All language subtitles for Secrets.Declassified.with.David.Duchovny.S02E08.1080p.WEB.h264-EDITH_track3_[eng]

[dramatic music]

- Tonight
on "Secrets Declassified"...

experiments considered
so wild, dangerous, or deadly,

they have to be hidden
from the public.

From building an aircraft
carrier made of ice

to defeat Nazi U-boats--

[Hakeem]
This thing will be

the largest naval vessel
ever constructed.

[David]
To a manned mission to Mars

that never leaves Earth...

[Sami]
These men are subjected

to every form of stress

that their Soviet overlords
can think of.

- Or even to Stalin's obsession

with understanding
his rivals...

- They want to profile Mao
by analyzing his poo.

[David]
These are the astonishing

and sometimes terrible things
done by governments

and the people
who work for them.

It's time to bring
them to light.

♪ ♪

It's World War II.

In the Atlantic,
Hitler's U-boats are hunting

British ships relentlessly.

So Britain gambles
on a daring experiment--

build an unsinkable ship,

not from steel but from ice.

♪ ♪

- By 1942, Britain feels
like it's against the ropes.

U-boats hunting
in the mid-Atlantic

are sinking 650,000 tons

of shipping every month.

- The killing zone
is called U-boat Alley.

It's a stretch
of the mid-Atlantic

where Allied ships
are unprotected.

Air Force planes can't reach
that far from land bases,

and the British can't send
aircraft carriers to help

because they would be sunk
by the U-boats, too.

- What they need is an aircraft
carrier that can't be sunk.

♪ ♪

[David]
Enter Geoffrey Pyke,

an eccentric adventurer
and inventor

now working for Allied HQ.

- Geoffrey Pyke
comes up with the realization

that nature already produces
giant, unsinkable platforms

in the ocean.

They're called icebergs.

So he comes up
with the idea

that you could flatten one

and tow it
wherever you wanted it to be.

- You can use it as
an unsinkable aircraft carrier,

and it can close
the mid-Atlantic gap.

[David] But Pyke soon realizes
icebergs won't work.

- They have
this nasty tendency to flip,

which would put your aircraft
and your crew

in the cold Atlantic waters,
so, no,

not a good solution.

♪ ♪

[David] Pyke won't be stopped
so easily.

He begins to design
an artificial iceberg.

[Hakeem]
Pyke's idea is to create

a giant aircraft carrier,

not from steel
but from blocks of carved ice.

He could have a system
of cooling pipes

throughout the ice
to keep it frozen

and also use diesel engines
to propel it forward.

[David]
At a secret lab

hidden in a refrigerated
storage unit

at London's
Smithfield's Meat Market,

Pyke's team starts
experimenting.

♪ ♪

[Martin] There's
one big shortcoming with ice.

It is extremely brittle.

If it came under enemy attack,
it will fracture.

- So, as Pyke
considers this problem,

he takes some inspiration
from reinforced concrete

and the idea
that perhaps combining water

with another element

would produce
a harder ice product.

♪ ♪

[David] Pyke's team
begins to experiment

with additives to increase
the durability of ice.

[Don]
They find a research paper

from scientists
in Brooklyn, New York,

testing cotton as a reinforcer,

but this makes a slushy,
uneven ice block.

[Hakeem] Finally,
after lots of experimentation,

they come up
with just the right recipe,

and that is 4% wood pulp
and 96% water.

This combination creates

an incredibly durable
block of ice.

[David] Pyke's new ice behaves
like nothing else on Earth.

It's strong as concrete
and almost bulletproof.

It can be cast like metal
and cut like wood.

♪ ♪

They name this new
miracle material Pykrete,

after its inventor.

[Sami] British Prime Minister
Winston Churchill

is the kind of guy who likes
unusual, bold, daring ideas.

So he says,
yeah, let's do this.

Pyke's project is given
the code name "Habbakuk."

♪ ♪

[David] Habbakuk
is an Old Testament prophet

who records God's promise
to the doubtful.

"I'm going to do
something in your days

that you would not believe,
even if you were told."

Pyke chooses the name

to fit his impossibly ambitious
ice ship.

Now he needs to construct
a prototype.

But Britain is too warm
to build it,

so the entire project
moves to Canada.

