Before he decided to only make movies with the word “Avatar” in the title, James Cameron was planning to shoot a documentary in space. The filmmaker initially approached the Russians, who agreed to let him visit the Mir space station, but he eventually set his sights on the ISS instead. As Cameron explained to NASA administrator Daniel Goldin, who was overseeing the assembly of the ISS at the time, he saw Mars as the future, and getting there would require a lengthy flight. For that reason, Cameron wanted to observe what it was like for people who were already living in space.

Goldin considered Cameron’s proposal, but ultimately felt it would be too difficult to pull off. Alternatively, Goldwin offered Cameron the opportunity to take a shuttle flight. That way, he’d at least get to see space for himself and view the Earth from above. After thinking it over, Cameron declined to go on the flight, sticking to his guns about traveling to space on his own terms, even if it never came to be.

How James Cameron Narrowly Avoided One of NASA’s Deadliest Disasters

Cameron’s rejection made Goldin realize how determined the director was to make the project happen, and he finally gave him the green light to venture to the ISS. Cameron then flew to Houston to train for his trip, and started mapping out the logistics of the shoot. “And they were going to fly me,” Cameron told GQ in 2022, “and then Columbia was lost.” For context, the Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrated while reentering the Earth’s atmosphere in 2003, killing all seven people on board.

The eerie part of all this is the Columbia flight was actually the one Cameron had turned down. “I f—king saved my own life by choosing the higher path!” Cameron recalled. When asked if he had any regrets about not going to space, Cameron said, “Zero,” adding, “The stuff I did instead was equally cool. Yeah, it would’ve been great and I think if I had really, really put my mind to it, I could have remanifested that a few years later with a better camera system and a better plan.”

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