The Sinking of the R.M.S. 'Titanic': A Case Study in Thermal Inversion and Atmospheric Refraction Phenomena

On April 14, 1912, the British passenger liner R.M.S. "Titanic" struck an iceberg. The ship sank in a fraction of the time designers had estimated following a worst case scenario. The purpose of this article is to examine the atmospheric refractive phenomena that might have played a significant role in obscuring the iceberg from "Titanic"'s two lookouts. We describe a way in which these phenomena can easily and inexpensively be brought to students in our introductory physics classrooms.