Original subtitles

Narrator: worldwide, six billion Cameras are watching us...

On our streets, at work, And in our homes.

They capture things That seem impossible.

It defies the laws of physics.

Man: Oh, this is unbelievable, man.

Narrator: experts carry out Forensic analysis

Of these unusual events.

Man: there's got to be some Explanation for what's going on.

Narrator: coming up, what's got Its claws into jaws?

Woman: I thought sharks were The king of the ocean.

What could eat a shark?

Narrator: is a demonic Child-snatcher

Using these lights as a lure?

This lady would come in And get ahold of children.

Narrator: and, could a local Deity be venting its anger

On a golf course lake?

♪♪

Bizarre phenomena...

Mysteries caught On surveillance...

What's the truth behind This strange evidence?

-- captions by vitac -- Www.Vitac.Com

captions paid for by Discovery communications

Narrator: now, if you're afraid Of jaws...

How scared should you be Of the beast that eats jaws?

Man: this is a shark having its Face eaten by a monster.

Narrator: the shark is supposed To be

At the top of The ocean food chain.

But here it is, being attacked By some strangely shaped,

Unknown beast.

This footage is so rare.

I've never seen anything Like it.

What in the world Would be eating a shark?

♪♪

Narrator: the shimmering waters Off the west coast of florida --

It could be the setting For another "Jaws" movie.

These waters are teeming

With over 50 different species Of shark,

Including deadly bull sharks And hammerheads.

Even the great white shark, Star of the "Jaws" movie,

Has been spotted Patrolling the waters here.

Each year, sharks attack About 80 people,

Killing six.

April 2015 --

Marine biologist And shark expert brendan talwar

Is releasing two captive Sharks back into the wild.

The underwater shark cage Opens to let the predators out.

Man: there were two sharks In the cage.

they were both in really Good condition,

So I would expect them To swim out of the cage

When the door opens.

Narrator: but instead of The sharks swimming out,

Something else Swims in to join them --

Something that marine biologists Have never seen before.

We see the sharks Swimming around.

And then all of a sudden...

This creature attaches itself To the shark.

and the shark starts Thrashing around,

but we can't tell What exactly it is.

Narrator: scientists realize

They're witnessing A type of aggression

That's never been seen before.

you can see this creature Latch on to the shark --

To the face of the shark.

It is not another shark.

It looks like a prehistoric Creature with a giant mouth,

And it's biting off The shark's head.

What is this thing that is Taking on a shark, head-on?

♪♪

Narrator: danni washington began Her career in marine biology

At the university of miami.

She knows these waters well.

Now she's on the trail

Of this mysterious Shark-munching monster.

Closely examining this footage,

I can see that the predator Has some type of exoskeleton,

Right, a compressed, Almost, like, shell.

And that leads me to think That this could be a part

Of phylum arthropoda,

Or the arthropods.

narrator: Creatures with exoskeletons --

With their skeletons On the outside --

Date back over 500 million years In earth's history.

Man: we have lots of fossils Of them,

Because their hard Exoskeletons --

That armor -- that can turn To fossils really easily.

Narrator: but there's a problem.

Arthropods are small creatures, Like cockroaches and scorpions.

The only large ones we know Of died out

Hundreds of millions Of years ago,

Way before even the dinosaurs.

There are arthropods Called eurypterids,

Or sea scorpions, that got Between eight to ten feet long.

And they had huge claws.

They were the top predators In the oceans

About 500 million years ago.

narrator: as a result of this Incredible footage,

scientists are beginning To think the unthinkable.

It makes me wonder If ancient arthropods

Still exist in the deep ocean,

And is it the thing That's attacking a shark?

♪♪

Narrator: at toledo zoo, Curator jay hemdal

Studies the footage carefully.

For hemdal, the creature's Hard-looking,

Spherical body shape

Makes him wonder If there might be some distant

Genetic link To creatures known as isopods.

He has such a creature In one of his tanks.

