Original subtitles

- Tonight on "The Proof Is Out There."

We investigate a classic case from the 1960s.

Is this a UFO flying next to an airplane?

- It's got fins on both sides

and then the fins kind of retract into the body

and it disappears.

- [Tony] A terror beneath the waves.

What are these grinning beasts in Brazil?

- If there are undiscovered creatures

anywhere on the planet, Brazil is where we would find 'em.

- [Tony] How did this ancient Roman artifact

wind up in Mexico before the conquistadors?

- There are many people who believe

that it may have been possible for Romans

to have made that transatlantic voyage.

- [Tony] A real life haunted mansion.

Could this be the ghost of a 19th century Aristocrat?

- The figure's legs are missing, and as it happened,

Lord Combermere suffered a severe carriage accident.

- [Tony] And a Bigfoot in Alabama?

These guys say they got close, too close.

[monstrous growling]

- Made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

[dramatic music]

- [Tony] Around the globe are videos,

[witness screaming]

photos,

and sounds that defy explanation.

[electric whirring]

- [Expert] We don't know where they come from,

who made them, or how they operate.

- [Tony] What are they?

- [MJ] Some sort of bizarre mutation.

- [Marc] What's exciting is nobody really knows.

- Extraordinary claims need extraordinary proof.

- I'm Tony Harris,

and as a journalist for more than 30 years,

I've followed the facts where they take me.

Now, I'm bringing that spirit of investigation

to the world's strangest sounds and images.

- [Witness] It's coming towards us.

- [Tony] We'll analyze each one with top experts.

- It's a credible case, it's a credible video.

- [Tony] And pass a verdict on what it is.

- This video was clearly faked.

- The proof starts now.

[dramatic music]

Good evening, everyone,

and welcome to "The Proof Is Out There."

You know, some of the best UFO footage

comes from airline passengers.

A recent in-flight sighting

near New York's LaGuardia Airport made headlines,

but one of the most famous clips from coach class

comes from way back in 1966.

Take a look.

April 2nd, 1966, 9,000 feet

above Staffordshire County, England.

It's Joan and Tom Oldfield's first time on an airplane,

in this case a British Dart Herald turboprop.

The couple captures the moment with their home movie camera

by filming out of the plane's window,

when they catch a glimpse of something otherworldly.

The original eight millimeter film has been digitized

and marked with a logo,

but the anomaly it shows remains clear.

Slowing down the footage, we see a long, sausage-shaped UFO

on the right side of the screen.

It appears to have two prominent fins

on it's left and right sides.

After a brief moment,

the object seems to rotate on its vertical axis

before zipping away from the plane in the blink of an eye.

- This film became known as the Oldfield Film

and was sent to the British Air Ministry for investigation.

It became very popular with British UFO enthusiasts.

It even made news headlines in the United States.

The Palm Beach Post published an article

saying that it might be a return of a mysterious craft

that had terrorized a small English town in an incident

called The Warminster Thing.

- [Tony] The Warminster Thing refers to a swath

of UFO sightings in Warminster, England,

in the summer of 1965.

- There were a number of witnesses

who saw different types of shapes.

Some saw a cigar shaped alien craft like the one

in the Oldfield Film, and others saw what they described

as twin red hot pokers hanging down one on top of the other.

- [Tony] It was a mass sighting.

More than 400 people claim to have seen

and heard what appeared to be a flying saucer,

but officials remained up in the air

about the object in the sky.

- There are a number of military installations

around Warminster.

The government said they weren't doing any experiments

at the time that could explain what the eyewitnesses saw.

To this day, all of those Warminster sightings

are unexplained.

- What's fascinating to me about the Oldfield Film

is the way the object spins and disappears

in the blink of an eye.

See how it just vanishes there?

Could the Oldfields have seen the same craft

that appeared during the Warminster Thing

and not known it?

Or was their UFO another kind of aerial vehicle?

[tense music]

Since this footage was shot in 1966,

staging an event like this would have been extremely tricky

because all effects would have to have been done in camera.

- Now, it doesn't appear to be something that's affixed

to the window because we see the edge of the window here

and we see the object itself changes shape.

So I don't think there's any way

that you could actually fake this video.

- [Tony] So if it's outside the plane and real,

what could it be?

