Original subtitles

>> NARRATOR: A secret city

built into the side of a

mountain.

>> NICK REDFERN: It has its

own lake, it has sidewalks,

it has shops, it has a railway.

>> NARRATOR: A cavernous control

room hidden 16 stories

beneath Central Park.

>> STEVE DUNCAN: It's a project

that takes as long as one of the

ancient pyramids, using

contemporary technologies.

>> NARRATOR: And a subterranean

rail system, that runs coast to

coast.

>> ROBIN DORNFEST: Is it

possible to have an underground

maglev system?

Absolutely.

>> NARRATOR: Americans may be

aware of what's above ground,

but do they know what's

concealed beneath?

>> JAMIE HENN: The explosion was

so large that people thought an

airplane had crashed into

their neighborhood.

No one even knew that a pipeline

was running through their

community.

>> NARRATOR: And is there a

reason why so much that is below

ground remains a secret?

>> MARK ALLIN: What our

government and big industries

are doing, there's a whole lot

they don't want us to know.

>> NARRATOR: There are those who

believe in the existence of a

book.

A book that contains the

most highly guarded secrets of

the United States of America.

A book...

whose very existence

is known to only a select few.

But if such a book exists,

what would it contain?

Secret bases?

Secret transports?

Secret vaults?

Does there really exist

America's Book of Secrets?

>> NARRATOR: Bowling Green,

Kentucky.

February 12, 2014.

A mammoth sinkhole opens up

under the National Corvette

Museum, swallowing eight vintage

and rare race cars whole.

Among those lost...

a 1993 ZR-1 Spyder...

a 1984 PPG Pace Car...

and a 1962 black Corvette.

>> JAMIE HENN: One of the most

dramatic things that's happened

in the United States below

ground is the appearance of

these massive sinkholes.

These are the size of multiple

football fields.

They swallow entire houses.

Entire towns at some points.

>> MARK ALLIN: People are really

freaked out about sinkholes

because if you were sitting in

your living room and you heard

this rumbling noise, you

heard your dog howling before

it disappeared into a hole in

your backyard, that would freak

you out, too.

>> NARRATOR: In 2013, sinkholes

made headlines across the

country for swallowing people,

cars, and even a building at a

resort in Florida.

In fact, the number of sinkhole

claims to Florida insurance

companies tripled from 2006 to

2010.

The frightening trend makes

many wonder what could be

causing the sudden proliferation

of sinkholes?

Could a vengeful Mother Nature

be behind the recent outbreak?

Or might it be something else?

>> JOE LANIER: We've got Swiss

cheese under our country.

This is a problem, and this is

not a natural problem.

This is a problem because we're

messing around with things we

shouldn't be messing around

with.

>> NARRATOR: Assumption Parish,

Louisiana.

August 3, 2012.

A massive sinkhole opens up

right under the town that

eventually grows to over 20

acres wide

and 750 feet deep.

350 residents are forced to

evacuate in order to save their

lives.

It is one of the most

disruptive and costly sinkholes

yet to be reported in

the United States.

After a thorough investigation,

authorities blame the sinkhole

on a collapsed underground salt

dome operated by Texas Brine

Company.

Geologists point to the collapse

as one of the consequences of a

method called undermining, a

process where underground

excavation erodes the foundation

of bedrock.

>> ROBIN DORNFEST: Manmade

sinkholes occur all the time.

Something has to cause them.

A common form of a manmade

sinkhole is related to mining.

There's lots of areas that

have been undermined and over

time those mines collapse...

(rumbling)

...and this void migrates to the

surface and forms a sinkhole.

>> HENN: Picture the

foundations of your house.

It's held up by pillars, by

concrete, by the earth that's

happening there.

What we're doing is basically

messing with all of that.

And when you do that, especially

in geologically sensitive areas,

it can have disastrous

consequences.

>> NARRATOR: With reports of

sinkholes on the rise, and

Americans fearful of where they

might strike next, more people

than ever are focusing on just

what is or isn't

underground.

The fact is, beneath America

lies a mammoth infrastructure.

Experts say underground are 2.5

million miles of pipelines,

including 182,000 miles for

hazardous liquid, and 2,145,000

miles for gas distribution and

transmission.

