“[The 3D model] is a baseline from which all future work is going to be done,” Stephenson says. “We’ve got to understand the depths before we go charting in and exploit it,” 

The special follows a team of leading historians, engineers and forensic experts, including Stephenson, metallurgist Jennifer Hooper and master mariner Captain Chris Hearn, as they explore the twin, constructed by the deep-sea mapping company Magellan. 

Stephenson, Hooper and Hearn stand in awe of the digital twin, projected on a massive, curved LED volume stage that renders the ship at full scale in breathtaking detail. With the wreckage preserved exactly as it lay in 2022, the team is able to walk through the model and use the reconstruction to challenge long-held myths.

They examine the jagged break of the hull, which is evidence that the ship didn’t split cleanly in two, but was violently torn apart, shredding through first-class cabins where passengers like J.J. Astor and Benjamin Guggenheim may have taken shelter. A single open valve in the boiler room confirms that crew members stayed at their post after impact, keeping electricity running and sending out distress calls. Even the position of a lifeboat davit, frozen mid-motion, provides evidence to exonerate First Officer William Murdoch, accused of desertion. 

Those details, preserved on the ocean floor, are now accessible without going near the wreck. The seafloor is not a renewable surface, and digging or drilling through it can cause irreversible harm. Stephenson believes technology like the digital twin can revolutionize the way we study the ocean, without disturbing it.

A naval analyst, historian and expert in maritime forensics, Stephenson has long been at the forefront of history and technology. After retiring from the Navy, where he served as both a submariner and a flight officer, he went on to advise filmmakers, historians and deep-sea expeditions. He stresses that as tools for underwater expeditions grow more advanced, so does the need for ethical boundaries.