‘Jack might have lived,’ Titanic’s James Cameron says after testing raft theory

Four tests were conducted with a team of scientists to determine Jack's fate

Acclaimed director James Cameron finally addressed the long-debated theory that Jack Dawson, Titanic’s protagonist, could have survived on the raft with love interest Rose DeWitt Bukater.

Cameron gave fans an inside look ahead of National Geographic’s special about the study, Titanic: 25 Years Later with James Cameron. The director commissioned a team of scientists to recreate the scene and test several scenarios in which Jack climbed on the floating wooden door alongside Rose, and what the possible outcomes could have been.

Good Morning America aired a segment of the special on Thursday where Cameron “revisits the floating door debate.”

The clip begins with Cameron and two stunt people recreating the famous scene, testing four different scenarios to see if Jack could have fit on the door.

“Jack and Rose are able to get on the raft, but now they’re both submerged in dangerous levels of freezing water,” he said, explaining why Jack would not have survived had his legs been in water.

They then test a different angle in which Jack props himself up above the water and on the door with Rose.

“Out of the water and violent shaking was helping him, and projecting it out, he could have made it pretty long,” Cameron said.

“Like hours.”

However, they went a step further and put themselves in the places of Rose and Jack, both of whom were exhausted in the film. For the final test, they factored in the physical strain the characters endured prior to this point.

The stuntman portraying Jack swims toward Rose who is kicking to stay afloat while being held back by another man. Jack then swings three punches to the individual. Afterward, both Rose and Jack are afloat on the door as they were in the previous test, and are now wearing life vests to help insulate their bodies and keep warm.

“He got into a place where if he projected that out, he just might have made it until the lifeboat got there,” Cameron said.

The verdict?

“Jack might have lived,” he confirmed. “But there’s a lot of variables.”

Ultimately, Cameron explains that Jack wouldn’t have done “one thing to jeopardize her, and that’s one hundred per cent in character.”

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