All language subtitles for Strange.Evidence.S05E10.Mystery.of.the.Face.Parasite.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.

[woman]
Do you see that?

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

Wow, what a blast!

[people screaming]

This doesn't make sense.

[screams]

There has to be
some sort of explanation.

What else is going on here?

[camera whirrs]

[narrator] Coming up...

[gasps] Oh.

[narrator]
...meet the face invaders.

Don't let there be more.

They're squirming around
inside of his nasal cavity.

It's making me sick
just watching it.

[narrator] A UFO gives birth
over a busy airport.

Is it a bird, a plane,
or something from outer space?

[narrator] And in Britain,

the beach body
you don't wanna get.

Ugh!

[woman] What in the name of
God is this?

I would absolutely not want to
run into this thing
while it was alive.

[narrator]
Bizarre phenomena...

Oh, my God! [gasps]

[narrator] ...mysteries
caught on camera...

[woman screams]

What's the truth behind this
strange evidence?

[narrator] Now...

Dien Bien Phu,
north-west Vietnam.

July 5th, 2018...

a villager turns up
at a clinic

complaining of agonizing pain
in his nose.

A doctor moves in
for a closer look.

[doctor speaking]

We see this unfamiliar view
from the endoscope.

It's a tiny,
tiny little camera

that is actually going up
this gentleman's nose.

And it looks like
an alien world.

[narrator]
What the doctor finds
is truly horrifying.

Oh, my word.

This is the whole another
degree of nasty.

[narrator] Something is alive
inside his nose

They're squirming around
inside of his navel cavity.

It's making me sick
just watching it.

Oh, hell no. He did not just
pull that out of
this man's nose.

And he's going back in
for more. Oh, no.

Don't let there be more.

Oh, God, no.

[narrator] A second
gruesome creature is removed

from the man's nasal passage.

Oh!

You can't look away.
It is so disgusting.

[Ashanti] This is so gross.
I feel so bad for the guy,

and the look on his face
when he sees

the thing
come out of his nose,

he... he looks disgusted.

[narrator] The invaders are
unlike anything

the shocked doctor
has seen before.

I don't even want to talk
about this. This is...
this is too disgusting.

This takes me
out of my comfort zone.

What are these face invaders?

And how did they get there?

[narrator]
The man is a farmer

from the dense jungles
of Vietnam

where American GIs
fought the Vietnam

during the Vietnam War
between 1961 and 9875.

[Martin] For the people
who fought there,

they thought
that the Viet Cong

and the People's Army
of Vietnam
were the big enemies.

But mother nature was
an adversary too.

[narrator]
After the fighting ends,

some returning soldiers
come home with
more than just medals.

Recent studies show
that some veterans are
infected with liver flukes

they ingested by eating
raw or undercooked fish.

In the worst cases,

the parasitic worms feast
on the patients' livers,

causing irreparable damage
to their bile ducts
and by potentially cancer.

Well, if these kind of animals
are lurking out the jungle,

who's to say that that's not
what got into
to this man's body?

[narrator] When biologist
Roland Kays studies footage,

he thinks it's unlikely that
these horrifying nose invaders
are liver flukes.

It's very unusual to see them
in the nasal cavity.

Biologist Carin Bondar
discovers the stomachs

of the revolting creatures
are visibly bursting
with blood...

sucked out from
the unfortunate
villager's nose.

Could this be
a blood-sucking leech

that's crawled up
the man's nose?

Leeches are kind of
a Vampire bug. And they come
in all different sizes.

[narrator] Over 650 different
leech species

lurk in the world's waters.

Some have 10 stomachs,
32 brains,

nine pairs of testicles
and several hundred teeth.

These aquatic
parasitic predators

are attracted to any kind
of movement in the water

and have evolved to sense
carbon dioxide,

the signature of the presence
of a nearby living creature,

who they target, latch on to
and such their blood.

They secrete an anesthetic

so that the victims may even

feel themselves
getting bitten.

