All language subtitles for NASAs.Unexplained.Files.S06E06.Secrets.of.the.Alien.Signals.720p.WEB.x264-CAFFEiNE

Narrator:
Nasa and the perfect astronaut.

Playing god to this extent

could create an entirely
new strain of humans.

Narrator:
A message from deep space.

The signals stand out
as distinctly artificial.

It repeats over and over.

Narrator:
And american intelligence,

the mysterious alien craft,

and russian soldiers
turned to stone.

[ cracking ]

why would the cia be involved
if there wasn't something there?

[ men groaning ]

♪

narrator: These are nasa's
unexplained files.

-- Captions by vitac --
www.Vitac.Com

captions paid for by
discovery communications

the average life expectancy
of a human on earth is 80 years.

The average life expectancy of
a human in space is 15 seconds.

Without the protection of a
multi-million-dollar space suit,

your skin, mouth,
and eyes literally boil

and your lungs explode.

The human body
isn't built for space,

but what if we could change it?

What if we could create
the perfect astronaut?

Narrator:
Nasa, from its inception,

hasn't just looked to improve
its spaceships.

It's looked at improving
its space men and women.

The effect of zero gravity
and cosmic radiation particles

batter human bodies,

even when they're in the
relative safety of the craft.

Dr. Toby freedman was

north american aviation's
medical director

working on the american
manned space flight program.

He proposed a genetically
modified astronaut,

which he called an optiman,

able to withstand
the hammer blows of space.

You would find people
who had the best eyesight,

who had the most strength,

who could live and breathe and
function well at high altitudes,

then you would take these people
and selectively breed

until you came out
with the optiman

that had all these
wonderful abilities.

Narrator: Freedman wanted an
astronaut breeding program,

like a horse trainer trying
to create a derby winner.

Since the mercury program,

nasa has been selecting
astronauts

according to desired physical
and mental characteristics,

but even super-fit astronauts
struggle

to withstand the punishment
of space travel.

After 340 days on the iss,

the body of top gun navy pilot
scott kelly showed the strain.

You have a mild form
of osteoporosis

after being in outer space.

Taylor: Your muscles atrophy,
your bone density decreases,

you get various sicknesses
that you're not used to having.

You can even go blind.

Narrator: So far,

nasa's most robust
space travelers are robots.

But we are still very far
from working out

how to build a robot

with anything like
the extraordinary originality,

intuition,
subtle intelligence,

imagination,
and adaptability of a human.

One pair of scientists --

manfred clynes
and nathan kline --

believe they have
the solution --

a merger of man and machine.

Taylor: The scientists clynes
and kline wrote a paper

about augmenting the human body
with cybernetics,

and they called
this person a cyborg.

Narrator:
A man turned into a cyborg

wouldn't just be able to survive

a long journey
on a spaceship,

he'd be able to explore
unaided on alien planets

and even survive in space.

They proposed sealing the mouth
and nose shut of the astronaut,

collapsing their lungs
to prevent decompression,

and then feeding the body
with oxygen and nutrients

using synthetic organs.

The idea was to walk around
in space

without having
to have a spacesuit.

Narrator:
Half man, half robot,

the cyborg astronaut
would overcome the problems

even the fittest human
could not survive in space.

Brensberger:
It's a really interesting
thought to think about --

a type of human and mechanical
being all at once,

replacing eyes
with mechanical eyes,

replacing bones with
a different type of material

so you don't have to worry
about the bone-density loss.

Clark:
The idea is not only possible,

but it's already in works.

We see this with robotic
implants of prosthetic limbs.

It's phenomenal, the degree
of advances that are being made,

and nasa is leading in this.

Narrator: But there are
practical problems

using, maintaining,
and replacing machine parts

when you are thousands
or millions of miles

from factories or workshops.

If the machine part
of you stops working,

you could be left alive,
but broken down, unable to move

and condemned to a slow
and excruciating death.

I've always wanted to be an
astronaut, but not like that.

This sell...

Narrator: As well as
combining man and machine,

leading biochemist craig venter
raises the possibility

of blending humans
with other creatures.

Could nasa embrace
genetic engineering,

creating a new breed
of space humans?

Venter came up with the idea
that we should alter our dna

to give us the traits
that we don't naturally have,

such that we become resilient
as space travelers.

