go wrong.

Unfortunately, we lost over 1,500 people.

It's something that you would think

would only be in the world of fiction and fantasy,

but it's actually historically true.

NARRATOR: What if we could build a new Titanic?

Could 21st century engineers use the latest materials

and technology to make the fastest, safest transatlantic

ocean liner ever?

It would be a very, very expensive vehicle to build.

With the technology that we have here,

it's absolutely possible.

NARRATOR: What will it take to make the Titanic 2.0 happen?

I am confident we can pull this off.

It's not going to be an easy one.

NARRATOR: Now we're wondering how long would it take?

How much would it cost?

How many workers would we need?

Could we even do it?

"If We Built It Today."

[music playing]

NARRATOR: This is history's deadliest race

course the North Atlantic route between Europe

and North America.

At the turn of the century, the main mode

of transport across the Atlantic was

the transatlantic ocean liner.

NARRATOR: The route had settled between Liverpool and New York.

They were pushing the speed envelope at the time

to make the boats quicker.

Just taking an hour or two off and arriving

a little better in New York really makes

a big difference to people.

NARRATOR: Technology and fierce competition

drove innovation, making the crossing faster and safer.

Well, the Titanic was a race to be

the premier ship on the water.

Every citizen in the world was waiting for Titanic to set

sail on her maiden voyage.

NARRATOR: Everyone knows what happened next.

It's a part of our global shared history.

Even the word Titanic is known in every language.

It means disaster of epic proportion.

BLAIR BEED: Titanic is the disaster.

I mean story is probably one of the most popular stories of

history from the 20th century.

NARRATOR: And today, over 100,000 people a year

travel here to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee

to visit the Titanic Museum, owned and operated

by Mary Kellogg-Joslyn.

Well, Titanic was found in 1985.

And in 1987, a second expedition was put together,

and that expedition was led by my husband John Joslyn.

They did retrieve over 1,800 artifacts.

He made a decision to build permanent museums.

He was able to show all these artifacts for the first time.

NARRATOR: Decades later those artifacts continue to captivate

the public as the last vestiges of the most

famous shipwreck in history.

But before Titanic was a legendary disaster story

this massive luxury liner was the pinnacle

of seagoing technology.

MARY KELLOGG-JOSLYN: She pushed the boundaries

more than anybody else.

And at the time, people were like mesmerized

how big she was.

And that really would amaze passengers

to see this enormous ship.

NARRATOR: At over 880 feet, it was as

long as three football fields.

Turn it upright, it was almost 200 feet longer

than the MetLife Tower in New York City, the world's

tallest building at the time.

At near 58,000, tons Titanic was twice as

heavy as the Statue of Liberty and five times heavier

than the Eiffel Tower.

It was the largest moving structure of all time.

But what if we wanted to build a new Titanic today?

I don't think you could ever build Titanic again.

Unfortunately, I have to believe that that era

has very much come to an end.

It would be a very, very expensive vehicle to build,

and that's assuming that the technology is there to actually

build what you need to build.

NARRATOR: To design a new Titanic,

we'll need to call in the experts.

ROBERT CLIFFORD: Shipbuilding has always

been one of moving on to lighter, better ships, faster

ships, bigger ships, and the Titanic

started that ball rolling.

NARRATOR: Bob Clifford is the chairman

of a massive Australian shipbuilding operation.

He's dedicated his life to building

boats that are big and fast.

ROBERT CLIFFORD: There's definitely

an argument for fast boats.

When you're competing against aircraft you have to be fast.

NARRATOR: But just what kind of speeds

can modern oceangoing vessels reach?

Welcome to the world of offshore powerboat racing.

With a sleek twin hull design, these speed machines

fly above the waterline at top speeds over 3 times faster

than the average highway speed limit.

They're fast enough to cross the Atlantic in just eight hours.

But offshore power boats can only carry

enough fuel for a 60 mile race.

So what's a more realistic time frame for our passenger ship

to cross the Atlantic?

It would be very nice to be able to cross

the Atlantic in two days.

NARRATOR: Titanic's maiden voyage

was supposed to take six days to travel over 3,000 miles.

Well, if we wanted to do the journey in two days,

we'd have to do about 54 knots.

Now, that's an aiming point.

NARRATOR: 54 knots on water is about the same as the speed

limit on most of the world's highways.

If we can reach that speed, we could shatter existing

transatlantic crossing records.

