Original subtitles

[narrator] In Ireland, a place of refuge turns into a house of horrors.

[Terri Kearney] All hell broke loose.

There was bodies everywhere.

It was appalling and it was totally unnecessary.

[narrator] A weird and wonderful fantasy land in the heart of Alabama.

[Hadley Meares] Everybody loves it so much.

They don't even wear shoes,

as a symbol that they never want to leave.

[narrator] And in South Korea,

the fate of a nation is determined behind these walls.

[Rob Bell] They were trapped,

cut off from the outside world,

but would fight to the death for democracy.

[narrator] Decaying relics,

ruins of lost worlds,

sites haunted by the past,

their secrets waiting to be revealed.

[narrator] In County Cork, on Ireland's southern coast,

are haunting remnants of a tragic era.

[Luke Pepera] The area's covered in lush, green hills and pristine beaches.

There's a reason this country is called the Emerald Isle.

[narrator] Yet the land's natural beauty hides a painful history.

On the skirts of a small town are the sprawling remains of a stone complex.

[Bell] You can still see these imposing walls,

but the overgrowth has almost entirely reclaimed these buildings.

[narrator] The crumbling relic reveals little

about its original purpose.

[Sascha Auerbach] When this was built, the country was

in the grips of a horrible catastrophe.

Partly natural, partly man-made.

[Kearney] I still imagine those poor people coming up,

knowing what their fate was going to be behind these walls.

That they'd never come out again.

[narrator] Additional ruins expose a different chapter of this heartbreaking story.

The structure of a wall

and a tall, dark building, and the windows boarded up.

[Bell] How are all these structures connected?

And what happened here?

This became the epicenter of one of the worst crises in Ireland's history.

[Kearney] The first time I came here, I wasn't ready for it.

I could actually feel the sorrow

seeping out through the walls,

and it really did have a profound impact on me.

[narrator] Terri Kearney grew up in the nearby town of Skibbereen.

She has dedicated her life to preserving the memory of a tragedy

many in Ireland wanted to forget.

For 150 years, Ireland really did forget, you know?

It wasn't spoken about. It's called "the great silence."

So these places are really, really important

as a physical manifestation of over a million dead.

I always describe it as a prison environment.

[narrator] But this was no prison.

During the 19th century, thousands of desperate people came here by choice

because their only other option was an agonizing death.

[Kearney] They were surrounded by high stone walls.

When you went it, you had to go in as a family. You were segregated.

Men, women, boys, girls.

You weren't allowed to see the other members of your family.

[narrator] This is the Schull Workhouse,

the government's answer for a population in dire straits.

[Pepera] The workhouse was an institution in Ireland.

At their peak, there were over 160 of them.

[Bell] It was really a last resort for the poorest families.

If you couldn't support yourself,

you could come to a workhouse and receive food and shelter for your labor.

[narrator] The workhouse system, funded by local taxes,

was first put in place by the British government in the late 1830s.

When they opened, the conditions were so bad,

the workhouses were rarely full.

But by the 1840s,

buildings like this all across Ireland were filled to capacity.

The reason for the increased demand

dates back to when the English invaded these shores.

[Bell] The Cromwellian conquest of Ireland in the 17th century

created a precarious situation amongst Irish farmers.

[Pepera] The penal law of 1704 dictated

that when an Irish tenant farmer died,

his land should be equally divided among his sons.

[Auerbach] As the population continued to grow,

this farmland got subdivided

into smaller and smaller plots.

As a consequence, these farmers turned to the one crop

that even in that limited space could feed a whole family.

The potato.

[narrator] Ireland's reliance on a single food source would prove to be fatal.

[Bell] In 1845, a blight that had been traveling

around North America and Europe

landed on Irish shores,

and the potato crop was decimated.

People around here were well used to failures, and they thought,

"One year, we just need to get over one year."

[narrator] But the next year, the situation only got worse.

In 1846, there was a 90% failure of the crop.

[Auerbach] The poor farming region of West Cork

was one of the hardest-hit areas,

and the town of Skibbereen became ground zero in the Great Potato Famine.