We wonder whether the Oldfields could have captured

a dirigible, flying alongside their plane.

- The problem with dirigibles

is that they would not keep up with the speed

of the Dart Herald aircraft.

They would've been actually outpaced very quickly.

And here, it's moving at exactly the same speed as the plane.

- [Tony] Given that they were filming through a window,

what's the possibility

they accidentally filmed a reflection?

- Window reflections often cause UFOs,

but the only things that reflect in windows are lights.

Here we're seeing something that's dark.

- It looks like it's right along with the plane,

and I think that's because it's on the plane,

part of the plane.

It looks like they were looking at something attached

to the plane itself.

- [Tony] What we're seeing could be a plane appendage

that's warped by the convex edge of the window

to look like a free floating object.

- [Marc] We're talking about the Dart Herald aircraft.

I think it's probably the horizontal stabilizer

in the back of the plane.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, this is a part of an airplane

that was distorted by the window

and misinterpreted by the witnesses.

In fact, one television crew even recreated the journey

in the exact same seat on the exact same aircraft.

And what do you know?

They saw the exact same UFO, or rather,

the same horizontal stabilizer.

Now I am going to show you some of the freakiest video

I've seen in a while.

A smile can convey warmth, humor, and happiness,

but in a sinister setting, it can have the opposite effect.

From the Joker, to Jack-o'-lanterns,

to the pirate flag known as Jolly Roger,

menacing grins can induce fear.

Just look at the mysterious smirking creatures

in our next story.

May 2024, Mato Grosso, Brazil.

A fisherman is on a quiet late night trip in his canoe,

when he feels eyes watching him.

He looks over the side of his boat and sees this.

The video captures glowing red eyes,

peering out from grinning faces

lurking just below the surface of the water.

Take a closer look.

Those eyes seem to hover in place,

smiling eerily at the fishermen as he tries

to placate the creatures with some snackable fish.

It's a spooky site,

taken in one of the world's most exotic locations.

- The Mato Grosso is an extremely dense

and unexplored region of the southern Amazon River Basin.

And really, if there are undiscovered creatures anywhere

on the planet, the Mato Grosso, is where we would find them.

Looking at this video, I'm immediately reminded

of a legendary Brazilian creature known as the Boiúna.

Typically depicted as an immense serpent

that's very dangerous, able to topple boats.

It's also a shapeshifter

and a protector of the Amazon rainforest,

capable of taking the form of a human.

And when we look at the human-like grin

on these two creatures, one can wonder,

are these Boiúnas attempting to lure this fishermen

beneath the waves?

- [Tony] Besides the Boiúna,

a menagerie of real life monstrous serpents

is well documented within the area.

- There are many accounts of gigantic snakes

from the Amazon River Basin,

and perhaps the most celebrated involves the famous explorer

Colonel Percy Fawcett.

Now, back in the year 1907,

he was at a place called the Rio Negro

when he encountered this gigantic triangular head

in the water and quickly realized

that it was an Anaconda.

He fired one shot into its spine,

which killed it instantly.

And when he and his companions were able to drag

most of its body on the shore, they measured it

and determined that it had a total length of 62 feet.

So we're talking about the mother of all anacondas.

Could these actually be giant anacondas here in the water?

- In a popular story from one of the Batman comic books,

the Joker poisons all the fish in Gotham Harbor,

leaving them with a menacing grin,

not unlike what we see in this footage.

And while I doubt any Smilex gas was used

to create these critters,

let's see what our experts have to say.

[tense music]

Some have speculated that this is nothing

more than some creepy looking catfish, but think again.

- Whatever this is, is very, very large

and there's no known catfish species here

that would make sense for that size range.

- A catfish mouth is actually downturned,

and that's because they scoot along the bottom

and scavenge a lot of food.

The mouth on this fish looks like

it's maybe an ambush predator.

- [Tony] Could these be predators,

protecting the rainforest, like the legendary Boiúna?

- The Boiúna is actually known to hypnotize its victims

using its red glowing eyes and then drag them underwater.

Instead, the person seems to be bringing these creatures

to him by feeding them.

And you're not actually supposed to see anything

of the Boiúna except for its eyes.

And we can tell this is some kind of an animal.