And in addition,
and anti-coagulant.

And that this means that
the rich blood the leeches
are feasting on

will not coagulate
or harden up.

It'll just keep on flowing.

[narrator] In 2008,
a 65-year-old man in Turkey

suffers after being bitten
by a 130 leeches.

They sucked out so much blood

that he required emergency
blood transfusions

to save his life.

So technically it's possible

that a hoard of leeches
could kill somebody.

[Kevin]
Removing them could mean
ripping and tearing flash

as they are taken off.

Think about
that one at dinner.

[narrator] But leeches
generally attach themselves

to outer parts of the body.

It's a very rare occurrence
when you find them living
in a nasal cavity.

[narrator] Doctors discover
the man in the footage
lives in a remote village

where drinking water is
taken directly from a river.

Perhaps these leeches
were accidently ingested
in a drink of water

and then migrated up
into the nose through
the nasal passage.

[narrator]
The leeches are probably from
a highly-specialized species

called Dinobdella ferox
that purposely seek out
their victims' noses.

Dr. Yite Lai of
the National Taiwan University

deliberately allowed them
to enter his nose

to study what would happen.

He even filmed the experiment.

There's some potential danger
here because they could
block his airway.

[narrator] Dr. Lai found one
of the leeches stayed in nose
for 75 days

and grew to 10 times
its original size

as it feasted on the veins
on his nasal cavity.

Can you believe that something
that big

can sit inside of your face
for so long?

[narrator] Finally he coaxed
the leech out

with a bowl of water
held under his nose.

Dr. Lai did his experiment
in laboratory conditions,

checking his health regularly.

The man in the footage

may have a had
a less fortunate encounter
with a Dinobdella ferox

if doctors hadn't intervened.

This is one lucky man
that caught these

while they were still there.

If he has missed 'em,

they could have burrowed
right through his brain.

[narrator] The man who had
two leeches removed from
his nose made a full recovery.

Next time he drinks
from stream,

he should boil it, filter it

or treat it with
an iodine tablet to kill off
any parasites.

Leeches are found
on every continent

except for Antarctica.

So who knows where these guys
might be hiding.

I will never be able to
lay down my head again,

knowing that somewhere
on this planet,

there is a creature
that might crawl up my nose.

These things look like
they could suck a human dry.

[narrator] Now...

The town of Washington
in Northern California...

November 2016...

And underground explorer
investigates a 100-year-old
abandoned mine.

[explorer] Okay,
that's the portal to the mine.

Let's get in here.

[narrator] The tiny tunnel
hand-dug from solid rock

is barely big enough
to stand in,

and penetrates deep
into the side of
a remote mountain.

[explorer]
I keep hitting my head.

Oop, that was bad.

[narrator]
Exploring old gold mines

is an extremely
dangerous pastime

and should be attempted
by anyone without expertise.

[explorer]
Yeah, let's keep going
straight ahead.

This is a crumbling gold mine.

Bad things could happen
in there at any time.

Does this guy wanna be
buried alive?

[narrator]
Then... 100 feet in...

[distorted sounds]

[explorer] Do you hear that?

Sounds like, uh...

Can you-- I don't think
you can hear that
on the camera.

[distorted sounds]

Do you hear that?

That's a weird noise.

Oh, my goodness,
what's that sound?

[distorted sounds]

You're in an abandoned mine,

and you hear demonic whisper,

what do you do?

-[distorted sounds]
-[explorer] Oh.

The whole point of
an abandoned mine is that
nobody else is there.

I would just leave. I...
I would just get out of there.

[explorer] I don't know
what that is.

That's crazy.

Dude, run. Don't wonder
about it. Just run!

[bleep]

[narrator]
Fearing for his safety,

the underground explorer
attempts to escape.

[bleep]

Coming up...

Is this mine also a tomb?

Could serial killers
or sadistic truckers

dump bodies
at the abandoned mines?