Narrator:
Venter is leading a field

where scientists splice dna,

producing incredible results.

They've created
glow-in-the-dark cats,

neon fish,

and goats
that produce spider silk.

Venter wants nasa
to engineer astronauts

with genes
from other organisms,

creating human hybrids.

We can enhance ourselves to live
and thrive in outer space

so that cell-repair mechanisms
are accelerated.

The modified astronaut
could have genes

to promote bone genesis,

protect them naturally
against radiation.

Tomlinson: We can also change
the very form of our body.

In outer space, legs and feet
have very little use.

What if you could replace
your toes with fingers?

Now you've got two more hands
to be able to grip tools with.

Teitel:
Playing god to this extent

could create an entirely
new strain of humans,

and that's creepy.

Narrator:
Tampering with the human genome

is currently banned
in the united states,

but china is less squeamish.

In 2018, a team of scientists
announced

they had successfully
delivered a designer baby.

Now, if you just create
something from an embryo

and you're working on
a superhuman race that way,

then you're getting into
the supervillain territory.

Narrator: China is now leading
a charge into space,

and morality itself may prevent
america from competing in a race

to create
space-travelling superhumans.

China presents
the greatest threat

against the united states.

I believe nasa's falling behind.

I believe that's given china
the opportunity

to jump way
in front of us, really.

Tomlinson: It has the potential
to get to the point

that we almost might create
a separate species of humanity.

Narrator: January 2017.

Cia headquarters,
langley, virginia.

A file is declassified,
detailing

a chilling 250-page kgb report
obtained by u.S. Intelligence.

The file describes a battle deep
in the wastelands of siberia.

But if the russian story
is to be believed,

this was no ordinary
clash of arms.

Proctor: It says there were
soldiers on maneuvers in siberia

and they encountered
an unidentified flying object,

a ufo.

As the story goes,
the soldiers shoot it down

with surface-to-air missile
and it crashes.

And then out of that wreckage
came some aliens.

They merge and form
a glowing ball.

Moran: Then it grows bigger

and explodes
with a fantastic flash.

[ explosion ]

in that instant, 23 soldiers
are turned to stone poles.

They petrified them.

It seems crazy, but why would
the cia be involved

if there wasn't something there?

Narrator: Coming up,

some being or weapon
with the power of medusa.

Granade: Certainly something

that could
transmute living flesh

into stone that quickly
is beyond our experience.

Narrator:
And aliens versus dolphins?

They believed that dolphins
could one day

take a seat in the u.N.

And represent their entire
species to the world.

Narrator:
Scientists try to make sense

of a recently
declassified report

of the deaths
of 23 russian troops,

instantly transformed
into pillars of rock

during a battle with what was
claimed to be alien creatures

wielding a deadly weapon.

Proctor: Supposedly,
this energy source

took the biology of the person

and turned them into stone.

Gerovitch: The whole thing
was supposedly witnessed

by a couple soldiers
who were hiding behind trees

and boulders,
unaffected by the death ray.

Granade: Certainly, something

that could transmute
living flesh

into stone that quickly
is beyond our experience.

Narrator: According
to the top-secret report,

the petrified soldiers,

as well as the wreckage of
the craft that they shot down,

were taken to a secret
laboratory outside moscow.

Russian scientists determined
they had been turned

into a substance
like limestone.

If true, could the kremlin

now possess otherworldly
weapon technology?

The russians would have laid
claim to that wreckage

and would have

reverse-engineered
the weapons system.

Narrator:
But some analysts say

there may be
another explanation.

It's highly unlikely
that the russians

have discovered some kind of
alien technology or materials.

Proctor: You don't know
if this is a cover story

for some kind of weapon

that the kgb might have been
testing on their own soldiers.

Paris: The kbg does have
a history of either

covering up certain events
or perhaps misdirection,

perhaps maybe exaggerate
and change

the facts of the story
to keep the real events

from actually
being learned outside.

Narrator:
Whatever the kgb is up to,

the cia cannot ignore reports

of such a strange
and terrifying weapon.

What kind of weapon
are they developing,

and what is it intended to do?

Granade:
The most terrifying thing

about a petrification weapon

is we don't know
how they'd be doing it.

If we're going to ask
the question,

"can you turn a living being
instantly into stone?"