[Kearney] By 1846, people were dying in this town and society was breaking down.

Death by starvation is a long, slow, painful disease.

And it robbed their humanity.

[narrator] A local doctor named Daniel Donovan

witnessed the tragedy that was unfolding

and he stepped in to be a champion for the people.

Oh, Dr. Dan was an extraordinary man.

He was qualified as a surgeon.

He could have gone off to Dublin

and had a very illustrious career.

Instead, he stayed here in Skibbereen during this worst catastrophe.

He did so much to help people.

He wrote and looked for help and screamed for help.

[Pepera] His advocacy was successful,

and £400,000 flowed in from the UK from donation drives.

[narrator] An old mill building in town

was hastily converted into a makeshift soup kitchen to feed the hungry.

[Bell] The relief effort embarrassed British politicians.

Here was the world's greatest empire

becoming reliant on external aid to help its people.

[narrator] Now in the spotlight,

the government was forced to offer support.

[Auerbach] In 1847, the Soup Kitchen Act was passed.

And within months, three million Irish people were being fed.

[Pepera] They served a concoction

of barley, water, beef, and onions, known as Soyer's Soup.

It was nothing fancy,

but it gave people just enough calories to survive.

[narrator] Charles Trevelyan,

assistant secretary to the treasury,

was the man in charge of Britain's relief efforts.

His political and personal views

dictated the government's initial reluctance to help.

[Auerbach] Charles Trevelyan was a subscriber of the laissez-faire policy,

which is government non-interference in economic matters.

That meant that in the middle of the famine,

food was being exported out of Ireland

even as millions continued to starve.

[Bell] Trevelyan infamously wrote that the famine

had been brought about by God

as a judgement on Ireland's excessive population growth

and dependency on the potato for food.

Even today, he's a hated figure across Ireland.

[narrator] It's not hard to see why.

Three months after aid was given,

Britain was hit by a financial crisis.

Trevelyan's response was to immediately shut down the soup kitchens.

From the autumn of 1847 on,

the only relief there on was through the workhouse system.

All hell broke loose.

It really did. It was the worst year of the Great Famine.

And it was totally unnecessary.

[narrator] In the 1840s,

Ireland was in crisis as the deadly potato famine ravaged the country.

After the British government ended its support for soup kitchens,

the workhouse was the only option left.

So this Schull Workhouse was one of the later workhouses

built in the late 1840s, early 1850s.

Horrible, horrible places.

During the Great Famine, they were so overcrowded and underfunded.

They kept running out of food. They were breeding grounds for disease.

[narrator] The awful truth was that families often didn't come here to live.

They came to die.

[Auerbach] Catholic families came to workhouses

because they knew they would get a properly consecrated burial.

[Kearney] And so many accounts of that.

People clambering at the workhouse walls, just wanting to get in

so they knew they wouldn't be left to rot at the side of the road.

[narrator] At Skibbereen's Abbeystrowry Cemetery

are the unmarked graves of over 10,000 people,

a small fraction of the total death toll.

[Kearney] These mass graves are all over Ireland.

Overall, it's estimated we lost about a million people,

and about another million-and-a-quarter emigrated.

It was the biggest mass migration in world history.

[narrator] By the mid-1850s,

the potato crop had almost fully recovered,

and the dependence on workhouses steadily declined.

The famine may have ended,

but its legacy had only just begun.

[Kearney] I suppose you could say

the events of this era would eventually lead to Irish independence, too,

because some of those who survived

were violently changed by it and became revolutionaries with arms.

[narrator] Their fight for freedom

would eventually bring about this building's demise.

[Bell] During the War of Independence,

the Irish Republican Army burned the workhouse to the ground

to prevent it being used as barracks by the British forces.

[Auerbach] Since then, it's become dilapidated and overgrown.

A ghostly reminder of the country's most dire period.

[narrator] In Central Alabama

is a curious collection of buildings

where reality collides with fantasy.

[Alexis Pedrick] A short distance north of the capital, Montgomery,

is a place called Jackson Lake Island.

