All language subtitles for The.Universe.S08E03.1080p.BluRay.x264.DTS-FGT_track3_[eng]

[ Narrator I sodom and gomorrah-

a tale of two cities incinerated
by a hail of fire and brimstone.

Is this a fantastic fable...

Or could it be
a near apocalyptic disaster from space?

Think about
your worst atomic nightmare...

Striking at just the wrong time.

Newly discovered evidence
might hold the secrets...

Fo one of the Bible's
greatest mysteries.

If you find an artifact
that looks similar to trinitite...

Then we know it has to be
an highly energetic event.

Science always said,
well, you can't test the Bible.

No, you can test the Bible.

Could a natural disaster be responsible...

For the destruction
of sodom and gomorrah?

Ancient mysteries
shrouded in the shadows of time.

Now can they finally be solved
by looking fo the heavens?

The truth is up there
hidden among the stars...

In a place we call-

Sodom and gomorrah-

a chilling saga of the sin cities
in the ancient world.

Sodom and gomorrah
is one of the most sensational stories...

That tells us about sex, violence,
greed and divine wrath and punishment.

According fo
the old testaments book of Genesis...

The citizens of sodom and gomorrah
are said to be so wicked...

That god destroys them
with fire and brimstone from the heavens.

In ancient times, the skies were
where the heavens are, where the gods are.

And so, in a sense,
these were messages from the gods...

Of some impending doom
or disaster.

[ Narrator I is this a biblical parable
about the price of sin...

Or might the story be based
on a real-life disaster?

A literal fire from the sky.

The Bible tells of events...

Where we are now realizing can be
matched up with historical events...

That we can go back and verify.

Archaeologists,
astronomers and biblical scholars...

Have spent years trying to unaercover
any truth to this age-old tale.

Now modern science reveals...

That the story might have been
an actual asteroid impact event.

If you were lucky enough,
or perhaps unlucky enough...

To actually see a meteor
entering the atmosphere...

Breaking into pieces...

Perhaps causing a wave to sweep over you
of air as its pressure passes by...

That is a story you would not forget.

Ancient peoples may not have connected
it to our modern astronomical knowledge...

The way we do
of a population of asteroids...

But I think
the idea of rocks falling from the sky...

Is probably something I'm sure the
ancient peoples must have been aware of.

[ Narrator I asteroids are
chunks of rock, metals and dust...

That are the leftover material
from the formation of the solar system.

Many of them are no more
than a few feet across...

But some are the size of moons.

The majority of them
circulate around our sun...

Between Mars and Jupiter.

However, occasionally,
they're nudged out of their orbit...

And head on a collision course with earth.

A small fraction of the objects
that hit the earth...

Are made out of iron and nickel metal-
very strong.

Can actually make a pretty nice crater
on the surface of the earth.

The most common asteroids that fall
on the earth are the stony asteroids.

They literally have
the composition of stone...

Like any rock you'd pick up here
on the surface of the earth.

Some of these
very weak rocky objects...

Never actually can make it
to the surface of the earth.

Weaker stony asteroids often explode
when striking the earth's atmosphere...

Creating a cosmic airburst.

A cosmic airburst
is when an asteroid or a comet...

Hits the atmosphere
and essentially disintegrates.

It explodes, because the atmosphere
feels like a brick wall...

To this rapidly oncoming asteroid or comet.

The atmosphere itself
is enough of a block to explode this thing.

How might one of these asteroids...

Produce the destruction
of sodom and gomorrah...

As described in the biblical texts?

[ Reading I

What sort of devastation
would an iron asteroid produce...

As opposed fo a stony cosmic rock?

To demonstrate that...

We're going to actually use
two different firearms here...

To examine the effects
of these types of impacts.

I've got a rather powerful rifle here-
an m1 garand.

And we're going to fire
a single intact projectile.

That's going to represent
one of our larger, more strong asteroids.

And then to talk
about a smaller, weaker asteroid...