To my eye, this is -- This is the same animal

That was in the video.

But isopod crustaceans Tend to be small,

And they definitely Don't attack sharks.

In fact, they don't Attack anything.

Man: they're scavengers.

They wait for food, like a fish From above to die

Or pieces of a fish, To fall to the bottom.

and then they move to that And consume it.

We see isopods in captivity That go months without food,

And to have something be So reactive to a food item

Like that in the wild Was just amazing to see.

♪♪

Narrator: to marine biologist Danni washington,

This sounds like some sort Of b-movie mutant monster.

She wonders if something In the water

Is transforming tiny, Docile crustaceans into mammoth,

Angry shark-munchers.

in april 2010, the deepwater Horizon oil platform

Collapsed into The gulf of mexico

After a catastrophic explosion.

An estimated five million Barrels of crude oil

Spilled into the waters,

Creating an oil slick The size of west virginia.

Washington: it was bad enough

That over five Million barrels of crude oil

Escaped into the gulf of mexico.

But what's worse were The chemical dispersants

Used to clear The oil afterward.

Narrator: two million gallons of Chemical dispersant

Were used to clean up the spill.

Dispersants break up The surface oil

Into smaller droplets That mix with the water,

So that the oil sinks Deeper into the sea.

Local fishermen report

Devastating side effects On the fish population.

Frankenstein mutations include Shrimp born with no eyes,

Crabs with extra claws, And fish with visible tumors.

Even deep sea creatures Like isopods

May not have escaped The chemical fallout.

Washington: The bodies of those animals

Will sink to the bottom,

And scavengers like the isopod Will feed off of the carcasses.

But what that means is,

The isopod will also ingest Those chemicals

And the oil, Accumulating the toxins.

narrator: did a mutation turn The isopod

into an underwater X-beast monster?

Washington: is it possible that A passive scavenger like

The isopod could mutate Its behavior

Due to exposure To the chemicals,

And transform Into an active predator?

narrator: the fight to the death Continues outside the cage,

with the shark appearing To be finished.

The hunters are now the hunted.

Man: Yeah, it's a bit frightening.

I mean, these things, They resemble storm troopers.

They're really pretty incredible Animals, pretty terrifying.

Narrator: experts can't be sure

If the behavior of this Giant isopod

Is a one-time event,

Or if sharks face A genuine challenge

To their underwater supremacy.

♪♪

Now, developers agree to build A golf course on chippewa land.

Then, weird things Start to happen.

When we got out here,

You could feel The ground moving.

Narrator: a town under threat

From a real Underground monster.

Man: I don't think the guy Who shot this video

Fully understands The peril that he was in.

♪♪

Narrator: lake huron sits Between michigan and ontario.

On its banks, For countless generations,

The chippewa occupied And worshipped the land,

Its rocks, rivers, and hills.

Developers build a gulf club Called indian hills

On ancient chippewa land.

On june 17, 2015,

A camera captures strange things Starting to happen here.

Strange sounds, Strange rumblings --

Then this.

♪♪

Man: I don't know if you can see it,

But if you look right across Right above the green,

There's this haze.

Narrator: a water hazard On the golf course

Turns into a bubbling cauldron.

And whatever it is,

It's affecting The wildlife around it.

Man: the question is, could it Potentially, actually be toxic?

Man: the guy that's shooting This video

Probably shouldn't Be standing so close.

Narrator: coming up...

Are lights from the heavens Luring children to their death?

When I was young, We'd get scared

Because they're gonna Come after us.

♪♪

Narrator: In the forests of russia,

A sinister cloud rises From a mysterious machine.

Man: maybe we've stumbled on A video

That we're not meant to see.

Narrator: and, is the exploding Lake a chilling warning

From the other side?

♪♪

♪♪

Narrator: a golf course Violently erupts in canada,

Spreading mud, panic, And confusion.

♪♪

Authorities Move to warn residents

Of the neighboring town Of ravenswood.