And it's small. I mean, less than a half-a-mile across.

It's really beautiful, but also kind of spooky.

At the end of the island is what looks like this abandoned, desolate town.

[Jim Meigs] There's something old about it,

but something kind of otherworldly too.

As you get closer to these buildings,

you realize there's something really odd about them.

There's nothing inside. In fact, some of them aren't even finished.

[narrator] At the town's entrance, the plot thickens.

[Pedrick] There's these two trees that frame the street,

but if you look closer, you can actually tell that they're fake.

Like where the bark is wearing away, there is Styrofoam.

So this is not actually a real place,

it's a place of complete make-believe.

[narrator] Everything seen here

is the creation of a visionary with a wild imagination.

[Pedrick] For the man behind it, it was a big gamble.

I mean, he needed a win and there was no guarantee that this was gonna be it.

[Meares] It's a magical story.

Sometimes it's funny, sometimes it's sad,

and sometimes it is just downright weird.

And there are goats. Lots and lots of goats.

[Lynn Bright] For many years,

this was just a place where people loved to come and fish

and maybe picnic or camp.

[narrator] Bobby and Lynn Bright

are the owners of Jackson Lake Island.

In 2003, an out-of-the-blue phone call changed their world forever.

We were contacted by the Alabama Film Commission,

and they said that they had a production company

that was interested in maybe doing a movie on our island.

It was exciting, because once we learned it was Tim Burton,

we knew that it wasn't gonna be a small-time deal,

it was gonna be a major production.

[Meigs] When a big Hollywood picture comes to town,

it's like an occupying army.

They bring almost everything they need. Trailers, trucks, catering.

Well, at the beginning, there was nothing here.

It was just grass and trees.

And they came in and just kind of cleared the site,

and then started the construction.

It was a big operation.

[narrator] This is the fictional town of Spectre,

one of the many whimsical locations

in the 2003 cult film Big Fish.

[Meares] If you haven't seen the movie Big Fish,

it's this really lovely magical realism film.

At its core,

it's a story of a father and a son's troubled relationship.

[Pedrick] So Ewan McGregor stars as the dad when he's younger,

and Albert Finney plays the older version of him.

And he loves to tell tall tales about his life.

I mean, tall tales, like, really.

[Meares] The son is played by Billy Crudup,

and he plays a character named Will Bloom.

And Will is absolutely fed up

with what he sees as his father's lifetime of lies.

[narrator] But when Will discovers his father is dying,

he decides to find out the truth about his life.

That's where the town of Spectre comes in.

[Pedrick] In the film, a young Edward Bloom wants to leave home.

It's too small for him.

He's a big fish in a small pond.

[Meigs] So he goes on kind of a journey,

and that journey brings him here.

The town of Spectre is kind of like a Brigadoon place

where you feel like you've stepped out of time into a different world

where things just work differently, like nobody wears any shoes.

[narrator] Shortly after Edward arrived,

he is invited to the mayor's house for apple pie,

and the townspeople try to convince him to stay.

[Lynn] Under the table comes little Jenny,

unties his boots, runs out the front door with them.

She runs down the street,

throws 'em over the line where all the residents' shoes are,

and he quickly learned why she took his boots.

[Meares] And the reason for that

is they love the town so much,

they don't ever want to leave.

The movie is full of all these weird and wonderful scenes,

in a way that makes you think

it could only be a Tim Burton film.

But it almost didn't turn out that way.

[narrator] In Alabama is a ramshackle movie set

created by director Tim Burton.

But it was a film he was never meant to be a part of.

That's because Hollywood royalty Steven Spielberg

was originally lined up to direct.

[Meigs] But then mid-project,

he got called off on a different film

and director Tim Burton got involved.

[Pedrick] Some say it was because he needed a win.

If you remember, he'd just put out that movie Planet of the Apes,

and it was nowhere near the hit that he really needed it to be.

[narrator] The pressure was on to make this film a success.

Landowner Bobby Bright's first encounter

with the future Oscar-winner didn't help matters.

