The recent tragedy of a submersible going down to visit the wreck of the Titanic has resulted in a resurgence in interest in the most popular piece of Titanic-related pop culture, James Cameron’s blockbuster movie. Cameron himself has spent a lot of time in submersibles similar to the one that imploded, and in a recently uncovered interview Titanic co-star Bill Paxton talked about the time he visited the wreck with the director. And the actor had some eerily prescient thoughts about just how dangerous doing so could be.
ET interviewed Bill Paxton back in 2003 for Ghosts of the Abyss, Cameron’s documentary film in which he and Paxton dove down to the Titanic themselves along with a team of scientists, in order to obtain the best images of the wreck (at the time to date). In the interview, Paxton spoke quite candidly about just what could go wrong in the submersible, and he clearly understood exactly what it would mean if it did. Paxton said…
Certainly, there are things that can go wrong. If they do go wrong, it's not going to matter anyway. And it's going to happen so quickly that you're not gonna even know it happened, probably. These are the thoughts you have going in.
While a rescue effort was undertaken following the loss of communication with the Titan submersible, now that the wreckage has likely been located, and “presumed human remains” have been recovered, it’s widely assumed that whatever caused the submersible to implode likely happened along the same lines that Paxton described in the unearthed interview.
Bill Paxton ultimately made multiple dives on the wreck as part of filming the documentary. He was seemingly glad he made the choice to see a thing few human beings have been able to view with their own eyes. However, the actor said that he did have to consider just what would be required of him each time he went down.
But then you start thinking about physically what's going to be required of you to get into a three-man, deep-sea Russian submersible for a 13-hour dive. To go down two and a half miles to a place where the sun has never penetrated. And you're starting to think 'OK, I've got young kids. I need to get them to an age where they can support themselves before I do something this crazy.
Considering everything that happened with the Titan situation, it’s a bit chilling to hear Bill Paxton talking about what he really did consider his own mortality every time he went down. Simpsons writer Mike Reiss, who had been on the Titan submersible before, had similar things to say. At the very least, when they made the decision to go down, they did so understanding the risks. You can check out the full interview with Paxton below.
Paxton’s interview shows there were real risks involved, but it also explains why somebody would choose to take those risks. There’s something about the Titanic that captures the imagination. While James Cameron himself has spoken about the tragedy and what he perceives as serious questions about the engineering involved, one of Titanic's technical advisors says that the public demand is such that there will always be people who want to see this. There's something about the Titanic that intrigues people.
