All language subtitles for Strange.Evidence.S05E09.Alien.in.Paradise.1080p.MAX.WEB-DL.DDP2.0.H.264-BETHELL_track3_[eng]

[narrator] Worldwide,
36 billion cameras

are watching us

on our streets, at work

and in our homes.

They capture things
that seem impossible.

Science says
this shouldn't happen.

[man] Do you see that?

[narrator] Experts carry out
forensic analysis of these
unusual events.

Wow! What a blast.

[woman screams]

This doesn't make sense.

There has to be
some sort of explanation.

What else is going on here?

[narrator] Coming up,

is this is a scrap
cut from the carpet of death?

Black Carpet
crawls across the ocean floor,

devouring anything
in its path.

[Ashanti] Now that we know
that this stuff exists,

we need to figure out
how to destroy it.

[narrator]
The invisible man appears.

[Athena] Are there portals
between worlds?

Science says
it's a possibility.

[narrator]
And a handful of horror...

[gasps]

...as mystery mini-beasts
invade a kitchen.

I've never seen
anything like it.

They look almost alien.

[narrator] Bizarre phenomenon.

Oh, my Gosh. [gasps]

[narrator]
Mysteries caught on camera.

[girl screaming]

[narrator]
What's the proof behind this

strange evidence?

The island of Saint Lucia
in the Caribbean.

April 2nd, 2020.

Two men explore the coast,
a haven for wildlife

like bottlenose dolphins
and leatherback turtles.

But on this beach...

...they find
a hideous black slime

writhing on the rocks.

[Eric] It's slimy, it's black,

and it keeps retracting.

What is that?

That's unpleasant.

This looks like a writhing,
slithery mass

of weirdness.

This pushes the boundaries
of "disgusting."

[narrator] The throbbing blob
seems impervious

to the men's slashing machete.

It has this
strange quality to it that,

as the person cuts into it,
it reforms.

It's almost like self-healing
or something.

Very bizarre. I've never seen
anything like it.

[narrator] The men
don't dare touch it.

[George] I was half-expecting
to see this

lump of black mass
jump up at the camera.

[man] It makes me
think of Venom from Spiderman,

the black symbiote alien
that takes over your body.

Did this come from the ocean

or has someone brought it
to this place?

This island
is supposed to be a paradise,

but you sure don't see this
in the tourist brochure.

[narrator] Saint Lucia's
beautiful seas

have long been thought
to hide hideous monsters.

This lends credence
to ancient stories of

some kind of creature

that lives
in the tropical waters
of Saint Lucia.

[narrator] The Lusca
is a sea creature

described by pirates
and other adventurers

who came here
in the early days
of European settlement.

This tentacled beast
was said to grow
to over 75 feet long,

and reported to lurk
in the deep trenches

and blue holes
in the Caribbean.

Some of which plunge
to over 400 feet deep.

But, recently,
reports have come in

of a new tropical terror.

For years, divers night-diving

off of the coast
of Saint Lucia

have reported this
writhing creature,

fifteen feet long
and as wide as a man's arm.

They've nicknamed it, aptly,
"The Thing."

[narrator] For decades,

The Thing was believed to be
just a salty sea tale,

but then,
one was caught on film.

It's a segmented worm
called Eunice roussaei.

And the face of this worm is

truly out of
a sci-fi horror movie.

That's where the mandibles

and all the eating parts are,

and various tentacles
that senses environment.

Active at night.

This is a great example
of some of the sea tales
of divers

turning out
to be absolutely true.

[narrator] But recent reports
have come in
of a new tropical terror.

Scuba divers
speak of encounters

with a mysterious
writhing mass

that sounds strikingly similar
to the thing in the footage.

They call it
"The Black Carpet."

The Black Carpet appears to be

a single organism

that could be
hundreds of feet across,

that crawls across
the ocean floor devouring
anything in its path.

[narrator] This creature has
so far not been photographed,

but sightings
of this undersea entity

coincide with an increase
in scuba deaths
in the Caribbean.