I would always come over after work and ride through the set

to see what progress they'd made.

And as I got behind the mayor's house,

this stranger came walking out and I thought maybe he was up to no good.

But I had no idea who Tim Burton was before the movie came here.

I almost started to do a citizen's arrest on him.

[narrator] Despite Bobby's best efforts, Burton did continue filming,

but Spectre was about to hit hard times, Hollywood-style.

[Pedrick] Spectre wasn't big enough for Edward Bloom.

I mean, he's a big fish and so he leaves.

[Meigs] Later in the movie, Edward comes back to the town of Spectre,

and something has happened.

The town is now in ruins.

So in order to shoot that,

the filmmakers first had to build these nice, new buildings

and then make everything look like it had aged 50 years.

[Bobby] They tore up the fences, the picket fences.

They used sandblasters, they used heating torches to burn the paint off,

to make the paint peel like that right there.

They took up the sod and they did everything they possibly could

to make it look like it was in really, really bad shape.

So, really what you're seeing here is not actual decay,

it's Hollywood magic.

[narrator] Yet that Hollywood magic

didn't translate into the runaway box-office hit Burton had hoped for.

[Meares] It did about $60 million domestically and $120 million worldwide

with a $70 million budget.

So a solid success, but not a great blockbuster.

[narrator] For the Bright family though,

the old movie set seemed like an opportunity too good to miss.

[Lynn] So towards the end of the filming,

we as a family decided to, you know...

"What if we let it stay?"

We had an expectation that people would be

really interested in seeing it.

But nobody wanted to come see it.

People just didn't realize it was here.

[Meares] In the years after the film,

the elements slowly took over the set.

Floods came in and destroyed one of the main character's homes,

things really went to rot and ruin.

[narrator] Spectre was in danger of complete destruction.

This time, for real.

If it was going to survive, it needed a lifeline fast.

[Lynn] It was not until around 2011 or so,

when social media picked it up and the next thing we knew, people knew we were here.

And once people started to come visit,

then we really realized that we needed to do whatever we could

to keep the structure standing.

They also come to see the goats.

And the goats take a toll not only on the island,

but they take a toll on the town of Spectre.

[narrator] Today, there's not as much of the town left

as there once was.

But thousands of fans

still come to walk the fictional street of a film they adore.

[Meares] It's really the message

and the heartwarming nature of the movie

that people really love because in the end,

Edward and Will do get their relationship back on track,

and it's really beautiful.

[Lynn] We had a man that came from South Florida,

and he told us the story of how he had watched the movie with his son

while his son was on his deathbed

and they healed their relationship.

He was so emotional about it, I was crying listening to him

because I could tell that it really mattered

that he get here for the memory of his son.

[Pedrick] Although the movie will live on

and likely get new fans over the years,

the future for the town of Spectre is not so certain.

[Lynn] I'm not sure how much longer it'll last.

At some point, it's just gonna all give.

They're not built on real foundations,

so we can't expect it to last forever.

[narrator] In the city of Gwangju, South Korea

are the forsaken reminders of a sacrifice that forged a nation.

From the outside, it could be a rundown apartment block or an office.

[Auerbach] Peering through the dirty windows,

it's really hard to get a sense of what's inside.

As soon as you walk in, you can really feel the decay.

[Bell] There are CT scanners, X-ray machines,

and cabinets still filled with vials of medicine and syringes.

[Auerbach] So, clearly, this was some kind of medical facility.

It's kind of post-apocalyptic, like everyone just vanished.

[narrator] Nearby are the remains of another facility

that at first appears to have no obvious connection.

[Bell] Set back from the square behind heavy metal gates

lies this imposing white building.

[Michele Mitchell] A grand staircase greets you as you first walk in.

Inside, it has clearly been gutted.

[Auerbach] These holes surrounded by yellow tape suggests

that something has been dug out of the walls for evidence.

[narrator] Together, these structures

tell a story of heroism in the face of mortal danger.

[Mitchell] When the government goes rogue,

it's up to the citizens to rebel.