We've got a Remington 870 shotgun here...

And a shotgun round
with the birdshot in the shell.

And that's going to represent
one of the smaller, weaker asteroids...

Which is fragmented in the atmosphere...

And we're going to see the effects then
of what sort of blast that might create...

In our pile of sand.

The 30-caliber single projectile
is loaded info the rifle... and fired.

That's a good crater.

Next, the birdshot
is discharged from the shotgun.

Okay, let's see what we have here.
This is perfect.

We have our rifle shot here,
representing our large, strong asteroid...

Which made it to the surface of the ground
to make an impact crater.

We've dug out, just to show you here
the typical size of the impacter-

the crater being several times larger
than the asteroid itself.

To the side here,
we see the result from our shotgun blast.

Our small, weak asteroid
which fragmented in the atmosphere.

And the debris from the blast,
the heat pulse...

That results in some destruction.

And so it's a good illustration
of the two different types of impact.

A large iron asteroid
could have flattened sodom and gomorrah...

And left a crater...

While a weaker sfony asteroid
would have shattered in the atmosphere...

But might have generated enough
fiery debris to incinerate the sin cities.

To figure out if one of these
cosmic impact scenarios is correct...

Archaeologists first need fo prove...

If and where the biblical sites
actually existed.

Well, there's a very ancient belief...

That there were once cities
down around the dead sea...

That are no longer there...

And that what happened to those cities
was something fell out of the sky...

And smashed them.

[ Narrator I
clues about sodom and gomorrah...

First appear in the book of Genesis,
chapter 13.

The biblical text tells the story of lot...

A Shepherd and nephew of Abraham,
the patriarch of the Bible.

Lot parts ways with his uncle
in search of more land for his sheep.

Abraham and lot stand on a mountaintop
northwest of Jericho...

And looked down
at the ancient land of canaan.

Today, it's the region
surrounding the dead sea-

the salt-laden lake
separating Israel and Jordan.

When Abraham and lot
looked down to the east...

Into the Jordan valley...

They look into what is described
as the krkkar of the Jordan.

Now, kitkkar is a Hebrew word
that can mean “a circular disk.”

And certainly,
from a geographical standpoint...

That area of the Jordan plain
just north of the dead sea...

Does widen out into kind of a disk.

The Bible says
that lot pitches his tent foward sodom-

one of a cluster of five settlements
called 'the cities of the plain.”

They include gomorrah, adman...

Zeboim and zoar.

And it said, in Genesis...

That the plain of the Jordan
was well watered.

And to this day,
that plain is still well watered.

And so that pins it down geographically.

That's to the north.

Archaeologists scour
the region northeast of the dead sea.

They discover the eerie remains
of 14 ancient sites.

Tall El-hammam,
the largest of the ruins...

Most closely fits
the biblical description of sodom.

Covering nearly 100 acres...

The city was once fortified
with 40-foot stone walls...

Massive city gates...

And a maze of streefs
lined with mud structures.

Tall El-hammam is the
largest site in that entire area...

Which would make one think
if it's sodom...

Then being such a large site,
it would fit that.

Tall El-hammam
was also most likely a wealthy city...

Which ties it to the biblical story.

According to Genesis...

Two angels disguised as men come
fo warn lot of god's impending wrath.

Lot invites them info his home
and feeds them.

But the other men of the city
offer no hospitality...

And instead demand
fo have sex with the visitors.

The sin of sodom
is actually unknown in the Bible.

The story has been interpreted
that it is the sin of sexuality.

Most biblical scholars, however, say
this actual sin of sodom and gomorrah...

Deals with hospitality
and the lack of hospitality.

Typically,
nomads were much more hospitable...

Than people that lived in the cities.

The prophet Ezekiel,
writing later in the old testament-

he says the people in sodom
had too much to eat...

And they were heartless
and they didn't take care of poor people.

That's what he says is wrong with them.

Lot, the only hospitable man in sodom...

