Titanic filmmaker says wreck should be left on sea bed

The Titanic leaving the docks in Southampton (Matlin PR/PA) Credit: Press Association Images

The Hollywood director behind Oscar-winning movie Titanic said he strongly opposes cutting off and resurfacing sections of the world famous ship.

James Cameron, a film-maker and deep sea explorer, said it would cost billions of pounds to raise the wreck itself.

Mr Cameron, who first visited the Titanic wreck site in 1995 and has since made 33 dives over a 10-year period, also believes an international agreement between the US and the United Kingdom would help conserve and preserve the site.

“The feasibility of raising the wreck itself is pretty much zero unless one were to throw enough money at the problem to start a colony on Mars,” Mr Cameron said.

“We’re talking billions of dollars, it’s a very daunting task working two miles under the surface of the ocean.

“What is feasible is cutting big chunks off the wreck, for example taking the iconic bow section which I featured in the film.

“They could cut that off and bring a big chunk to the surface leaving behind a horrible disfigured piece of wreckage.

“The wreck is deteriorating as one would expect and the rust forms part of a bacterial colony, there is a strange beauty to the wreck.”

The movie maker said that it would take another 500 years for the Titanic to collapse into an unrecognisable mound of rust.

“My feeling is it serves a greater purpose in situ, as a monument, and as a gravesite,” he added.

“I’m violently opposed to somebody going down there and hogging off great sections of the ship and distributing them off around the world.

A port hole recovered from the wreck of the Titanic Credit: Phil Noble/PA

“That isn’t as evocative and powerful as what was done, which was to bring up teacups and shoes and spectacles, things human beings touched and that touches our hearts much more.

“As a filmmaker, I would hope the wreck remains for imaging.

“We can continue to photograph it, celebrate and understand it as a monument of a tragic event.”

Mr Cameron said that an inter-governmental agreement between the US and the UK to conserve and preserve the Titanic wreck site would make a “great deal of sense”.

“Titanic has always been an intrinsic part of America and Britain.”