[narrator] In the South Korean city of Gwangju are two buildings

involved in a brutal episode that defined a nation.

I was just an ordinary citizen, an office worker.

[narrator] Jun-Bong Kim was an employee

of a local cement company in 1980.

Events that played out in that year

had a lasting impact on his life.

[Kim] I have experienced torture.

As a result, my body was completely ruined.

Nevertheless, May 18th thought me what justice is.

I don't regret or doubt anything that I've done.

[narrator] The catalyst for the cruelty Jun-Bong endured,

and which connected him to these buildings forever, began in 1979.

[Auerbach] Park Chung Hee had ruled South Korea

as an authoritarian dictator since the 1960s.

At a dinner party in the presidential complex,

the head of intelligence

pulled out a gun and shot him in the head and in the chest.

[siren wailing]

[narrator] The assassination was just the first act of a military coup

to take over the country.

In South Korea's major cities, like here, in Gwangju, student protests erupted.

[Bell] Seven thousand protestors

broke through the police barrier

surrounding their school

and went to the square in front of the provincial government building.

They demanded an end to the martial law declared across the country.

At 1:00 a.m. on May 18th,

the government announced a stoppage to all such activity.

They closed universities, they banned protests and demonstrations,

and they announced new restrictions on the press.

[narrator] The military government

deployed troops all over the city to enforce the new laws...

by whatever means necessary.

These were soldiers trained against the looming threat of invasion from North Korea,

not the policing of peaceful protests.

A 24-year-old deaf man was beaten so badly by soldiers

that he died of his wounds the following day.

[narrator] But the people refused to be silenced

and the protests continued for the next three days.

On May 21st, an alarming decision was made.

The stage was set for a clash that would reverberate through South Korea's history.

[Auerbach] At 1:00 p.m.,

the national anthem was played out over the PA system.

As soon as the last note of the anthem played,

the soldiers, armed with American-provided M16 assault rifles,

opened fire on the crowd.

[guns firing]

[Bell] Tens of thousands of people were running for their lives,

diving for cover in nearby alleyways.

[narrator] Jun-Bong was working in an office

across from the provincial government building

when he was unexpectedly drawn into the turmoil.

[Kim] Someone knocked on the office door

and I heard three people crying out.

"Help us, help us."

They were young students.

I was shocked when I saw the blood.

Everyone in front of me was covered in blood.

[narrator] He rushed the wounded

to the city's Red Cross hospital,

located less than half-a-mile away.

When he arrived, the scene was one of utter chaos.

[Kim] There were patients with gunshot wounds everywhere.

It was absolute mayhem.

The building was overflowing with wounded people.

[Auerbach] It soon became clear that the hospital was gonna run out

of blood supply for transfusion.

And when that happened,

people suffering from gunshot wounds

were gonna die very, very quickly.

[narrator] Jun-Bong was desperate to help in any way he could,

even if it meant risking his own life.

[Kim] It was devastating seeing what was happening with my own eyes.

I was so mad, I couldn't stay still.

The only thing in my mind was that I had to fight to protect Gwangju.

[narrator] He and a team of doctors drove into the city

as the crackle of gunfire echoed all around.

[Kim] I opened up the window and said,

"Gwangju citizens, there is not enough blood

to help save the gunshot patients.

Please donate blood. People are dying. Please donate blood."

The citizens lined up to donate.

Eventually, the line was about 200 meters long.

Those with serious gunshot wounds were stabilized,

had the bullets and shrapnel removed from their bodies,

and then taken to larger hospitals for longer-term care.

[narrator] But the real fight had only just begun.

The citizens of Gwangju mobilized,

raiding police stations and military depots

to take up arms against the aggressors.

The military forces facing this mass armed resistance

retreated to the outskirts of the city.

They cut off all outside communications and closed the roads.

What had become a demonstration and a response,

had now become a siege.

[narrator] For a few days, there was peace.

But this was just the calm before the storm.

On May 26th, it became clear the military was moving to retake the city.

[Auerbach] As news of the imminent attack began to spread,

armed protestors took up station inside the provincial government building.