- [Tony] If it's some type of animal,

could this be one of the area's infamous anacondas?

- If I was looking for a very large snake underwater

like this, you'd probably see something called periscoping.

You would probably see the neck coming outta the water.

And in addition, the head of this thing is massive.

If I was to see an anaconda with a head that big,

the anaconda would have to be 80 plus feet.

- While this may not be an anaconda

or other kind of monster,

what this is, is maybe equally terrifying.

- I think this is most likely an arapaima.

Arapaimas are massive fish found all throughout the Amazon,

and these things get over 400 pounds.

They can in fact cause injury

and have been noted to cause injury in humans all the time.

- There have actually been circumstances

of people being knocked out by these fish

jumping out of the water.

- [Tony] The natural shape of the arapaima's mouth

makes it appear to have a smile.

And as for those glowing eyes...

- They have a tissue on the covering of their eyes

known as tapidum lucidum.

And what that tissue does is actually reflect more light

into the eye itself to pick up more visual imagery.

- [Tony] On top of that, these aggressive fish

can even survive outside the water for as long as 24 hours.

- And they can also bite.

They've been known to grab things like bats

straight outta the air, or eat small mammals

that are on the banks of the river.

So I would say it's best to steer clear of these animals.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, these grinning jokers are arapaimas.

As our experts explain, they can be quite dangerous.

And don't think you're safe

just because you're not in Brazil.

In 2021, the carcass of an arapaima was spotted

in Florida's waters, leaving some to wonder

if this non-native species has found a new home in the US.

- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle is best known

for creating the iconic character of Sherlock Holmes.

And like his fictional detective,

the writer was a bit of a sleuth.

Tonight we're looking at a paranormal photograph

so compelling, Conan Doyle himself considered it

a true mystery.

It's 1891 in Cheshire, England.

At St. Margaret's Church, a funeral service is underway

for the second Lord Combermere.

Meanwhile, back at the late Lord's estate,

a guest takes a photograph of his empty grand library.

When the picture is developed,

it reveals something unseen to the naked eye.

At first, it seems there's nothing out of the ordinary,

just a richly furnished room

with an impossibly large bookshelf.

But take a closer look to the left

and you'll notice what appears to be a ghostly figure,

seated on an ornate chair.

It is the unmistakable outline of a man.

Note the suited upper body and the curve of a bald head.

However, the legs on the specter

seem to be completely missing.

The current owner of the estate,

Sarah Callander Beckett, believes it's clear

who we're seeing in this photograph,

a man who was supposedly dead and buried.

- When the photograph was developed,

there was Lord Combermere sitting in his chair.

And it is really remarkable.

And if you see prints of him, it absolutely is him.

I think the spirit was coming home to sit in a place

where he would've always sat.

- One detail that makes the story more compelling

is that the figure's legs are missing.

And as it happened, Lord Combermere suffered

a severe carriage accident in which his legs were run over

by a horse-drawn carriage.

He was rendered partly paralytic,

and the trauma contributed to his death

at the time this photo was taken.

- [Tony] The photo became an object of public fascination

when it was released in a newspaper article in 1926

by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle.

The subject of that piece:

something known as spirit photography.

- At the time, Americans and Europeans were obsessed

with talking to the dead, holding seances,

capturing evidence of the unseen world.

And one of the efforts was called spirit photography.

In spirit photography, the photograph was taken,

but upon development, a ghostly apparition appears.

- So-called spirit photographs were a thing back then,

and so were spirit frauds.

One of the most famous was the Englishman, William Hope.

He was once caught tampering with photographic plates

in order to manufacture a ghostly effect.

Could our Combermere ghosts be another such forgery

or could we be looking at the real deal?

Let's ask our experts.

[tense music]

- One of the more common processes that photographers

and other professionals began to utilize

to fake situations in the 19th century

was called a double exposure.

- [Tony] Double exposure is when you take two photographs

and overlay them to create one image.

Like this photo of Harry Houdini sitting across

from the ghost of Abraham Lincoln.

Houdini took an existing plate

with the image of Abraham Lincoln

and using that same plate, he photographed himself,

positioned as though he were right next

to the late president.

Is that what's happening here?

Well, maybe, or maybe not.

- I didn't detect any artifacts of that double exposure

in and around some of the details like the books.