Man: at that point, the office Of the fire marshall

declared it A state of emergency.

The entire valley was a massive Quarantined area.

Narrator: ravenswood becomes A ghost town

As locals flee From the mysterious threat.

Narrator: to the north lies The kettle point indian reserve.

The land here still belongs To the chippewa first nation,

Who believe they know what's Behind these strange events.

the elders from kettle And stony point

Think the thunderbird Was unhappy

And had a hand In causing this to happen.

[ screeching ]

Narrator: in chippewa culture,

The thunderbird spirit Controls the world

With his supernatural powers.

Tom bressette, Chief of the local tribe,

Speculates that modern Occupation and use of the land

Is the reason For thunderbird's rage.

♪♪

Narrator: as the lake continues To explode throughout the day,

The footage reaches George kourounis,

Who specializes In analyzing disasters.

Man: this is bizarre.

I've never seen anything Quite like this.

There seems to be A geyser of mud

And water coming out of this.

Narrator: kourounis believes This footage may show

A little-known But deadly phenomenon.

Kourounis: there are places Around the world

That experience mud volcanoes.

Could that be What's happening here?

Is it possible that A brand-new mud volcano

Is rising up in this Golf course in canada?

♪♪

Narrator: Deadly mud volcanoes erupt

When water is super-heated Into steam

By tectonic activity Deep underground.

And that steam has to be Released somewhere.

When it passes through an area Of volcanic ash or mud,

You can get an eruption That can be tremendous in size,

Causing widespread damage And destruction.

Narrator: mud volcanoes can be Truly terrifying.

May 2006, mud starts erupting In sidoarjo in indonesia,

Destroying villages All around.

Incredibly, 12 years later, It is still gushing mud.

♪♪

If this is the early sign

Of another Such volcanic mud eruption,

The towns on the shore of this Great lake face obliteration.

♪♪

Geoscientist sian proctor Studies the footage,

And finds ominous signs Of something else deadly

Coming up with the mud.

The clue lies in the terrified Reaction of the golfers.

Man: It smells like propane.

Woman: in the video, you can Hear somebody saying

That they can smell propane,

or some kind of gas.

Something is being released From underground.

Most likely, that's natural gas.

Narrator: proctor believes Deadly natural gas,

Rather than steam, Could be powering the eruption.

If she's right, then The residents of ravenswood

Could be sitting Not on top of a mud volcano,

But a vast explosive reservoir Of flammable gas.

♪♪

The weirdness is just

the narrowness of These fountains, right?

coming out of the lake.

I mean, it really is Quite extraordinary.

I think most of us might expect Kind of big "Bluh,"

which stops quite quickly,

rather than this continuing jet From down below.

Narrator: to test her theory That some form of natural gas

Is causing these violent jets Of muddy water,

Proctor creates an experiment.

the golf course lake sits above 60 feet of clay,

several hundred feet of shale Rock, and more ancient bedrock.

she creates this geological Model to see how it reacts

to an outbreak of natural gas.

What we're going to do Is release some gas

Into this chamber And see what happens.

narrator: if the experiment Mimics what is happening

in real life, then proctor Has evidence

to support her natural-gas Theory.

whoa!

[ sputtering ]

Narrator: the experiment creates Narrow jets of gas

Blasting up through the water, Just like those in the footage.

Proctor: our gas came up through The rock and the sediment

To the surface Of the pond,

Causing all of our pond water To churn.

♪♪

This is what I think Is happening.

We've got a natural gas leak Of some sort in that video.

Man: It smells like propane.

I don't think the guy who shot This video fully understands

The peril that he was in.

If he had been smoking Or had lit a match, kaboom.

♪♪

Narrator: the explosive gas lake Beneath ravenswood

Gets fiercer and angrier As the hours tick by.

Environmental experts race To ontario in an effort

To avert a full-scale disaster.

Woman: when we got out here,

You could Feel the ground moving.

There was a distinct rumble,

And cracks had opened up On the slopes.