Is allowed fo flee the city
along with his wife and daughters.

But they're warned fo never look back.

[ Wilson I
“don't look back,” he's saying.

In other words,
“look, don't you understand?

You got in trouble
by pitching your tents toward sodom.

When you get out,
I don't want you looking toward sodom.”

While lot and his family
head for the mountains...

Fire and brimstone
rains down on sodom.

Lot's wife disobeys
the forewarning.

She stares back at the inferno
and turns into a pillar of salt.

Is this passage
merely a moral metaphor?

Or might it have a literal meaning...

That helps connect the story
fo this location in the middle east?

All along the shores of the dead sea...

Are encrusted salt formations and
sculptures that actually look like people.

There is a pillar that if you look up,
you can see the figure of a woman.

This is one of the ideas for lot's wife
turning into a pillar of salt story.

[ Narrator I so these salt pillars
provide further evidence...

That sodom and gomorrah might
have been located near the dead sea.

But can the asteroid impact theory...

Explain how a person could appear
to turn into a pillar of salt?

And if tall El-hammam is indeed
the biblical city of sodom...

Do the sands of time conceal evidence
of a firestorm from space?

Sodom and gomorrah-

iwo biblical cities destroyed
by fire and brimstone.

Is this a cautionary tale?

Or are these actual cities that fall victim
fo a cosmic disaster of biblical proportions?

An asteroid impact.

Science's job is supposed
to investigate reality and truth.

And they always said,
well, you can't test the Bible.

No, you can test the Bible.

[ Narrator I archaeologists dig for the
truth among the ruins of tall El-hammam...

Located over eight miles
northeast of the dead sea.

The ancient city appears fo fit
the biblical description of sodom.

Excavaftors dig down
through the layers of dirt...

Fo what some believe
is the approximate time period...

Of Abraham and lof-

between 1750 and 1650 b.C.,
the middle bronze age.

A spade suddenly hits
a four-foot layer of spongy ash.

It's evidence that the city experienced
some sort of sudden fiery catastrophe.

The archaeologist who comes up
with a nice, sulfur-laden burn level...

Is beginning to convince me
that he's dealing with the right place...

If it's down in the area
where sodom and gomorrah might have been.

Within the sooly layer...

Archaeologists unearth
a few human bones...

Violently mixed
among smashed mud bricks and stones.

There were a few bones.

The bones were jumbled
and hyperextended and twisted.

Looked kind of ghastly.

And the bones were charred.

The dramatic thing
is after its destruction...

It's not reoccupied again until the
iron age which occurs 500 years later.

[ Narrator I what could have caused
such a massive inferno...

That rendered the city uninhabitable
for generations?

Evidence of fire spawns new theories.

Some think the city was destroyed
by a volcanic eruption.

However, there's no evidence
of volcanism in the region.

Others suspect a massive earthquake
might have triggered oll fires.

Or perhaps an enemy sacked the cily
and set it ablaze.

We're talking about heat
that vaporizes things.

The gas fire is not going to reach
the temperatures that we're talking about.

While sifting through the sand...

Archaeologists stumble
upon something else quite unexpected

pottery shards bearing a mysterious layer
of greenish glaze.

The discovery is baffling.

The glazing of pottery isn't invented...

Until over 800 years
after the alleged time period of sodom.

I've looked at pottery
from tall El-hammam...

That had a coating
of greenish glaze on it...

Despite the fact that glazing
as a surface treatment...

Was not common
in that region until the middle ages.

So being
on such an early piece of pottery...

The feeling was is
that it has to come from some other cause.

The glaze on the pottery shards...

Appears to have been produced
by extreme heat...

At over 3,000 degrees fahrenheit
and then quickly cooled.

The whole point is that it has to be
a very high temperature burning.

Not just a normal fire burning
but something stronger than that.

The glazing on the poftery...

Bears a striking resemblance fo trinitite-

the glass produced
by the first atomic bomb tests...