Also hidden, 19 million miles

of fiber-optic cables installed

in 2011 alone.

>> GARY BRIERLEY: Americans

would definitely be shocked if

they knew how much of the, uh,

urban infrastructure was

underground.

All infrastructure-- sewer

lines, water lines, gas lines,

fiber-optic cables-- it's

primarily put underground for

security purposes.

It's very safe, it's also out of

sight, out of mind.

>> DORNFEST: There are many

secret things underground.

By its very definition, things

that are underground are

typically hidden.

When we want to hide things,

underground is a good place to

put them, so that's why we often

put utilities and the pipelines

and cables and things like that

underground.

There's not a lot of people

that know what really happens

underground and what's down

there.

>> NARRATOR: Americans might not

know about the hidden structures

beneath their feet,

but as more and more large

projects move underground, like

the massive Keystone XL oil

pipeline, their scope and scale

affect even more citizens every

day, whether they want them to

or not.

>> HENN: The Keystone XL

pipeline has been a real fight

about who owns the land and who

gets to determine what's gonna

happen on it.

TransCanada, the company

that's trying to build this

project, has taken over 30

families and ranchers and

farmers to court.

And so a lot of people are

really concerned that while they

may own the property above

ground, uh, they don't have a

right to stop the type of

industrial development below

ground.

So there are a lot of fights

underway right now about

trying to block these companies

from using eminent domain and

other ways to take the land from

people.

>> NARRATOR: Many now worry that

the growing number of structures

built underground could have

unintended consequences in the

future.

>> ALLIN: It stands to reason

that as our population

increases, our demand for

service increases.

There is no doubt that we have

more and more and more stuff

going underneath our feet,

underneath our country.

There's no question about it.

A lot of people are concerned

that the activities of

industry and government

are causing more issues.

Undoubtedly, some of that has

got to be true.

>> NARRATOR: Some experts

believe the infrastructure we

put underground could cause

problems above ground to

skyrocket.

In fact, not only could what we

put underground be destructive

to private and public property,

it could also prove to be

downright deadly.

San Bruno, California.

September 9, 2010.

A 30-inch diameter leaky gas

pipeline explodes...

(explosion)

...just two miles west of San

Francisco International Airport.

Eight people are killed in the

blast.

>> HENN: I remember seeing the

giant cloud of smoke over the

city skyline.

It created 300-foot-high flames

into the air.

The explosion was so large that

people thought an airplane had

crashed into their neighborhood.

And the most amazing thing about

it was no one even knew that a

pipeline was running through

their community.

People had no idea that there

had been a leaky pipeline

underneath their property and

even the companies didn't really

know because they don't monitor

it.

We need a much better idea of

what's actually happening below

our feet.

>> ALLIN: There's a lot of

speculation that these things

are caused from activities

of industry.

Builders, big developments.

Who knows what?

The reality of it is we're never

gonna find out because if that

is what's causing it, there is

so much money being made that

they're not gonna stop.

>> NARRATOR: Some may ask why

put such a vast network, so

important for society's

day-to-day functions,

underground?

>> ALLIN: When it comes to what

our government and our big

industries are doing, there's a

whole lot they don't want us to

know, and there's probably some

decent reasons why we just

really shouldn't be discussing

it out in the open.

National security,

industrial security.

There is no question in my mind

at all that there is a whole lot

more going on under there that

we don't know about than there

is that we do know about.

>> NARRATOR: America's vast

underground can offer

protection, security,

but above all...

secrecy.

And there are some who believe

that buried deep beneath our

soil lies a clandestine rail

system,

but not one that secretly

transports people across town,

but across the entire nation.

>> NARRATOR: The New York City

subway is the largest

underground transit system in

America, moving over two million

people a day.

The network covers over 840

miles of track alone.

Enough to make two round trips

from the Big Apple to

Washington, D.C. and back,

and contains 468 subway

stations.

But the growing city's subway

lines are packed to capacity.

So, New York's Metropolitan

Transit Authority, or MTA,

is adding a new subway line

that will run underneath

2nd Avenue for eight miles.

How will the city complete this

underground feat of engineering?