I think it helps to go back
and look

at how the petrification
that we know about functions.

Narrator: Fossilization is
the most widely known process

that turns organic matter
into stone,

but it's seemingly hard
to weaponize,

as the transformation
is incredibly slow.

The natural process that we see
occurs over millions of years.

This is not a fast
process at all.

But the report involves
the transmutation happening

almost instantaneously.

Are there things
that we can do, though,

to speed up
the petrification process

and make it happen
on a more human timescale

instead of millions of years?

Narrator:
Scientists in washington state

have made a breakthrough

in the bizarre science
of petrification

that could hold the answer.

The scientists took
a cube of wood,

soaked it in acid for two days,

and then they put it
into a silica solution

for another two days,

and then baked it
at 1,400 degrees celsius,

and voilà.

Narrator: Rather than burning,

the wood reacts
with the acid and silicon,

transforming into the extremely
hard ceramic silicon carbide.

The entire process
takes just five days,

a massive ramping up
of the fossilization process.

It's still not fast enough
to explain what went on

with the reported soldiers
being turned to stone.

Can that process be sped up

so they could happen in a couple
of seconds or instantaneously?

Narrator:
But the ceramic silicon carbide

looks nothing like
the limestone-like substance

described in the report.

A scientific discovery
made in japan in 2019 suggests

it could be
some exotic biological weapon.

A new virus was found living
in a hot spring...

...Acanthamoeba castellanii,

but it's been nicknamed
"the medusa virus"

because of its similarities

to the famous greek
mythological monster

with snakes for hair
and a deadly gaze.

Anybody who saw her face
and the snakes were,

well, they turned to stone.

Narrator: Just like in the myth,
when the medusa virus

comes in contact
with its victims,

it leaves them encased
in a stone-like shell.

What's left behind is
sort of a stone image

of the living creature.

Narrator: The medusa virus
discovered in japan

so far seems only
to affect amoeba,

but is it possible
an advanced technology

could weaponize a virus
like this

and amplify it to petrify humans
as described

in the recently
declassified report?

Granade: Really reminiscent
of what we hear in old myths

and legends, the techniques
aren't sufficient to turn

living human beings into stone
instantaneously like that.

If something like that happened,

it is using a process
that we know nothing about.

Narrator: Coming up...

The medusa mystery deepens.

Proctor: Something went off that
was so intense in heat,

it vaporized all the water
in those soldiers,

turning them to stone.

Narrator:
And catch me if you can --

the spy at the very heart
of america's space program.

This breach risks us
losing space to china.

Narrator: Analysts try
to uncover the truth

about a recently declassified
kgb report of alien creatures

using a mysterious weapon

to turn russian soldiers
into stone.

Baker: Is it possible
that the kbg, now the fsb --

russian intel service --
could have engaged

in disinformation campaigns
or propaganda?

Absolutely.

That's 100%.

It's quite likely that
they're experimenting

with new and potentially
strange technologies

and trying to make
weapons out of them.

Narrator: The bright flash
detailed in the report

appears to match
the explosive signature

of the world's
most powerful weapons,

weapons the russians test in
remote locations like siberia.

Proctor: Maybe there was
something that went off

that was so intense in heat,

it vaporized all the water
in those soldiers,

turning them to stone.

A nuclear explosion,
if you're close enough,

will flash-incinerate you.

Narrator: Some suggest that was
really happened in siberia

was a nuclear accident.

Historical records reveal
it would not be the first.

Gerovitch: There were reports
of soldiers being killed

as a result of nuclear tests
in remote regions

where there were nobody
to witness that.

Thousands of troops
were exposed to radiation

during nuclear tests.

Narrator:
James oberg has investigated

russian military technology
coverups for over 20 years.

He finds the kremlin often uses
accounts of aliens

as cover stories.

From my own studies,

many of the famous
ufo stories from russia

in the '60s were directly caused
by tests of russian weapons.

Narrator: March 1967.

Thousands of soviet citizens
from ukraine

to the caucasus report

seeing strange, crescent-shaped
lights in the sky.

Similar sightings continue
through the spring of 1968

and are reported
in newspapers

and on television
across the soviet union.

But in fact, this was an illegal

space-to-ground
nuclear weapon system

being tested by the soviets.