At the Trinity site in new Mexico in 1945.

In an airburst event, what happens is...

You get a fireball
that makes a big bubble.

This bubble then collapses upon itself,
and that's how you get the stem.

And what happens is
that all the material...

All the dirt that's thrown
up into that stem...

Then gets entrapped into the fireball.

And that material just simply melts
as droplets and falls back down.

And that's how you got the trinitite.

These are examples of rocks
we found down at Trinity site.

Here's a standard piece of trinitite
that has the nice, shiny surface on top.

And in this particular case,
it has the beaded bottom.

So all these little beads
dropped out of the sky first...

And the shiny top here is an agglomeration
of all the beads that were still melted.

[ Narrator I similar glass has been found
in the Sahara desert in Libya.

But its formation predates the atomic age
by almost 30 million years.

Here's a natural example
of a type of glass...

That was formed in the Libyan desert
during an airburst event, we think-

some 30 million years ago.

Think of the intense heating it took to
turn desert sand into this glassy material.

There were no nuclear bombs then.

So the only conclusion that can produce
that kind of power and more...

Is a cosmic impact.

No impact crater is found
in the entire region of the middle east.

So the only other thing that could produce
such staggeringly high temperatures...

Would be an asteroid
that explodes in the earth's atmosphere.

A cosmic airburst.

The temperatures inside
the center of one of these airbursts...

Are incredibly high...

Much more immense than, for example,
the temperature of a volcano...

Or even like an oil fire...

Which may only reach
a few thousand degrees.

Let's demonstrate
the power of an airburst event...

With a simple homemade experiment here.

I just made a little vortex Cannon.

It's just a plastic bucket
with a hole in the end here...

To blast some air out of.

We're going to use this plastic diaphragm
on the back to actually move the air.

And this is going to basically show us
the power of moving air.

To make this a little easier to see, we're
going to fill this with a bit of smoke.

Okay. There we go.

Okay, let's see if we can blow down
our wall of cups here.

Excellent.

So when I pop
the back diaphragm here...

We can actually move a lot of air
out of the hole.

So that shows the power
of moving air.

Imagine now an actual airburst event...

Where you've got megatons
worth of blast energy going on...

And instead of blowing down
a wall of paper cups...

We can blow down
an actual wall of mud bricks-

the walls on a fortified city.

And so real airburst events coupled
with the intense heat from the fireball...

And from the hot, turbulent gases
near the surface...

Might well be capable
of firing pottery.

In addition to glazed pottery shards...

Glassy material
resembling actual trinitite...

Has also been discovered
at the site of tall El-hammam.

The pieces need fo be
scientifically analyzed.

But could they confirm that the city
was destroyed by a cosmic airburst event?

If you were looking anywhere in the world
for either a cosmic impact or airburst...

You would look for material
that looks similar to this-the trinitite.

This is a very nice piece that shows
the really nice, deep green structure.

These are examples
of what I call Taffy-like material...

Thrown out immediately
from the blast.

So all trinitite does not look the same.

If you find an artifact that has material
on it that looks similar to trinitite...

Then we know it has to be
an highly energetic event like an asteroid.

[ Narrator I the atomic bomb
tests of 1945 demonstrate...

That an asteroid airburst has the capability
of generating tremendous heat and energy.

But is there any real proof
that this type of cosmic event...

Produced the devastation described
in the story of sodom and gomorrah?

The answer fo this mystery lies
in one of the most remote places on earth.

Sodom and gomorrah.

Did these ancient cities
suffer the wrath of god...

Or a cosmic cataclysm?

Archaeological evidence points fo 14
ruin cities northeast of the dead sea.

One of the sites, tall El-hammam...

Bears the unmistakable signs
of a thermal catastrophe-

a thick ash layer...

Charred human bones...

And possibly trinitite-

a glassy material only produced
by extremely high temperatures...

Such as a nuclear blast...

Or an asteroid
that explodes in the atmosphere.