They were determined to make a last, desperate stand.

[narrator] Jun-Bong was one of the city's defenders holed up inside.

We were trembling with fear.

We could hear the helicopters in the distance.

We thought we were going to die here.

[narrator] May 27th, 1980.

In Gwangju, South Korea, the defenders of democracy are making their last stand

in the city's provincial government building.

As church bells pealed at 4:00 a.m., the first shots were fired.

Then, the chaos of war erupted.

[guns firing]

I went to the back door just as the soldiers came in.

I saw the soldiers shooting their guns.

There were flames everywhere.

They said that if we surrendered, they would spare our lives.

So we surrendered.

I threw away my weapon and crawled out.

The troops tied up people like fish.

[Auerbach] By 5:10 a.m.,

with the sun just beginning to rise over the city,

it was all over.

[Bell] Seventeen people were killed

inside the provincial government building,

and over 200 were arrested.

[narrator] Yet the event was swept under the rug.

In the years that followed, any mention of the uprising by the city's residents

was met with severe punishment.

[Bell] The provincial government building

was once again used as an administrative headquarters.

All traces of the brutal attack were covered over.

[people chanting in Korean]

[narrator] But the events of May 1980

laid the foundations for democracy to eventually flourish.

In 1987, the country held its first free elections.

Under the new regime, the city's Red Cross hospital

remained operational for another 27 years.

[Auerbach] By 2014, however, its doors were locked with everything left inside.

And the whole facility was just left to decay.

[narrator] Today, Jun-Bong works with the May 18 Foundation,

founded to protect these structures

and the memory of the Gwangju Uprising.

[Kim] Democracy has a living history.

It's necessary to preserve these locations to educate others.

[narrator] In Western Namibia,

where the desert meets the ocean,

traces of weather-beaten structures line the shore.

[Meigs] We're on the South Atlantic coast of Africa.

This is a place where, to this day, almost no one lives.

Then here and there, we see some signs of human activity.

[Pepera] There are these huge metal structures, almost like barrels,

lined up in rows.

And from above,

you can see the outline of a large concrete slipway on the water's edge.

[Dominic Selwood] Chains set into the ground

suggest that something massive was either lashed down or dragged across the beach.

[Meigs] What would require such heavy-duty infrastructure

out here in the middle of nowhere?

[narrator] These are the last remains of a booming industry

that powered the industrial age.

I believe it was a necessary evil at the time

when we had no other source of fuel.

[Meigs] If you walk on this beach, you see something kind of chilling.

There are bones everywhere. Enormous bones.

[Selwood] It's easy to see how this place got its name.

The Skeleton Coast.

[Paul Lombard] I am a born Namibian.

At a young age, my father brought me out

into this area,

and it really grew my passion for the desert.

[narrator] Paul Lombard is a local expedition leader.

It took years of experience

to learn how to live in this unforgiving environment.

As an early sailor, if you were stranded on this coast

and had no knowledge of the desert,

the chance of survival was next to nothing.

[narrator] Yet hundreds of people did venture here,

willing to risk their lives in search of fortune.

The prize they sought wasn't buried in the desert, it was in the ocean facing it.

[Meigs] There are giant seal colonies,

sharks come in close to the shore,

and there are whales.

[Selwood] In the winter, they migrated north to the warmer waters,

like those along the South African and Namibian coasts.

They sought out shallow bays like these to give birth.

In the early 1700s, the Dutch West India Company sent whalers to this region,

and American, French, and Norwegian hunters soon followed.

[narrator] Whaling stations were quickly established along Namibia's coast

to exploit the abundant population.

This one became known as Meob Bay.

[Meigs] Everyone thinks of Moby Dick and the 19th-century ships

that sailed around the world chasing a variety of whales, especially sperm whales.

But here in Africa, it was possible to hunt whales right off the beach.

The unique design of these surf boats

was specific for breaking through the waves.

With a bow and a stern with the same shape.

If the small crew of men got twisted or turned in the waves,

they could just turn their paddles around and row their way through.

