All language subtitles for Tales.From.The.Explorers.Club.S01E01.1080p.WEBRip.x265-RARBG

On Earth's highest peak,
Explorers Club members
Edmund Hillary

and Tenzing Norgay
are either on the brink
of making history

or falling through
its cracks...

[grunting and screaming]

[Josh] ...while at Earth's
lowest point,

an ocean abyss called
Challenger Deep...

Oh, so close!

[Josh] ...Don Walsh
and Jacques Piccard pray they
won't be crushed

by the deep sea's colossal
pressure.

[sighs]

We're still alive.

[Josh] And Joe Kittinger
takes one giant leap
from the edge of space.

Every job
has its highs and lows,
but members

of the Explorers Club have
taken both to the extreme.

[Joe screaming]

[Josh] Welcome
to the world-famous
Explorers Club.

For over 100 years,
this has been a gathering
place for trailblazers.

The people who dare
to venture higher,

further and faster.

As a member
of this exclusive club,
I'm bringing

one-of-a-kind access
to its archives...

This is incredible.

[Josh] ...artifacts...

Oh, my word!

[Josh]
...and my fellow explorers.

This is actual lunar dust.

Unbelievable!

[Josh] The expeditions planned
here have tested

the boundaries of human
possibility.

Its flag has flown
on death-defying voyages

into the unknown
that forever changed
our world.

These are the greatest
adventures of all time.

These are...

Tales from the Explorers Club.

The Greek philosopher,
Aristotle, once observed,

the best things
are placed between extremes.

Here, it's just the opposite.

Extremes are what this place
is all about, pushing limits,

breaking records
and redrawing maps.

Two Explorers Club members
made it their mission to climb

to where no one in history
had gone before.

Ed Hillary and Tenzing Norgay,
two men who would rise
above the rest,

all the way to the highest
point on Earth.

[wind whooshing]

Mount Everest is the highest
peak in the Himalayas,

straddling the border
between China and Nepal.

The summit rises
to 29,035 feet.
Named after 19th century

British surveyor,
George Everest,

but the Nepalese
call it Sagarmatha,
goddess of the sky.

To them, the peak
is the sacred home
of their goddess's spirit.

If Everest's thin air
doesn't kill you,

the freezing temperatures
will.

Winds blow as strong
as a hurricane and avalanches

crash down the slopes
each day.

How does one find perspective
on extreme places like
Mount Everest,

the kind of destination
few have reached?

Lucky for me,
in my search for answers,
I'm an Explorers Club member.

I have access to the club,
its vast archives
and the most irreplaceable

resource of all,
my fellow members.

Case in point,
former Disney Imagineer
and my good friend, Joe Rohde.

He ventured to the Himalayas,
researching
one of his signature

thrill rides,
Expedition Everest.

How do locals think
of these mountains?

Is it a reverence?

Is it a fear?
Is it a respect?

There's a quality
of reverence, of course.

They are revered.

It's a problem
at the beginning,
finding Sherpas

or Tibetans who would go
on these mountains because

they were part of that sacred,
untouched realm.

-Right.
-And then, of course,
they're manifestly dangerous.

[Josh] Yeah.

So when somebody does go
and something bad happens,

everyone's like,
"See, I told you."

Right, or they simply
never come back.

[Joe] Yeah.

[wind whooshing]

[Josh] In 1953,
Everest remains unconquered,

but with a contingent
of Nepalese Sherpas
at their side,

a plucky troop of British
explorers have assembled
for a summit attempt.

Without the Sherpas'
experience and expertise,

the expedition
would be impossible.

The team's leader,
Colonel John Hunt,
is efficient and tenacious.

No one wants to get
on Hunt's wrong side,

since he will be choosing
which pair among them

will make the historic
summit assault.

No climber wants
that chance more than
a reserved,

yet resolute New Zealander
named Edmund Hillary.

In the weeks of preparation
setting up base camps,

Hillary has forged
a strong bond

with the Sherpas' leader,
Tenzing Norgay.

You get more pemmican?

Yes, plenty.

Oxygen?

Hmm, a little low.

Don't breathe so hard.

Norgay is such a critical
part of this expedition.

First of all, he is personally
incredibly experienced, right?