[narrator] And after
a nuclear accident,

a monster on a British beach.

I can't even tell if
there are limbs
or where they start or stop.

This is really bizarre.

[narrator] In an abandoned
gold mine in Washington,
California,

an explorer flees for his life
after hearing this sound.

[distorted sounds]

These whispers
are actually quite loud.

[narrator] Anthropologist
Debra Hyde

discovers the region is
scarred with over 2,800
derelict mines

in a ghoulish legacy.

Mining traditionally has been
an incredibly dangerous
enterprise.

And for as many people
that walked out of
that mine

with a handful of gold,

there must have been many,
many more who were killed
or injured.

[narrator]
Over 300,000 miners
migrate to California

during the gold rush
at the 1840s and '50s.

One in five would die
within six months.

On August 27th, 1922,

fire breaks out in
the Argonaut Mine,

one of California's
biggest gold producers.

3,000 feet underground,
47 miners are caught
in the blaze.

Fire expanded,
worked its way
through the mine shafts.

When there's no means
of escape,

the only thing you could
hope for is
a really quick death.

[narrator]
Many mines in this area
have seen tragedies

and many are
said to be haunted.

If you're superstitious,
you could believe that

suffering miners
had been down there,

that their souls were still
making these noises

and this is what
we've been hearing here.

[distorted sounds]

[narrator] Former FBI agent
Rhonda Glover

analyzes the audio.
she rules out animal noises
from birds or bats,

and fears the ghostly whispers
could be a person in peril.

Snaking through the U.S.
from California to New Jersey

is Interstate 80.

There's a stretch where
there's a Bermuda Triangle
of missing persons.

[narrator] The 3,000 mile-long
transcontinental corridor
passes through 11 U.S. states.

When it reaches
the derelict mining districts

of Nevada
and Northern California,

the road becomes known
as The Big Lonely.

Hundreds of bodies have been
found discarded
near America's highways,

but many others
have gone missing,
never to be found.

Could serial killers
or sadistic truckers

being using Interstate 80
to dump bodies

at the abandoned mines?

[narrator] In 2018,

murderer Jerrod William Baum
kills two teenagers in Utah.

Their bodies are later found
in an abandoned mine

to the south of Interstate 80.

Glover wonders
if the sound in the mine shaft

could be a victim of another
of the I-80's killers.

[distorted sounds]

Could these creepy sounds
be the last breaths
of a dying person?

Could they have
been kidnapped,

beaten and left for dead
in this mine?

[narrator]
But science journalist
John Farrow isn't convinced.

[John] These whispers,
they're actually quite loud.

And there's some force
behind them.

They don't sound like
someone's last dying whispers.

[distorted sounds]

[narrator] Image analyst
Ben Radford

believes the human-like noise
could be caused by rocks

shifting above the rotten
wooden beams

as the explorer's footfalls
vibrate and disturb them.

[Ben] In an environment
that has these hard surfaces,

you're going to have
these echoes.

When you look at the surfaces
the sound's being
reflected off of,

it's rocky, it's uneven,

and so you're gonna get
different sound waves
reflecting off different parts

and it's gonna be distorted.

[narrator] The weird acoustics
of the mines walls

could be transforming
the warning groans from
the mine's rotten timbers

into what sounds like
human voices.

With every single step,
there's an ever present threat

of being crushed under
hundreds of thousands of
tons of rock.

[distorted sounds]

[explorer] It's...
It's really dangerous.

[narrator] Unexplained voices
and potentially deadly
cave-ins

are just two reasons
not to venture into
abandoned mines.

We don't know
what this noise was.

It's a mystery still.

But I can tell you I'm not
gonna be the one
to go explore it.

[narrator] Now...

Ainsdale, Northern England.

July 29th, 2020...

a woman walking
by the Irish Sea is confronted
by a horrifying carcass.

Bones sticking out...
That's huge.

What on earth could this be?

It made me
almost throw up.