With a massive tunnel boring

machine, or TBM.

>> DORNFEST: They're large

machines that we put in the

ground that basically have a

circular disc in the front that

allows you to excavate the

ground and build a tunnel or

a pipe behind that machine.

>> NARRATOR: The largest tunnel

boring machines are over 60-feet

tall and 400 feet long.

They can dig through anything

from sand to bedrock.

But some believe that the use of

these machines may also provide

evidence of secret government

transportation projects.

Projects far more ominous than

any subway expansion line.

>> ALLIN: If someone were to

come across one at a military

installation, that would make

you wonder what are they doing?

Well, obviously, what they're

doing is they're digging

underground hidden bunkers

and/or train ways or who

knows what.

>> JOHN LEAR: Tunnel boring

machines make huge

underground areas.

For instance, under Edwards Air

Force Base, uh, there's huge

areas there, uh, that are

tunneled out.

There's other underground rail

systems that connect the

different Air Force bases.

They connect, uh, Edwards Air

Force Base with China Lake,

Nellis, Area 51, Groom Lake,

and then out to New Mexico at a

facility called Dulce there.

And, uh, connect all those.

>> NARRATOR: Are there really

underground transport systems

that have been kept hidden from

the American public?

Some suspect that not only do

hidden underground rail systems

connect various army bases, but

that there also exists a covert

rail system used coast to coast

to ferry government officials in

times of crisis.

>> LEAR: The main one that I

found out about belonged to the

U.S. Navy.

The base of it was in San Diego.

It was reached by going down the

submarine pens, and there was

a tracked system with cars on it

that somehow you could get in

these vehicles and be anywhere

in a manner of minutes.

The tube system is a, uh, sort

of maglev type of operation.

>> BRIERLEY: "Maglev" refers to

"magnetic levitation."

If you put two magnets together

they repel one another,

so the train is lifted off the

tracks, and then it can be used

to propel the train.

>> DORNFEST: Is it possible to

have an underground maglev

system?

Absolutely.

We have underground subways,

trains are evolving every day,

the technology is growing.

I don't see why one day we

couldn't have underground maglev

systems.

>> NARRATOR: Perhaps government

officials aren't just using a

secret underground rail system.

Some believe they could also be

covertly travelling underwater

by submarine.

In the middle of the Nevada

desert sits Walker Lake.

The body of water supports a

strange curiosity.

A naval undersea warfare

training center.

Critics wonder why place an

undersea warfare center right

in the middle of the desert?

>> LANIER: It's very odd to

have a naval center out in the

middle of the desert.

What are they doing there?

Unless there's a lot of deep

water, um, that-that we don't

know about, that lake wouldn't

be sufficient to really train

Navy SEALs, you know?

So there's, so there's got to be

something else to that that we

don't know about, and I suspect

that there is.

>> NARRATOR: Could the lake be

hiding a secret, one that

allows for clandestine transport

underwater?

>> NICK REDFERN: The story is

that it's essentially like a

bottomless lake that runs all

the way to the coastline near

Santa Cruz.

Some believe that Walker Lake

actually allows military

submarines to travel from the

coastline near Santa Cruz

through this underground tunnel

filled with water and then to

surface in the vicinity of

Walker Lake.

In other words, this would

allow military submarines to

travel from the Pacific

secretly deep under the land,

and then surface somewhere in

Walker Lake.

It's far from the coastline.

>> LEAR: The Navy transports,

uh, all kinds of things that

they don't want us

to know about.

Warheads, all kinds of

munitions.

Many people ask how I got

all this information.

As far as the Hawthorn

underground, that came from, um,

people that work there that felt

that that should be in the

public domain.

>> NARRATOR: While some believe

the government is using

underwater passages for

transport, others agree that

authorities are hiding a secret

water chamber...

underneath a city of eight

million people.

Could its secret location be so

valuable that tampering with it

might lead to riots, bloodshed

and even death?

(woman screams)

>> NARRATOR: New York City,

Manhattan's Central Park.

Over 35 million people a year

visit this national historic

landmark to escape the city's

hustle and bustle.

But buried 16 stories beneath

the park lies a secret.