Narrator: the first thing They spot

Are fresh craters On the fairway.

The explosive gas is moving fast Towards the town.

When they discover it's Highly flammable methane,

They need to act immediately.

They drill down into The reservoir of lethal gas

In an effort To relieve the pressure.

But one wrong move, and all of Ravenswood could go up in smoke.

So we were drilling Fairly slowly

Through the various layers.

The floor was shaking.

I didn't even know what was Happening, and boom.

♪♪

Narrator: coming up, In tennessee,

Snow is captured Defying gravity,

Rising up into the sky.

Woman: I can't actually compute this.

It looks like It's snowing upwards.

Narrator: has a drone uncovered A dark secret

In russia's area 51?

Man: what we could be seeing In this video

Is a chemical weapons test Gone awry.

Narrator: and, disaster Threatens towns

By the great lakes.

Man: obviously, a flammable gas Could cause an enormous danger

To people In that nearby vicinity.

♪♪

Narrator: a golf course Violently erupts.

And the explosions spread,

Threatening to destroy A nearby town.

A team is sent in To release pressure

From a giant natural Underground reservoir of gas.

man: obviously, a flammable gas Could cause an enormous danger

to people In that nearby vicinity.

if somebody was smoking

or if there was Another ignition source,

That could really cause An enormous explosion.

And people could get killed.

♪♪

Woman: once we did finally punch Into the gas,

the gas came out with such force

that it actually shook The whole rig.

The gas came out and relieved The pressure in that bedrock.

Narrator: With the pressure released,

The eruption begins to subside.

The immediate threat passes, But ravenswood residents

Now realize that just a few feet Beneath their homes sits a vast,

Explosive gas reservoir.

is this a ticking time bomb? Will it happen again?

♪♪

Man: after something like this Happens, you're shocked

'cause you're not really sure What's under your feet.

Narrator: the first nation Elders warn that this eruption

Is a judgment Of the angry earth gods.

♪♪

Now, a fearful texas town Under siege...

From sinister, hypnotic lights.

Woman: lights just don't appear From nowhere.

That's not how physics works.

Narrator: locals fear They're the work

Of a demonic child-snatcher.

When I was young, We'd get scared

Because they're gonna Come after us.

We're seeing malignant spirits

That lead children off To their death.

♪♪

[ screaming ]

[ train blowing horn ]

Narrator: Marfa, far west texas...

An old frontier town

In the middle of The trans-pecos desert.

Local government worker Minerva lopez remembers

She first saw These strange lights

When she was a little girl.

they're so mysterious.

that's why for us to sit here And watch and stare at them.

I've seen the lights maybe Hundreds of times, maybe more.

I lost count.

They can be there For five minutes, two minutes.

They're usually unpredictable.

I've seen them zig-zag, and then All of a sudden, they're gone.

It's a mystery.

♪♪

Narrator: as a girl, lopez heard The old tales about the lights

And the warnings To steer clear of them.

♪♪

Lopez: they talked about ghosts A lot around that area.

There used to be a tale About the ghost of this lady

That would come in And ahold of children.

Narrator: child snatchers, Real and supernatural,

Are the nightmare Of every parent.

♪♪

Lopez sends her clips To an expert,

Meteorologist angela fritz.

Woman: the first thing I want to Know is,

Where is this taking place?

then I start to get an idea Of what could be going on,

if it has A natural explanation.

Narrator: the first theory Is an obvious one.

Couldn't these just be lights From cars on a highway?

What I think is actually Happening here

Is we're seeing headlights.

Narrator: this seems unlikely, Since the lights filmed by lopez

Don't appear at ground level.

They form in the sky.

But fritz thinks the car-light Explanation could still work.

Fritz: Marfa is a very special place

Because you can see very, Vary far off into the horizon.

Texas is also very hot, Until the sun goes down.

And at that point, you get The temperature inversion.

Narrator: a temperature Inversion occurs

When the cooling earth Chills the air above it,

Trapping cold air beneath A layer of warmer, thinner air.