Oberg: Their weapons were
designed for a surprise

first-strike attack on the u.S.

Some of them occurred
at twilight,

with the sky dark but with
the rocket plume illuminated,

people on the ground
saw astonishing-looking shapes

in the sky that
they reported as flying saucers.

Some of those famous ones
are still online,

on the internet
as genuine ufos certified

by the russian academy
of sciences.

Narrator: But something
doesn't make sense.

If the kbg report about aliens
in an alien craft

was meant to throw
people off the scent,

why was the report
not made public?

The description of these aliens
and of the incident

in which russian soldiers
were turned into stone,

all of this was
in a top-secret report.

It cannot be dismissed
as a mere cover story.

The russian media
never reported openly.

On this level,

the government definitely
suppressed this report.

Narrator: Russia today remains
as secretive as ever.

The truth of what happened
in the siberian wilderness

may never be fully revealed.

There remains the possibility
that russia,

which is still
a military superpower,

possesses a secret weapon
that can turn man into stone,

whether developed
by its own scientists

or stumbled upon from elsewhere.

We could be looking at
some kind of new warfare.

[ men groaning, cracking ]

♪

narrator: January 2019.

China makes history.

For the first time,

a rover lands
on the far side of the moon.

A triumph for chinese
space science,

or is it achieved with
stolen american space science?

China, it seems,
has spies everywhere.

Gutheinz: They have agents
in every major city,

around every military base.

They have agents around
every nasa facility.

Narrator: In just 16 years,

since its first astronaut
went into orbit,

china has raced ahead
of america and russia,

who used to be the only
two players in the game.

China is really aggressively
expanding its foothold in space.

One of the things you do
when you have global ambitions,

which the chinese do,
is the conquest of space.

Moran:
We'd been caught blindsided,

really sort of caught
with our pants down.

When you see an advancement
this rapid,

you really start to look
at how they did it,

and you start
to get concerned.

Narrator: China hasn't made
giant leaps into space

by playing by the rules.

It's been stealing
from its rivals,

and the u.S. Space program
is a prime target.

And they even suspect

there's a spy inside
the space program itself.

The united states needs to find
that security hole and plug it.

Narrator: The fbi starts
to look for leads

and possible suspects.

Moran: They find the name
of a chinese-born american --

dongfan chung -- who's assumed
the american name "greg."

narrator: He works for one of
nasa's biggest contractors.

He was a structural engineer
for rockwell

and a structural engineer
for boeing,

and what do both companies do?

They build and maintain
the shuttle fleet.

Narrator: Chung helped design
the crew cabin

of the doomed space
shuttle columbia

and tests the fuselages
of spacecraft.

Important work, but doesn't
make you a millionaire.

Yet chung has a large amount
of money at his disposal.

Orwoll: He's making about
$60,000 a year,

yet he has purchased
multiple businesses, land,

he has built a house
on the land,

paid for it with cash.

It doesn't add up
for how much he's making.

Narrator: The fbi begins
to monitor chung's movements.

Chung leaves his house,

carrying what will turn out
to be diplomatic pouches.

He drives 400 miles
to san francisco

and pays a visit
to the chinese consulate.

That is not normal behavior
for a structural engineer.

What is chung carrying
in those diplomatic pouches?

Narrator: In the dead of night,

agents look through
his trash cans.

Moran: What they discover,

slipped in between pages
of chinese-language newspapers,

are highly sensitive
technological documents

from rockwell and boeing.

The documents have got some
letters like "ov" and "sts."

well, that stands
for orbiting vehicle

and space
transportation system.

It's shuttle technology.

Narrator:
The spy hunters make their move.

They confront chung.

The chinese engineer
flatly denies

that he is passing space
secrets to the chinese.

The fbi knows that they
have to crack this guy.

Narrator: The investigators
have evidence --

a letter addressed to chung

from a top aviation official
in china.

Moran: It actually says that
the chinese government

plans to build an
earth-orbiting space station,

and they want chung to gather

any relevant
technological information.

Narrator:
But this is america.

According to the letter
of the law,

the feds need
irrefutable evidence

that chung has passed
on secrets,

and they can't raid embassies or
start searching diplomatic bags.

Moran: While the letter asks
chung to steal secrets,

the fbi still needs
to find proof

that he's actually done it.

