Timeline of United States discoveries four days into the ship's maiden voyage, "Titanic" struck an iceberg and sank two hours and forty minutes later, early on April 15, 1912. The sinking resulted in the deaths of 1,517 of the 2,223 people on board, making it one of the deadliest peacetime maritime disasters in history. After nearly 74 years of being lost at sea on the bottom of the ocean floor, a joint Franco-American expedition led by American oceanographer Dr. Robert D. Ballard, discovered the wreckage of the RMS "Titanic" two miles (3 km) beneath the waves of the North Atlantic on September 1, 1985. Ballard
Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean (MARCO) Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean (MARCO) Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean is a regional initiative by states in the Mid-Atlantic States region "to maintain and improve the health of our ocean and coastal resources, and ensure that they continue to contribute to the high quality of life and economic vitality of our region’s communities well into the future." Five states currently participate in the initiative. In 2009 Governors David Paterson, Martin O'Malley, Jon Corzine, Jack Markell, and Tim Kaine joined to form the Mid-Atlantic Regional Council on the Ocean. The initiative was announced on June 4, 2009 by