I was a little bit scared
'cause I didn't know if it was
definitely dead.

I couldn't tell what it was.

There were three big bones
sticking out at the top.

You could see
mangled bits of skin
and what looked like hooves...

It just didn't make any sense
to me whatsoever.

[narrator] It's enormous

and seems to be
a hideous hybrid
of more than one creature.

I was looking around it,
it looked like it had hair.

It was black, blue, gray...
Just a mixture of three
or four different animals.

It looked like
a woolly mammoth.

Could have been an alien
as far as I was aware.

Quite scary to think that
something like that
could be out.

I've lived here all my life,
I've come to the beach
all the time,

and I've worked here
for three seasons,

and this is the strangest
thing I have ever seen
in my life.

I couldn't... I still can't
make sense of it.

There are so many things
that are still unexplained.

[narrator] Coming up...

Is this monster a victim
of Britain's secret Chernobyl?

The Irish seas are toxic,
Celtic, cauldron of radiation,

and who knows what mutated
creatures are swimming
around in it?

[narrator] A woman walking
on a British beach finds
a mysterious monster carcass.

[woman] What in the name of
God is this?

Ugh!
Ugh, that's disgusting. Ugh.

Holy smoke. My...
That's huge.

[narrator] The beach blob
seems to be made up

of an impossible collection
of body parts.

This is the size of a car
with flesh and bone in it.

Who would not be freaked out
by this, right?

Oh, I didn't want to look.

[Tony]
This Frankenstein creature
is a mish-mash of skeleton

of blubbery skin and fat.

I mean it's impossible
to make out what it is.

I can't even tell
if there are limbs
or where they start or stop.

This is really bizarre.

I can see horns,
I can see bones, ribs,
you can see legs.

[narrator] It seems to have
some of the features

of animals only found
on land.

And you get to those bones,
and they split like hooves.

I've seen some creatures
that would make
your skin crawl,

that come out of the sea,

that are truly unique
but none with hooves.

[narrator] There are farms
and cattle pastures
surrounding the beach,

but this isn't a cow
or a bull.

It's over 15 feet long.

Twice the length of
a standard farmyard Heifer.

Why aren't there crabs
and seagulls
all over this thing?

Is there something these
animals know that we don't?

One thing for sure, though,

I would absolutely not wanna
run into this thing
while it was alive.

[narrator] The bizarre mash up
of land and marine features
on the corpse

reminds anthropologist
Debra Hyde

of a supernatural creature
sent to inhabit seas, rivers
and lakes

in the western British Isles.

[horse whinnies]

[Debra] There have
been stories

of a kind of creature
which has been called
the water horse.

And the idea is
it's a shapeshifting creature

which can change
into a horse.

In the human form, they look
like a handsome young man.

And then when he goes
into his horse form,

he sits by still water
and entices people
to mount his back.

When you get on the back
of a water horse

you can't move.
You're glued there.

The water horse
will run into the water,

will drown you and you will
become his next victim.

[horse whinnies]

One has to wonder given that
this is such an unholy mess

whether or not the water horse
was in mid shape shift

when it met its end.

[narrator] Marine biologist
Eric Hovland

studies the body in detail
and is horrified

to find the creature might
have a grotesque mutation.

I'm starting to see what
might be a second head.

Did we get this all wrong?

If we are truly seeing
a double-headed creature,

this is definitely
one unique mutation

that we've not
encountered before.

[narrator]
Historian Tony McMahon

discovers a nuclear plant
called Windscale

a hundred miles to the north

that suffered a terrible
radioactive disaster.

Windscale was
producing plutonium

for the British
defense industry.

So a huge fire there
about 60 years ago.

[explosion]

[narrator] The fire cannot
be put out with water
or carbon dioxide.

And it's only
one worker's quick thinking

to shut the air supply
off to the flames

that saves Britain
from an even more
apocalyptic explosion.

However, terrible damage
has already been done.