Narrator: Coming up,

have the feds found
a clue that nails the mole?

Baker: He took advantage
of u.S. Citizenship

to screw over this country

and our allies
in a very significant way.

Narrator:
And a message from outer space.

Scientists warn us
not to open it.

Whatever's making that signal

has got to be very,
very powerful.

♪

narrator: Fbi agents
search the home

of suspected chinese spy
greg chung,

but they find nothing.

The house has been
scrubbed clean,

and there are
no technical documents

relating to space science.

They're not finding anything
really inside the house,

but then they discover
something under the house.

Narrator: One of the agents
finds a hidden door

under the deck
at the back of the house.

It leads to a secret room
under the building.

What they find inside
changes everything.

Orwoll: There's floor-to-ceiling
shelves in this room

just filled with documents.

Baker: He had over a quarter
million documents

sitting in a crawl space
underneath his home.

This was a massive dump
of material.

Narrator: The horde of material
contains details

on some of america's
most classified technology,

including the delta iv
booster rocket

used for launching men
into space,

a massive boon for china's
ambitions to reach the stars.

It covered everything
from space shuttle systems

to rocket technology,
military hardware.

By the time he was wrapped up,

he had been doing this
for over 30 years.

Narrator:
Fbi agents finally arrest chung,

and he is brought to trial.

It's discovered he had amassed
over $3 million

from the chinese government.

Chung is the first
american citizen to be convicted

under the economic
espionage act,

and this is a major success
for the fbi.

Narrator:
Chung gets 15 years in jail,

but the extent of his treachery

may have put china
ahead in the space race.

It was a bit of a hollow victory

'cause he had already
done the damage.

The chinese had
already benefited

from all of that effort.

Moran: China appears poised

to achieve some kind of
milestone in space

before the u.S. Does.

It would kind of be like
a sputnik moment relived.

♪

August 2017.

Tech billionaire yuri milner
spends $100 million

of his fortune searching for
alien signals in space.

Today, he strikes gold.

His breakthrough listen project
detects 15 strange signals

coming from the auriga
star system.

It's basically like a beacon
of radio energy

rippling outwards
across the universe,

kind of like a stone
makes ripples in a pond.

The signals stand out
as distinctly artificial.

[ beeping, static ]

it repeats over and over.

And that's exactly the sort
of thing that we would

look for in a signal from e.T.

Narrator: Now scientists face
a massive challenge.

If this is a message,
what does it mean,

and how can we possibly
decipher an alien code?

Narrator: Science-fiction
makes it look easy.

We're from mars.

Don't be afraid.

Shostak: On tv, you know,

the aliens always speak
idiomatic english,

and usually better
than the english spoken

by my relatives, right?

But in reality, that's not
likely being the case.

They're not gonna speak english.

Narrator: Whatever message
may be hidden

in the mysterious radio signal

will be much harder to decipher
than any human language.

We have to be prepared when
we intercept alien languages.

Not just an alien version
of english,

but a totally different
dimension of sounds,

sights, smells,
colors, that aliens may use.

Narrator: Nasa has poured
millions into researching

the ways animals receive
and relay information

as a first step towards
trying to understand

how aliens might communicate.

Even on the planet earth,
animals communicate

in a much different way
than we communicate.

Take a bat, for example.

If you could somehow breed a bat
that becomes intelligent,

they would talk to you
with sonar.

If you were to talk to a race
of birds,

they would communicate
with melodies.

Or take a dog.

Dogs think in terms of smells.

Thousands of smells drifting in
and out of their consciousness.

That's how they
would communicate.

Narrator: The space agency's
largest investment has been

in an attempt to
communicate with dolphins --

the nearest thing we have on
earth to intelligent aliens.

They aren't terrestrial.
They don't live on the land.

These are aquatic creatures,

but they're incredibly
intelligent.

Narrator: Three dolphins,

including a particularly
clever one called peter,

are brought to a specially built
submerged laboratory

in the caribbean.

Man: Perhaps someday, we'll
understand what they're saying.

Vakoch: There was such
a feeling of optimism

that the scientists
dubbed themselves

the order of the dolphin.

[ dolphin squeaking ]

they believed that dolphins
could one day

take a seat in the u.N.

And represent their entire
species to the world

and even make a contribution
to world affairs.