One that the city's government

keeps hidden to avoid it falling

into the wrong hands.

>> BRIERLEY: People like to

store things underground because

it is safe and secure.

It's difficult to access.

And they can control who is

available to visit these

facilities.

>> NARRATOR: What is the

mysterious entity under the park

that thousands unknowingly pass

over every day?

Officials say it is a brand-new,

massive water tunnel mechanical

room nicknamed the "bat cave."

The mechanical room controls

the city's new water tunnel

number three.

>> Fire in the hole!

(explosion)

>> STEVE DUNCAN: This is the

biggest project New York has

ever tried to accomplish.

Far bigger than the Empire

State Building.

Bigger than the Brooklyn Bridge.

Bigger than the Verrazano and

Narrows Bridge, both of which

set records when they were

constructed.

It's a project that takes as

long as one of the ancient

pyramids, using contemporary

technology and techniques.

>> NARRATOR: The project dates

back to the 1950s, when city

leaders realized New York City's

water supply couldn't keep up

with a rapidly growing

population.

The city's fresh water traveled

from reservoirs 120 miles

upstate, flowing through two

massive water tunnels, but even

that wasn't enough.

>> DUNCAN: New Yorkers consume,

on average, about 142 gallons

per day, per person.

That includes water that we're

drinking, showering, and, you

know, running the dishwasher, as

well as industrial uses.

>> NARRATOR: But not only was

the city's water supply becoming

more scarce, the existing two

water tunnels were becoming less

and less reliable.

>> Watch the pressure!

>> DUNCAN: They've been leaking

pretty catastrophically, but you

can't shut them down for even a

day, because then you'll have

giant sections of New York that

are going without water.

And that's a horrendous health

hazard that can be catastrophic.

So, city water tunnel number

three is gonna do, it's gonna

distribute more water.

It's gonna do it more

effectively throughout the five

boroughs and it's gonna finally

allow us to do maintenance

on the earlier two.

>> NARRATOR: The cavernous,

60-foot-high chamber beneath

the park will help control the

flow of the new water tunnel to

the thirsty metropolis.

But park-goers would be hard

pressed to find the chamber's

entrance.

>> DUNCAN: The city has tried

to keep people, uh, away from

the city water tunnel number

three, except the people who

are directly concerned with

building it.

>> NARRATOR: But why is the

entrance to the chamber secretly

hidden somewhere in the middle

of Central Park?

>> DUNCAN: Those are considered

to be really sensitive command

centers for the water supply.

And they keep the actual

position secret.

They're trying to prevent any

bad guys essentially from being

able to screw with New York's

water supply, because if our

water supply were to get cut

off, uh, it would, it could

be devastating.

>> NARRATOR: Just how

devastating would it be if the

city that never sleeps had its

water tunnels compromised?

>> JOHN CASTI: If the fresh

water supply was compromised in

some way, people dump some kind

of chemicals or poisons or other

things into the water supply, a

lot of people get very sick,

and they will die.

Another type of attack might be

where the water supply is just

shut off.

So, uh, you don't get sick.

You-you get highly dehydrated.

>> DUNCAN: One of our only

emergency water supplies in the

city limits would be the small

lake in Central Park.

Now, that looks like a lot of

water, the lake is about 40

feet deep.

It's somewhere around a billion

gallons of water.

But that's less than one day of

water for New York City.

The city of New York would be

drastically thirsty within one

day... period.

If in some way the valve

chambers got damaged by bad

guys, that would be just about

the most crippling blow that

could be dealt to New York

City's infrastructure.

>> NARRATOR: If New York City's

water supply were to be cut off

or contaminated, experts worry

that entire neighborhoods could

be destroyed by chaos and

anarchy, crippling whole

communities from within.

>> CASTI: People just take what

they want from the food stores,

hardware stores and whatever.

And when those are cleaned out,

there's still plenty of people

left who don't have food or

weapons.

And they band together and you

get reduced back to survivalism.

Ultimately in the end, the-the

iron rule is-is you have to

survive.

>> NARRATOR: But while officials

worry about terrorists breaching

our underground infrastructure,

could they already be here

living next door to us

after sneaking through an

elaborate tunnel system

at America's borders?

