Original subtitles

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The monsoon.

(thunder)

The greatest weather system on earth.

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(thunder)

The giver of life and the destroyer.

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Shaping magical lands, from the himalaya to australia.

Its impact felt by giants...

Exquisite...

And bizarre.

Where spectacular nature coincides

With the colorful celebrations of life.

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(screeching)

Our story begins when all of life is waiting.

(hissing)

It's a time when wildlife is pushed to extremes.

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A time when ancient cultures anxiously await the great rains

To deliver the wonders of the monsoon.

(thunder)

From india to australia,

Life is dominated by an immense weather system.

The monsoon.

Throughout the year

Unimaginable quantities of water

Are moved about this swath of our planet

In rhythms sometimes unpredictable and mysterious.

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The monsoon delivers a deluge,

And with it the miracle of rejuvenation.

(chirping)

(screeching)

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But the monsoon can also bring drought.

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Such extremes test the endurance

Of every creature... And everybody.

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We begin our journey

In the far southern extreme of the monsoon world.

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It's dry season in northern australia.

(bird squawking)

(insect buzzing)

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Six long months without rain.

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(birds chirping)

But there is an escape from this dry and thirsty land.

(birds chirping)

The roper river.

Fed by underground springs, it flows throughout the year.

It's a vital refuge for a small mammal

With an intense dislike for the sun.

(chirping)

The little red flying fox.

(chirping)

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These bats are waiting for the monsoon rains.

But right now, it's 100 degrees fahrenheit.

Just a few degrees more, and they will die.

(screeching)

Squabbles break out for shade.

(screeching)

They're dehydrating.

300,000 bats are desperate for water.

(screeching)

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Only the roper river can save them.

(screeching)

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By soaking their chests,

They collect a little water to lick off back at the roost.

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This is probably the most dangerous thing

They will ever do.

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Australian freshwater crocodiles.

Warmed by the summer heat.

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A crocodile's jaws snap shut in the blink of an eye.

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The bats' reactions must be quicker.

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They must choose a spot and run the gauntlet.

(screeching)

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(screeching)

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The survivors will brave the river every day

Until the monsoon rains break.

(chirping)

Which must be soon.

(screeching)

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The pre-monsoon.

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It's a tense, menacing time that can last for weeks,

And brings an unexpected danger.

(thunder)

Dry lightning.

(thunder)

The spark that ignites the fire devil.

(roaring)

(roaring)

(crackling)

This raging tornado of fire

Can grow to more than 300 feet high.

It incinerates everything in its path.

(roaring)

At its core, the temperature can reach over 1,800 degrees.

(rumbling)

From all around, air is sucked into the furnace,

Feeding the flames before being blasted high into the sky.

(whooshing)

(rumbling)

(rumbling)

By a similar process of heat rising

That right now the monsoon winds

Are drawn toward australia.

(wind howling)

But on a scale that's continental.

The entire landmass is now a vast hot plate.

It heats the air above, causing it to rise,

Which then sucks in more air from all around.

These are the monsoon winds.

And as they hit australia's coast,

Great storms begin to build.

(wind howling)

As the humid air hits the heated land,

It's thrust upward...

Rapidly cooling, condensing...

And forming clouds taller than the world's highest mountains.

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Giant cumulonimbus.

The biggest and most powerful clouds on the planet.

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Inside, vast electric charges build on a monumental scale.

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The energy released from just a single storm cell

Can be equivalent to an exploding atom bomb.

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These clouds can release 1,000 lightning strikes an hour.

(thunder)

(thunder)

With every discharge, the air around explodes

At over 45,000 degrees,

Four times hotter than the surface of the sun.

(thunder)

(thunder)

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(thunder)

At last the flying foxes are free.

No longer tied to the crocodiles' river,

They can return to their nomadic life

And disperse across the outback.

(thunder)

For the next few months,

One of the biggest weather systems on earth

Sits over northern australia,

Transforming the land and stirring dragons.

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A frill-necked lizard.

He's endured the dry season heat

And lack of food

By drifting in and out of a state of suspended animation.

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But the monsoon rains have triggered a bounty.

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This is his chance.

He must cram a year of life into these few short months.

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But he's not the only predator the monsoon wakes.

The black-headed python has a taste for lizards.

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(hissing)

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His frill is a bluff to look big and ferocious.

But if it doesn't work, he's off.

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He sprints so fast that his upper body lifts off.

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At speeds of up to 9 miles an hour,

No snake is going to catch him.

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This is a lizard that lives life in the fast lane,

At least while the southern monsoon is overhead.

(thunder)

More than 900 miles to the north,

On a remote, tiny island, the rains have triggered

Another extraordinary emergence.