The less dense, warmer air Now acts like a mirror,

Deflecting car headlights Back down to earth

And into the eyeline Of any observers.

What I think is happening is, We're seeing headlights

That are being angled above The horizon into our eyesight.

That's actually the effect Of a temperature inversion.

♪♪

Narrator: but the car-light Theory can't explain

Historical records That date back

Before the invention of The automobile.

Folklorist deborah hyde Has studied this phenomenon

That has become known As the marfa ghost lights.

Woman: these lights Were first seen

in 1883 by a cowboy called Robert reed ellison.

He thought that the lights May have been made by apaches.

The apaches themselves were said To believe

That they were stars Coming down from the sky.

And others were said to believe That it was malignant spirits

That lead children off To their death.

♪♪

Narrator: coming up, is this Mysterious russian machine

Pumping out a deadly chemical?

The possibilities can be really, Really terrifying.

Narrator: the world is turned Upside-down in tennessee.

Man: these little particles Seem to be rising upward

From the ground, Like reverse gravity.

Narrator: and the marfa lights Get even weirder.

Man: what was fascinating was, The orientation of the lights,

They move.

♪♪

Narrator: hypnotic lights appear Frequently in they sky

Outside a small texas town.

According to local stories, There appearance has,

In the past, coincided with The disappearance of children.

♪♪

Now texans keep vigil

On these creepy Apparitions.

Woman: I don't know what it is.

there were little dots of light.

and they were more white Or yellowish.

I've heard other people Talk about seeing them,

They were orange and green.

But I think it's different For everybody.

♪♪

Narrator: third-generation Oilman harvey howell

Owns the drilling rights To the land.

He thinks the answer Might be buried in the dirt.

The area where we now know The lights to have occurred

Is geologically Very interesting.

I've always thought that The lights

were somehow related To the terrain.

♪♪

Narrator: howell conducts A detailed survey of the land.

He tries to chart the location

Of confirmed video Recordings of the lights.

He believes the locations Might correlate

With pockets of natural gas.

Howell: we have light gas -- Light hydrocarbon gas:

Methanes, ethanes, Some butanes, some propanes,

That we can measure That are seeping up in the area

Where the lights Have been mapped.

They gotta be related.

Narrator: hydrocarbons are Usually trapped

Deep underground,

But seep out of the earth Naturally at a handful

Of locations worldwide.

Depending on oxygen supply

And the presence Of other chemicals,

They can burn blue, orange, And even green.

Howell believes Burning chemicals

Lie behind the legend Of the marfa lights.

But howell admits there's A problem with this theory.

How they ignite, What actually illuminates,

That I don't know.

Narrator: scientists agree

There is No satisfactory explanation

For the mysterious Marfa lights.

until we get more information,

this mystery Is gonna go unsolved.

♪♪

Narrator: Now, in russia's area 51,

A drone captures what may be Some kind of experiment or test.

I wonder if we stumbled On something covert.

Narrator: investigators fear Some new chemical weapon.

Woman: what if there were some Kind of toxic element there?

The possibilities can be really, Really terrifying.

♪♪

Narrator: the wilderness Of central russia...

Over three million Square miles of woodland,

Nearly as large As the entire united states.

But hiding within these Impenetrable woods,

Numerous top-secret Military bases

And weapon-development labs -- Home to russia's area 51.

♪♪

September 2017, an amateur Drone operator

Accidentally captures This menacing, manmade cloud.

It just keeps getting bigger And bigger and bigger.

Man: I've never seen Anything generate fog like this.

I wonder if we stumbled On something covert.

Narrator: when investigators Observe how dense

And long-lasting it is,

They fear It's something dangerous.

Hari: This isn't acting like smoke.

It's not sort of dynamically Moving through the air,

Rising quickly.

Man: what we could be seeing In this video

is a chemical-weapons Test gone awry.