The airburst is basically
like exploding a bomb up in the air...

And have a shock wave
that propagates with huge speeds...

And that can be extremely devastating.

[ Narrator I but what are the odds
that this could happen on earth?

Over the last 100 years...

Earth experiences
iwo major cosmic airburst events.

In 1908, a 200-foot-wide asteroid
explodes in the sky...

Above Siberia's tunguska wilderness.

You got to think these things
are coming into the atmosphere...

Like something like mach 60, right?

And that pressure was too much
for that object to take.

And it detonated in the atmosphere
with an explosive energy...

Of something like two or three megatons.

[ Narrator I most of the rock disintegrates
upon entering the earth's atmosphere.

So it doesn't leave a crater.

But if releases heat and shock waves...

Which fopple 80 million trees
over an 800-square-mile region.

The tunguska event is
a great example of a devastating airburst.

Something like that traveling
at tens of thousands of miles per hour-

when it explodes,
it creates this big shock wave.

In the case of the tunguska,
it happened over a forest...

And you see this tremendous impact wave that
flatten these trees like little toothpicks.

[ Narrator I no one is killed or injured
as a result of the tunguska event...

Because if occurs over a desolate forest

but this isn't the case the next ime
Russia experiences a cosmic attack.

On February 15, 2013...

A 50-foot asteroid explodes
over the city of chelyabinsk...

With almost 30 times the energy released
from the Hiroshima atomic bomb.

The amazing thing
about the chelyabinsk event...

Is that it was
so beautifully documented.

There were hundreds of video cameras,
dash cams, photographs, cell phones.

So we were able to really analyze
how destructive it truly was.

Almost two minutes
after the actual sighting...

A huge Sonic boom was unleashed...

And broke windows,
injured about 1,500 people...

Primarily from broken glass.

It was just very damaging.

The events in tunguska and chelyabinsk...

Are tangible eviaence...

That a cosmic airburst could have
decimated sodom and gomorrah.

A tunguska event
occurring over a mud and stick city...

In the second millennium b.C...

Would have completely annihilated it.

The buildings back then
weren't very strong.

They could easily fall apart.

All kinds of fires could erupt
from the heat generated.

There would be nothing left.

Such a cosmic event
can even explain the fire and brimstone...

Mentioned in the biblical story.

Now, the translation
that brings us “brimstone”...

Simply meant
“yellow fire,” “yellow light.”

So really, at the very minimum,
what we can interpret about this...

Is that a bright, yellow fire
rained down upon sodom.

That could easily be a meteor
passing through the atmosphere...

Leaving behind a trail
of smoke and fire in its wake.

When this raining-down effect occurs...

Then you see all these particles
that are just beet red from the heat...

Until they finally coalesce
and land on the ground.

From somebody way back in time
seeing this...

They would think
that would be an act of god.

We know today that that's probably
an asteroid impact or something like that.

If a cosmic airburst
destroyed sodom and gomorrah...

It might also explain another curious line
from the biblical text...

Which says-

[ reading I

as far as the sodom and gomorrah story...

It's entirely plausible that what they saw
was essentially a mushroom cloud...

And that mushroom cloud
would have looked like a big smokestack...

Much like what the nuclear bombs look like
when they go off.

A lot of energy gets deposited
in a very short amount of time.

That lifts debris from the ground.

Moreover, everything catches on fire,
creating more smoke and ash.

Yeah, you would have had
a huge pillar rising from these cities.

[ Narrator I a cosmic airburst event
could have destroyed tall El-hammam...

And the other sites
northeast of the dead sea.

But is this the actual location
of sodom and gomorrah?

The fiery apocalypse
of sodom and gomorrah.

Fiction or factual account
of a natural disaster from space?

The charred ruins of an ancient city over
eight miles northeast of the dead sea...

Fit the geographical
and physical description of sodom.

The discovery of strange glazed pottery
and desert glass...