But it doesn't necessarily mean

that it didn't happen that way,

especially because this particular subject appears

to have a different visibility than the rest of the image.

- [Tony] However, there's another key photographic detail

that could account for what we're seeing.

- This camera required a very long exposure time,

and that's because of earlier cameras

having less sensitivity to light.

Long exposures open up the possibility of people, objects,

and things crossing the field of view of the camera

and showing up as ghostly figures

through a partial exposure.

But also these older cameras

are not gonna pick up every single motion during that hour

or whatever length of time the exposure was.

- [Tony] And that inability to pick up on motion

might also explain the missing legs.

In 2018, French photographer Mathieu Stern

recreated the Combermere photo using long exposure

and some simple, if silly, leg kicks.

And here's the resulting photo.

On long exposure, the camera can't pick up

the constant movement of the subject's legs.

- It's possible that you actually have intentional fakery

where you create a ghost-like image on purpose.

So I'm not convinced here that we're seeing a ghost

or anything paranormal.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, camera trick.

We think someone sat in the chair and moved their legs

back and forth really fast,

just long enough to create that image.

But the owner of Combermere Abbey tells us

there are other ghosts roaming its halls.

Let's just hope they're not camera shy.

- The national UFO Reporting Center has cataloged

more than 13,000 sightings of triangle shaped UFOs,

many going back decades.

These alleged craft have been spotted all over the world,

but the best evidence ever may have come

from the great state of Kansas.

April 16th, 2014, Wichita, Kansas.

Amateur photographer Jeff Templin is in his lakeside

community, testing out a new camera lens,

when he notices something strange flying overhead.

A crisp edged triangular craft soars across the sky

with a two-pronged smoke trail stretching out behind it.

As we increase the photo's contrast,

we can see that the craft is like gray

with the front edge making a stark V

and the darker body almost blending

with the blue sky behind it.

This triangular object falls into a new UFO classification

system established by the UFO Investigative Group,

Sky-Watcher.

Out of the nine UFO types, this would be a tetra,

but it turns out Jeff's photo is only the beginning.

- A second photo surfaced online

depicting the exact same object.

And after this image surfaced,

a lot of people began making inquiries to the military

to ascertain whether this was a military craft.

But they've not responded to requests for comment.

- [Tony] With no word from government officials.

The rumors begin to fly.

- Netizens began to speculate

as to what we could be looking at here.

One of the speculative theories out there

is that this is actually a B-2 stealth bomber.

- [Tony] The B-2 is a unique platform

in the American arsenal,

which played a central role in the 2025 American airstrikes

on Iran, blending stealth and aerodynamics

like never before.

It's considered one of the most feared aircraft

in the world.

- The B-2 bomber is essentially designed

to travel over an adversary country

and deliver a payload without ever being seen

or heard or tracked.

It's essentially invisible,

but when it flies close to the ground, it's very obvious

as a very large sort of black triangular shaped object.

- [Tony] But what if it's something even more secretive?

Some suspect this object is actually an infamous triangular

spacecraft only alleged to exist.

It's known as the TR-3B.

- The TR-3B'S story begins at Roswell

when the US military allegedly recovered the debris

of a crashed flying disc.

The project ever since

was to essentially reverse engineer it

into something that a human can fly.

- [Tony] Rumor has it the engineers who unlocked

that alien tech were Nazi rocket scientists

sheltered by the United States after the war

in exchange for research.

The resultant TR-3B is said to use nuclear

accelerated mercury to generate plasma

that creates an anti-gravity field around the craft.

- The TR-3B exists in this mythical land

of, perhaps the government has secret planes

that we don't know about and they've been

quietly building them without public awareness.

- It's not publicly known exactly

how much money the government sets aside

and what is known as the black budget

for its secret military programs.

But some estimate that it could be around $100 billion.

Did Jeff photograph proof of your tax dollars at work

or something else?

[tense music]

Given that Kansas is home to three military installations,

could we be seeing a known delta wing stealth bomber

like the B-2?

- The B-2 aircraft looks like a flying wing,

and it is designed to blend in, especially at nighttime.

But for training exercises in the daytime,

usually they would fly at an altitude

where they wouldn't leave a contrail

so that people wouldn't see it.