[Tony McMahon]
As a result of that fire

a vast amount of
radioactive waste ended up

in the Irish Sea with
calamitous consequences.

So this is one of the most
radioactively polluted

parts of any ocean
in the world.

It's like Britain's
little mini Chernobyl.

[narrator] British leader
Harold Macmillan downplays
and classifies

reports on the disaster.

But cow's milk from farms
over 300 square mile area
is contaminated

with deadly
radioactive iodine 131.

Quickly the order comes
for 250,000 gallons of milk

to be dumped into the sea.

But it's not enough.

The iodine 131 dust spreads
across the United Kingdom.

Iodine 131 is the radioactive
element that causes thyroid
cancer.

Hundreds of people
and possibly more

are believed to have been
diagnosed with cancer

as a direct result
of that incident.

We know that radioactivity
can cause mutations in DNA,

so, of course, that question
comes to mind,

is this some horrible mutant

as a result of that disaster.

[Tony] The Irish Sea
in a fact is a toxic, Celtic

cauldron of radiation
and who knows

what mutated creatures
are swimming around in it.

If that's the case, that hunk
of rotting flesh could be
filled with radiation.

Uh, so whoever's filming that
should get out of there pretty
much immediately.

[narrator] Coming up...

Atomic autopsy. Is this,
one, radioactive monster,

-or, two...
-Looks like we've got
some spare parts.

What we're seeing may be
a second smaller organism.

[narrator]
And a strange object

spews UFOs over Mexico City.

Is it a bird, a plane,
or something from outer space?

[narrator]
On a British coast ravaged
by a radioactive disaster,

a bizarre beast's body
defies identification.

It didn't look unlike anything
I've ever seen before.

[narrator] But biologist
Eric Hovland believes

this could be
a mangled mammal.

[Eric Hovland]
If we looked closely,

we could see what's
certainly shaped like a skull,

but then perhaps,

those tusks are actually
the jawbones of this cetacean.

By cetacean, I mean a whale.

[narrator] But the strange
features of this creepy
carcass

tell us a tragic tale.

There's still some
unexplained mystery here.

Let's say we could
reassemble the parts,

put them in the context that
we have ourselves a whale.

Looks like we've got
some spare parts.

What we're seeing may be
a second smaller organism

attached to our whale

by an umbilical cord.

So this is probably a whale
that's died during childbirth

and both the mother and fetus

have died and washed up
on shore.

[Jayde Lovell] It's possible
that the nuclear radiation
that's in the water

would have affected
this whale and that can
cause things like,

stillbirth and miscarriage.

[narrator]
Biologist Jayde Lovell fears

this is not the end
of the story for
the human population

that live by this
Chernobyl by the sea.

The thing that worries me is

this area is heavily fished
for human consumption.

What is happening to
humans that are also
eating these fish?

[narrator] Now...

The suburbs surrounding
Mexico City airport.

May 22nd, 2009.

A man filming planes captures
something weird arriving.

This passenger plane
looks like it's on
a descent to land.

Just business as usual.

And then, bang!

Out of nowhere this
other object just pops up.

[narrator] It's not shaped
like a plane of a helicopter.

And as eyewitness
Alfredo Carerro films,

it starts doing something
really bizarre.

All of a sudden there's
a bunch of other
little objects

kind of emanating outwardly
from the central object.

[Patrick Tomlinson]
What the heck is it doing?

It looks like it's dividing
or multiplying somehow.

[Amy Shira Teitel]
One unidentified object in
the sky is rude enough.

When it starts deploying
dozens of other smaller ones,

that gets really weird.

It's almost like giving birth
midair or something.

Very strange.

[Amy] This thing is
so close it has to be

some kind of
aerospace violation.

[narrator] The footage
could be dismissed as
a trick of the light

or digitally altered.

But another film emerges
of the same object

shot by eyewitness
Pedro Hernandez,

shortly after the first
and from a different angle.