Indicates that an asteroid
might have destroyed the ancient site.

It would have been
absolutely devastating...

And certainly the stories of the destruction
like that propagate through time...

Even to modern times today.

According to the biblical story...

As fire and brimstone
rains down on sodom...

Lot and his family flee
fo the mountains near zoar-

one of the five cities of the plain
that is spared god's divine destruction.

According to the biblical narrative,
zoar was not destroyed.

In fact,
lot escapes to that city as a refuge...

Which would indicate that the city would have
to be somewhere in close proximity to sodom.

[ Narrator I zoar should be a relatively
short distance from tall El-hammam-

the alleged site of sodom.

However, on the floor of a byzantine church
in madaba, Jordan...

Is a sixth-century mosaic map
written in Greek.

It's the oldest surviving depiction
of the holy land.

What's fascinating about this map...

Is it gives us the geographical locations
of major Christian pilgrimage cities.

So we can take the map as being
an accurate map of the ancient near east.

By comparing the mosaic map
fo the modern-day landscape...

It places Jerusalem and Jericho in the
precise locations that they are today.

Sodom and gomorrah
are oddly missing from the eroded mosaic.

However, zoar is found on the map near
the southeast region of the dead sea...

And over 30 miles
from the site of tall El-hammam.

The location of the
city of zoar on the madaba map...

It is not exactly a smoking gun
to tell us where the other cities are...

But it gives us
a general locale in which to look.

And the mystery deepens.

On the mosaic map near zoar...

Are the Greek words
'sanctuary of Saint l.”

The rest of the word is missing.

But many scholars interpret it
as the “sanctuary of Saint lot.”

By following the mosaic map...

Archaeologists find the sanctuary of
Saint lot perched on a mountainside.

Hidden behind the monastery is a cave.

Could this be the place where lot and his
family took refuge during the firestorm?

In the cave behind the church...

That is associated with Saint lot...

They found bronze age pottery.

However, there's nothing evident...

That says this is the place
where lot and his daughters stayed.

But we do have evidence of them
living there at a certain time period...

That correlates with the story of lot.

[ Narrator I the discovery leads many to
believe the real sodom must exist nearby.

Less than 10 miles
from the sanctuary of Saint lot...

Archaeologists discover
the ruins of bab edh-dhra-

a fortified early bronze age city
once occupied by a thousand inhabitants.

A short distance from bab edh-dhra...

Archaeologists uncover
the remains of four settlements...

Which could be
the other lost cities of the plain.

In the early bronze age,
the third millennium b.C...

Precisely in this area
you have five cities...

Whereas tall El-hammam is located in a
cluster of middle bronze age settlements...

Of which there are
many more than five.

So if we're speaking
of five cities of the plain...

Then bab edh-dhra and the associated
four cities towards the south...

Would really fit that very well.

[ Narrator I
like the ruins at tall El-hammam...

A thick layer of ash
covers much of bab edh-dhra.

It suggests the ancient cily
also suffered a violent end.

Eight miles fo the south of bab edh-dhra,
archaeologists find the ruins of numeira...

Which is thought fo be its sister city.

They find a substantial ash layer...

And skeletal remains of humans
who suffered severe trauma.

Could bab edh-dhra and numeira
be sodom and gomorrah?

The problem here...

Is that both of the cities
were destroyed at different time periods-

at least 300 years apart.

The city of numeira was destroyed
in a great destruction very rapidly.

We know that from an ash layer.

As opposed to bab edh-dhra, the city
was destroyed over a hundred years or so.

So the dates don't match up.

In order to make the story work...

They both have to be destroyed
in the same manner at the same time.

There's not enough evidence...

Lo prove that bab edh-dhra and numeira
are sodom and gomorrah.

But what about tall El-hammam and
the other ruins northeast of the dead sea?

Does the alleged location of zoar
on the mosaic map...

Rule them out as the sin cities?

People who make maps
have to make decisions...