Narrator: But after three years
of hard work,

it all comes to nothing.

Szulgit: By putting his mouth
halfway out of the water,

peter did learn to say something
that sounded like,

"hello, margaret."

whether peter really knew
what that meant or not,

we don't know.

Narrator: The team run up
against a fundamental problem

of cross-species communication,

which makes cracking
newly received alien code

seem almost impossible.

They're never gonna be able
to speak good english

or any other language.

That's just not part
of their brain structure.

Szulgit: If in the end,
we can't speak with dolphins,

who are biologically
very similar,

what's the chance we're gonna be
able to speak with aliens

from a different civilization?

Narrator: Coming up,
a way to crack the alien code,

but could this message
be a weapon in disguise?

It could be a virus
that could morph

and take over everything
there is on earth.

Narrator: And an engineer

investigating
the apollo 1 tragedy

is suddenly killed.

Barren claimed to have
been visited by a man in black.

♪

narrator: Some scientists hope
there might be a way to crack

what seems to be a coded signal
from another star system.

Mathematics and physics is
the universal language

of the universe.

Vakoch: The engineers who build
the radio telescopes

on other planets need to know
some basic math and physics.

That's what we use
as our universal language.

It's very easy to explain math
to another culture

if they know math themselves.

While they may not use the line
up and down for one

and a circle for a zero,

they use some symbol for a one
and a zero or on and off.

Narrator:
But as some scientists

work out
a possible way to decode

the signal from auriga,
others urge them to stop.

Shostak: Whatever's making
that signal

has got to be
very, very powerful.

Narrator: In 2018,

astrophysicist john learned
releases a paper,

warning that signals potentially
sent by an alien civilization,

like the one picked up
by breakthrough listen,

could be an attack
rather than a greeting.

Is this a civilization
that wants to just reach out

and find out if we exist?

Do they want something
that we have?

If they are much more advanced
than us, then watch out.

We may be insects to them.

Or for that matter,
we may be lunch to them.

Who knows?

Taylor: It might even be
dangerous to open it

'cause it could be
some sort of "super weapon."

a highly intelligent,
superior civilization

could send us a message.

And in that message, it could be
a very intelligent virus

that could morph and take
over everything

that there is on earth.

Narrator: Learned warns
an alien signal

could shut down our computers,

bringing our technological
society to an end.

Or worse, it could even hijack
our laboratories and factories

to start the construction of
an alien civilization on earth.

It could be some kind of
downloadable program

that would open up
and then tell other things

to start replicating.

That would seem like the most
sensible way to me

to spread your species.

Narrator:
The breakthrough listen signal

remains unexplained
and undeciphered.

Many believe that's the way
it should be left.

If we do receive and decode
an alien message,

it could be our undoing.

It's a terrifying prospect,

and we won't know
until it's too late.

♪

man #2: A horse-drawn caisson
bears the body

of lieutenant colonel
virgil "gus" grissom,

one of three apollo
astronauts killed

in a tragic flash fire
at cape kennedy.

Narrator: America is united

in a state of shock
and mourning.

Nasa has never experienced
a tragedy like this.

In 1967, three of its most
senior astronauts

are killed
in a terrifying way.

But half a century later,
the circumstances of their death

remains a matter of dispute
and controversy.

January 27, 1967,

cape kennedy, florida.

Nasa's new apollo 1
command module

stands atop the saturn 1b rocket
that will take it into orbit.

Szulgit: Apollo 1

is the most complicated
piece of space equipment

that has been built
at the time.

Shira teitel: This was the
flight that was going to prove

the new, large,
three-person spacecraft

was up to the task
of going to the moon.

Man #3: This mission

is one of the most
important space flights to date.

Narrator: Nasa selects
a highly decorated crew

for the prestigious mission.

Command pilot gus grissom,

senior pilot ed white,

and pilot roger chaffee.

Vakoch: They needed to make sure
that this first apollo mission

would be by the best
astronauts that they have.

Narrator: A month before
the scheduled launch,

the crew buckle in
for a full system check.

Oberg: They're inside the cabin
and the hatch was closed,

everything was isolated.

Narrator: As the cabin is
pressured with pure oxygen

to simulate
mission conditions...

The cabin was full
of flammable material.

And their suits are starting
to catch on fire.