Now, the smaller objects are
moving around the larger one.

The second video shows
definite similarities
to the first one.

For example, there's an object
and it seems to have

smaller ones coming out
on either side.

What we're seeing in these
images almost certainly
is not a kite.

Um, it doesn't have
the structure of a kite.

The string is
horizontal not vertical.

The objects are all lined up.

It's not characteristic
of a balloon or anything
like that.

I have no idea
what that could be.

Is it a bird, a plane,
or something from outer space?

[Antonio Paris] So some
UFO investigators, uh,

have alleged that this
is possibly a mothership

and the mothership
is releasing other
surveillance drones

that are part of
the mothership to fly
around kind of like scouts

and then they come back
and report to the mothership.

In fact, there have been
multiple sightings

that seems to document
very similar phenomenon.

In 1956, a navy transport
air crew flying over
the Atlantic

reported seeing a cluster
of lights on their way
into Newfoundland.

The crew was stunned
to realize that the lights

were surrounding
a saucer of some kind.

Outlining it over
400-foot across.

But what was telling was
that as soon as they landed,

they were greeted by suited
government officials on their
way to debrief them.

It begs the question if these
sightings really are giant
flying saucers,

how are they getting past
our radar and early warning
systems so easily?

Some people have suggested
that these appear without
warning.

That they come teleported
from some other location

or even another dimension.

[narrator] But historian
Martin Morgan believes
this object

isn't an artifact of
the war of the worlds

but more likely
the war on drugs.

Cartels are becoming
more and more well-armed.

They're moving around
with armored cars.

With machine guns,
with anti-tank weapons.

And they're beginning
to use drones as well.

They're using drones to
carry drugs over the border

and into the United States.

They can carry 100 pounds
of drugs in a single trip.

One cartel in particular,
the CJNG,

have been rapidly expanding
their operations.

[indistinct radio chatter]

[narrator] The Jalisco
New Generation Cartel
known as CJNG,

has taken Mexico's
notoriously violent

drug wars to the next level.

El Mencho is their kingpin.

Also known as
"The Lord of the Roosters,"

thanks to his reported love
of $100,000 cock fights.

El Mencho is the most
wanted criminal in Mexico.

By September, 2020,

his cartel had seized control
of the drug trade

in 35 US states
and most of Mexico.

Since 2017,

the CJNG has become notorious
for their use of drones

to help conduct
their business.

At this point,
the CJNG is thought to be

supplying up to one third
of all the drugs

flowing from Mexico
into the United States.

Drones are
the perfect drug mule.

They're cheap, expendable,
and they'll never talk to
the authorities.

[narrator]
Multiple small drones
deploying from a mothership

are harder to catch
than one big drone

carrying a huge haul of drugs.

First in 2011 and then
again in 2017.

There seems to be
video footage documenting
a mothership

deploying smaller craft.

Both of them happened over
the town of Tijuana

right under US-Mexico border.

[narrator] Alfredo and Pedro's
footage is captured in
Mexico City,

over 1,400 miles south
of Tijuana,

one of the drug
wars frontlines.

But El Mencho has
recently expanded into
the Mexican capital,

and with a history of
using weaponized drones
to kill his enemies,

he could be planning a hit.

The potential to use drones
for, uh, nefarious reasons

is nothing new.

Uh, recently in 2018,

uh, the president of
Venezuela narrowly escaped
an assassination

by a drone.

[narrator] It was an event
that could have inspired
the CJNG

who are later
caught red-handed.

In 2020, Mexican police
seized multiple drones

that had been rigged with
explosives and ball bearings.

They were turned into flying
anti-personnel mines.

The nasty part is that
these drones were found

in cardboard boxes and they
were soaked in blood.

It seems that whoever built
these drones may have been
their first victim.

[Rhonda Glover] The cartels
are learning fast.

But they're still using
crude explosives

and over-the-counter
technology.

What we're seeing here
are more advanced.

[narrator] Coming up...

