Sinking

At 11.40 pm (ship's time), lookout Frederick Fleet spotted an iceberg immediately ahead of Titanic and alerted the bridge.[119] First Officer William Murdoch ordered the ship to be steered around the obstacle and the engines to be put in reverse,[120] but it was too late; the starboard side of Titanic struck the iceberg, creating a series of holes below the waterline. Five of the ship's watertight compartments were breached. It soon became clear that the ship was doomed, as she could not survive more than four compartments being flooded. Titanic began sinking bow-first, with water spilling from compartment to compartment as her angle in the water became steeper.[121]
Those aboard Titanic were ill-prepared for such an emergency. The ship's lifeboats had only enough space to carry about half of those on board; if the ship had carried her full complement of about 3,339 passengers and crew, only about a third could have been accommodated in the lifeboats.[122] The crew had not been trained adequately in carrying out an evacuation. The officers did not know how many they could safely put aboard the lifeboats and launched many of them barely half-full.[123] Third-class passengers were largely left to fend for themselves, causing many of them to become trapped below decks as the ship filled with water.[124] The "women and children first" protocol was generally followed for the loading of the lifeboats[124] and most of the male passengers and crew were left aboard.
Two hours and forty minutes after Titanic struck the iceberg, her rate of sinking suddenly increased as her forward deck dipped underwater and the sea poured in through open hatches and grates.[125] As her unsupported stern rose out of the water, exposing the propellers, the ship split apart between the third and fourth funnels due to the immense strain on the keel.[126] The stern remained afloat for a few minutes longer, rising to a nearly vertical angle with hundreds of people still clinging to it.[127] At 2:20 am, it sank, breaking loose from the bow section. The remaining passengers and crew were plunged into lethally cold water with a temperature of only 28 °F (−2 °C). Almost all of those in the water died of hypothermia, cardiac arrest, or drowning within minutes.[128] Only 13 of them were helped into the lifeboats though these had room for almost 500 more occupants.[129]
Distress signals were sent by wireless, rockets and lamp, but none of the ships that responded were near enough to reach her before she sank.[130] A nearby ship, the Californian, which was the last to have been in contact with her before the collision, saw her flares but failed to assist.[131] Around 4 am, RMS Carpathia arrived on the scene in response to Titanic's earlier distress calls.[132] 710 people survived the disaster and were conveyed by Carpathia to New York, Titanic's original destination, while 1,514 people lost their lives.[85]