♪ ♪

[Don] They turn the frozen
surface of Patricia Lake

into a giant laboratory

and build a 1,000-ton,
60-foot-long scale model.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem] The Habbakuk team
starts experimenting,

and they find that in order
to keep the ice stable,

the ship's refrigerators
need to keep it

at a frosty 5 degrees.

[Don] They also discover
that to stop a torpedo,

the hull has to be
at least 30 feet thick.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem] When they complete
their design,

it is an absolute behemoth.

[Martin]
Pyke wanted an ice ship

with a runway 2,000 feet long
and 300 feet wide.

- It has 40-foot-thick walls,

and it can carry
over 150 bombers at one time.

- This will be the largest
naval vessel ever built.

♪ ♪

[David]
Project Habakkuk

is now becoming
hugely expensive,

so it needs American backing.

In August 1943,

at the Allied conference
in Quebec,

the Brits make their pitch.

[Sami] To prove
the properties of Pykrete

to the Americans,

one of the UK's top commanders,
Lord Mountbatten,

stages a demo.

- Mountbatten gives
U.S. General Hap Arnold an ax

and asks him to smash
a block of Pykrete.

Arnold swings at the Pykrete
with all his might.

The ax bounces off.

- Then Mountbatten
draws his pistol

and fires it at the Pykrete.

[gunshot]

The bullet ricochets off,

sending the generals diving
for cover.

- The room erupts,
but the point is made.

The Americans are on board
for Habakkuk.

♪ ♪

[David]
Before production can begin,

the tides turn
in the Atlantic.

Long-range aircraft
and new anti-submarine tactics

blunt the U-boat threat.

With the crisis over,

the ice ship
is no longer needed.

♪ ♪

[Martin]
In January 1944,

project Habakkuk is canceled.

- The prototype ship
they'd built on Patricia Lake

is allowed to melt away.

[David] Soon,
the war comes to an end.

The British military
keeps details of Pykrete

on ice for the next 30 years.

[Martin] We only learn
the full details

through declassified documents
that are discovered in 1973.

They speak
to an hour of desperation,

when England faced
an existential threat

as a result of the U-boat.

♪ ♪

- Winston Churchill
isn't the only leader

to green-light
an audacious experiment.

When the Soviets decide
to beat the U.S. to Mars,

three cosmonauts
are locked in a test chamber

for a year-long study.

They learn that it's not
the equipment that fails,

it's the crew.

♪ ♪

- In Moscow, leaders are
convinced that getting to Mars

will definitively win
the Space Race.

[Martin] For the Soviets,
putting a man on Mars

would be
a massive prestige win.

♪ ♪

[David] But a round trip to
Mars would take a full year.

At the time,
no one knows whether humans

can survive that long
in space.

- Moscow's Institute
of Biomedical Problems

hatches a bold experiment.

They call it a year
in a spaceship,

but they run it
at their labs in Moscow.

The plan is to lock up
a cosmonaut test crew

for 365 days
inside a cramped metal box.

[Sami]
They want to find out

if the team can endure
such a long spaceflight

and what the scientists
need to do to make it work.

[David]
Soviet leadership signs off

on the space-chamber plan.

On November 5, 1967,

the top secret experiment
begins.

[Martin]
In order for this experiment

to provide
any meaningful results,

the three cosmonauts

are going to have
to be actually isolated.

The only contact
that they will have

with the outside world

will be through
a radio channel,

and everything
will be documented on film.

[David]
To the men locked inside,

the chamber feels more like
a prison cell than a starship.

[Don]
There is no privacy.

The living quarters
are just 10-by-13 feet

and not built for comfort.

The crew has a table, a stove,
some medical gear,

and three flimsy
fold-out bunks

♪ ♪

[David] Soon, the conditions
begin to take a toll

on the cosmonauts,
and the space chamber

becomes a psychological
pressure cooker.

- Within a few weeks,
all of them are showing signs

of psychological stress.

They're no longer enjoying

any collective activities
together.

They seem to be almost at each
other's throats all the time.

[Martin]
Within two months,

the crewmen are not speaking
to one another.

If they're holding
these churlish grudges

against one another,
they're not a cohesive team.

They're not an effective team.

[David]
With the experiment at risk,

the scientists take action.

- They build
a 200-square-foot greenhouse

and dock it
with the simulated mission.

[Martin]
The greenhouse gives them

a little bit of dignity
to get away from one another.

It gives them something
positive and constructive

to do with their time.