And the fact that they have not come out

and said anything, would leave me to believe

that this is some kind of aircraft

that somebody was experimenting with other than a B-2.

- [Tony] If it's not the B-2,

could this whole thing be a hoax?

Well, maybe in part.

Remember that second photo that mysteriously emerged online?

- This one is just a perfect triangle.

When I looked at this one before, I thought,

how is he getting such a deep projected shot on this?

Was that maybe a hoaxed image?

- [Tony] Since the person who shot that photo

never identified themselves, we're leaning that way.

But Jeff's photo doesn't show any indication of fakery.

Then are we looking at proof the legendary TR-3B

really exists? Not so fast.

Remember, that craft was allegedly reverse engineered

from a UFO.

- UFOs don't typically have engines like we've created here

on the earth that would produce a contrail like this.

It looks to me like these are twin contrails

from very real human engineering.

We can't see all the details on this,

but I think it, at the very least, it's a new kind

of aircraft being tested, but we can't tell what it is.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, unidentified test craft.

Without clearer confirmation from the US military

or some private entity, it's really up in the air

as to what Jeff photographed.

- Famous sounds from the state of Alabama

include everything from the roar of the Talladega Superspeedway

to the southern fried rock of Lynyrd Skynyrd.

But now, we may be able to add Bigfoot's growl

to the state's greatest hits.

August 2024, Talladega National Forest, Alabama.

With two individual cameras rolling, YouTubers Matt Graham

and Darrel Smith head deep into the dense forest,

a spot they've explored countless times

for their channel.

The night has been uneventful, when suddenly...

- Whoa, stop. - What was that?

- [Tony] A rumble can be heard

coming from deep within the woods.

They try to locate whatever it is with their flashlights

and hear it again, louder now.

[monstrous growling]

- Dude, that is a growl. - It is a growl.

- [Tony] Let's hear that one more time and we'll turn it up.

[monstrous growling]

- I'm not gonna lie, it caught me off guard

and we were hurrying back to the vehicle.

So we don't know what it is,

but I need to get video proof and actually see it

and know it's real before I'm gonna say,

"That was Bigfoot."

- [Tony] And it turns out, Alabama Bigfoot sightings

actually go back centuries.

- The Alabama Coushatta people describe a wild man

called the Eeyachuba.

The way they describe it, it comes out at night.

It's hair covered.

It follows hunters when they're carrying small prey.

- [Tony] Like we hear in this video,

many believe that these creatures will ferociously roar

to mark their territory

and to freeze potential threats in their tracks.

- They will bang on the ground, roar, scream,

just to get you out of an area.

And when you leave, they will make sure you leave

by escorting you out, even if that means chasing you out.

I've spoken to several witnesses that claim that,

"Oh, that thing was gonna kill me."

- One story from the 1800s claimed

that early Alabama settlers encountered a giant, hairy,

bipedal creature about eight feet tall.

Someone allegedly shot the beast

and a posse followed the blood trail,

which eventually disappeared at the edge of a cliff.

It's quite a tale.

Could a descendant of that creature

be what made this sound?

Let's see what our experts think.

[tense music]

Could this ferocious growl come from an Alabama Bigfoot?

- There's quite a variety of sounds

that have been attributed to Sasquatch,

which range from grunts, and hoots, to screams,

and roars, and growls.

- [Tony] The sound has a guttural roaring aspect

similar to a black bear.

But while this forest is home to some black bears,

there are only about 200 in the entire state.

- 200 is a very modest number.

You talk to people who are avid outdoorsmen in Alabama

and they rarely encounter black bear.

- [Tony] So let's do some comparison testing, shall we?

First, we match our Alabama growl

with what many believe is the closest thing

to a legitimate Sasquatch recording,

the infamous Ohio howls recorded in Columbiana County,

Ohio, in the fall of 1994.

- So when I compare the characteristics

of the Ohio Bigfoot howls,

they have more frequency variation.

[monstrous growling]

The growl sound to me does sound kind of like

it might be a bear, but there were a few features

that seem a little unnatural to me.

An animal making a growl ordinarily would be moving

or having some variation throughout the sound.

[bear growling]

[monstrous growling]

This particular growl recording stays at one pitch,

in one frequency range throughout the sound.