There was a Swiss expedition
the year before

and he almost
was at the summit.

He's been within 800 feet
of the top of this mountain.

He's already been higher
than anybody in the world.

[Edmund] It looks like
a storm is brewing.

It is all goddess's wish, sir.

[Josh] Their bond goes far
beyond climbing stories
and small talk.

Their partnership was forged,
risking their lives together
on Everest.

Early in the expedition,
Hillary had plunged down
a deep crevasse,

but Norgay alertly snagged
Hillary's trailing rope,

preventing a fatal fall,
then lifted him to safety.

Their friendship
and professionalism make
a lasting impression

on 20-year-old Kancha Sherpa,
destined to become the last

surviving member
of the expedition.

During a recent trip I made
to Everest, he invited
me to his teahouse.

There, I sought his first-hand
perspective on just
what made Hillary

and Norgay
such a special team.

His stories of their bond
only heightened
my reverence for the duo.

When the Sherpas
would get together
and talk about Hillary,

did you have
confidence in him?

[Kancha speaking
in foreign language]

At any point during
the expedition,
did you ever think about,

"This is crazy,"
you know, this...

you know,
"I should get out of here"?

[Kancha speaking
in foreign language]

So, why did you stay?

[Kancha speaking
in foreign language]

Right, you have to work.

[chuckles]

[Josh] To this moment in 1953,
Everest has repulsed

ten expeditions
and killed 19 mountaineers.

The most renowned
was Englishman,
George Mallory.

In 1924,
he and another climber,
Sandy Irvine,

were last seen high
on the peak before being

swallowed up
by a thick layer of clouds.

They disappeared
without a trace.

Hillary and Norgay are well
aware of the doomed footsteps

that they're following in,
but it does not deter them.

On May 21, Hillary,
Norgay and the rest
of the climbing party

reached their final staging
area 3,000 feet below
the summit.

On extreme expeditions
like this, the time
honored-practice

is for the leader to wait
until late in the ascent

to select his summit
assault team,

based on each
climber's performance.

[Edmund] We are here.

Give me a moment.

[Josh] Colonel Hunt
has narrowed
the field to two teams.

One is Hillary and Norgay,
the other,
Tom Bordelon, a physicist,

and Charles Evans,
a brain surgeon.

[John] Congratulations.

Tom, Charlie.

[Josh] Hunt's choice,
Bordelon and Evans.

Hillary and Norgay
must stomach
the disappointment,

but they're also on deck
if their colleagues fail.

On May 26, Bordelon
and Evans set off
to make history.

The obstacles are many,
but in this last push
above 26,000 feet,

the deadliest
is Everest's thin air.

Each breath the climbers
take contains just one-third

of the oxygen found
at sea level.

Every step
is a Herculean effort.

It's like running
on a treadmill,
but breathing through a straw.

An oxygen-starved climber
can experience dizziness,
nausea and hallucinations,

make critical errors
in judgment, and finally
lose consciousness and die.

[breathing heavily]

You all right?

Never better.

[Josh] Bordelon
and Evan's supplemental
oxygen provides relief,

but only as long as their
supply holds out.

At 1:00 p.m.,
they reach the elevation
of 28,700 feet,

higher than any known
climber before.

But Evans is spent
and their oxygen will never
last if they continue.

Reluctantly, they retreat.

Hours later,
at the expedition's base camp,

a colleague snaps
this picture.

They were 330 feet
from immortality,

but Everest had left them
exhausted and defeated.

Tom Bordelon always
regretted his decision
to turn back,

even though going
on would have
meant certain death.

That may not make sense
to many people,
but it's the kind of thinking

members of this club
would understand.

[Josh] Edmund Hillary
and Tenzing Norgay

are about to put that mindset
to the ultimate test.

The date is May 28, 1953,
two days after Bordelon

and Evans came so close
to making history.

It is now Hillary
and Norgay's turn.

Their strategy is to climb
as high as they can to a point

where they can set up
camp for the night,

then set out again
with fresh legs at dawn.

27,900 feet up,
they sleep higher than

any known humans
have slept before.

The temperature drops
to 30 degrees below zero.

In the morning,
Hillary finds his boots
have frozen solid.