And, suddenly,
rather than being

at each other's throats
constantly,

they're back to being
a cohesive team again.

[David] With the experiment
back on track,

the scientists decide
to stress-test the crew.

They simulate a failure

of the chamber's
life-support systems.

♪ ♪

[Paul]
The Soviet lab administrators

massively raise
the concentration

of carbon dioxide
in the capsule.

[Don] They crank the
temperature up to 86 degrees.

They push the humidity
to a tropical 90%.

- All of the subjects
are suffering

from headaches and exhaustion.

- It feels like hell in space.

[David] The extreme conditions
force the crew to cooperate.

♪ ♪

[applause]

On November 5, 1968,

after a full year
inside the space chamber,

the experiment
comes to an end.

♪ ♪

[Sami] The most
important lesson learned

is that claustrophobia
and monotony

are two of the biggest
challenges a cosmonaut crew

will face on the way to Mars.

♪ ♪

[David]
For years, the full details

of the secret
space-chamber experiment

remained buried deep
in Kremlin files.

It's not until 1975 that
they're finally revealed

to the world,

when cosmonaut Andrej Bozhko
publishes his memoir.

♪ ♪

[Paul] He actually describes
the feelings

that he and his
fellow participants had

living inside this tiny capsule
for a year.

[David]
Although the cosmonauts

never actually leave Moscow,

the lessons learned
from the experiment

prove useful for planning
future space missions.

♪ ♪

- If we're going to send
somebody to Mars,

you can't just simply
put them in a capsule

and expect them to endure
a 34-million-mile voyage.

You have to provide
more space for them.

Otherwise, the mission
is going to fail,

because the individuals
are going to fail.

- At the start
of the Cold War,

the U.S. wants to know more
about biological weapons--

how to protect against them
or how to use them.

To learn more,
the Pentagon comes up

with a top secret experiment.

The target--
unsuspecting American cities.

[dramatic music]

[Sami] At the beginning
of the 1950s,

the Pentagon is terrified
that the Soviets

might launch
a biological attack

against the United States.

[Martin] In the event
that such an attack

was released on the U.S.,
what would happen?

Everything is, at this point,
an unknown quantity.

[David]
The Army Chemical Corps

is tasked to investigate.

- The Chemical Corps
considers several options.

The first one they come up with
is using a wind tunnel

to see how it disperses,

but that's nothing
like real-world conditions.

The second option they consider

is building a city
in the desert.

However, that turns out
to be too expensive.

And the third option
is to do live testing

in real U.S. cities

but, instead of using
a real biological agent,

use a stand-in.

[David] They start by looking
for a safe substitute

for deadly germ weapons.

- Chemical Corps scientists

find this apparently ideal
candidate.

It's a fluorescent powder
used in TV screens

called zinc cadmium sulfide.

[Hakeem] What makes
this powder so ideal

is that
the individual grain sizes

are very similar to the sizes
of the known biological agents

that an adversarial nation
may use.

The other thing about them
is that they fluoresce

under ultraviolet light,

so it's easy to track them
wherever they go.

♪ ♪

[Martin]
Initially, at least,

the Army thinks that
the substance is harmless.

[Dan] What they didn't know
then but we do know now

is that cadmium is
a top-tier carcinogen.

It causes lung cancer
and kidney cancer.

- In January 1953,

the experiment
is ready to begin.

The Army wants to study
how a biological agent

would spread
through an entire city.

The question is, what city?

♪ ♪

- The Army needs cities
in the United States

to be an approximate match

for corresponding
Soviet cities,

in the event that one day
the U.S. wants to carry out

some sort of chemical
or biological attack

against a Soviet city.

♪ ♪

- First up is a viable proxy
for brutally cold Leningrad--

Minneapolis in Minnesota.

Here, they want to find out
how a biological weapon

might get inside
different types of buildings.

[Hakeem] To cover up
what they're doing

and reassure the public,
they come up with a story

that they're testing
a smoke screen

to protect the city
from Soviet missiles.

Local authorities are eager
to help, so they sign on.

[David] The Army selects
a range of testing locations--

factories, office buildings.

But one site stands out...

♪ ♪

Clinton Elementary School.

♪ ♪

[Amy] They mount sprayers
on the roof

and release clouds
of zinc cadmium sulfide

onto the surrounding building
and the playground.