[monstrous growling]

My subjective impression would be

that the growl was produced by playback

through a loud speaker at the scene.

- [Tony] That might help explain the mild behavior

of our eyewitnesses.

- Their reaction was rather minimalist.

So maybe this experience was a contrived one.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, we're calling this one a well executed hoax,

one that fooled thousands online.

Don't blame yourselves.

Not everyone can have a forensic audio analyst

at their fingertips.

That's what we are here for.

- It is widely accepted that the first European

to land in modern day Mexico was the Explorer

Francisco Hernandez de Cordoba,

who arrived in early 1517.

But our next story features an artifact that casts doubt

on that fact, and the entire history

of exploration in the Americas.

Take a look.

1933, Toluca, Mexico.

A group of archeologists is excavating Calixtlahuaca,

a 16th century Aztec city.

Digging in a grave site

that dates between 1476 and 1510 AD,

they come across several Aztec relics from the era.

And then this.

It's a small terracotta head that stands out

because it looks nothing like the other Mesoamerican

artifacts found here.

The man has an expressively stern look,

sporting a beard in what appears to be

some kind of head covering.

Geologist Peter Schaaf says, the head left experts befuddled

because it seemed like something from ancient Rome.

- This kind of cap and the beard and so on,

there were not features which you would've expected

from a colonial ceramic.

So I was also convinced it is some kind of Roman thing.

- [Tony] But what's a Roman sculpture doing

at an Aztec archeological site?

- There are many people who believe

that this is a genuine Roman artifact

and that Romans actually made their way

to the so-called New World more than 2,000 years ago.

Norwegian adventurer, Thor Heyerdahl

took a transatlantic voyage in 1970

in a boat built according to ancient Egyptian

boat building techniques.

His boat was called the Ra II,

and it sailed from Morocco to the West Indies

showing that it may have been possible for Romans

to have made that transatlantic voyage.

- [Tony] What's even more shocking?

This head may not be the only Roman artifact

to have made an epic journey across the Atlantic.

In 1982, underwater archeologist Robert Marx

made an intriguing discovery off the coast of Brazil.

- Marx discovered barnacle covered amphorae,

which are large jars that the Greeks and Romans used

to transport things like wine, oil, water,

and grain on long voyages.

His theory is that there was a Roman ship

that was blown off course and was wrecked on shoals

or coral reefs during a severe storm.

And if that's true, that completely upends

what we know about the history of exploration in this area.

- In 2016, an archeologist discovered a handful

of ancient Roman coins within the ruins

of a 12th century Japanese castle.

There was no known trade between these two civilizations.

No one knows for sure how this currency got there.

But can our experts figure out how this ancient Roman relic

crossed an ocean?

Let's find out.

[tense music]

There's debate over exactly when the head was carved,

with one source suggesting

it dates to the second century AD.

But the experts agree on one point,

this artifact was not made locally.

- Because of how it's constructed, its size,

this cannot be made in Mesoamerica.

We have not found any other example like it.

This is not pre-Hispanic type of pottery.

- [Tony] Then how did it get across the Atlantic?

The burial site dates to before the Spanish conquest

of Mexico.

And our artifact might predate all of this by centuries.

Did the Romans make the trip after all?

- We know that the Romans were seafaring

and that they were able to sail all the way

to what's now Great Britain and Ireland.

But it's always about show me the artifacts.

And really if they made it across the Atlantic

in any substantial way, we would expect Roman artifacts.

And we don't have that.

- [Tony] But what about the jars found off the coast of Brazil?

- In the end, those supposed Roman ceramics

turned out to be planted there by a man

who claimed he intentionally submerged them

to allow them to collect barnacles and look old.

So questions of authenticity came up.

- [Tony] Those jars may be an archeological scam,

but our ancient head was confirmed by multiple studies

as a genuine artifact from antiquity.

So then what explains its presence in Calixtlahuaca?

Could the dating of the burial site be off by a few years?

- The excavation evidence said that the objects

around this little bust were somewhere in the late 1400s

or early 1500s,

which is not very far off at all from Contact Period,

which would mean that it's a more likely case

that this was deposited during the Spanish Entrada

and not much, much earlier in the Roman period.

- [Tony] Or in the end, could this all have been

just an elaborate joke?