With the technology that we have here with the vessels

that we're building, it's absolutely possible.

NARRATOR: But Naval architect Tony

Thompson's not so confident.

A transatlantic vessel making a trip in two days...

It might be a great competition...

But I'm not so sure that it could be commercially viable.

NARRATOR: To up the appeal we'll need luxury features to rival

the original Titanic's.

You had a swimming pool, you had a gymnasium.

It was a beautiful ship, and it had luxuries that people

had never seen before.

NARRATOR: Of course, the latest safety features

will put passengers at ease and avert any potential disasters.

BLAIR BEED: They head out to sea and head to the open ocean.

And life on board the ship is what is expected.

And all of a sudden iceberg ahead.

37 seconds later they hit that iceberg.

And two hours and 40 minutes later she was gone.

NARRATOR: Can we rewrite history and rebuild the most

famous boat of all time?

We're imagining building a brand new Titanic.

A record breaking ocean liner to cross

the Atlantic fast and in style.

But the original model was also born of necessity.

ROBERT CLIFFORD: Well, that era, of course, it was the only way

of getting across the Atlantic.

And of course, there was a great deal of competition to have

the fastest, biggest ships.

TONY THOMPSON: A number of countries, in fact, we're using

it to support their shipbuilding industries,

which were big industries in those days,

and just the National pride of having the fastest vehicle

that can cross the Atlantic.

JEREMY DUCHOW: When it came to the ships,

you really had Cunard, White Star, and also the French lines

and the two German lines, which are all competing

in this booming market.

NARRATOR: It was the White Star Line

that commissioned the Titanic as part of their Olympic Class.

MARY KELLOGG-JOSLYN: The White Star Line

decided that they were going to be the most

beautiful and luxurious ship.

BLAIR BEED: They really were going for the luxury angle.

Boy, you were going to really enjoy your travel on it.

NARRATOR: The White Star Line understood

the science of psychology.

Time flies when you're having fun, a trick

that's still in use today.

The cruise ship industry is worth over $55 billion a year.

Always striving to provide their passengers

with the latest amenities.

You want to keep people entertained

during their crossing, so you've got to think of things

that will entertain them.

Will there be cinema rooms?

Will there be quiet spaces?

Will there be gaming areas, beauty salons?

You've got to think creatively how you can entertain

people on such a long crossing.

NARRATOR: Over 100 years after the Titanic sank,

passengers still crave the latest

and greatest activities to keep them

entertained on a long voyage.

But for builders the main challenge

has always been to cross the Atlantic as fast as possible.

And that's a dream that didn't go down with the Titanic.

It was always about speed.

And it continued through the 1920s and the 1930s.

Every increase in speed was a shorter time

on the ocean, which was especially

good for the business class that was traveling in these liners.

NARRATOR: And the race rages on today.

The current record is two days and 20 hours

set by a transatlantic ferry named Cat-Link V. Built here

at Incat Shipbuilding the company Bob Clifford

founded over 50 years ago.

We're very proud to be a shipbuilders to the world.

Not just any old shipbuilding, we build the best.

NARRATOR: But if we could cross the Atlantic in under two days,

we'd smash the current record by over 20 hours.

So let's do it.

Let's build a 21st century ocean liner

that's elegant, safe, and fast enough

to cross the Atlantic in just 48 hours.

To design it we need to stitch together centuries

of shipbuilding styles.

So you're talking about a whole new design

of vessel that can do it.

NARRATOR: We need the perfect materials.

Finding them will be an all hands on deck endeavor

to make a Titanic sized ship fly across the ocean.

Obviously, light weight is very important, without making

the ship light, we can't achieve the sort of speeds

that we need.

NARRATOR: You better believe we've got a need for speed.

So this turbine is exactly the same as you see on aircrafts.

NARRATOR: But it's also got to be fully loaded with amenities.

This will be the fanciest boat on the water in over a century.

KIM CLIFFORD: Even though they're on a high speed craft

there is no reason that they can't

enjoy the normal things that they

would enjoy on a cruise ship.

NARRATOR: So we won't sacrifice comfort,

but we can't sacrifice safety either.

We lost over 1,500 people.

NARRATOR: And we've got to figure out what size workforce

we'll need, how long it will take,

and how much the whole thing's going to cost.

But first, we've got to figure out

what it's going to look like.

Well, if you want to get a look at the original Titanic,

it can be found over 2 miles below the surface of the ocean.

