Moment James Cameron found out about 9/11 caught on camera as he just emerged from visiting Titanic
Topics: Film and TV, James Cameron, US News, Titanic
Emily Brown
Featured Image Credit: Walt Disney Pictures
Topics: Film and TV, James Cameron, US News, Titanic
Footage which has resurfaced following the implosion of the Titan submersible shows director James Cameron learning about the 9/11 attacks after going underwater to see the wreck of the Titanic.
Cameron has been outspoken about the safety aspects of going to see the wreckage of the Titanic after OceanGate's submersible vessel disappeared in the Atlantic Ocean on 18 June.
The Canadian director is familiar with the unforgiving environment of the deep ocean after having gone to see the wreck of the Titanic himself.
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His journeys have been documented in films like Deepsea Challenge 3D and the 2003 documentary movie Ghosts of the Abyss, in which one on-camera moment caught Cameron after he went to see the wreckage in 2001.
Cameron took a dive in a vessel on September 11 - a date that has since been burned into the memories of Americans and the rest of the world due to the terrorist attacks which took place that day and killed around 3,000 people.
At the time, however, Cameron was none the wiser to the horror unfolding up on dry land.
Footage which has resurfaced on Twitter shows Cameron's vessel being pulled out of the water and returning to its mothership before the director begins to climb out.
Before he's even at the bottom of the ladder, Cameron is met with the voice of actor Bill Paxton saying: "Worst terrorist attack in history Jim."
Cameron later recalled the experience during a discussion with the German news outlet Spiegel International, saying: "The day the 9/11 terrorists murdered 3,000 people in New York and Washington, I was just diving to the Titanic.
"Twelve hours later, I came back to our mothership. I was presumably the last man in the Western Hemisphere to learn about what had happened."
Paxton, who died in 2017, also previously recalled the moment Cameron returned from his venture to the Titanic, and how he broke the news to the director.
He told The Guardian: “I said, ‘Jim, the world changed from the time you went down till you came back.’ It was strange. We felt a little bit like survivors out there.”
Cameron has spoken this week about the 'terrible irony' in the loss of OceanGate's Titan vessel as he likened it to the sinking of the Titanic, saying: "We now have another wreck that is based on unfortunately the same principles of not heeding warnings."
"OceanGate were warned," he added.
The Titan submersible vessel suffered a 'catastrophic implosion' after it set off to explore the wreck of the Titanic.