People horrified by sobering reality of what the Titanic sinking may have looked like

We've all watched the Titanic and saw James Cameron's interpretation of how the 1912 disaster went down, but this simulation circulating online has really managed to spook people.

The legendary filmmaker - who had made multiple dives to the wreckage site in the North Atlantic Ocean - admitted even he had struggled to get the pivotal scene in the iconic film right, but he seems to have now been outdone by a social media user.

As well as making sure Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslet looked good, he was tasked with making the ship's sinking as realistic as possible and enlisted a team of scientists as well as engineers to help him.

In the National Geographic special, Titanic: 25 Years Later With James Cameron, he revealed that even after the team carried out multiple hydrodynamic tests, he only got his recreation of the tragic moment 'half right'.

Cameron explained: "The film Titanic depicts what we believed was an accurate portrayal of the ship's last hours.

"We showed it sinking bow-first, lifting the stern high in the air, before its massive weight broke the vessel in two.

"Over the past 20 years, I've been trying to figure out if we got that right.

"I think we can rule in the possibility of a vertical stern sinking, and I think we can rule out the possibility of it both falling back and then going vertical. We were sort of half right in the movie."

The US Navy even lent a hand in Cameron's investigation and built two computer simulation models of the huge ocean liner, which revealed the ship only needed to lean 23 degrees out of the water before it would have snapped in two.

There was a time when survivors' accounts about the Titanic splitting in half - which occurred after it fatefully collided with an iceberg and claimed the lives of more than 1,500 people - were dismissed.

People believed that the White Star Line ship had sank in one piece until its wreckage was finally discovered in 1985.

Cameron's classic film, survivors' accounts and science are what most of us rely on to try and imagine what actually happened on 14 April 1912.

But for some reason, a lot of of us presume the night sky would have been lit up like it was in the Hollywood blockbuster.

In fact, 14 April was a moonless night.

The sobering reality of the situation is that those onboard would have actually been in complete and utter darkness as the lights went out as the bow continued to sink.

The stars above would have likely been the only source of light while it was being submerged, meaning that they would have been blind to what was actually happening while concerning creaks from the vessel and screams from passengers rang out.

A social media user shared a chilling video on X with a simulation of what they think the sinking of the Titanic would have actually looked like under these circumstances and it proved a shock to a lot of people.

It shows an array of lights haphazardly flickering on and off for just a few seconds, before the ship is plunged into complete and utter darkness.

One said: "Whoa, this is intense! Watching the Titanic go down like this is a stark reminder of how wild and unforgiving nature can be. The sheer power of the ocean versus human engineering puts things in perspective."

Another wrote: "That darkness, that horror, that pain, that scare."

A third added: "Woah! In the dark it's like, a 1000x more terrifying!"

And a fourth chimed in: "Makes sense that there were such varying accounts of the sinking."

Featured Image Credit: X/historyIand

Topics: Titanic, Viral, TikTok, History

Olivia Burke

Olivia is a journalist at LADbible Group with more than five years of experience and has worked for a number of top publishers, including News UK. She also enjoys writing food reviews (as well as the eating part). She is a stereotypical reality TV addict, but still finds time for a serious documentary.

@livburke_