JEREMY DUCHOW: It's hard to imagine what it might have

looked like in the past, because there's actually

microscopic organisms down there that

are literally eating the steel.

NARRATOR: Scientists have identified the microorganisms

on the Titanic as an aggressive form

of a fungus that causes rust.

JEREMY DUCHOW: Basically, these microorganisms

are eating away at the ship, a couple hundred pounds a day.

And at one point it's going to finally just cripple

the whole structure of the ship, and very likely

the bow section will just completely implode upon itself.

NARRATOR: At this rate, scientists believe the Titanic

will rot away within 14 years.

Can we salvage the legacy of this great ship

from the depths of the ocean and design a swift,

sleek, and safe Titanic?

We're trying to figure out how to build a new Titanic.

But what's it going to look like?

Maybe our friends in Tennessee can help out, after all,

they built the world's largest Titanic replica.

MARY KELLOGG-JOSLYN: It was going

to be a museum, a traditional museum with some icons.

And then as we got into it, we thought

why not pull the blueprints and actually build the ship

half scale to original size.

But as we were going through this process,

we realized how in the world they built this in 1912.

And it took them a little over two years to build.

Well, it took us almost two years

to build this at half scale.

NARRATOR: So clearly this isn't going to be easy.

But luckily, back in Tasmania, Incat's top designer

Gordon Stewart is ready to take on the greatest

challenge of his career.

GORDON STEWART: I've been designing boats

and drawing boats all my life.

And the idea of designing the vessel

that will be the fastest ship across the Atlantic... it'd

be the peak of my career.

I work on the concepts right from the very beginning.

I'll start with a general arrangement drawing.

And that lays out the machinery to passenger spaces

to fuel tanks to the control stations of the bridge.

NARRATOR: But for this build, they won't have to go totally

back to the drawing board.

It's going to be a supersized version

of Incat's fastest boat ever.

That concept to smash this record

is the larger version of what's behind us here.

It consists of two slender hulls connected by a bridging beam

and a center bow.

NARRATOR: This double hull or catamaran

style has a major design advantage

over the original Titanic.

Boats expend most of their power just

pushing water out of the way.

A bigger hull means more water resistance,

but catamarans reduce the hull size dramatically

by splitting it between the port and starboard all the stability

with way less resistance.

But the catamaran design we're looking at has another leg up.

Remember these?

See how they angle up in the air as they catch speed?

This takeoff is called planing.

And our catamaran will be able to do the same thing,

that is if we can get enough power

to push it beyond hump speed.

Hump speed is an area where the resistance has peaked up.

And once you get beyond that hump,

you can start to fly again.

NARRATOR: Hump speed is sometimes

known as displacement speed or hull speed.

It's the difference between sailing in the water

and sailing on the water.

And it varies from vessel to vessel.

STEWART WELLS: So hump speed can be termed hull speed,

which is a hull length.

So the longer the boat, the higher the speed

can be achieved without having to go over hump,

which is where it's effectively overtaking the bow

wave, which the hull creates.

So to do that it requires a lot of energy to get past that.

But once it's passed there, a lot of dynamic lift

is generated by the hull and allows the vessel

to lift up out of the water effectively, which

is why smaller, flat bottom craft

it's easier to do this than a large 100 meter catamaran.

NARRATOR: 100 meters is about 330 feet.

The Titanic was almost 900 feet long.

If we want to reach hump speed and sail on the water,

we're going to have to adjust our design

to keep us underweight.

We're working on 150 meter boat, which will have up

to about 200 passenger cabins.

NARRATOR: There were 840 cabins on the Titanic.

Looks like we're compromising size for speed.

At least our design dilemma is settled...

Catamaran it is.

But what material is light enough

to catapult us to hump speed?

Well, what if we used the same thing the 1912

Titanic was built from?

TONY THOMPSON: The large liners we're all made of steel.

And if you were to build a boat like that today,

you just have to keep the weight down.

It's just straight physics.

Every bit of weight has to be propelled across that ocean.

And the heavier it is the more fuel you've got to carry.

And you're kind of in that catch-22, where

you just can't beat the game.

NARRATOR: Our boat builders say steel isn't going to cut it.

So what about aluminum?

The Wright brothers used lightweight aluminum

to build their plane engines.

And aluminum is the chief material

used in the International Space Station.

But how does it fare out at sea?