>> NARRATOR: Nogales, Arizona.

February 14, 2014.

Federal authorities confiscate

46 pounds of marijuana and a

half a pound of heroin inside a

small home along the U.S. and

Mexican border, leading to the

immediate arrest of three

suspects.

But investigators are more

shocked by what they find

beneath the home.

A 481-foot drug smuggling

tunnel, the longest ever

discovered in the Nogales area.

This super tunnel has its own

wood shoring, electric lighting,

and ventilation system,

and stretches longer than one

and a half football fields.

But the Nogales tunnel is just

the latest found in a massive

network of underground smuggling

tunnels discovered along the

United States border.

>> JEFFREY GROSSMAN: Those

tunnels are used for

transporting illegal materials--

drugs, money, weapons, even

even human assets,

prostitution, human trafficking.

>> TERRY KIRKPATRICK: In

Nogales, Arizona, there have

been over about 270 tunnels

discovered in the last five

years alone.

And then come up 30 feet

into houses, bowling alleys,

churches.

Come up into kids bedrooms,

below stoves, behind

refrigerators, entryways and

even doghouses out in the yard.

>> NARRATOR: Traditionally,

backpackers would simply hike

across the border under the

cover of darkness to bring

contraband into the U.S., but in

1982 when Ronald Reagan declared

a war on drugs, trafficking

moved underground.

>> GROSSMAN: The tunnels

started sprouting up in the

late 1980s.

And they were makeshift, if you

will.

They weren't engineered

properly, they caved in a lot,

and a lot of people lost their

lives in these tunnels.

>> NARRATOR: Tighter security

measures above ground started to

change the nature of underground

tunnel smuggling.

In 1996, President Bill Clinton

ordered an increase of foot

patrols to secure the U.S.

border with Mexico.

And in 2006, President George W.

Bush signed into law the Secure

Fence Act, which mandated the

construction of 700 miles of

reinforced fencing.

>> LAURA DUFFY: The Southwest

border has undergone tremendous

change.

There are stretches of

the fencing that's been

completely modernized.

And there are stretches where

nonexistent fencing, primary

fencing and secondary fencing is

now in place.

>> GROSSMAN: A super tunnel

today is quite different from a

tunnel from the '80s.

They come equipped with their

own lights and a transportation

system or a rail system.

>> DUFFY: Some of them we've

even seen that they have

elevators, uh, they have

telephone lines.

>> NARRATOR: These secret

tunnels aren't just

architecturally complex, they're

also built over an inordinate

amount of time.

>> DUFFY: You've got an

extremely labor-intense process.

This is a process that can

take up to a year to construct

one of these things.

>> NARRATOR: But just who would

invest so much time and money

to build something so secret?

>> GROSSMAN: Drug cartels

mainly are behind the tunneling

systems.

You have to have a strong

financial structure in place to

fund these type of operations.

>> NARRATOR: With drug cartels

fixated on their bottom line,

homeland security experts worry

about a horrific, looming

possibility.

What if Mexican cartel leaders

secretly teamed up with

terrorist organizations to use

their tunnels for even more

sinister purposes?

Could greedy cartel lords be

bribed by terrorist

organizations, allowing them to

bring unthinkable carnage to the

United States?

>> KIRKPATRICK: The worst case

scenario would be, uh, any

terrorist coming in the United

States with some kind of weapons

of mass destruction or some

biological weapon that we're not

aware of, and it affects

hundreds of thousands of U.S.

citizens.

It's definitely a possibility.

Money supports both

organizations.

Uh, the terrorists need money to

operate.

The drug smugglers need money

to, uh, buy more drugs and keep

their business afloat.

>> NARRATOR: The U.S.

Department of Homeland Security

considers this scenario a valid

threat, and as the tunnels have

evolved, officials have

attempted to stay one step ahead

of the cartel's game by using

the latest sophisticated

technology to detect movement

underground.

(indistinct radio transmission)

>> GROSSMAN: There are cameras,

there are drones, there's

satellites, there's sonar

equipment that's used.

>> DUFFY: There are ground

sensors using, uh, seismic waves

to detect underground movement

by looking at cavities that

might be underground.