Over 90 divers perish
in just ten years.

There's a monster in paradise,
and humans are on the menu.

[narrator] Biologists
haven't yet identified

this massive
black sea monster.

But in the Pacific in 2010,

scientists found
an enormous White Carpet,

consisting of
billions of microbes

forming a living mass
on the ocean floor.

It certainly makes you wonder
what other mysteries are
hidden below the sea floor.

[narrator] This film
could be the first
photographic evidence

of a Caribbean Black Carpet,

a writhing mass
of interconnected organisms,

perhaps a section
cut off from the main body,

or a young one
in its early stages
of formation.

Are we looking at something
that's about to become
a giant Black Carpet?

[narrator]
Biologist Kiki Sanford

wonders if this could be
one monstrous creature

bathed in its own slime.

The slimy mucus
and dark coloring

leads me to believe
that this is a bootlace worm.

Bootlace worms
are known to grow
to extreme lengths.

One individual was found
to be 180 feet long.

That's two blue whales,
end to end.

[narrator]
And these enormous creatures
can be deadly.

When bootlace worms are
attacked or threatened,

they produce a sticky mucus

that is actually
a powerful neurotoxin.

Many ribbon worms

are known
to produce tetrodotoxin,

which is the same toxin
produced by puffer fish.

[narrator] Tetrodotoxin
is 1,200 times more toxic

to humans than cyanide.

Just a pinhead of it
is a lethal dose.

-[vomiting]
-[narrator] First you
begin vomiting

and experiencing
excruciating stomach pain.

Then comes muscle paralysis,
and finally, death,
from suffocation.

[monitor flatlines]

[narrator] In 2019,
a Florida man

permanently lost
the use of his kidneys

after tetrodotoxin
got into his body.

In 2020, two Cambodian men,

a dog and seven chickens

were all killed by the poison
after eating it in sea food.

But that's not the only trick
that ribbon worms have
up their sleeve.

They're also
incredibly hard to kill.

If you try
to kill a ribbon worm
by cutting it in half,

it just produces
two new worms.

They survive.

And, in fact, one ribbon worm
can be cut

into 200,000 new worms.

So this guy
hacking away at this worm

with his machete
is not gonna hurt it.

He's just going to make
an army of worms.

[narrator] But a bootlace worm

shouldn't be living
on a busy Caribbean beach.

They aren't normally found
in the Caribbean.

They're native
to cold-water regions.

So, how did it get here?

[narrator] Coming up,

is this Arctic alien poised
to bring death to paradise?

Even humans can find
themselves under threat

from their presence.

[narrator] And a doorway
to another dimension

seems to open on to a street.

Could whatever it is
invade this world?

[narrator] A man films
a sinister-looking black ooze

writhing on a beach
in the Caribbean.

Biologist Kiki Sanford

identifies it as a poisonous
bootlace worm,

a cold water species
that shouldn't be found here.

Sanford suspects
transatlantic ships

crossing from cold seas
to the Caribbean

could've brought
a stowaway bootlace worm
with them.

Invasive species
can rapidly adapt

to threats
and prey opportunities
in new environments.

[narrator]
These invasive species
can quickly spread.

Every year,
from Saint Lucia to Cancún

and up to the Keys
in Florida's coast,

millions of sun lovers

stretch out on the beautiful
golden beaches

that lie
in the tranquil waters
of this region.

Newly arrived bootlace worms

could turn these sun-traps
into hellholes.

Could the bootlace worm
have adapted its neurotoxin

to be even more dangerous

to Caribbean predators?
In fact, it might even be

more dangerous to us.

[narrator] If these
toxic monster blobs
are spreading,

the residents and tourists
at the Caribbean

will have to find ways
to deal with this

virtually
indestructible menace.

Now that we know
that this stuff exists,

we need to figure out
how to destroy it.

If you can't
kill it with knives,

burn it with fire.

[narrator] Now, Tokyo, Japan.

September 23, 2019.

A busy daytime street
in a downtown area.