- There are stories among the archeologists of the time

that one archeologist was playing a trick on another,

putting something in the excavation

to make him think he had found something amazing

when in fact, it was just a plant.

That, of course, is a story.

And all the folks that were involved in the excavation

in the 1930s have passed away years ago.

So we really can't verify that story.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, looks like we have a split decision here.

Our experts can verify that this is an ancient artifact,

very likely of Roman origin,

but exactly how it ended up at a Mesoamerican grave site,

for us, that remains unexplained.

- Bloodsucking vampires are a staple

of horror movies and Halloween.

But centuries ago, people thought vampires were very real

and some believed strongly enough

to commit monstrous acts of their own.

September 2024, Chelm, Poland.

Workers are removing tree roots

for a garden renovation at a cathedral,

when they unearth something grisly.

Two children's skeletons dating to the 13th century

are found in a shallow burial pit

where no grave sites are marked.

But what's truly shocking is that

one of the children was decapitated after they died,

the severed head turned to face the ground.

Why would someone do this to the remains of a child?

- In Poland, in the medieval era,

people were mortally terrified

that the undead could feast on the blood of the living,

both humans and livestock.

And measures were taken, some of them really grisly,

to bury the dead in such a way

that kept them from rising.

- [Tony] That's right.

In medieval Poland, fear of vampires was very real

and it endured for centuries.

- In one famous tale in 1674,

a Polish man rose from the dead

and he was going around sucking the blood of his neighbors.

His nocturnal wanderings only stopped

when the body was decapitated.

- Belief in vampires ran riot throughout ports of Eastern

and central Europe.

Imagine how terrified you have to be to do something

this gruesome to a child after death.

- This isn't the first time we've investigated supposed

vampire skeletons in Poland, like this woman's remains

found with a sickle around her neck.

The question is, was this practice really nothing more

than medieval superstition?

Or did these bodies pose a real threat?

Let's ask the experts.

[tense music]

Could this be a real blood sucking vampire?

There's a reason the locals decapitated the dead body.

- You're severing the head from the body

and it's upside down in the grave

so that he's confused then if he comes back alive.

- [Tony] But there's another theory

behind the widespread belief in vampires.

It has nothing to do with the supernatural.

Instead, it's tied to one of history's darkest periods.

In 1348, the black plague spread across Europe

and wiped out half the population.

And it turns out dead plague victims,

were sometimes mistaken for the undead.

- The black plague really did inspire

a lot of the tales about vampirism.

And it was widespread in Europe

that something, you know, was evil walking among you,

can kill you, drain you of blood.

And these superstitions, of course,

arose from a lack of understanding

of how diseases are passed from person to person.

- [Tony] Hang on, though.

The black plague didn't start until a century

after these children died.

But there were other diseases

that would have been just as scary.

- We know that the time period that this child died

was around the 1200s.

And that was a time where wave after wave

of what we understand now as pandemic diseases

were sweeping through and there was a lot of fear

and superstition of how people got sick.

- [Tony] It's also possible these kids were afflicted

with a very specific disease, one with symptoms

that definitely would make these children appear vampiric.

It's called porphyria.

- Porphyria is a rare hereditary disorder

where individuals are unable to metabolize protein

that comprises our red blood cells.

Individuals with porphyria cannot go out into the sunlight

because their skin is so sensitive

that it might blister up and it may scar.

And some individuals with porphyria

can have receding gum lines,

which can make your teeth look longer

and maybe pointier, like a fang.

- [Tony] Whatever disease was responsible,

it's clear it scared the villagers to their core.

And at a time when they couldn't explain the concept

of a virus, they turn to their legends for an explanation.

And the way to stop the diseases spread.

- These two children may very well have been

because of their age, more susceptible to diseases

and may have been the first to get the disease

that spread into the village.

And so for the village, the only way to rectify that

and their own superstition is then to bury them

in this special way so that they can continue

with their lives.

[tense music]

- Our verdict, unknown disease.

Even today, public health concerns

have spawned vampire myths,

like the wildly inaccurate online rumor

that the COVID vaccine will turn you

into a blood sucking monster.

You just can't make this stuff up.

And that's our show for tonight.

Thank you so much for watching,

and keep those cameras rolling.

[dramatic music]