So we'll be using marine grade aluminum.

Well proven system that we've developed over the last 30

years of Incat's existence.

NARRATOR: Marine grade aluminum.

It's basically like a soda can, but blended with other metals,

like magnesium, to make it stronger and ultra resistant

to corrosion.

Its strength properties are the highest

that's commercially available.

So here we have one of the lightweight aluminum extrusions

that we use on the vessels.

So this is extruded out of 6,000 series marine grade aluminum.

That's used for the decking here that we're standing on.

And allows us to get less weld into the deck.

So saves on the overall structural weight

of the vessel, which accounts for about 40%

of the total vessels weight.

TONY THOMPSON: Aluminum is one third of the weight of steel.

So it can result in a very lightweight,

well engineered structure that can maintain very high speeds.

[buzzing of machinery]

NARRATOR: So we'll build it with marine grade aluminum.

Next, we have to determine how to achieve

our target horsepower.

In 1912, the Titanic boasted the world's most state

of the art ocean-going engine.

JEREMY DUCHOW: Her turbine engine room

and her main reciprocating engine room

were just a sea of bells and whistles.

NARRATOR: Six separate boiler rooms stoked with over 800 tons

of coal a day heating water to produce enough steam to power

Titanic's three engines.

Each engine used the steam power to move

a piston inside a cylinder translating

this motion into the rotational force of the propeller.

Titanic's engines allowed it to travel at 23 knots.

But if we want to cross the Atlantic in 48 hours,

we need to more than double that cruising

the ocean at highway speeds.

Can we drum up the horsepower to claim the transatlantic

crossing record?

We're imagining how we build a Titanic for the 21st century.

We know it's going to be a catamaran

style ocean Cruiser, built from ultra

light marine grade aluminum.

But now we're in the market for an engine that can bring

us up to at least 54 knots.

And that hunt brings us here to Argentina.

Meet the HSC Franscisco, the latest and greatest boat

built by our friends at Incat.

Francisco travels between the South American cities

of Buenos Aires and Montevideo, a route over 100 miles

long in less than two hours.

How does that work?

ROBERT CLIFFORD: The ship is powered

by LM25 jet engines, similar to that are used an aircraft.

NARRATOR: That's got to be worth a peek under the hood.

So this turbine is exactly the same as you see on aircraft.

NARRATOR: The engine room here is a far cry from the Titanic's

grimy boiler rooms.

And this is the control panel for the turbine.

From this position you can monitor all the parameters when

the turbine is in operation.

NARRATOR: This engine leaves the competition in its wake.

And here's how it works...

Instead of powering propeller's, the engine power

is a pair of water jets, known as impellers.

An impeller is a rotor that sucks

in water from underneath the vessel

and shoots it out the back.

The force of the jet pushing backwards

sends the boat forward.

It's the same system that is used for jet skis, but bigger.

DAVID RISELEY: So basically you're

forcing the water through a small duct out through a jet.

And the amount of water that's propelled through that

is just phenomenal.

NARRATOR: These water jets displace over 6,300 gallons

of water per engine per second.

That's the average American's drinking water

supply for over 100 years.

They're very durable.

So they don't have the impacts and that sort of thing

that you might get on a traditional propeller.

So they're enclosed in a safer environment.

Smaller than a normal propeller, but far more efficient

as an impeller arrangement.

You've got to be on board.

The highlight is standing on the vessel

doing more than 55 knots, and seeing

the rooster tail come out of the back of the water jets.

The performance of the vessel is just something you've got

to experience to understand.

NARRATOR: So Francisco's fast, but is it fast enough?

Well, this ferry tops out at just over 65 miles per hour.

But we might be able to beat that

during our cross Atlantic journey.

The vessel that we're proposing

will be starting off at a relatively modest speed,

and then as it burns down that fuel load

and reduces the vessel's overall weight,

the vessel speed will obviously increase.

And it's just as much a test of endurance

as it is overall speed.

NARRATOR: So the finish line is in sight, right?

Well, not so fast.

If we really want to make sure our passengers

time across the Atlantic flies by,

we'd better borrow another move out of Titanic's playbook.

They decided, OK, the speed thing's great,

but luxury is what will draw people.

NARRATOR: So what kind of amenities

are we going to offer?

The Titanic's passengers represented the rigid class

system of its day.

And depending on what kind of ticket you punched,

your experience on board would be very, very different.

