The 100th anniversary of the sinking of the Titanic is being remembered at a number of a special events, including one in the ship's birthplace Belfast. 
 
 A memorial service for the 1,500 people who died was held at the North Atlantic wreck site on cruise ship MS Balmoral, which is retracing the Titanic's route. 
 
 A minute's silence was held and wreaths were cast into the sea at the moment the Titanic sank. 
 
 And a plaque featuring the names of those who died was unveiled in Belfast. 
 
 The ship, which at the time was the largest vessel in the world, was built in the city. 
 
 The plaque, in the Titanic Memorial Garden, lists the names of those who died in alphabetical order. 
 
 At the scene In the middle of the Atlantic a ship's whistle sounded to mark exactly 100 years since the Titanic struck an iceberg. At that moment passengers stood in silence on the decks all around the MS Balmoral looking out into the darkness. Hundreds of miles from land some imagined the despair they would have felt being lowered into the sea in a lifeboat. Others thought of their relatives who had drowned here a century earlier. After the excitement of the departure and earlier days at sea, the ship seemed eerily quiet. In the cold of the north Atlantic one person described the atmosphere as "almost ghostly". The Balmoral had traced the route of the Titanic from Southampton to the spot where the ship sank. There it was met by another vessel that had travelled from New York, the destination Titanic never reached. The ships sat side-by-side thousands of metres above the wreckage, allowing passengers to pay tribute at what some relatives regard as a grave site. 
 
 Thousands attended or listened to the Belfast service, which was held at the city hall. 
 
 Una Reilly, head of the local Titanic Society, said: "We are all proud of this ship. What happened was a disaster, she was not." 
 
 And a memorial service was held in Southampton, from where the ship set sail five days before its sinking. 
 
 The anniversary has been marked in a number of services across the UK. 
 
 who died after staying at his post until his equipment failed 
 
 was unveiled at his home town of Barmouth, Gwynedd, because records show he commanded the only lifeboat to look for survivors, pulling four people from the freezing water 
 
 in the accident were commemorated with the unveiling of a plaque 
 
 And a service described as an act of remembrance 
 
 Earlier, on the Balmoral, passengers and crew members listened in silence as the names were read out of those who died when the liner sank on its maiden voyage. 
 
 Jane Allen's great-uncle, Thomas Pears, was one of those who died. 
 
 Explaining the emotions she felt during the service, she told the BBC: "It was just so eerily quiet. 
 
 "And then you look down over the side of the ship and you realise that every man and woman who was not fortunate enough to get into a lifeboat had to make that decision of when to jump or to stay with the ship, until the lights went out. 
 
 "And when the lights went out it must have been horrendous. We witnessed that tonight." 
 
 Melinda Norris, whose relative Charles Lightoller was a surviving crew member, said: "You still get a chill just looking at that water, imagining you have to go into it. 
 
 "We've been listening to the names of the 1,500 people who died. 
 
 Image caption A newly unveiled plaque at the Titanic Memorial Garden in Belfast features the names of those who died on the Titanic 
 
 "It's just an unimaginable amount of suffering took place here, so it's surreal to be here." 
 
 Richard Hyman's great-grandfather was also on board Titanic and lived to tell the tale. 
 
 Mr Hyman said: "You imagine it's pitch black, freezing cold, nothing is anywhere near you other than an iceberg. 
 
 "The fear that must have been with all those people who were either stuck on the ship or in a lifeboat, not knowing whether they were going to survive or not. 
 
 "And people did freeze to death as well, even though they'd survived the disaster." 
 
 Another cruise ship, Azamara Journey, which has travelled from New York, also held a service at the site of the disaster, which occurred 400 miles (640km) off the coast of Newfoundland. 
 
 Image caption Many of those who participated in a memorial service on board MS Balmoral were related to people who died when the Titanic sank 100 years ago 
 
 The sinking is also being remembered in other parts of the globe including New York, which had been the Titanic's intended destination. 
 
 About 1,300 passengers, ranging from millionaires to poor emigrants, and about 900 crew were on board the Titanic when it sank on its maiden voyage. 
 
 The ship left Southampton on 10 April 1912. It headed to Cherbourg in France and Queenstown - now Cobh - in the Irish Republic before heading for New York. 
 
 The ship hit an iceberg at 23:40 (Ship's Time) on 14 April 1912, and sank two-and-a-half hours later. ||||| Helena Beaumont-Jones from Airlie Beach, Australia is overcome with emotion as the MS Balmoral Titanic memorial cruise ship approaches the wreck site of the Titanic in the Atlantic Ocean, Saturday, April... (Associated Press) 
 
 Cruise ship passengers and crew said prayers Sunday at the spot in the North Atlantic where the Titanic sank 100 years ago with the loss of more than 1,500 lives. 
 
 Passengers lined the decks of MS Balmoral, which has been retracing the route of the doomed voyage. After a moment of silence, three floral wreaths were cast onto the waves as the ship's whistle sounded in the dark. 
 
 Jane Allen from Devon in southwest England, whose great-uncle perished on the Titanic, said the moment had vividly reminded her of the horror of the disaster. 
 
 "All you could hear was the swell splashing against the side of the ship. You could see the white breakers stretching out to sea," she told the BBC. "You are in the middle of nowhere. And then you look down over the side of the ship and you realize that every man and every woman who didn't make it into a lifeboat had to make that decision, of when to jump or stay on the ship as the lights went out." 
 