As pedestrians
go about their daily business,

a CCTV security camera

captures a mysterious arrival.

Wait. Can you rewind?
How on earth did he do that?

He just appears
out of nowhere.

[narrator]
Experts don't detect
a glitch in the footage

or any lost frames to indicate
a camera fault.

The man
seems to step out of thin air

and over a small fence
onto a busy sidewalk.

I've seen
a lot of strange things,

but this one particularly
is blowing my mind.

It was weird.

It was weird to see that man
come out of nowhere.

[narrator] Magician Ben Nemzer

discovers a theory
being widely circulated
on the Internet.

Many of the people
who've been
watching this online

think that he's a visitor
from another dimension.

[narrator]
Stories of people and things

suddenly appearing out of
interdimensional gateways

go back centuries.

There's a famous story about
two children with green skin

that were
found wandering in the forests
near the village of Woolpit

in the UK in the 12th century.

The girl learned English

and told people
that she and her brother
had come from

another dimension, a place
called Saint Martin's Land.

They said they heard
a loud noise,

then passed through
a tunnel-like opening

that dropped them
in medieval England.

[narrator] More recently,
Japan has had
strange visitors.

Newspapers report that
during the 1950s,

a man approaches customs
at Tokyo Haneda Airport

with a passport
from a country called Taured,

which doesn't exist
in our world.

It's claimed that the man is
detained by immigration

and held under guard
on the 15th floor of a hotel.

When the guards enter the room
to check on him
in the morning,

the man has
allegedly vanished.

Are there portals
between worlds?

Science says
it's a possibility.

[Saad] Stephen Hawking's paper
suggests that ours

isn't the only universe
created in the Big Bang,

but a whole
multitude of others were
created at the same time.

[narrator]
Physicists have put forward
a number of theories

that argue that multiverses
are not only possible,

they're actually very likely.

These include bubble universes

where many universes exist
side by side,

each within their own
space-time bubble.

Daughter universes,

where every action
creates universes
of alternative outcomes.

And parallel universes,

where our own universe
is replicated infinite times.

This sounds far-fetched,
but the equations
in these theories

make this
theoretically possible.

[narrator] Scientists at

the Oak Ridge
National Laboratory
in Tennessee

have started
conducting experiments,

hoping to prove the existence

of a mirrorverse
parallel world.

What would lie
on the other side?

Some of these universes
might contain

Earth-like planets, societies

and even individuals
that look just like people
here on Earth.

[narrator]
Image analyst Ben Radford

looks at the other people
in the street

and notices something strange.

[Ben] When you're
analyzing this video,

you can look at
the bystanders' reaction.

In this case, we have
at least half a dozen people

walking on the street
who are within

ten, fifteen feet of
when this guy suddenly appears
out of nowhere.

And what they do
is interesting.

And what they do is nothing.

They're not surprised,
they're not shocked,

they don't stand back and say,
"Where did this guy appear?"

They go about their day.

So this tells us that

what we're seeing
in the video clip

is not what happened
in real life.

It's a digitally
manipulated image.

[narrator] The area
the man appears
to be stepping out of

seems to have been overlaid
with another image

to conceal something
or someone.

So then the question is,
okay, well, why take
an image of the empty road

and overlay it
so it's covering up

where the guy comes from?

[narrator] Coming up,

are invisible yakuza assassins
stalking the streets of Tokyo?

If these gangs could
cover their tracks
so efficiently,

law enforcement
does not have a chance.

[narrator] And
twitching in the kitchen.

Have micro-rats
broken out of a lab?

[Kevin] He saw those things
on the floor,

and then he just
picked them up.

There's no way
I would touch that at all.

[narrator] CCTV
captures a man who seems
to step out of nowhere

onto a busy Tokyo street.

Former FBI agent Rhonda Glover

locates the area where
the camera was installed.

This is the Shibuya ward
in Tokyo.

This is a busy
downtown neighborhood.