♪ ♪

[Dan] Inside the school,
they put detectors

to measure how much zinc
cadmium sulfide

is seeping in.

[Martin] What the Army learns
from all of this

is that even during the winter,

when everyone's largely
sealed up in interior spaces,

the pathogen
is still gonna find its way

into those spaces.

- That means
there's nowhere to hide

from a biological attack
of this sort.

♪ ♪

[David]
By February 1953,

the Army decides to scale up
the experiment.

How would a bioweapon
spread across a bigger city...

like Moscow?

♪ ♪

They set their sights
on St. Louis, Missouri.

- The Chemical Corps focuses
their experiments

on the Pruitt-Igoe
housing projects.

They put sprayers on
the rooftops of all 33 towers

and start pumping out
zinc cadmium sulfide.

Other sprayers are mounted
inside vehicles,

and those squirt out toxic
powder while they drive around.

[Vince]
Over two years,

the Chemical Corps sprays
more than 2,000 pounds

of zinc cadmium sulfide

over just 10 square miles
of St. Louis.

[David]
The results are disturbing.

In urban canyons
between tall buildings,

wind turbulence disperses
the particles vertically.

But in open spaces like parks,

they linger at ground level.

- In an attack, some places
are gonna be largely spared,

while others
are gonna be devastated.

[David] Next, the Army
wants to understand the spread

over multiple states,

so it launches
its biggest experiment yet,

called Operation LAC--
Large Area Coverage.

- An aircraft is loaded
with zinc cadmium sulfide,

and it sprays it
during a flight

from South Dakota
to Minneapolis.

The results are alarming.

That's because they detect
particles from that flight

1,200 miles away.

It proves that even
with a small quantity

of pathogen distributed
in air

can reach a much broader
geographical area.

Over the next 10 years,
the U.S. Army Chemical Corps

conducts 200 experiments
with zinc cadmium sulfide

in a geographical region

stretching
from the Rocky Mountains

to the Atlantic Coast,
affecting 40 different states.

- The Chemical Corps
learns that a single tank

of weaponized biological agent
can spread disease

to an area three times
the size of New York City.

♪ ♪

[David]
By the end of the 1960s,

the Army has the information
it needs.

The experiments
are wrapped up,

and the details are buried

under top secret
classification.

The Army keeps the experiments
hidden for decades.

Then, in 1994,
the truth is revealed.

♪ ♪

[Sami] When journalists
publish their findings,

the public is outraged
and rightly so.

These were experiments done
on unwitting Americans,

and the experiments could
potentially have been deadly.

- The Army maintains that,

yeah, cadmium may be
a dangerous chemical,

but the amounts of exposure
were so low,

they were nontoxic.

♪ ♪

[Sami]
This entire operation

suggests the mindset during
that era of the Cold War.

When you're talking about the
survivability of the country

in a biological, chemical,
or nuclear attack,

there's very little
that the U.S. government

was unwilling to do.

- At the end of the 1940s,
the Soviet Union and China

begin talks
over potential alliance.

Stalin wants a deeper
understanding of Chairman Mao,

so he sends a scientist
into Mao's bathroom.

[dramatic music]

[train horn blows]

[Don] Communist China's
leader, Chairman Mao Zedong,

rolls into Moscow, aiming to
forge an alliance

with Soviet premier
Joseph Stalin.

- Stalin sees Mao
as something less than him,

and he has no problem
keeping him waiting.

In fact, he keeps him waiting
for days.

This insult
is a deliberate ploy.

The issue is that Stalin, as
is often the case with Stalin,

doesn't trust Mao.

And he's letting him wait
for days on end

because he wants to get
into Mao's head.

He wants to figure out
what makes the man tick.

[David]
While Mao waits in Moscow,

Stalin turns
to his secret police.

He orders the NKVD to conduct
a bizarre experiment,

which will remain secret
for over six decades.

He wants them to build

a complete psychological
profile of the Chinese leader,

starting
in a very unusual place.

♪ ♪

[Greg] It sounds insane,
but one of the ways

that they plan to do this
is by analyzing who he is,

getting a piece of him,
if you will.

They're going to analyze
his poo.

♪ ♪

[Don]
For years, the NKVD labs

have been running a bizarre

and top secret
experimental program

in scatological research.

That's the study of excrement
to gain intelligence.

[David]
The theory is simple.

