GROUND ZER0, New York, N.Y.--Aug. 9, 2003--  Ninety-one years ago, on April 14, 1912, 1,500 people died in one of the world's great sea tragedies.    Seventy-three years later the wreck was found in the icy darkness of the North Atlantic, and since then, the ship has been Terrorized by humans seeking to make movies, get married on its bow, and salvage trinkets for both personal and historic reasons.

    The New York Times reported today a headline:  "Scientists Warn That Visitors Are Loving Titanic To Death."
      The scientists claim the ship is rapidly decaying, caused in part by a surge of human activity burrowing into the rusted hulk of the great ship for a variety of reasons.

     Besides the salvage workers, scientists and movie makers, for a mere $36,000 you can book a trip down the two mile chute of frigid North Atlantic water to view the famous shipwreck.

     In July 2001, a New York couple, David Leibowitz and Kimberley Miller, hired a submersible to rest on the Titanic's bow while a ship's captain officiated over their marriage.
      Pirates have also attacked the rusting corpse of the ship that was termed "unsinkable."  Unauthorized salvagers have attacked the Titanic, attempting to remove artifacts without permission and circumventing safety and preservation guidelines.
     One scientist hired to investigate the rapid decay of the ship's hulk, located 380 miles off Newfoundland, claims that rivers of rust are populated by iron-eating microbes.   In 1996, a microbiologist noted that 200 pounds of iron were being eaten a day from the bow.   Two years later, the scientist revisited the ailing wreck and estimated the biological activity has increased so that 600 pounds a day were being consumed by the microbes.
    

    Humans are indirectly responsible, goes one theory.   The iron-eating microbes, according to ocean scientist and retired submariner Dr. Alfred S. McLaren who dived onto the wreck in 1999 and again last month, are the result of overfishing in the Grand Banks.   Dr. McLaren claims the marine life normally eaten by heavy fish populations are simply falling like snow down the to the ocean's floor, resting on the Titanic and eating it.  
     The measure of the damage is from the growth of rusticles, brownish appearing icicles hanging from the ship's iron plates.
    Dr. McLaren, an emeritus president of the Explorers Club in New York, used Russian submersibles to explore the Titanic's state of decay.
     Because of the location, little can be done about the salvors seeking to grab a piece of history.   Plus, the rapid decay of the ship suggests the wreck will soon be consumed by the ocean.   Ashes to ashes, dust to dust, and rust to rust.
     Anyone who has read the history of the Titanic, seen the original 1953 action drama Titanic starring Clifton Webb and Barbra Stanwyck, or seen the James Cameron remake in 1997, can fathom the Terror of that night in 1912 when human Courage and Fear butted up against one another as thousands scrambled to the limited life rafts.
     But the Titanic is more a story of Vigilance than Terrorism.

     It is an example of Complacency.
     The ship was touted as unsinkable.   The captain and crew felt they were aboard a ship that had more power than even Nature herself, and in the final analysis, an iceberg ripped the guts of the ship apart.    Frozen water, not bombs, humbled human arrogance.

      It seems to me that the salvors seeking to preserve the wreck should be more concerned with preserving the pitfalls of Complacency and Arrogance than the fine china or chandeliers from the body of the great luxury liner.
     Terrorism begins with Complacency.   Nothing feeds the danger of the darkness more than assuming you have overpowered the Beast.
     There is no wall thick enough, no weapons fierce enough, to stop the Beast from entering into the soul of a human being and twisting one's thinking.    But, there are guards, crewmembers who keep a steady eye for the icebergs of life.
      These are the Sentinels of Thought.  They are Courage, Conviction and Right Actions taken for future generations.
      One installs them into the crows nest of their being when he or she takes the Pledge of Vigilance and lives by the Principles of Vigilance.
      What these tools provide is radar that the Beast of Terror is moving about, flexing his or her muscles, shoving an iceberg closer and closer.

      The average person waltzing through life assuming everything is okay and wonderful, putting the duty and responsibility for life on others, and wakes up one morning to find his or her world turned upside down.
       It happens so often.   In half the cases, marriages sink.  They are hit by icebergs just as the Titanic, and children suffer as the ship breaks in half and both halves sink down into the icy waters of divorce.
       What happened?
       Where did the iceberg come from?  Why wasn't it seen?  How come the unsinkable ship of marriage ended up so fragile?   Why did the children suffer?
       I use marriage as only one example, for it is the most illustrative.
       There are countless others.  How about the expectations people have about what they are going to do with their lives, or what they want to be, only to find they smack headlong into a thick wall, and their hopes for finding the rainbow sink as fast as the Titanic.
        Then, the microbes fall.

         We begin to walk around with the rusticles of our life hanging on the iron plates of our Hopes and Dreams.   The iron of our will is eaten.   Each day we feel our structure crumble as life seems to go on without us, leaving us to decay on the bottom of the ocean of dreams.
         The Titanic is a symbol of Complacency.
         We should be more concerned about salvaging human Courage, Conviction and Right Actions that were the real legacy of the ship.   If the Titanic has a message, it is the lesson that all things are fleeting.   And, we should never think we are invincible.
         Perhaps, if the Captain of the ship had taken the Pledge of Vigilance, he might have not been asleep in his cabin that night, unconcerned about icebergs.   He might have known the most unsinkable ship was sinkable.
         Vigilance might have changed history.
         Right now, the lack of Vigilance is rusting two-miles below the North Atlantic.
    
       

Aug 8--Terminator Takes On Beast Of Political Terror

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