[narrator]
Glover discovers that

beneath its
respectable-looking
main streets,

a group of criminals has ruled
the underworld of Shibuya
for decades.

The yakuza.

And their rule has
often come at a bloody cost.

They spent years fighting
and killing each other

in inter-gang wars.

[narrator] The yakuza
are criminals with
a reputation for violence.

One of their godfathers,
Kenichi Shinoda,

murdered a rival
with a katana.

The yakuza are
involved in running gambling,

prostitution
and protection rackets,

but have also penetrated
the mainstream business world.

But in recent years,

the yakuza have turned
from guns and knives

to keyboards and hard drives.

Many people say that
the yakuza are becoming
more sophisticated,

using technology to become
less visible to the police.

Like any business,
they're becoming more modern

and they're hiring hackers.

[narrator] And the yakuza
are using these hackers

to commit
truly audacious crimes.

In May 2016,

the yakuza were involved
in a digital heist

from cash machines
across Japan,

stealing 17 million dollars
in just three hours.

If these hackers are
sophisticated enough

to steal 17 million dollars
from ATMs,

surely they're also
good enough

to scrub somebody's image
from a security camera.

[narrator]
Security cameras were
a criminal's worst enemy,

forcing thieves
to try to disguise
or cover their appearance.

But now the yakuza
seem to have the power

to hack security systems

and edit out
their crimes altogether.

The yakuza have
attacked politicians

with Molotov cocktails.

They've stabbed
their enemy's children
in the street.

[narrator] Glover discovers
that the yakuza

are involved
in a violent turf war

with Iranian gangs
in the Shibuya area.

She suspects
part of this conflict

might be playing out
on the road behind the man

who seems
to step out of thin air.

Maybe this camera
recorded somethin'

that could
send someone to jail.

Considering their
history of violent crime,

anything that was
caught on tape
would be hard to miss

and very dangerous
to the organization.

So, if this was worth erasing,

it must've been pretty bad.

[narrator] Author H.G. Wells

wrote The Invisible Man
in 1897,

a tale of a man
embarking on an almost

unstoppable spree
of crime and murder.

A hundred
and twenty years later,

science fiction looks like
it could become science fact.

[narrator] Camera technology

has led to a 25% reduction
in street crime.

But if gangsters
can now make their
digital footprints invisible,

crime fighters will have
to find a new way
of catching them in the act.

If these gangs could
cover their tracks
so efficiently,

law enforcement
does not have a chance.

If these hackers are
sophisticated enough

that they can
hack into a security camera,

then that is terrifying.

[narrator] Now,

the city of Auckland
in New Zealand.

January 30th, 2019.

A man notices
something moving
on a kitchen floor.

He saw those things
on the floor.

And then he just
picked them up.

Now there's no way
I would touch that at all.

[narrator] They look
unlike any creature on Earth

and appear to be twitching.

I would be worried
that they would burrow in,

like a tick
or something like that,

leaving a disgusting
little tail sticking out.

This is
one of the creepiest things
I have ever seen,

that it will
not stop twitching.

[narrator]
Their strange appearance

leaves experts unsure
about their origin...

I've never seen
anything like it.

They look almost alien.

[narrator] ...and whether they
might be intelligent.

Are they reaching out
for each other?

Are they kinda communicating
with each other?

Are they dangerous?

[narrator]
Biologist Leslie Samuel
studies the footage,

and thinks these tendrils
could be some kind of tail.

They look
like they have tails,

which is something we see
in certain types of maggots.

I think we're looking at
some sort of insect larvae.

[narrator] The most common
of these tailed larvae

is the rat-tailed maggot,

which is the spawn of
a type of hoverfly.

The tail acts as a snorkel

that allows them
to breathe while submerged.

And they thrive
in wastewater environments,
including swamps,

sewers and even
human stomachs.

If you're unlucky enough
to ingest rat-tailed maggots,

they will feast
on your flesh

causing lesions,
intense stomach pains
and uncontrollable diarrhea.

The problem with that
is the rat-tailed maggots

are usually
a totally different color.