>> NARRATOR: Technology has

helped authorities destroy

secret subterranean spaces, but

could it also help to build them

as well?

There are some who believe that

government has access to

technology that is so advanced

that it has allowed them to

create entire cities...

underground.

>> NARRATOR: September 11,

2001.

(people screaming)

As the twin towers of Manhattan

crumble to the ground and the

Pentagon burns in Virginia,

chaos reigns in the Capitol.

Could the U.S. government

itself be under assault?

As President Bush is flown from

a speaking engagement in Florida

to Andrews Air Force Base, some

suspect the Secret Service,

following protocol for

continuity of government,

decides to put Vice President

Dick Cheney on a secret

aircraft.

Its destination is known to only

a select few, but some experts

assert the chopper is headed to

a clandestine location 48 miles

from Washington, D.C., and

buried deep underground.

>> ALLIN: In the event that

something goes so

catastrophically wrong that the

government can no longer

operate, there's a-a safe haven.

>> NARRATOR: Many believe the

safe haven the vice president

was flown to is a little-known

site called Mount Weather.

>> REDFERN: Mount Weather is one

of the most impressive

underground installations in the

United States.

It's roughly 46 miles from

Washington, D.C.

It's highly protected, and for

that reason alone, I wouldn't

recommend anybody tries to

intrude upon the facility.

>> MULLER: When I interview

the movers and shakers-- the

senators, the governors-- they

all know about Mount Weather in

Virginia.

You haven't heard about it?

That's because when a mic is on

or a camera's on, they're not

allowed to talk about it.

>> REDFERN: Mount Weather is

essentially an underground city.

Kind of imagine something like

in a James Bond movie, what the

typical super villain would

live in.

>> NARRATOR: Unofficially, Mount

Weather is an underground

shelter and command center to be

used in the event that the

United States is engaged in an

all-out war.

REDFERN: There's a very good

reason why Mount Weather is

located so close to Washington,

D.C.

In the event of a national

emergency, the president and all

his staff could be taken to

Mount Weather to allow for some

continuation of government.

>> NARRATOR: In case the

government needs to shelter

officials for an extended

period of time, some believe

Mount Weather is purposefully

laid out like a city that could

be inhabited for months

or even years.

>> REDFERN: It has its own lake,

which allows for, uh, pure fresh

water all the time.

It can house literally tens of

thousands of people for months.

It has sidewalks.

It has shops.

It has a railway.

It has an air-conditioning

system.

And most important of all,

because Mount Weather is

designed to protect the

president, it's highly fortified

below ground.

Mount Weather has this gigantic

steel door that will pretty much

withstand anything including a

nuclear attack.

>> NARRATOR: If Mount Weather

really serves as an underground

command center where people

could live for an extended

amount of time, could there be

other secret cities that our

government is trying to hide?

>> REDFERN: It would make a

great deal of sense for there to

be a Mount Weather on the west

coast, in the middle of the

country, the north and the

south.

>> NARRATOR: Some experts

declare that there exists

another, even bigger Mount

Weather, not under a

mountainside, but shockingly,

right underneath the Denver

International Airport.

>> REDFERN: When the Denver

Airport was first constructed,

the conspiracy theories began.

One of the main reasons was

because the project to built it

actually massively overran in

terms of time and in terms of

budget.

Some suggested that this

money had been kind of siphoned

off to build this secret

underground facility.

>> ALLIN: When they were

building that airport, there was

this massive, and I mean

massive, hole in the ground.

And buildings were going up

in there.

Buildings that, all of a sudden,

you know, you-you didn't see

them when the airport was

finished.

And their answer to that was,

"Well, the buildings were

incorrect, and we had such a big

"hole, we just covered them over

and kept building."

Who would buy that?

People that get into this stuff,

they think that underneath

Denver International Airport is

a Mount Weather times ten.

A Mount Weather on steroids.

>> MULLER: Remember the Planet

of the Apes?

In the second movie, Beneath

the Planet of the Apes, there's

a whole human subterranean

existence.

That's what the Denver Airport

is.

Madness up above, but the elites

have a place to gather.