It takes him
an hour to thaw them.

Any number of variables
can derail them at this point,

weather, equipment failure
or an untimely slip leading
to catastrophic injury.

The odds of failure far
outweigh the odds of success.

Still, the weather
has cleared.

The day seems perfect
for their assault
on the summit.

But as Hillary and Norgay
climb to a spot just below it,

Everest throws up one final,
seemingly insurmountable
obstacle.

A nearly vertical 40-foot
wall of rock and ice.

Retreat seems the only option,
but never bet against
two obsessed explorers

ready to risk everything now
that success
is tantalizingly close.

The now-famous cliff
face towers over

Hillary and Norgay like
a granite guardian,
refusing to let them pass.

Scaling a rock like
this is hard enough.

Imagine trying
it at the crushing altitude
of your last airline flight.

Studying the challenge,
Hillary and Norgay
spot a solution.

There's a jagged crack
running the length
of the step,

with a rock pillar
on one side and a ridge
of ice on the other,

and a space just big enough
for one climber.

This is the final barrier
to overcome.

There are no other routes.

God only knows
what's racing through
Hillary's mind at this moment.

But I suspect it's the quote
for which he's most famous.

"It's not the mountain
we conquer, but ourselves."

[screaming]

Many things are named
after Edmund Hillary,

including an undersea
canyon near Antarctica
and a mountain range on Pluto.

But nothing bearing
his name carries
more mystique than

the 40-foot cliff face that
confronted him just short
of Mount Everest's summit.

The name it was given
is as understated as the man

who first dared to climb it,
the Hillary Step.

At the end of your journey,
you beat the hell
out of yourself, you know.

[Josh] Right.

And now, you're slogging
and slogging and slogging
to get up there.

And then there's a 40-foot
wall.

So you gotta chimney up
into it, it's like a crevice,
you know.

You're in there...

It's unimaginably
exhausting to do this.

And if you slip and fall,
it's a very, very,
very long way to go.

Right!

[Josh] Some explorers
become immortal by traveling
thousands of miles.

This 40-foot climb
at the top of the world

will make Edmund Hillary
a legend.

He wedges himself
in the crack between the rock

and ice and painstakingly
propels himself
upward inch by inch.

[breathing heavily]

He makes it to the top
of the step and pulls up
Norgay with his trailing rope.

It's 11:30 a.m.
when they realize
there's nowhere else to climb.

They're standing
on the highest spot on earth.

After the moment sinks in,
Hillary's thoughts
turn to George Mallory.

He searches for any signs
of him but finds nothing.

Mallory's frozen remains
will eventually be discovered

in 1999, 2,000 feet
below the summit.

After 15 minutes atop Everest,
Norgay leaves an offering
to the goddess he believes

resides in the mountain,
a chocolate bar,
biscuits and candy.

Minutes later,
Hillary snaps Norgay's picture
for posterity.

But Hillary
wouldn't let Norgay
take his picture.

Pretty much tells you
everything you need
to know about Hillary.

He wasn't in it for the glory.

The deed itself was enough.

It takes the climbers
four hours to reach
their base camp 3,000 feet

below, where
the expedition's leader,

John Hunt,
sends word of their triumph.

[John] They've done it.

[Josh] It will travel
from Everest to a Nepalese
radio post,

then relayed to London.

Britain's new queen,
Elizabeth II, is elated
to receive the news

on the eve of her coronation.

The next day,
she shares the news
with the world.

The achievement
is her favorite
coronation gift.

Since their historic first,
more than 6,000 climbers

have reached Everest's summit
and more than 200 have
died trying.

Explorers Club members
have carried 24 different
club flags to the top.

Why people climb Everest
only they can say.

But no one expressed
his reason better than
George Mallory,

"because it's there."

Seven years after
Hillary and Norgay proved
they could stand

on top of the world,
two other members
of the Explorers Club

resolved to answer
that age-old question
made famous by the limbo.

"How low can you go?"

The answer could only
be found in one place,
an undersea trench

200 miles southwest of Guam,
the deepest known
place on earth.

[Josh] Named after
the 19th century
British survey ship

that first recorded its depth,
Challenger Deep lies
at the southern end

of the Mariana Trench,
Earth's deepest oceanic abyss.