So maybe we're looking
at an entirely different
creature.

[narrator] Coming up,

could these horrors
be an experiment
in vermin control gone wrong?

These are things that
have taken millions
and millions of years

to evolve just
the way they are.

And now we're coming along
and we're chopping
and changing them,

you know, overnight.

[narrator]
And in Texas,

a mirror that seems
to have a mind of its own.

[Ben] That's just not
how mirrors work.

Your reflection's
supposed to
copy you exactly.

[narrator] A man
in New Zealand films
weird, twitching objects

he discovers
on the kitchen floor.

Biologist Steve Potvin thinks
they remind him of an
all too familiar pest.

It almost looks kind of
like a rat, but that's
way too small.

[narrator]
New Zealand was isolated
for over 80 million years

from the rest of the planet.

It became an avian paradise.

Birds here were so safe
from any kind of predator

that many took to the ground
and lost their ability to fly.

Big mistake.

When humans came
around 1300 AD,

they brought rats
in their boats

who enjoyed
an easy-to-eat bird buffet.

Now the
New Zealand government

is looking at
a controversial solution

to dealing with
these ravenous rodents.

Potvin believes
these twitching horrors
could be the result.

One technique
that's come up recently

to deal with populations
of rats

is CRISPR gene editing.

[narrator]
CRISPR is a technology
that allows scientists

to directly alter parts
of an organism's DNA

to change biological traits.

Scientists in New Zealand
are hoping that gene editing

will work where
traps and poison
have failed in the past.

Scientists have been using
CRISPR technology

to mess around with the genes
of animals to try and control
their population.

[narrator] This technology
could sterilize rats

or make them all male,
preventing breeding.

New Zealand has vowed
that all rats will be gone
from the island by 2050.

But many scientists fear that
this Frankenstein technology

could also lead
to genetic abominations.

[Steve] These are things
that have taken
millions and millions of years

to evolve just
the way they are.

And now we're coming along
and we're chopping
and changing them,

you know, overnight.

[narrator] Potvin investigates
if the footage is evidence

that genetically modified rats
have already been released
in New Zealand,

causing horrifically
shrunken pups.

Could it be that
they're producing offspring
but they're just too small

or, you know, they have
genetic defects?

Or could this be affecting
rats in some other way

that's making them
look like this?

[narrator]
Entomologist Kevin Kasky

detects deposits
of a shiny dust
near the twitching objects,

leading him to believe
that these might not be
individual organisms

but rather parts of
a larger creature.

[Kevin] You can see
a little sheen
on this guy's palms.

Moths. They're covered
with a dust-like scale.

Could these be
the legs of a moth?

[narrator] Severed
moth legs can exhibit

the strange
twitching behavior
seen in the footage.

Like a lot of insects
if a moth's legs
are removed from its body,

there are still
electrical impulses
in the leg muscles

that can explain
this twitching
that we're seeing.

The fact that
they're still twitching

means that they haven't
been detached for very long.

[narrator] If these
are moth legs,
they look truly massive.

It begs the question,
what kinda moth
do these legs belong to?

How big would this moth
have to be?

[narrator] Some of
the largest moths in the world

can be found in this part
of the southern hemisphere.

The Hercules moth that lives
in Queensland, Australia

can have a wing span
of over a foot.

I mean, these moths
are bigger than your head.

[narrator] Moths
may seem harmless,

but some have
a sinister reputation.

One, known as Calyptra
or the vampire moth

feeds on the blood of mammals.

Their powerful proboscis
works like a drill

allowing them to penetrate
even elephant skin.

Vampire moths
can suck blood
for over 50 minutes,

and they have even
been known to feed on humans.

Imagine one of these moths
paying you a visit
in the middle of your night

flapping around
your bedroom.

I'd probably wanna keep
my windows closed.

[narrator] New Zealand
is a land of enormous bugs.

The giant weta
is native to New Zealand.

It's about the size
of a gerbil,

and it's been around
for 190 million years.