Soviet scientists believe
a person's waste

can provide insights
into their psyche.

[Dan] Stalin's team
is under the impression

that high levels

of the amino acid tryptophan
in the poo

indicate a calm
and approachable personality.

- The deficiency in potassium
could be an indication

of a nervous
and unpredictable person.

[David]
To run their tests,

the NKVD needs one key thing--

a sample
from the chairman himself.

[Greg] Mao gets invited
to the Kremlin

to have talks with Stalin,

but the NKVD makes sure
that those talks get delayed

day after day after day.

[Dan]
While Mao is waiting,

the Kremlin staff serve up
a series of elaborate banquets

for him and his team--

huge feasts piled high
with delicacies.

- But this lavish hospitality
is a trap.

Really, they're just looking
to ensure that the man

has to have a bowel movement
there in the Kremlin.

And they have
a specially rigged toilet

that they want him to use.

- NKVD agents install
special collection toilets.

These don't connect
to the sewers.

Instead, they funnel the waste
into special containers.

It's a dirty trick.

- Eventually, the NKVD
succeeds in collecting

some of Mao's products.

♪ ♪

[David]
Once collected,

the samples are rushed
to a classified lab

where a team
of dedicated scientists

meticulously analyze them.

♪ ♪

[Amy]
They test for tryptophan,

potassium,
and other chemicals--

things that
they ultimately think

are going to be indicative
of Mao's moods.

[Dan]
The excrement experiment

is reportedly a success.

The NKVD team
sends a detailed...

scatological-psychological
portrait of Mao

directly to Stalin.

[David] The report
about Mao sent to Stalin

has never been found,

so the details inside it
are lost to history.

What we do know

is that after reviewing
the scatological profile,

Stalin is said to be scathing

about Mao's
communist credentials.

"This man is a radish,"
he declares.

'He's only red on the outside,
but his insides are white."

[Paul]
This makes Stalin very wary

of engaging in any
significant partnerships.

[Don] The Chinese leader
leaves Moscow

with a watered-down treaty,

and none of the financial
support he's been hoping for.

[Paul]
Stalin's scatological lab

doesn't last much longer
after he died in 1953.

His successors didn't have
the same predilections

about analyzing
the biochemistry of humans.

♪ ♪

[David] The experiment
remains classified

for the next six decades.

Then in 2016, former Russian
agent Igor Atamanenko

reveals Stalin's obsessions.

- He reports that
he's found the details

of this poop research

in the declassified files
within Soviet archives.

♪ ♪

[David] The revelation
makes headlines worldwide...

as one of the Cold War's
most bizarre experiments

is finally brought to light.

- As World War II
comes to an end,

millions across Europe
are on the brink of famine.

To maintain order,

the U.S. must figure out
how to help them.

So, far from the front lines,

the War Department begins
an extraordinary experiment--

intentionally starving
healthy American volunteers.

[dramatic music]

[Martin]
By 1944, Allied forces

are ashore in Normandy.

They're driving the enemy,

and they will soon be
in Germany itself.

[Don] Allied leaders are
about to face a new challenge.

Millions of civilians
across the war zone

are on the edge
of starvation,

and it's gonna be the job

of the victors

to feed them back to health.

- To be prepared,
they need to understand

how people's metabolism changes

as they experience
malnutrition,

and that has never
been studied properly.

[David]
Enter Dr. Ancel Keys,

a physiologist
at the University of Minnesota

and special assistant
to the U.S. Secretary of War.

- To solve the famine problem,

Keys proposes a dangerous
and controversial experiment.

He wants to do
a controlled study

under lab conditions

of human starvation
and recovery from starvation.

[David] The War Department
likes the plan

and gives Keys its backing.

Now he needs volunteers
who are willing to starve

for their country.

[Dan]
To get useful results,

Keys wants to use healthy
young men for the experiment,

but most of those are
off fighting in the war--

but not all of them.

Keys identifies an untapped
pool of healthy young men

who are still in the U.S.--
conscientious objectors.

[Amy] Keys recruits
using a brochure

signed off on
by the War Department.

On the cover is a picture
of starving children,

with the text reading

"Will you starve
that they be better fed?"

It's an emotional appeal,
but it works.

[Don]
More than 200 men volunteer.

Keys picks 36 of the healthiest

and most psychologically stable
candidates

to be his guinea pigs.

