by To commemorate the 25th anniversary of the film, never-before-seen footage of the Titanic wreck will be released titanic. The raw footage gazes through the murky depths of the Atlantic Ocean and reveals the world’s most famous shipwreck in all its rusting and rusting expired Fame.
The video footage was shot during a July 1986 expedition by researchers at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution (WHOI). Returning to the site just nine months after the discovery, the team used a small submarine called the Alvin and the newly developed Jason Jr. remote-controlled vehicle to tour the ship for the first time since its ill-fated voyage in 1912.
The “unsinkable” ocean liner famously sank in the North Atlantic on April 15, 1912 after striking an iceberg during its maiden voyage from Southampton, England, to New York City. At least 1,500 passengers died and the wreck sank to the seabed about 4,000 meters (13,123 feet) below sea level, some 740 kilometers (400 nautical miles) from Newfoundland, Canada.
Titanic’s final resting place was not discovered until September 1985, 73 years after her icy fate. Since then, fewer people have visited Titanic’s wreck than flew into space, but a small handful of expeditions have ventured to its wreck and have returned with stunning footage.
A full cut of the newly released footage will premiere on Wednesday, February 15 at 7:30pm EST (February 16 at 12:30am GMT) on the WHOI YouTube channel, which you can watch in the video player at the bottom of this article can. It lasts 1 hour and 21 minutes and consists mostly of raw and unnarrated footage as the team explores the wreck lying on the seabed.
In the meantime, you can watch a short snippet of the film in the player above.
Most of this footage has never been released to the public, says the WHOI. They’re releasing it to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the 1997 film titanic directed by James Cameron.
“More than a century after the Titanic sank, the human stories embodied in the great ship continue to reverberate,” said Cameron, oceanographer and director, in a statement.
“Like many others, I was spellbound when Alvin and Jason Jr. ventured up and into the wreck. By releasing this footage, WHOI is helping to tell an important part of a story that spans generations and circles the globe,” he added.
It’s good to catch a glimpse of the wreck while we still can as its days may be numbered. During expeditions over the past few years, the ship has been rapidly decomposed and disintegrated by rust, sea salt, bacteria, swarms of deep-sea creatures and other forces of nature.