Mexico City
could be witnessing

aerial tech never seen before.

[Patrick]
It doesn't have engine exhaust
of anything else

that would make you think
it's another aircraft.

[narrator] And an Indian
magic wand

that has humans
under its spell.

What we're seeing here
should not be happening.

It's defying
the laws of physics.

[narrator]
Multiple witnesses film
a weird mothership like object

disgorging smaller craft
near Mexico City airport.

Space journalist
Amy Shira Teitel

believes only a super power
would be capable

of unleashing this
kind of technology.

The Chinese, Russian
and US military

have all been known to use
drone swarm technology.

[narrator] AI drone swarms are
the future of modern warfare.

Like something out of
the Terminator movies,

these flying killing machine

share real-time
battlefield information

with the entire swarm

and then react instantly
as one unit.

Recently DARPA OFFensive
Swarm-Enabled Tactics

demonstrated the largest use
of drone swarm technology
in the world.

Imagine a swarm in the sky
of hundreds of hunter-killer
drones

swooping down
on you kamikaze style.

For years the Mexican
government has been
combatting the cartels

with the help of
the US government.

Could they now be
deploying drone swarms?

[narrator] But even
cutting-edge America
drone tech

relies on normal aerodynamics
to achieve flight.

[Patrick] It doesn't have
wings or engine exhaust

or anything else that would
make you think it's another
aircraft.

There's nothing
that easily explains

how this thing could be
flying in the air.

[narrator]
Neither the Mexican
or US government

claimed any knowledge
of this mothership.

Until more evidence emerges

its identity
will remain unknown.

We still don't know what it
was, but one thing's for sure,

we're gonna need more
than a wall to keep these
invaders out.

[narrator] Now,
the ancient city of Raipur,

central India.

August, 2018.

Film emerges of a man
with a mysterious object.

It looks like an unassuming
twisted piece of wood.

[narrator] Then he puts it
in a stream...

[Jeff Belanger]
As it gets into the water,
it starts spinning.

Like a screw
and it makes some sense

because the flow of water
is propelling it.

[Roland Kays]
Then the guy lets go

and the spinning stick
starts moving up river.

Not down river but up river.

How is it moving
against the current?

[narrator]
The corkscrew shaped object

seems to move deliberately
in a spiraling motion.

[Jeff] It's almost like this
thing has a will of its own

to just go up the water
against the tide.

[narrator] Then, like a prop
in a Harry Potter movie

the weird wand does
something even stranger.

Whoa!

[Jeff] In another part
of the clip

it's actually swimming up
a spout from water

he's pouring into a bucket.

How does he do that?

What we're seeing here
should not be happening.

It's defying
the laws of physics.

[narrator] Priest,
wizard and witches

have been using wooden sticks
for thousand of years

to cast their spells.

In the west,

witches were said
to favor wood

carved from the ash
or hazel tree.

In India,

one plant was thought to be
particularly powerful.

In the Hindu faith,
there is a legend

of this mythical plant
called the Sanjeevani.

Translated this means
"one that gives life."

And in their ancient texts
there are stories and myths

about this plant being used

to bring dead soldiers
back to life.

[narrator]
Stories of its power come from
the fifth century BC Ramayana,

one of Hinduism's
holiest text.

Belief in this mythical plant
is so strong

that a northern Indian state
has spent teams of botanists

into Himalayas
searching for it.

The problem is, there's no
plant with this botanic name.

And so scientist had never
been able to find the plant

and test if it actually works.

Many people believe that
the Sanjeevani plant
really exists.

[narrator]
Biologist Kiki Sanford

learns of another
extraordinary ability

the plant is said to hold.

One that would suggest
the locals in Raipur

have finally found
this mystical herb.

[Kiki Sanford] On top of all
of its healing qualities,

locals believe that
this strange herb

always travels against
the flow of water

and that's how
they identify it.

Looking at the video
and judging how it moves
in the water,

they might have found it.