One of the greatest wonders of the monsoon.

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Across the island, the forest floor is erupting.

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More than 40 million burrows are opening up.

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The red crabs of christmas island.

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For most of the year they hid below ground

Feeding on rotting leaves.

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But now, with the monsoon and rising humidity,

They begin to March.

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It's time to spawn.

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The forest is a colossal assault course.

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And the neighbors are indignant at the sudden swarm.

(squawking)

(squawk)

(squawk)

A nesting booby is best avoided.

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(squawk)

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But the crabs face a more insidious danger.

Suffocation.

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Crabs, even land crabs,

Breathe with gills that must remain moist.

They attempt this journey

Only when the monsoon brings damp air.

But every time the clouds part, water evaporates

And gets increasingly difficult to breathe.

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But that's not the end of their troubles.

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Monster-size robber crabs.

Their legs span up to 3 feet across.

And with little competition,

They've become the top predator.

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(crunch)

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(crunch)

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But no matter how many they kill,

They won't dent red crab numbers.

There are just too many of them.

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The island's entire population, over 45 million of them,

Are on the March.

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Journey's end.

(waves lapping)

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More than two weeks have passed

Since these crabs left the darkness of their burrows.

(waves lapping)

And this is why they've come so far.

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Tonight, when the tide is at its highest,

Billions of red crab eggs will be released into the sea.

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Mission complete.

They'll return to their forest burrows

Before the island dries out once more.

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Thanks to the moisture brought by the monsoon,

These crabs can make their incredible journey.

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The colossal weather system

Revives australia and its neighboring islands.

But further north, it's making life surprisingly difficult.

Monsoon winds draw away moist air,

Creating a dry season in one of the most unexpected places.

Southeast asia's equatorial islands.

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The annual rainfall for some islands

Can be as much as 20 feet.

(birds chirping)

But even here it's seasonal.

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What amounts to a sort of dry spell

Is actually crucial for the survival

Of some forest species.

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Dipterocarp trees, some up to 230 feet tall.

As the forest dries out, something magical happens.

They all flower and fruit at the same time.

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Which means all their winged seeds ripen,

Then drop together.

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Each tree sheds as many as 20 million seeds,

So there are billions carpeting the forest floor.

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Though triggered by the unpredictable failure

Of the monsoon,

The reason for this spectacle is the trees' greatest foe.

A tiny weevil, less than the width of a matchstick.

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This is a voracious seed predator.

But because the trees have not fruited for several years,

The weevil population has starved

And has been kept in check.

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By fruiting now as one,

The remaining weevils are swamped by a glut of food...

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...Guaranteeing that many of the seeds

Will survive and germinate.

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The trees have used a rare failed monsoon

As a cue to outwit their number one enemy.

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(seeds landing)

But there was a time when the monsoon cycles

Mysteriously changed and weakened for almost a century.

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In the forests of cambodia

Lie the remains of a once thriving city.

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The temple angkor wat.

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Nearly 1,000 years ago

Angkor was the pre-industrial world's greatest city.

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Built on the bounty of the monsoon.

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Superb engineers constructed vast reservoirs

To collect monsoon waters,

Used for irrigation and pushing food production to the maximum.

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At its peak, over a million people lived in angkor,

But then the monsoon weakened,

Causing a cycle of severe droughts

That lasted nearly 100 years.

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Drought brought famine

And an end to the wealth and prosperity.

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Angkor's population collapsed.

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The kingdom fell, its buildings consumed by the forest.

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Its people had created a system

That relied totally on the monsoon.

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Too fragile to survive such drastic change.

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Today, over half the world's population

Is dependent on the monsoon's fickle nature.

Each year in india, people's hopes focus

On whether the rains will come to them.

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An explosion of color welcomes spring

As rainbow playfights take to the streets

In the joyous celebration of holi.

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It marks the end of the dry winter

And anticipates what all hope is soon to come.

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In mathura temple, in northern india,

Families gather in a centuries-old tradition.

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They're honoring a symbolic victory

Of the future over the past and good over evil.

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And for this, they call on the monsoon.

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Water is colored with the spring flowers of the forest.

Symbolic of the monsoon rains,

It washes away the dust of the dry season and the old year.

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This is a rebirth for everyone.

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But underlying the color and good humor

Is something far more serious.

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Economic success, and even a family's very survival,

Depend on the rains.

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The himalaya, the highest peaks on earth.

And beyond, the great tibetan plateau.

This is the other driver of the monsoon,

Even more powerful than australia.

As the plateau heats up in spring, hot air rises,

Drawing in monsoon winds

From far beyond the southern tip of india.

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When the winds pull at the surface of the indian ocean,

They create currents so powerful

That even the waters of the deep sea

Turn to follow...