OK, well, this will be a lot of information here.

Well, in first class, we had access to a gymnasium.

You have a lounge.

You had a smoking room.

You had a barbershop.

You had first class dining room.

You had a Turkish bath.

You had a swimming pool.

So there's a lot of features on board.

Second class, you had your dining room.

You had a library on board.

But no pool, no gymnasium, no squash court.

What made Titanic unique is Titanic

really took care of third class.

If you traveled on any other ship,

you would have probably traveled dormitory style,

and you would have brought your own food.

They wouldn't even give you beds sometimes,

just some hay to lay down on.

And then two buckets, one for the water,

one for your bathroom issues.

Third class was amazing for the people

from Europe, who expected just to be crowded into rooms.

It made them feel, wow, we're really

getting special experience for our money.

NARRATOR: We're only going to have one tier of ticket

aboard our ship.

But can we give every passenger a first class

experience even when they're traveling at breakneck speeds?

KIM CLIFFORD: I think we can still ensure that our customers

on board the boat have a really fun

adventurous time with a sense of romance and mystique

about being on one of our vessels,

but in the safety of the modern environment

with all of the necessary equipment on board

to enhance their experience.

NARRATOR: So when it comes to amenities our new Titanic

will have everything, luxury cabins,

restaurants, theaters, a gym, and even a swimming pool.

But how are we going to keep everyone safe?

There were so many things that just

didn't quite fit that night.

JEREMY DUCHOW: There was no moon,

so it was incredibly dark out.

It was really hard to see.

Unfortunately, when they saw it at 11:40, it was too late.

The officers had pulled the wheel for a hard to starboard,

and it tried to pull around the iceberg,

but it just was not enough time.

And it scraped her along the front of the ship.

It just hit the Achilles heel.

It didn't destroy two compartments,

it took out six of them.

It was designed to have the first four

compartments damaged.

However, the fifth compartment is what will doom her.

Boiler room number six, once that compartment was cut open,

there was nothing they can do.

NARRATOR: Can we be prepared for the worst case scenario?

We're almost ready to build our new Titanic.

We know it's going to be a supersized catamaran assembled

out of marine grade aluminum with jet engine speed

and state of the art impellers.

Let's just say everything about it is going to be first class.

But we're staring down another big problem.

This is where Titanic sank 400 miles

south of Newfoundland, Canada.

This harrowing stretch of ocean is known as iceberg alley.

Ever since the Titanic disaster the International Ice Patrol

has been on active duty here, because the best

way to protect against icebergs is

to know where the icebergs are.

STEVE KOCH: International Ice Patrol

is one part of an international collaboration that monitors

the iceberg danger in the North Atlantic

and provides a relevant warning products

to the maritime community.

We started the ice patrol in 1913, because

of the tragedy of the Titanic and have been executing

that mission ever since.

Over the course of 117 years the way in which we've done

that has changed quite a bit.

It used to just be a ship watching for the icebergs

to travel south and counting them as they went

and warning the vessels by radio.

Nowadays we're using satellite.

We're using highly sophisticated models.

We're using aerial reconnaissance

from US Coast Guard c-130s in order to find those icebergs,

and then generate a warning product

that goes out daily to ships at sea.

NARRATOR: It's a big moving maze that

needs year-round surveillance via radar

and airplane ice spotters.

Tracking every berg in an area larger

than the state of Kansas.

DON RUDNICKAS: We cover a huge amount of area,

basically from the tail of the Grand Banks

all the way North to the coast of Labrador.

NARRATOR: Remarkably, since the ice patrol

began monitoring here no ship has suffered loss of life

from ice.

Nothing speaks louder than a century of success.

Thanks to the International Ice Patrol icebergs

are a problem of the past.

But there's another Titanic mishap we'd like to avoid.

Because of what happened to Titanic

there was many things that had to happen.

But probably the biggest one is that all ships

had to have enough lifeboats for everyone on board.

NARRATOR: Titanic had over 2,000 passengers and crew aboard,

but a lifeboat capacity of just 1,178.

They weren't too many safety regulations in the early days

of vessels like the Titanic.

So they placed a lot of emphasis on performance

and making sure that the passengers were comfortable.

But in terms of the safety equipment

they were probably a token gesture and not much more.

NARRATOR: But if an iceberg slips

through the cracks on our transatlantic journey,

we've got a plan.

Just down the road from Incat's shipyard

is Life Raft Systems Australia.