♪♪

Narrator: Just 500 miles from here,

The city sverdlovsk of suffered An accident so lethal,

It became known As the chemical chernobyl.

♪♪

In 1979, the soviets Illegally developed

Their most deadly strain Of the infection anthrax.

According to u.S. Intelligence,

They planned to arm warheads With this lethal bacteria

And fire the missiles at U.S. Cities,

Causing chemical armageddon.

But anthrax leaked From the plant,

Killing at least 60 people.

This could be The unintentional release

Of some sort Of chemical agent,

Which forced the russian Military to respond.

♪♪

Narrator: coming up,

Freak weather In the tennessee summer...

It looked like snow, But in reverse.

Narrator: and have investigators

Unmasked the russian weapon Of mass destruction?

This definitely looks like It could be a chemical weapon.

♪♪

Narrator: in the russian Military's area 51,

A menacing fog fills the sky.

Ex-cia agent lindsay moran Operated undercover

For three years In eastern europe,

Spying on their black ops.

When she sees how the smoke Hugs the terrain,

She fears the russians are Preparing for something ominous.

seeing something like this Intentionally creating smoke,

Some kind of horrific thoughts Jump to mind.

What if there some kind of toxic Or chemical element there,

And what's actually being tested

Is a method to deploy it?

Narrator: the geneva convention

Bans the use of Chemical weapons.

Despite this, U.S. Government officials

Accuse russia of responsibility

For chemical attacks In syria.

Military analyst carlo muñoz Uses his contacts

To source another copy Of the drone footage,

And this one captures the start.

When he zooms in, he spots A detail that casts doubt

On the chemical-weapon theory.

Muñoz: looking at the video And recognizing

What the russians Have in their military arsenal,

to me, this looks like A russian tda-3.

Narrator: the tda-3 is A russian army vehicle,

The official purpose of which Is to generate smoke

To obscure various Military activities

From the prying eyes Of foreign powers.

Even some infrared cameras Cannot penetrate the cloud.

Military smokescreens are not Classified as a chemical weapon.

However, what military Analysts call combination smoke

Is used to carry other chemical Agents from tear gas upwards.

The tda-3 is a potentially Terrifying weapon

Of mass destruction.

Muñoz suspects the function Of this thick,

Heavy smoke could also be Connected to the united states'

Latest Military development --

Death lasers, known As directed-energy weapons.

Muñoz: the benefits of Direct-energy weapons

Are twofold -- one, you don't Run out of bullets

With a directed-energy weapon.

Two, they're very easily hidden.

They can be fired From miles away,

Towards an enemy Who will never see it coming

And never know Where it came from.

Narrator: but muñoz believes The tda-3's cloak of smoke

Could turn the tables On a laser attack.

Muñoz: smokescreens can be used To identify the location

Of where the laser Is coming from.

While normally invisible To the naked eye,

Once you apply A heavy screen of smoke,

You can very easily track

Back the source Of the directed-energy shot

And hopefully, Take out the weapon itself.

Narrator: russia has made no Comment on this footage,

Leading some experts to believe We should never have seen

This defensive smokescreen In the first place.

so maybe we've stumbled On a video

that we're not meant to see.

♪♪

Narrator: now, under the cover Of darkness,

Surveillance cameras evidence Of nature gone wrong.

I can't actually Compute this.

It looks like It's snowing upwards.

Narrator: did a blizzard Hit tennessee

In the middle of the summer?

I can't believe my eyes.

It looked like snow, But that don't even make sense.

♪♪

Narrator: tennessee...

Home of country music, Dollywood,

And world-class bourbon.

In rural tennessee, Away from the glitz,

Locals value their privacy And security.

Man: we've installed probably 14 different cameras

all over this -- This property.

Normally, we see different Critters running around:

Rabbits, birds, butterflies,

You know, nothing out Of the ordinary or unusual.

Narrator: july 2, 2013,

Peyton installs Closed-circuit cameras

At the gates of a property.

Next day, he checks the feed.