Bringing great change beneath the waves.

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In the maldives, an unusual gathering takes place

Triggered by the pull from the distant tibetan plateau.

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A giant manta ray almost 13 feet across.

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They're normally solitary wanderers,

But now many arrive together in one small, shallow bay.

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They're here for a feast.

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Mantas feed on microscopic plankton--

Relatively scarce in the tropics.

But the monsoon winds pull up cold nutrient-rich water

From the depths, full of plankton.

It's trapped for just a few hours

In the confines of this bay.

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Remarkably, the mantas know when to be here,

Almost to the minute.

Just how they know is still a mystery.

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For a fleeting moment,

It's the greatest gathering of giant mantas in the world.

And all brought about

By the winds blowing toward the tibetan plateau.

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After just a few hours the plankton disperses,

And conditions won't be as good again until next year.

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Above the waves, through the monsoon season,

The winds hold steady and strong heading toward india.

(birds chirping)

It's April in kanha, northern india,

And the forest wakes to a new summer day.

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Soon it will be unbearably hot.

But there's a sure sign that change is coming.

(honking)

According to local folklore,

The peacock's call means the monsoon is just weeks away.

(rustling)

Right now, his one desire is a partner.

(squawk)

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(rustling)

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But peahens aren't so easily impressed.

(rustling)

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If only he could mate now,

Eggs would hatch just in time for the monsoon.

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(honking)

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But intruders are hampering his chances.

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The April sun in northern india

Is scorching hot by mid-morning.

The forest is drying out,

Toughest perhaps for the chital deer.

The ground is parched

And food out of reach for even the tallest stags.

But they've learned that, for now,

It's a good idea to hang out

With fellow forest dwellers hanuman langur monkeys.

Mahua trees produce their strange fleshy flowers

Before the rains, just when the animals most need them.

There's so much that the monkeys can take their fill

And leave the rest.

(insects buzzing)

Sticking with the langurs

Means the chital can keep their strength,

But there's also security in their combined numbers.

(growling)

A tiger mother with two rapidly growing cubs.

(growling)

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They're bouncing with energy.

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Not even the heat of the day stops their play.

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(growl)

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(growling)

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(growling)

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Despite the invitation,

Their mother is more intent on keeping cool than joining in.

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Experience tells her it's only going to get hotter.

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Right across india, temperatures are soaring.

It's June, and the monsoon should be here by now.

Roads must be repaired before the expected floods.

But will they come?

The city waits.

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Traders monitor the market.

When rains delay, food prices rocket.

The impact of a failed monsoon

Will ripple across the entire world.

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(men chanting)

With the monsoon already late and the stakes so high,

It calls for desperate measures.

(chanting)

(chanting)

(chanting)

(chanting)

(chanting)

(chanting)

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In a sacred ceremony called upon

Only when fears of failure are greatest,

Holy brahmins give voice to ancient vedic texts

That are learned by heart.

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(chanting)

They call on varuna, the god of water.

(chanting)

(chanting)

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This centuries-old ritual

Asks varuna to deliver india from drought.

Prayers to bring the mighty monsoon.

(chanting)

(chanting)

But will he answer?

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Surviving the drought is getting tougher by the hour.

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On the northern indian saltpans,

The rains are now two weeks late.

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And for one family

The situation is becoming critical.

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New foals have been born into a herd of asian wild ass,

Their birth timed to coincide

With the usual arrival date of the monsoon.

All around new grass should be growing,

But the frazzled ground offers nothing.

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A mother struggles to provide her youngster with enough milk.

And now there's danger coming from within the herd.

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Rain or not, the stallion has one thing on his mind.

(braying)

(braying)

(braying)

(braying)

He can't delay.

Breed now and next year's foals will arrive on schedule

In time for a normal monsoon and its fresh green grass.

(braying)

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(braying)

(growling)

But the mares have barely enough energy

To care for this year's foals, let alone carry another.

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They'll resist, but there's nowhere else to go.

The herd must endure the rising tensions

And wait for the life-giving monsoons to return.

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In the forest,

Chital deer are tied to the last muddy waterholes.

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A hungry tigress is enticed to come out, even in this heat.

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But chital have a keen sense of smell.

(stomps and barks)

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(barks)

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(barking)

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Still the tigress brings down a large stag,

A sort of gift from the delayed monsoon.

(thunder)

Finally, a sign that the rains could be on their way.

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(thunder)

India has endured months of drought.

(thunder)

Could the long wait be over?

(thunder)

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When the deluge comes, the land will be green again.

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But the monsoon can bring both welcome relief

And complete devastation.

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The only certainty is that all of life here

Is about to change.

Captioned by side door media services

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