[narrator]
Twenty-three percent
of the country

is dense virgin forest

where many
moth species reside.

If you're looking for
a giant insect,

then New Zealand
is the place for you to go.

[narrator] Could this clip
be evidence of
an undiscovered giant moth?

Perhaps,
an unknown carnivore

that's been hiding out
in the island's
remote wilderness?

At least 70% of the plants
and animals living
in New Zealand and Australia

have yet to be discovered
and are complete mysteries.

Maybe they're lucky
they only found the legs.

I personally would not
wanna come close

to a moth with
a two-foot wingspan.

[growling]

[narrator] Now,
San Antonio, Texas.

August 2018.

A young boy is filmed
playing with a mirror.

It's a kid looking at himself
in the mirror
sticking out his tongue.

[narrator] Then the camera
captures something disturbing.

-Ooh! Oh, my goodness.
-What happened there?

Wait, hold on.
Did that kid's reflection
just move before he did?

[narrator]
The child's reflection appears
to break the laws of physics.

The longer I look
at this clip,
the weirder it is.

Because how is it possible
that the person's reflection

can leave before
the person themselves?

[Ben] That's just not
how mirrors work.

Your reflection's supposed to
copy you exactly.

It looks like his reflection
has a mind of its own

and isn't taking orders
from anyone.

[narrator] Humans have
been making mirrors
for over 6,000 years.

And although they are found
in almost every home
in the developed world,

we are still not
entirely comfortable
having them around.

In Jewish culture
when someone dies

all the mirrors are covered
while the household mourns.

It's a tradition called
Sitting Shiva

that some people believe
protects against demons
that visit the home

after a loss or tragedy
has occurred.

These demons can't be seen
with the naked eye,

but their
horrifying reflections
can be seen in mirrors.

[narrator] Some cultures
believe mirrors can even
steal your soul.

In German and Dutch cultures
mirrors were always covered up
when someone had died.

This is because they say
that if you saw

your reflection in the mirror
after someone had died,

it is believed that
you would be
the next one to die.

[narrator] Magician Ben Nemzer
wonders if this footage
shows a clever trick

intended to shock
and disturb audiences.

There's a lot of illusions
that are spooky and
frightening and unsettling,

and this is definitely
one of them.

[narrator] Nemzer suspects
this isn't a mirror at all

but instead,
two identical twins
working in perfect unison.

[Ben] So the way
the classic mirror tricks work

is usually there's
an empty frame

and there is somebody
on the other side
of the mirror

and every move is exactly
choreographed and rehearsed

to make sure that
the person pretending
to be the reflection

and the person
who looks just like them

are doing the same movements
at the same time.

[narrator] Around
half a million identical twins
are born every year.

As many as one in three
claim to have
a telepathic connection

that allows them to anticipate
their sibling's next move.

Some twins use these powers
for criminal ends.

In 1994, identical twin
Donald Anderson

did jail time
for his convicted brother,
Ronald,

with the authorities
none the wiser.

If the kid had a twin

and they practiced that
"ahh" with the tongue

exactly at the same point,
it could be pulled off.

[narrator] But historian
Marcus Harshaw

doesn't believe the dimensions
of this ordinary looking room

would support such a trick.

Given the angle of the mirror
and the space between that
and the wall,

it doesn't seem likely
that someone could fit
back there.

It's definitely
a true reflection.

[narrator] Coming up,

Chad Orzel attempts
to bring his own reflection
to life.

Wow, look at that.

There's a real
biological basis

for why many people
find mirrors to be unsettling.

[rumbling]

[narrator] And locals rush
to escape the village
of the damned.

What kind of powerful
underground force

is being unleashed here?

[narrator] In Texas,
the reflection of a young boy

playing in front of a mirror
appears to move by itself.

Physicist Chad Orzel
suspects that a strange
scientific illusion

associated with mirrors
can explain the boy's
disconnected reflection.

He sets up an experiment
to see if he can recreate

the unnerving effect
seen in the video.