MIKE GRAINGER: These days the modern day Titanic would have

a very, very upmarket safety equipment, including systems

like the systems we produce.

NARRATOR: And it would look something like this.

MIKE GRAINGER: The system, for example, that we produce

inflates within 60 seconds.

We can evacuate 100 people within about three minutes.

So they leave the ship, go down the slide

straight into a large capacity life raft,

and then the life raft can be cut away

and towed away from the sinking vessel if that's the case.

NARRATOR: And the nylon plastic that canopies the raft also

provides life saving insulation in even the most

frigid marine conditions.

MIKE GRAINGER: So this is the very life raft

that we would install on our new Titanic Two

along with our evacuation slides.

So again we would evacuate a ship like Titanic Two very,

very quickly and very, very efficiently without passengers

getting their feet wet.

NARRATOR: So we figured out design, materials, horsepower,

amenities, and safety.

But how many people are we going to need?

And how long is it going to take?

When it came to building the Titanic,

it was the biggest operation the city of Belfast,

Northern Ireland ever undertook.

Belfast was probably one of the most

busiest shipyards in the world.

The shipyard that would have built the Titanic

would have had a staff of 15,000 people working on it.

So that's a very, very large shipyard

even by today's standard.

NARRATOR: Today's shipyards are leaps

and bounds ahead of the Titanic thanks to modern technology.

But we'll still need to employ a diverse team of experts

from the Incat shipyard.

GORDON STEWART: Those people would be fabricators, welders,

but we also have the people working

in the design office, the stores and supply people, purchasing.

NARRATOR: So how many people?

Approximately 500 to 600 people.

NARRATOR: We'll put it at 600 people.

But how long will it take?

Well, the first Titanic was built

in two years and two months.

So flash forward to the present and we've

got to be able to move faster than that, right?

Yeah, so in the design phase typically

you're looking at three to six months.

And then construction can be around the two year mark.

NARRATOR: So two and a half years?

That's longer than it took to build the first Titanic

and that's not even considering all the red tape.

STEWART WELLS: You have to go through that approval process

and independent checks and things

like that, which obviously adds to that time.

NARRATOR: All right, we'll put it at three years then.

But how the heck are we paying for this thing?

Titanic's business model was simple...

Stock the steerage cabins and up charge for first class.

Well, in first class, the cheapest ones

are probably around $300 US back in 1912 or so.

And the most expensive, one of the private promenade suites,

will be around $3,300.

Today's equivalent, your cheapest ticket

for first class to be around $15,000, most expensive

run $125,000.

NARRATOR: Our experts are split on the financial future

of this one.

I think from the perspective of doing it as a challenge is

one thing, but to do it as a passenger operation is probably

a different kettle of fish.

Absolutely, we have complete confidence that this vessel

is commercially viable.

NARRATOR: We're left in financial uncertainty.

Just how big is the final price tag going to be?

And how are we going to pay for it?

So you want to build a new Titanic, one that'll cross

the Atlantic in just 48 hours?

What would it take?

We're imagining a 21st century ocean liner

with a catamaran design, jet engines,

and luxury accommodations.

And it's going to take up to 600 workers

three years to build it.

So let's do it.

Step one, optimize the design with state of the art modeling.

STEWART WELLS: We all have computer programs, which

we can do virtual testing.

So we don't have to build a physical model.

NARRATOR: Step two, bring that design into the shipyard.

But are we going to have to rebuild the shipyard,

like they did the first time?

They were the largest structures

in the world at the time.

And the Northern Ireland guard was

completely reconfigured to be able to build these vessels.

It took two years for the Harland and Wolff

to build the docks.

JEREMY DUCHOW: They built these two

gigantic gantries for Titanic that were

going to be built side by side.

They also built this enormous gantry structure

to hold all the cranes.

It was about 11 stories high.

NARRATOR: Back in Tasmania, they're

already geared up with a shipyard

big enough to handle our build.

GORDON STEWART: We have undercover workshop areas

with dried up facilities, everything

that's required to build a vessel

of this size and this capacity.

ROBERT CLIFFORD: And there aren't

too many groups in the world that are capable of doing that.

NARRATOR: Our shipyard's in ship shape.

Our hull can start taking shape too.

While we wait on that, we'll tell you how

they did things a century ago.

When it came to construction processes over 100 years ago,

it took a lot more work.