[Martin]
He sets up a facility

literally underneath
the bleachers

at the University of Minnesota

so that the men
are away from prying eyes.

[David]
In February 1945,

the starvation phase
of the experiment begins.

[Dan]
To start, he slashes

the men's daily calorie intakes
in half.

- Keys wants to impose
a reduced calorie intake

but also make the subjects burn
more energy by exercising.

So he puts them through
the Harvard fitness test,

which is a series
of exercises that are designed

to push people to the limits
of their endurance.

[David]
The effects of starvation

are swift and shocking.

- The subjects drop around 20%

of their body weight
in the first 12 weeks.

Their ribs are sticking out.

They've got no energy.
They're just wilting.

- One subject
gets himself trapped

in a department store's
revolving door.

He's just too weak
to push himself through.

[Dan]
And it's not just physical.

As the weeks go by,
the starving subjects

are getting irritable,
they're getting depressed,

and, not surprisingly,

they become totally obsessed
with food.

[Martin] Two men get
into a physical brawl

in a canteen line
over a scrap of pasta.

That's how complete
this obsession with food

becomes for them.

They're fighting
even over a couple of scraps.

♪ ♪

- One individual starts having
visions of cannibalism.

He's fantasizing about food,

and he reaches the limits
of his mental endurance.

[Person]
Look at that generous helping

of rich, juicy barbecue.

[Paul] He actually sneaks
out of the study,

goes into town, and engages
in a massive caloric binge

in the form of milkshakes
and ice-cream sundaes.

[David]
After six months,

the starvation phase
finally ends.

Next comes the refeeding.

[Sami] Keys believes
that by gradually increasing

the subjects' calorie intake,

he can safely feed them
back to health

without triggering
any negative reaction.

- He splits the subjects
into four groups,

and the different groups
get different amounts

of extra food.

Some groups are also given
extra protein and vitamins,

while others just get the base
amount of carbohydrates.

[David] Now a new
and dangerous problem arises.

- Their body weight
continues to plummet,

even though
they're renourishing

these test subjects.

[Don] Keys discovers
that the men are shedding

retained edema fluid

that's been masking just
how much weight they've lost.

This is a potential disaster
for the study.

[David] To get the experiment
back on track,

Keys decides to supersize
his portions.

- He just doubles the calories
for the groups,

and to the relief of
the scientific team, it works.

The men finally begin
to recover.

[Amy] Keys realized

that in refeeding
a starving population,

vitamins and protein
were really a luxury.

It was the calories
that mattered.

They needed at least
4,000 calories a day.

- Keys passes that information
on to the War Department,

who immediately put it
to practical use

in post-World War II Europe.

[David]
Keys wraps up the experiment

in October, 1945,

but his complete findings
remain hidden.

It's not
until five years later

that he finally reveals
the data in his masterwork--

"The Biology
of Human Starvation."

The results
of the starvation experiment

are used worldwide
in famine relief.

- In 1979, Soviet scientists
are secretly experimenting

with deadly bacteria.

And when a lab technician
makes a simple mistake,

an entire city
will pay the price.

[dramatic music]

- The U.S. and the Soviets
have signed a treaty

banning
biological-weapons research.

The Soviets are looking
to get an edge

and have no problem cheating.

They're continuing research

to create even more dangerous
weaponized diseases.

[Don]
In the city of Sverdlovsk,

laboratories at Compound 19
are running 3 shifts a day,

working to develop
a killer weapon using anthrax.

♪ ♪

[David] Anthrax
is a deadly disease

caused by the bacteria
Bacillus anthracis.

If inhaled, its fatality rate
is up to 90%.

Even a fraction of a milligram
can kill.

It's perfect for a weapon

because the spores
are tough enough

to be delivered by a bomb

and small enough to disperse
after the explosion

as an invisible, lethal mist.

- Compound 19's goals
are absolutely terrifying.

[Dan]
Inside airtight chambers,

scientists are testing
new anthrax strains

in aerosol form on monkeys,

hoping to create
a deadly super weapon.

- They're attempting to create
a new strain

that does not respond
to antibiotics.

This work
is incredibly dangerous,

not just for the workers

but also for the citizens
in the surrounding city.

- Compound 19 uses
a complex system of filters

to purify the contaminated air

before it gets vented
into the atmosphere outside.