>> ALLIN: If you're gonna hide

something underground, what

better place to do it then under

a huge airport kind of out in

the middle of nowhere

away from a city.

An airport is an extremely

secure location on the surface.

You can't just walk in and go

anywhere you want.

It's absolutely controlled

airspace.

And from a satellite

perspective, there's not a whole

lot to see.

That's a really, really good

place to hide.

I'd probably put it under an

airport, too.

>> NARRATOR: Some wonder what

could happen if a large-scale

attack was ever executed against

the United States?

Even if some survived in

underground bunkers,

what would become of America's

culture, history, art

and people?

There are many who believe that

the answer can be found

underground in a vault that

stores data on every single

American who ever lived.

>> NARRATOR: Little Cottonwood

Canyon, Utah.

15 miles southeast of Salt Lake

City.

Deep inside a mass of solid rock

known as Granite Mountain, lies

a secret vault protected by

steel doors that can withstand a

nuclear blast.

The vault is run by the Church

of Jesus Christ of Latter Day

Saints, a religious faith also

known as the Mormons.

>> RYAN CRAGUN: The Mormon

Vault, or often called the

Granite Mountain Vault or the

Granite Vault, is an enormous

structure.

They bore into the side of this

mountain about 600 feet, dug it

out, and they built a number of

structures in there or vaults.

>> RYAN DUBE: Three external

doors-- one of them is a 14-ton

door and the other two are nine

tons.

>> NARRATOR: Some might question

why would a religious group need

a secret vault all of its own?

The answer is unbelievable to

some.

The vault is stacked with rows

upon rows of genealogical data

saved on microfilm.

In the 1950s, the Church began

to search for a safe place to

store its collection, and

ultimately chose the underground

site at Granite Mountain.

>> CRAGUN: They had this idea

if they go underground and they

build big enough doors in front

of this, this basically makes

this nuclear bomb proof.

>> NARRATOR: And why would the

Mormon Church build an

underground vault that could

survive a nuclear war?

Some religious experts say the

answer lies in the Mormon belief

system of how souls are rewarded

in the afterlife.

Mormonism's founder Joseph

Smith believed that a person's

soul could be converted to

Mormonism after death through a

process called baptism by proxy.

>> DUBE: They have what they

call proxies, which are

stand-ins, people that are

worthy of taking part in the

rituals.

They do a full immersion into a

pool of water.

And they read the names of

the dead during this ritual.

>> NARRATOR: How do Mormons come

up with a list of the dead to

baptize?

By an extensive, secretive

collection of genealogical

records.

>> CRAGUN: They've got census

records, they've got birth

records, baptism records

wherever they can find records

of people with names and dates.

But the ultimate goal truly is

to get records of everybody.

>> NARRATOR: The Church has even

discovered a creative way to get

people to volunteer information

that helps them catalog every

human being who has ever lived

on the planet.

>> CRAGUN: They have a free Web

site, FamilySearch.org, where

you can go on and you can start

to trace your genealogy and you

can fill in details and they

will help you.

There's a question on there

when you set this up that asks

are you a member of the Church.

If you don't get to click that

button, if you're not a member

of the Church, then you don't

get any of the additional

information that's kind of

really the true motivation for

why they're doing this.

Mormons get to see who the work

has been done for.

Everybody else gets to use this

just to trace their ancestry.

Where does all this genealogical

data end up?

According to the Mormons

themselves, millions upon

millions of records eventually

find their way to microfilm that

is then stored in the Mormon

Vault.

>> DUBE: In the end, they want

to go through this ritual of

posthumous baptism.

They want to do this baptism by

proxy, so even if there's an

apocalypse, Mormons can continue

on doing what they want to do.

>> NARRATOR: Even after the

destruction of every living

person in America, a safe haven

underground could allow the

Church to take care of the

world's souls.

>> REDFERN: If there really were

an America's Book of Secrets,

I think it would reveal that

there's far more going on

underground than really anybody

realizes.

>> NARRATOR: Could America's

network of underground

infrastructure be the answer to

mankind's problems?

Or might we be paving the way to

our own destruction?

Are we creating such a vast

network of hidden tunnels,

vaults and chambers

under our feet that they are

destined to collapse

and take us with them?

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