When sometimes the archaeological
or historical evidence...

Is hot conclusive.

So they did a lot of guessing, frankly.

You're not going to find a sign
that says, “this is zoar”...

Or “welcome to zoar.”

There's still much debate about
the actual location of sodom and gomorrah.

But science can now provide
a terrifying picture...

Of what might have actually happened
fo the jll-fated cities.

It can even decode the mystery behind
lot's wife turning into a pillar of salt.

Sodom and gomorrah-

myth or astronomical mega disaster?

In the search for the truth...

Archaeologists discover
a cluster of ruins...

In two different locations
along the eastern side of the dead sea.

They've even found
unaeniable evidence...

That a fiery catastrophe destroyed most
of the ancient cities in both locations.

But is either of these sites
home fo the real sodom and gomorrah?

All along the shores of the dead sea...

There is a possibility
that there are a number of sites...

That we have not yet found.

Sodom and gomorrah
could be anywhere.

Some people say
the cities are under the dead sea.

Though we don't have
any solid archaeological evidence...

Of sodom and gomorrah...

It had to be an important event.

Twenly-first-century astronomy,
combined with the biblical accounits...

Now offer a scientific explanation...

For what might have happened
fo the cities in their final hours.

Between 2300 and 1700 b.C...

An asteroid barrels down from space.

It strikes the earth's atmosphere...

And explodes
above the ancient land of canaan.

The force is over 200 times more powerful
than the Hiroshima atomic bomb.

For the airburst hypothesis
for the destruction of sodom...

We're talking
dozens of megatons of energy.

In modern context,
we have an understanding of that.

But in ancient times, that would have
been literally a biblical event.

The energy from the airburst
reaches the ground...

Creating a mushroom cloud
of rock and dirt...

That's ejected info the atmosphere.

If it's an airburst...

You're going to have possibly either
many pieces of the rock raining down.

And so you'd imagine that those things
would cause tremendous devastation...

And many fires on the ground.

[ Narrator I
the citizens of sodom take cover...

As flery rock or brimstone
rains down on their city.

Ancient city walls made out of mud
bricks would easily have been blown flat.

Straw or thatched wood
construction, charred...

Literally brought to the point
of spontaneous ignition...

By the heating of the event.

The shock wave from the impact
would have flattened buildings.

This could have led to huge destruction
of these ancient, poorly built cities.

You could have vaporization of bodies.

At the very least, they would be
incinerated. They would be cremated.

So it would be
an absolutely terrifying event.

Lot and his daughters
flee for the mountains.

But his wife lags behind as she
stares back at the ferocious inferno.

One of the most famous tales to
come out of the sodom and gomorrah story...

Is the story of lot's wife
being turned into a pillar of salt.

Could an airburst event, in any way,
be responsible for that?

It's kind of gruesome to think about...

But that might potentially be not salt
but maybe charred to ash.

If lot's wife had been
unprotected, not in a cave or something...

Then she could have
been charred to a crisp.

So in a sense, metaphorically, she could
have become like a pillar of salt.

It's kind of a gruesome idea.

But she could have been incinerated.

The cosmic disaster does more
than destroy sodom and gomorrah...

And the other cities of the plain.

It scorches the landscape...

Making it uninhabitable
for hundreds of years.

Was destroyed by, let's say, an asteroid...

It would be left “ininhabited,”
perhaps as a superstition.

But they couldn't possibly live there.

[ Narrator I
the science of the universe...

Gives us a new way
of looking at an ancient story.

If we can demonstrate
historically and scientifically...

That there really was a sodom
and that these events really took place...

And therefore what the Bible describes
are real historical events...

It gives us a greater sense
of security and certainty...

That the rest of the Bible is valid.

And so I think this also plays very much into
the modern interest in these two cities.

We have enough science...

To actually try to understand some
of the historical origins of our faiths.

And this, to me, is only to enrich
our culture as a species...

And our creativity
as the real core of our humanity.