- The lab's safety system
seems foolproof,

but its chain of protection

is only as strong
as the weakest link.

On Friday, March 30th,
that link snaps.

♪ ♪

[Don]
A technician

is finishing up
the afternoon shift

on an anthrax production line.

And he shuts down as normal

before the next shift
comes on duty.

[Greg] He notices that there's
a filter that's clogged.

He takes it out.

And he leaves a note
letting the next shift know

that, hey, I've taken it out.

This needs attention.

[Don]
Now, this is where

the safety protocols
break down.

The officer in charge fails
to make a note in his logbook,

and the technician's note
gets lost.

- The next shift comes on,

and the anthrax production line
gets going again.

[machinery whirring]

[David] The machinery
is switched back on.

What the scientists
don't realize

is that the critical filter
is still missing.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem] When the plant
is restarted

without the filter in place,

it begins to pump out
anthrax aerosol

into the cold night air.

[Greg] A steady wind
carries this invisible cloud

of deadly spores

right over the sleeping city
of Sverdlovsk.

♪ ♪

It seeps into buildings,

getting inhaled
by unknowing citizens.

- No one realizes for hours
that this is happening.

[Dan] When a technician
at Compound 19

finally spots the error...

[machinery whirs down]

They shut down the line
and replace the filter,

but it's too late.

♪ ♪

[David]
It doesn't take long

for the anthrax
to take effect.

The first victims have no idea
what's hit them.

- 32-year-old Raisa Smirnova

is working at a nearby
ceramics factory,

when a co-worker notices
her hands are turning blue.

She's rushed to the hospital.

She's feverish,
struggling to breathe,

and slips into a coma.

[Dan] Over the next few days,
more people fall sick

with mysterious
flu-like symptoms

that progress
to respiratory failure

and then to a horrible
choking death.

Soon, the hospitals
of Sverdlovsk

are overwhelmed with victims.

At least 64 people die.

[Hakeem]
Local doctors are baffled.

The symptoms are indicative
of inhalation anthrax,

but that almost never happens
in nature.

- When that starts
to really sink in...

terror seizes the city.

♪ ♪

[David]
Kremlin officials

realize
that Compound 19's secrets

are about to be exposed.

So they dispatch agents
to contain the fallout.

♪ ♪

- The KGB comes in and enforces
a citywide cover-up.

They confiscate patient files.

They take autopsy reports.

They even bring in trucks
that spray down the town

with chlorine bleach
that turns the trees yellow.

- News of that many deaths
is bound to leak out,

within the Soviet Union
and to the West.

So the Soviet authorities
create a cover story.

They say the deaths are caused
by gastrointestinal anthrax,

which is easily explainable

by citizens eating
contaminated meat

that they bought
on the black market.

[David] Moscow keeps
the deadly lab leak hidden

for more than a decade.

Then, in 1991,
the Soviet Union collapses.

A new Russian president,
Boris Yeltsin, comes to power

and soon reveals the truth
about the Sverdlovsk incident.

♪ ♪

[Greg]
Yeltsin spills the beans.

He's trying to be
a good partner

and demonstrate to the West
that he's trustworthy,

and he lets it be known
that, no, it had nothing to do

with black-market meat.

[Dan] Harvard bioweapons
expert Matthew Meselson

gets permission
to investigate further.

He travels to Sverdlovsk.

He tracks down survivors,

and he talks to the families
of the dead.

- He confirms exactly
what Yeltsin's admitted to--

this was caused
by military development.

♪ ♪

[Dan] In 1994,
Meselson finally publishes

his research paper,
and it conclusively reveals

that the Sverdlovsk incident
was caused by weapons research

at Compound 19.

♪ ♪

That accident caused
the deadliest recorded

anthrax outbreak
in human history.

- After the U.S. dropped
two nuclear bombs on Japan,

World War II is over.

But the plutonium core
of a third bomb is ready

and waiting at the
Los Alamos National Laboratory.

Scientists put it to use there

in experiments
that are so dangerous,

they name it the Demon Core.

[dramatic music]

♪ ♪

- The war is won,
and America's atomic whiz kids

are now working to master
the apocalyptic power

they've unleashed.

[Hakeem] Louis Slotin is
a 35-year-old physics prodigy

working at Los Alamos lab.

He has
a pretty impressive résumé.

He's a veteran
of the Manhattan Project,

and he's also known
as a bit of a cowboy,

both in his style of dress,

as well as his fearless
approach to science.