Peyton: I can't believe my eyes.

It seems to be snowing upwards.

That don't even make sense.

♪♪

Narrator: during the red-hot Tennessee summer,

A surveillance camera Captures the impossible.

Peyton: I can't believe my eyes.

It seems to be snowing upwards.

That don't even make sense.

Narrator: the footage reaches Video analyst conor mccourt.

He wants to figure out Why the snow is rising up

Rather than falling down.

He spots a clue In the location of the camera,

At the top of a curved wall.

Man: what's very likely Happening here

is we're getting upward Wind current

That's kicking Those particles up.

And that looks very strange.

And that may be the explanation Of the snow going up

In the air the whole time.

Narrator: What mccourt doesn't know

Is the footage Was recorded in july.

No one alive recalls snow Falling during the sticky

Tennessee summer.

Peyton: it looked like snow.

I mean, it did.

I showed it to some Other people,

and they said It looked like snow.

But it was in the middle Of july.

Narrator: meteorologist Karen kosiba

Believes the snow theory Isn't as crazy as it sounds.

She points to a geological event

That can dramatically Alter weather.

Woman: something like an extreme Volcanic eruption,

Which puts a lot of soot In the atmosphere,

Could impact Global temperatures

by impacting the amount Of sunlight, um,

that gets into The earth's atmosphere.

Narrator: history shows how A volcanic eruption

Can cause spectacular Global cooling.

Mount tambora in indonesia

Blasted 36 cubic-miles of ash Into the atmosphere in 1815.

The cloud travelled 9,000 miles To cloak north america

In a dry, red fog For an entire year.

And just like in Peyton's footage,

Snow fell in tennessee in july.

Kosiba: there have been examples Globally of freak events

That occur, things that we refer To as the little ice age.

♪♪

Narrator: but jeff wise believes

That if a mini ice age Froze tennessee,

He'd have heard about it.

I've never heard of any weather That involves freak snow

In this part of the world At that time of year,

So it's definitely not snow.

♪♪

Narrator: the bizarre footage

Reaches biologist scott bundy.

He suspects that the particles In the footage are alive.

Man: it looked like it was A wooded area.

There's lots of vegetation Around, which is great habitat.

the movement is, um -- It's a bit random,

but that's kind of how some Of these insect swarms happen.

Narrator: insect swarms can Number in the trillions

And devour everything In their path.

In 1874, a swarm of locusts

Estimated to weigh 27 million tons

Obliterated crops Across the u.S.

And even ate the clothes On people's backs.

Thousands starved to death As a result of the devastation.

If a great plague of locusts Is loose in these farmlands,

The results Could be devastating,

And not just for crops.

Bundy: if they swarm at the Wrong place in the wrong time,

They have a potential To kill people

Because there's, you know, So many of them around.

Narrator: but plant expert Jeffrey dean

Believes a swarm of locusts

Would've left their mark On the land.

The snowy storm reminds him Of another type

Of deadly critter.

Man: the one type of insect That I can come up with

that might fulfill All of the criteria we see in

that video is a very tiny, Weak flyer

That's called the asian Hackberry wooly adelgid.

Narrator: The wooly adelgid parasite

Invaded from japan In the 1950s,

And now looks set to wipe out An entire u.S. Tree species.

They attack hemlock trees From new england to georgia,

And their march Appears unstoppable.

A female adelgid can generate

90,000 clones of herself Each year

Without the assistance Of a male.

Man: it's able to reproduce Into huge numbers of insects.

They can exhaust the food In a particular area

And, um, when that occurs,

they start looking For some place new to travel to.

narrator: but dean expects them To stick around

because of their poor Flying ability.

hours after the plague arrives, Peyton returns to the scene.

I would've thought that The number of particles we seen,

if it'd been insects, I think we would've seen those.

'cause we were out here, like, The next few days after that,

and I seen no evidence of it.

narrator: and so the summertime Blizzard that blitzed tennessee

remains a bewildering mystery.