I wanna test if the angles
between the camera,
the boy and the mirror

are what's causing
this phenomena.

[narrator] He copies
the setup of the mirror
and camera in the footage.

I know the mirror
needs to be tilted

slightly away from
the line of sight
of the camera.

And now I just need to adjust
the camera to get exactly
the right line of sight.

[narrator] Orzel believes
the boy's head

moves imperceptibly
towards the camera.

But the angle of the mirror
exaggerates the movement
of his reflected image.

[Chad] So now I'm standing
very close to the mirror,

holding my head still
and my refection
isn't going anywhere.

But if I just lean my way
back a little bit,

I see my reflection
move in the mirror.

The question is,
what does this look like

to the camera
looking over my shoulder.

Have I managed to make
my reflection look like
it's moved of its own accord?

[narrator] Orzel
reviews the footage.

Wow, look at that.
That is exactly the thing
in the clip.

[narrator] Orzel thinks
he solved the riddle

of how the boy's reflection
appeared to move by itself.

[Chad] We managed
to find exactly
the right set of angles

to make my reflection
look like it moved
on its own.

This wouldn't work
in any other orientation.

It's really amazing that
this kid was able to get
this effect by accident.

[narrator] This footage
offers a unique window

into how susceptible
the human psyche is

to the brain-bending power
of mirrors.

Moments like these
are a reminder

of how easily
the human brain
can be tricked.

And it can make you ask
what else is there

that we see
in the world around us

that looks different
because we're looking
from the wrong angle?

[narrator] Now,
Mahakalapada in Odisha, India.

June 5th, 2020.

It's a quiet afternoon
in a small Indian village

as a group of men
stand around a work site.

There's a whole bunch of guys.
I don't know exactly
what they're doing.

[narrator]
Then, without warning,

the ground begins to churn
as though it's alive.

[gasps]

How is that even possible?

It looks like the ground
is just boiling.

[narrator] And locals fear
that their entire village

is about to be consumed
by the exploding earth.

The only thing that you can do
if you were standing there

is pray that it won't
spread any further.

[Craig] This is
a terrifying scene.

There's a force
in nature here.

It's completely
out of control.

What kind of powerful
underground force

is being unleashed here?

[narrator] George Kourounis
investigates the area

and discovers a widespread
undercover industry

that could be responsible
for disturbances
beneath the earth.

Here in the Odisha region
of India, there's been
a recent explosion

in the illegal mining
of gemstones like
rubies, emeralds, garnets

and even some diamonds.

Is it possible we're looking
at an illegal mining operation
that's gone horrible wrong?

[narrator] It's one of
the toughest jobs
in the world.

[Craig] Illegal mines in India
are often called rat holes

because they are very small,
very confined,

and that's the space
that illegal miners
are forced to work in.

[narrator] An emerald
plucked from the ground here

can be worth around
$7,000 per ounce.

But an illegal miner
will get paid less than
two dollars a day

by the mine's gang masters.

And for this meagre wage
the miners endure
terrible conditions.

One area in India
called Meghalaya,
there was a mining accident

where one of these rat holes
actually collapsed.
15 miners lost their lives.

Why? Because the mine
was too confined to execute
a rescue operation.

[narrator]
Being trapped and killed
in these tiny tunnels

isn't the only danger
miners face.

Journalist Jeff Wise discovers
that many of these secret
illegal mine shafts

are funded by
a dangerous organization.

This illegal mining,
we're not talking about
mom and pop operations.

These are really large
and well-funded operations

that are run
by a terrorist rebels.

[narrator] Coming up.

Is this village hiding
an underground
criminal operation?

So what we're seeing here
is something's that's putting
the entire village at risk.

[narrator] A man films
villagers fleeing

as their home
seems to explode from below.

Journalist, Jeff Wise
discovers that many illegal
gem mines in this region

are being run
by a dangerous guerrilla group
known as the Naxalites.

The United States'
state department
has categorized these rebels

as the world's sixth
most dangerous
terrorist organization.