What this video
could be doing is

proving the miraculous
properties of Sanjeevani.

[narrator] Coming up...

Could an experiment by
Nick Householder

confirm the apparent
mystical qualities

of the magic wand?

We saw it spin a little bit.

Maybe we were
seeing it get started.

[narrator] In Raipur,
central India,

video footage emerges

showing a mysterious
magical wand

appearing to bend nature
to its will.

He puts it in the water
and it starts spinning

which kinda makes sense
with the shape.

But, as it starts
going faster,

it's going upstream not down.

I don't understand how it
could be swimming upstream.

It seems to defy the laws
of physics for an inanimate
object.

[narrator]
Engineer Nick Householder

believes the video could be
an unknown plant of some kind.

And wants to know if
this strange spiraling shape
of this bizarre wand

could explain its
apparent magical powers.

It seems like nature
has evolved this structure
that's capable of

converting flowing water
into forward propulsion

allowing it to swim upstream.

The shape reminds me
of something called
an Archimedes screw.

A device invented
specifically to move water.

[narrator]
Archimedes screws first appear
over 2,000 years ago

along the Nile
and ancient Egypt.

This incredible feat
of early engineering

shifts water from a low level
to a higher level

using a simple
screwing motion.

[beeps]

I'm gonna use a 3D printer
to replicate the object.

It could be possible that
the shape is what is
allowing it

to go against
the flow of water.

[narrator] Householder filled
a large tub with water

and attaches a pump
to simulate the current
of the stream

seen in the video.

Let's see if it works.

I don't see anything
magical yet.

I wonder if it needs to
kinda get started before
it'll really shoot off.

Oh!

We saw it spin a little bit.

Maybe we were
seeing it get started

but not enough
to propel itself.

[narrator] It seems Nick can
get the 3D magic wand to spin,

just not spinning towards
the flow of water coming
from the pump.

This experiment shows that

this spiral shape isn't gonna
swim upstream against
the current.

It just can't.

It would violate the laws
of thermodynamics

and physics as we know it.

Whatever's happening
in that video...

...it's not this.

[narrator] Householder
believes this footage

of a so-called magic wand

could be intended to deceive.

[Nick Householder]
I think what we're seeing
is probably a fake.

There's likely someone off
camera pulling a thin string

or a piece of fishing line
that causes the root

to shoot upstream instead of
flowing backwards.

[narrator]
Biologist Kiki Sanford
discovers other examples

of mystical spiraling
roots online.

They claim to be
the cure-all plant,
Sanjeevani.

People in areas without
access to modern medicine,

and perhaps they're
poor or uneducated,

are more likely to to buy in
to these phony cures

because they really don't
have any other options.

[narrator] Fake ayurvedic
treatments and practitioners

are a growing problem in India

where modern medicines
and health care

can be financially
out of reach.

When our doctors have
told us there's no hope,

we don't lose hope until
we've tried everything.

And if that means
seeking out some root

or some mythical plant,
we'll try it.

[indistinct chatter]

[narrator] Every June,
thousands of asthma sufferers

travel to the city
of Hyderabad

to gulp down live murrel fish.

Stuffed in a yellow
herbal paste,

they believe will help them
breathe more freely.

It's administered by
non-medical practitioners

who say that it's a gift
from the gods.

[Jeff] The scene is just epic.

I mean, you've got people
vomiting in the streets.

Children screaming.
It's just a mayhem all around.

[narrator] Even if this
video was filmed as just
a harmless prank,

it could be used by others
as an unscrupulous attempt

to part the gullible
and desperate
from their money.

Vita-Zone. Suppressing
all the medical specialist

and all the hospitals
of the globe...

If I'm a snake oil salesman
and I tell you this is
the Sanjeevani root.

This can swim
against the water

with no one touching it.

This is clearly a mythical,
magical, powerful plant.

Who knows what else
it can cure.

If you see this video,
you might be ready to buy in.