Niagara Falls filmmaker well-versed in deep sea exploration weighs in on the Titan tragedy

Niagara | Niagara Falls | Latest News |

By

Published June 23, 2023 at 9:34 am

Niagara Falls filmmaker James Cameron, who's also highly experienced in deep sea exploration, said he wished he'd known a little more about the OceanGate Titan expedition beforehand so he could have spoken out against it.

While it would be easy to shrug off Niagara Falls filmmaker James Cameron’s opinion on the OceanGate Titan tragedy, simply because of his connection with the Titanic through his own movie of the same name, the truth is the man knows a lot about deep sea exploration.

By that, we mean first-hand. On March 26, 2012, Cameron made a record-breaking solo dive 10,908 metres (35,787 feet) in the Mariana Trench below the surface of the Pacific Ocean in the Deepsea Challenger submersible vessel to reach the world’s deepest frontier.

Cameron also visited the Titanic 33 times onboard a submersible, prior to and during the making of the film Titanic.

So his opinion about the OceanGate Titan implosion is not to be taken lightly. To that end, he has made one thing clear. He believes the vessel was ill-suited for the depths it was headed.

He also revealed – days before it was officially announced – so the so-called knocking sounds heard by sonar was actually the sound of the submersible imploding, instantly killing the five passengers.

“I knew Titanic submarine imploded on Monday (June 19) and rescue was a charade.” He told one news agency the search was a “prolonged nightmarish charade.” The search was finally called off yesterday (June 22).

He said he would have sounded the alarm about the expedition beforehand, except that he “wasn’t aware (the crew) wasn’t certified. I wasn’t studying it.”

However, in retrospect, he noted, “There was a lot of concern about this outfit and this sub.” He said there were many experts concerned about the seaworthiness of the vessel and that countless people had warned the company bout the dangers.

“I’m struck by the similarity of the Titanic disaster itself, where the captain was repeatedly warned about ice ahead of his ship and yet he steamed at full speed into an ice field,” he told news outlets.

inNiagaraRegion's Editorial Standards and Policies