[narrator] In just
under a decade,

illegal mining
in the Odisha region
of India alone

has unearthed over
9.6 billion dollars' worth
of minerals.

And this money funds
acts of terror.

Just in 2018 alone
the insurgency in India
killed more than 300 people.

[narrator] The Naxalites exact
terrible retribution against
anyone who stands up to them.

[Jeff] In 2010, the rebels
watched a revenge attack
on a village

just for the arrest of
some of its members,

and they burnt
a family of four to death.

[narrator] Wise believes
that this group

would even be willing
to sabotage one of their mines

to punish a village
for threatening
their operations.

If someone has accidently
uncovered a rebel

illegal mining operation,
that would be
extremely concerning.

[narrator] But historian
Craig Gottlieb
looks at mining surveys

and doubts this is
an exploding
or collapsing mine.

Geological surveys
of the area do show
mineral deposits

in this region,
but not in this village.
So that tells me

this is probably not
the result of an illegal
mining operation.

[narrator] Image Analyst
Conor McCourt
studies the footage

and wonders if this could be
a disaster caused by India's
unquenchable thirst.

So what we're seeing here
is something that's putting
the entire village at risk.

It's very unusual,
the floor is bubbling.

There is mud splashing
everywhere.

We see a blue pole
in the middle of watery mud.

I think what we have here
is a well drilling operation.

[narrator] India is suffering
from a catastrophic shortage
of fresh water.

Looking at the water situation
in India,

by 2030 it's estimated
that there's gonna be
twice the amount of demand

compared to what
they can actually supply.

A solution for
this lack of water

is to go underground
to find new resources.

For instance,
utilizing aquifers.

[narrator] Aquifers
are large layers of
super saturated rock

located underground
below the water table.

They contain about 30%
of all the available
fresh water on earth,

over 2.7 million
trillion gallons.

If aquifers
are near the surface

then they will easily
release this water
through natural springs.

Or even by digging
a shallow well.

But many aquifers lie
over thousand feet
beneath the surface.

And tapping their water
is like drilling for oil.

Your ground water is
an essential resource that's
in crucial demand right now.

When you take it out,
it doesn't just
magically reappear.

So as you use up
your ground water

you have to dig deeper
and deeper and deeper
to get that resource.

[narrator] Across India
33 million borewells

have been drilled
to depths of up to 1800 feet.

So much ground water
has been extracted,

that it has caused the Earth
to tilt on its vertical axis,

shifting eastwards
seven inches a year.

If the world
was to tilt too far,

our seasons and climate
would be thrown into chaos.

But there are other
more immediate dangers.

Now the thing is there's
a lot of complications
with drilling.

If you drill a little bit
you might be okay.

But the deeper you drill
and the further you go
the older the rock gets,

there's quite a lot
of risk at hand.

For instance,
gas pockets.

[narrator] It's not
just India that's at risk.

The United States sits upon

the fifth largest
natural gas field
in the world.

Estimated at more than
450 trillion cubic feet.

When released by a drill,
this high pressured methane

will hit straight
to the surface
without warning.

And if the friction of
the metal drill against
the hard rock causes a spark,

it will ignite.

Now drills have
caught fire before.

And borewells
have burst into flames.

[narrator] But it's
even more dangerous
if the gas reaches the surface

without encountering
a source of ignition.

Natural gas is odorless.

So it could be seeping
on the surface
and cover everything

and nobody would know.

[narrator] In August 2014,
Cody Murray, a Texas rancher

investigates why
his groundwater well
isn't pumping correctly.

A build-up of methane
in the pump shed ignites

and turns the air in the shed
into an explosive fireball.

He survives the blast,
but suffers third-degree burns
over a quarter of his body.

[sirens wailing]

[narrator]
If the churning ground
captured in the video

is the result
of huge quantities
of methane gas,

then hundreds of lives
could be in danger.

[Craig] It could entirely
impregnate the ground

making the village
a powder cake
ready to explode.

One spark
and boom!