HEARTBREAKING MISTAKE

It was an tragic error on a gigantic story.

The Evening Sun, based in Baltimore, Maryland, got it quite wrong when Titanic sank in 1912.

Just 705 people survived the terrible disaster
"All Titanic passengers are safe; transferred in lifeboats at sea" was the paper's headline on 15 April, 1912.

As John Leo of the Columbia Journalism Review says, the error "had many authors".

There was "a White Star spokesman who kept explaining that the Titanic was unsinkable, radiomen who garbled emergency messages, and the usual mix of reporters eager to beat the competition with news almost certain to be correct, since everybody knew the ship couldn't possibly sink".

The Baltimore Sun, the Evening Sun's successor, called the gaffe "the most embarrassing moment in the 85 years" of that paper.

They weren't alone, however: newspapers all over had trouble with the Titanic story, and a few even mocked those newsmen - like those at the New York Times - who got it right.

By Jennifer Quinn
BBC News Online Magazine

In fact, basically all newspapers who covered the story did initially get it wrong--even the New York Times had many errors, although it was the first to say that the Titanic had sunk.