He's doing experiments
to understand

how to make the plutonium bomb
more efficient.

[Vince] He is a physicist
who is absolutely brilliant,

but he certainly is someone
who's willing to bend the rules

if it helps to enhance
his persona

as a risk-taker.

[David]
In May 1946,

just weeks before he's set
to leave Los Alamos

for a teaching job,

Slotin heads into the lab
to show his replacement

how to do his signature
experiment,

working directly on the
leftover plutonium bomb core.

[Dan] The core is
a softball-sized sphere

of weaponized plutonium alloy.

It's so radioactive
that it's warm to the touch.

[Hakeem] It's so dangerous
that it's given the nickname

the Demon Core.

- The Demon Core is constantly
emitting subatomic particles

called neutrons.

If those neutrons
can escape freely,

the core remains stable.

But if those neutrons

are somehow trapped in the core
and build up,

it'll become unstable
and effectively become a bomb.

[Don] His mentor, the
nuclear pioneer Enrico Fermi,

warns him
about the experiment.

If you keep doing it,
you'll be dead within the year.

He keeps on doing it.

- The audience is transfixed

as Slotin gets to work
on the Demon Core.

[David]
To get his data,

Slotin must intentionally edge
the Demon Core

toward an explosion,

while trying to stop
just short of triggering one.

- He lowers
a neutron-reflecting

beryllium shell
over the Demon Core

and measures how many neutrons
start building up inside it.

- This is incredibly useful
for the scientists

but also incredibly dangerous.

[Hakeem] The closer
the shell gets to the core,

the closer the core comes
to a super-critical state.

- If the beryllium shell closes
completely over the Demon Core,

the energy inside will build up
to super criticality

in a catastrophic instant.

And that means either
a burst of radiation

or an all-out explosion.

[Vince] Los Alamos
has rules for everything.

You need to, right?

You're dealing with some of
the most dangerous substances

on Earth.

And the regulations
Los Alamos puts in place

is to use wooden spacers
to keep the two hemispheres

of these shells apart.

Slotin, however, as the cowboy,
decides to do it his own way.

Instead of wooden spacers,
he uses a flathead screwdriver

to wedge open these two shells

just enough to keep it
from going critical.

- It's a reckless method,
but it works.

- In his left hand,
he holds the shell of the core,

in the right hand,
a screwdriver with a flat tip

just between the two halves
of the hemisphere.

♪ ♪

[David]
After tempting fate,

Slotin's luck
finally runs out.

The screwdriver slips,
and the shell snaps shut.

- There's
a silent blinding flash

of blue light,

and then a wave of heat
sweeps across the room.

- Radiation is expanding
in every direction.

Slotin knows it's too late
for him to run.

He immediately lunges forward

and rips the beryllium shell
off with his bare hands.

♪ ♪

His quick decision
breaks the chain reaction

and puts the Demon Cores
back to sleep.

- He saves the lives
of the other men in the room,

but it's too late for him.

[Dan] Being so close
to the Demon Core,

Slotin's absorbed
a massive dose of radiation.

[David] Slotin's left hand
feels like it's on fire.

A sour, metallic taste
fills his mouth.

As he leaves the room,

he begins to vomit
uncontrollably.

♪ ♪

[Hakeem]
On the way to the hospital,

Slotin turns to one of the
observers, and he apologizes.

"I'm sorry
I got you into this,

but I have less
than a 50% chance of living."

And even that was optimistic.

♪ ♪

- Over the next nine days,

Slotin's body
slowly disintegrates.

He has what's known
as three-dimensional burns,

which is essentially a sunburn
inside of his body.

He also has gangrene
and massive organ failure.

On May 30th, he dies in agony--

a victim of the Demon Core.

♪ ♪

[David] Although Slotin's
death makes the papers,

for decades, the full details

of his fatal Demon Core
experiment are buried

under top secret
classification,

hidden for over a quarter
of a century.

♪ ♪

- Finally, in 1989,
"The New York Times"

publishes the full story

and reveal the true horror
of the Demon Core experiments

to an unsuspecting public.

- From toxic tests
in black-site labs

to bold ideas that push back

the boundaries
of human knowledge,

governments have long conducted
extraordinary experiments

in secret.

Though it may take years,

the covert science eventually
finds its way into the light.