 Another cruise ship, Journey, which has traveled from New York, also held a service at the site of the disaster, 400 miles (640 kilometers) off the coast of Newfoundland. 
 
 The Titanic, the world's largest and most luxurious ocean liner, was traveling from England to New York when it struck an iceberg at 11:40 p.m. on April 14, 1912. It sank less than three hours later, with the loss of all but 700 of the 2,208 passengers and crew. 
 
 A century on, events around the globe are marking a tragedy that retains its grip on the world's imagination. 
 
 In Belfast, Northern Ireland, where the Titanic was built, a memorial monument was unveiled Sunday at a ceremony attended by local dignitaries, relatives of the dead and explorer Robert Ballard, who discovered the wreck of the Titanic on the ocean floor in 1985. 
 
 A brass band played as the granite plinth which bears bronze plaques was uncovered beside Belfast City Hall. Officials say it is the first Titanic memorial to list all victims alphabetically, with no distinction between passengers and crew members, or between first- and third-class travelers. 
 
 After a minute's silence, a choir sang "Nearer My God To Thee" _ the hymn Titanic's band is reported to have played as the ship went down. 
 
 Belfast spent decades scarred by its link to the disaster, but has come to take pride in the feats of engineering and industry involved in building the Titanic. 
 
 On Saturday, thousands attended a memorial concert in Belfast featuring performances by Bryan Ferry and soul singer Joss Stone. At St. Anne's Cathedral in the city, a performance of composer Philip Hammond's "The Requiem for the Lost Souls of the Titanic" was followed by a torch-lit procession to the Titanic Memorial in the grounds of city hall. 
 
 The requiem _ performed by male choristers dressed as ship's crew and female performers in black _ also included words by Belfast novelist Glenn Patterson, who imagined the victims reflecting on all they had missed in the last 100 years. 
 
 "We passed instead into myth, launched a library full of books, enough film to cross the Atlantic three times over, more conspiracy theories than Kennedy, 97 million web pages, a tourist industry, a requiem or two," Patterson said. "We will live longer than every one of you." 
 
 Remembrance ceremonies also were being held in the ship's departure port of Southampton, southern England _ home to hundreds of Titanic crew who perished _ and in Halifax, Nova Scotia, where more than 100 victims of the tragedy are buried. 
 
 The most famous maritime disaster in history was being marked even in places without direct links to it. 
 
 Venues in Las Vegas, San Diego, Houston and Singapore are hosting Titanic exhibitions that include artifacts recovered from the site of the wreck. Among the items: bottles of perfume, porcelain dishes, and a 17-foot piece of hull. 
 
 The centenary of the disaster has been marked with a global outpouring of commemoration and commerce. Events have ranged from the opening of a glossy new tourist attraction telling the ship's story in Belfast to a 3-D re-release of James Cameron's 1997 romantic weepie "Titanic," which awakened a new generation's interest in the disaster. 
 
 Helen Edwards, one of 1,309 passengers on memorial cruise aboard the liner Balmoral who have spent the past week steeped in the Titanic's history and symbolism, said the story's continuing appeal was due to its strong mixture of romance and tragedy, history and fate. 
 
 "(There are) all the factors that came together for the ship to be right there, then, to hit that iceberg. All the stories of the passengers who ended up on the ship," said Edwards, a 62-year-old retiree from Silver Spring, Maryland. "It's just a microcosm of social history, personal histories, nautical histories. 
 
 "Romance is an appropriate word right up until the time of the tragedy _ the band playing, the clothes. And then there's the tragedy." 
 
 As the world paused to remember the victims, a U.S. official revealed that there may be human remains embedded in the ocean floor where Titanic came to rest. 
 
 James Delgado, director of maritime heritage at the National Oceanic and Atmosphere Administration, said Saturday that one photograph taken during a 2004 expedition shows a coat and boots in the mud. He said the way they are "laid out" makes a "compelling case" that it is where "someone has come to rest." 
 
 He released the full image this week to coincide with the disaster's centenary. It was previously seen in a cropped version. 
 
 ___ 
 
 Jill Lawless reported from London. She can be reached at: http://twitter.com/JillLawless
– Amid a buildup to the centennial of the Titanic's sinking that went on and on, the actual event arrived last night, with ceremonies from Belfast to the North Atlantic marking the disaster that claimed nearly 1,500 lives. The MS Balmoral, on a cruise retracing the doomed liner's first and final voyage, observed a moment of silence at the site of the sinking with passengers lining the decks, reports the AP. Three wreaths were tossed into the waters. "It was just so eerily quiet," says the great-niece of one of the ship's victims. "And then you look down over the side of the ship and you realize that every man and woman who was not fortunate enough to get into a lifeboat had to make that decision of when to jump or to stay with the ship, until the lights went out." Says another passenger aboard the Balmoral, "You still get a chill just looking at that water, imagining you have to go into it." In Belfast, where the Titanic was built, a plague with the names of the victims was unveiled in the Titanic Memorial Garden, notes the BBC. Titanic hit an iceberg some 400 miles off the coast of Newfoundland at 11:40pm on April 14, 1912, and sank a scant three hours later.