Man #4:
Get in there and help them.

Pure oxygen -- even things
like skin will burst into fire.

[ radio chatter ]

narrator: The three astronauts
fight frantically to open

the capsule's hatch
as fire crews reach the craft,

which is now pouring with smoke.

But the hatch refuses to open.

Mars:
In a matter of seconds,

the pressure in the capsule
built so much,

there was no way
you could pull that hatch in

against that pressure.

You couldn't have done it
with a wrecker.

Vakoch: By the time the escape
hatch had been opened,

they were charred.
They were dead.

Mars: Can you imagine being
on the crew at the pad,

having to bring out
those bodies?

That just had to be one
of the most traumatic,

emotional experiences
a person could have.

♪

♪

narrator: January 1967 --

nasa has never before lost
an astronaut while on a mission.

Suddenly, in the most
horrific circumstances,

it loses three of its best.

It leads some to suspect
that america's space program

has been targeted
by the soviets.

Any time there's a fatal
accident involving an astronaut,

there has to be
the presumption

that this could be
a crime scene.

A motivation certainly could be
that the russians

competing with the americans

did not want them
to get a leg up.

Mars: There was a russian ship
off cape canaveral

during that launch,
listening to us,

watching us,
seeing what we're doing.

Narrator: But one man believes
the culprits behind the fire

are much closer to home

and is determined to expose
what he sees as the truth.

Szulgit: Thomas barren was
a quality-control engineer

who filed a 500-page report
criticizing the project.

Narrator: Barren claims
to have seen firsthand

manufacturing problems

that he says make apollo
a death trap.

Before filing his report,
barren told nasa

that there were irregularities
and improper actions

at the launch pad.

Narrator:
And after this, barren claims

a sinister campaign
of intimidation begins.

Szulgit: Barren claimed to have
been visited

by a man in black
who harassed him.

Man #5: In washington,
astronauts borman,

mcdivitt, clayton, shirra,
and shepard

attend a congressional
subcommittee hearing,

probing the apollo
capsule disaster.

Narrator: Despite
the apparent intimidation,

barren gives critical testimony

in front of the committee
investigating the fire.

A lot of things that he had
personally witnessed

in the design of the spacecraft
in checking out the spacecraft

that he thought was
a disaster waiting to happen.

Oberg:
A number of studies were found

that a lot of his concerns
were legitimate.

Narrator: But his report

doesn't just
address technical issues.

He was focusing on morale
questions and dissatisfaction

with specific employees.

Murphy: You've always got
the potential possibility

of some disgruntled employee
sabotaging something.

Mars:
Don't know from the standpoint

of every bit of detail
that he wrote in there,

whether it was 100% accurate
or not,

but it was accurate enough
that we had to look at it

and we had to answer
all of his questions.

Narrator: But the official
response to the report

is dismissive.

I say, "yes, but we're working
those, we're fixing these,

fixing that."

narrator: For his efforts,
barren is fired from his job

as engineering inspector.

In my opinion,
they shot him down.

Narrator: And six days later,
barren is dead.

Mars:
He and his wife and two kids

were killed at a train
crossing in titusville.

[ siren wailing ]

narrator: State troopers say
it's an accident,

that he tried to cross
in his car

just as a train was coming.

But many felt barren's death

so soon after he gave testimony
was suspicious.

Szulgit: Some would question,

"is this a pattern
that points toward conspiracy

to silence the critics
of the space program?"

narrator: After three months
of thorough investigation,

nasa determines apollo 1
was not sabotaged

but was destroyed by a series
of accidental factors.

They never could say
conclusively

where or what ignited the fire
within the capsule.

Narrator:
Former committee experts

praise barren's tenacity
in filing his report,

but deny any conspiracy
to hide the truth.

Sabotage was never considered to
be a viable inspection point.

Narrator: Barren's death may
have been an accident...

Or maybe not.

Whatever the truth, nasa
engineers rose to the challenge,

completing the mission
of the three astronauts

who died on the launch pad
that day when two years later,

apollo 11 successfully
landed on the moon.

Armstrong:
That's one small step for man...

...One giant leap for mankind.

Szulgit: When armstrong finally
landed on the moon,

he placed an apollo 1
patch there

in memory of those
who lost their lives,

and it's still there today.