You didn't have as much machine equipment to help

you really build things.

You first laid the keel and the tank top,

which is the lowest decks of the ship.

And then build the ribs along the side, where they would then

install the shell plating to create the hull

or the body of the ship.

NARRATOR: Back in those days, steel boats were assembled

by a process known as riveting.

TONY THOMPSON: Riveting was the predecessor to welding.

That meant a tremendous amount of labor and work

to build these vessels.

Rivets were fired down below in a coal fired kiln,

and then they were thrown up to the shipwrights,

who would catch them in buckets, and then insert them.

And a man on the other side would peen the back

of the rivet, while the man on the front

was driving the rivet in.

There's at least four people for one rivet.

And there'd be millions of rivets in one of these vessels

to be able to hold it all together.

I don't think I would have liked it very much.

But they were learning.

Those people were learning.

They were right on the edge of technology at the time.

NARRATOR: Today, all the pieces of our aluminum hull

can be connected via a specialized welding

process called MIG welding.

A small metal wire is fed through the welding gun

sparking and creating enough heat to forge the two

pieces of aluminum together.

With the hull in place, our next job's

the same task as the bygone boat builders of Belfast.

They still had to do what's called outfitting, which means

basically installing all of her mechanics and her interiors,

because she basically was just a giant empty shell.

NARRATOR: We're outfitting our Titanic with some seriously

heavy duty horsepower.

These are the 16 cylinder engines from Germany.

Twin turbo chargers, after coolers, all the mod cons

to make them efficient today.

Those engines are going to roll across

here, roll into the ship.

We take the seal away, roll them down there,

and put the second engine in.

Two engines fit in this engine room.

MIKE GRAINGER: The type of arrangement's

never been done before.

So we had to kind of reinvent the wheel

as far as installation goes.

Once you've got it in there, you've

got all the hurdles of attaching everything to it,

complicated pipe systems, the exhaust systems.

So getting it all fit is always a task all in itself.

NARRATOR: As the machinery gets hooked up,

we can begin installing our luxury

amenities and safety features.

When we're done, our Titanic will slide out

of its shore-side hangar and hit the water en route

to its transatlantic raceway.

It'll be a shipbuilding celebration

unmatched for over a century.

BLAIR BEED: The day that they launched the Titanic,

it was a clear day, a large, flat area

where crowds had gathered.

They had lined up all the workers.

And people would have thought is it going to launch?

Is it going to launch?

The whistles start to go and more whistles.

And all of a sudden this huge, huge hull starts to move.

And then, finally, it took up some speed,

and then hit the river.

And as it hits the water, the cheers are even greater.

And the cheers would have been heard right into the mountains

around Belfast.

NARRATOR: We did it.

A brand new Titanic to cross the Atlantic in just 48 hours.

We built a catamaran style and used ultralight marine grade

aluminum.

It's got twin gas turbine engines decked out

with first class amenities and every safety

feature imaginable.

It took 600 people and three years.

But how much did it cost?

Well, the original Titanic cost $174 million

in today's dollars.

So how big is our bill going to be?

Hundreds of millions of dollars we're talking

about for a ship this size.

Ballpark figure for a ship like this about $200 million.

NARRATOR: Time to pay up.

$200 million it is.

But can we make this a commercially

successful venture?

Our trophy winning inaugural voyage

is sure to make headlines.

And if we can drum up enough supporters,

we just may be able to resurrect the golden age

of ocean-going travel.

You can still conjure up a feeling

of being one of these amazing liners, that era of romance

and adventure on the high seas.

NARRATOR: Our Titanic may never live

up to the legacy of the original,

but maybe that's a good thing.

TONY THOMPSON: The loss of the Titanic was a watershed.

Titanic has affected the construction and design

of every passenger vessel that operates now,

and that goes from small table ferries that cross rivers

to ships that cross oceans.

NARRATOR: But for the thousands that gathered in Belfast

to watch the original Titanic launch to the millions who've

learned it's tragic and great story to those who carry on

in marine technology, the future of ocean travel

is being written.

MARY KELLOGG-JOSLYN: There are many ships

are much bigger than Titanic today,

but what she represented was the inner self of our self,

something that kind of tugs and awakens ourself to say,

hey, we can do something even better and bigger.

NARRATOR: The Titanic we've imagined

shows we can fuse safety, luxury, and speed

on the high seas carrying passengers

on an age old route in a brand new way if we built it today.