They would then have the open ocean to chase across and hunt down their prey.

[narrator] The hunters catch of choice was the Southern right whale.

Legend has it the right whale got its name because for the early whalers,

it was the easiest whale, the right whale to catch.

[Pepera] They often swam up close to the shore

and stayed near the surface,

making it easy to spot and follow them.

[Selwood] They also floated when they were dead,

which made it much easier to lash them to the side of ships

or drag them back to shore.

[narrator] The whale was a literal gold mine,

and a use was found for every part.

[Pepera] The most important product from whaling

was the oil produced from the animal's blubber.

[Meigs] Before the dawn of the electric light,

whale oil was considered the best kind of oil to burn in a lamp for illumination.

And that made the oil extremely valuable.

[narrator] Over the course of a century,

around 3,700 right whales were killed by the industry in Namibia.

Their downfall was inevitable.

[Selwood] By the 1800s,

right whales had been hunted almost to the verge of extinction.

But whalers didn't have the technology to catch and harvest whales

which didn't float when they died.

[narrator] As a result, nearshore whaling declined

and stations like this were left abandoned.

But in the decades to come,

the Industrial Revolution's advances

would see the trade return to Namibia with a vengeance.

As whaling got mechanized, it became even more deadly.

[narrator] In Namibia

are the remnants of a once-prolific whaling industry

that had fallen into decline by the early 1800s.

But at the turn of the century,

technological innovations

brought the trade back to this coast with sinister efficiency.

Steam power was coming in, so ships could travel faster and farther.

And they began to develop mechanized harpoons

that could shoot farther with much more force.

And most, kind of, chilling of all,

they developed harpoons with a kind of grenade tip.

[narrator] Jean-Paul Roux is a local marine scientist

who studies the ecosystem of these waters.

Faster whales could be taken because of new technology,

which allowed the whalers to target the humpback whale, blue whales, fin whales.

They were more abundant because they had never been exploited before.

[narrator] 150 miles south of Meob Bay,

just outside the town of Luderitz,

a collection of rusted remains hint at the scale of this deadly new era.

This is the Sturmvogel Bucht whaling station.

When the German-run operation opened in 1913,

it was equipped with the latest hunting and processing technology.

So that's where it all started

after the killing of the whale.

It was towed here, fastened to cables and dragged tail-first.

You can see all the cables have made grooves in the concrete here.

[Selwood] Once the whale had been brought to the factory,

a process known as flensing began.

Using long hooked knives, workers would cut off sections of blubber,

which were then dragged to the boilers and cooked down into oil.

[narrator] This process required fresh water,

which was hard to come by in the desert.

They had to set up a big, powered system to boil sea water and condense it.

[Pepera] But it wasn't an easy start.

There were constant problems with the water supply,

and they only produced 2,000 barrels of oil,

which was way below what they'd hoped.

[narrator] The situation was about to get far worse

for the whaling station's German owners.

A conflict loomed

that would bring the entire industry here crashing down.

Since 1884, Namibia had been a German colony,

then part of what was known as German South West Africa.

Soon, however, World War I would intervene.

[Pepera] On the request of the British government,

South Africa invaded Namibia

and occupied the town of Luderitz.

[Selwood] The station's ships were seized,

and operations ground to a halt.

[Roux] At the end of the war,

all the machinery was taken away,

the sheds itself were left abandoned.

Norwegian whalers, mostly,

discovered that it was far better to look for whales in Antarctica

instead of having these shore stations,

and later on developed the concept of a factory vessel.

And this is what brought most whale stocks to decline.

[narrator] For centuries,

whaling was a vital yet unpleasant part of human development.

[Lombard] Whaling in Namibia, or South West Africa at that stage,

put us on the map.

And my town, Walvis Bay, where I was born and bred,

was founded on the backbone of the whaling industry.

[narrator] When the whaling industry collapsed,

workers turned to commercial fishing

and the diamond mines that littered the desert for their livelihoods.

Now, decades later,

the Southern right whale has finally started to return to Namibia's waters.