The bottom of Challenger
Deep is nearly seven miles

below the Pacific Ocean's
surface.

If Mount Everest base
rested on the seabed,

its summit would still
be 7,000 feet underwater.

Who in their right mind
would try to venture
to such a place?

The answer is this man,
Lieutenant Don Walsh.

The year is 1960.

The United States Navy
has embarked on a bold new

program of undersea
exploration.

The top brass is resolved
to send a manned mission
to Challenger Deep.

Walsh is a submarine
commander, handpicked
for the assignment.

His partners
are two Swiss civilians,
oceanographer,

Jacques Piccard,
and his physicist father,
Auguste.

They've been on the leading
edge of deep sea
research for several years.

The three men
are at an inflection point

many Explorers
Club members face.

After crunching the numbers,
exhaustive planning
and painstakingly

detailed engineering,
they must decide
whether to trust

their preparation,
their collaborators
and ultimately themselves.

Want to see our latest
figures, Don?

Yes, sir.

I'll take a look.

[Josh] When you're venturing
to where no human
has traveled before,

there's always a leap
of faith and lives
hang in the balance.

Their objective
and Auguste's confidence
are Herculean.

Now there's no better place
to hear tales
of daring missions

into the unknown
than the Explorers Club bar,

and no better person
to gain some insider
knowledge on the dangers

of Challenger Deep than
someone who's personally
made the trip,

Explorers Club President
Richard Garriott.

What's the biggest danger
they're facing?

Oh, pressure.

At that depth, the pressure
per square inch is something
like 1,000 times

the pressure we naturally
feel here at approximately
sea level,

on the surface of the earth.

That's the weight of,
you know, 50 jumbo jets.

To have made
that first dive

when the engineering
and safety aspects of the...

the doability
of this was still

so completely unknown,
I think it was truly heroic.

[speaking in foreign language]

I don't want to die, sir.

[Josh] The Navy's answer
is the one-of-a-kind

submersible designed
by Auguste, theTrieste.

Named after the Italian city
in which it is constructed,

theTrieste is essentially
an undersea balloon
that goes down instead of up.

The two-man crew occupies
a six-foot steel sphere

with walls five-inches thick,
thick enough, they hope,

to withstand
the deep sea's immense
pressure.

Above the sphere
is a 58-foot chamber,

holding 34,000 gallons
of aviation fuel.

Lighter than water,
it keeps the craft afloat.

To descend,
the crew floods
air tanks with seawater.

To rise, they release
tons of iron pellets.

Up to the point
that they're going to make

this dive, how deep
had Triestegone?

Something like 23,000 feet.

Okay.

And so, it still had another
13,000 feet or so to be tested
to this full ocean depth.

Right, which is not
insignificant.

No, that's another, you know,
400-500 atmospheres
of pressure.

[Josh] Yeah.

So it's an enormous
amount of additional pressure.

Yeah.
Right around now
is when I would ask the Navy

for a conveniently-timed
shore leave.

But Don and Jacques,
who'll be manning the Trieste,

were more than ready
to take this insane plunge.

[Josh] Go time
is January 23, 1960.

Jacques knows that surviving
the expedition depends

entirely
on his father's invention.

TheTrieste dives
at 8:23 a.m.

At 1,500 feet,
Walsh and Piccard see

the last traces of sunlight
vanish and the sea
becomes inky black.

Down they go,
dropping 200 feet per minute,
deeper and deeper.

10,000 feet, 15,000, 20,000.

At 23,000 feet,
they break their own
diving record,

entering depths never
before visited by humans.

At 29,500 feet,
Walsh and Piccard sense
the Mariana

Trench's steep walls
rising around them.

They feel the deep sea's
immense pressure
pushing on their tiny sphere.

Then at 32,400 feet.

[muffled booming]

In a flash,
theTrieste's mission
is on the brink of disaster.

This alien world might crush
the two men in a millisecond.

[Josh] Put yourself
in the shoes
of Explorers Club members,

Don Walsh and Jacques Piccard,
on January 23, 1960.

They were 32,000 feet
under the Pacific Ocean,
on the brink of becoming

the first humans to reach
the deepest point
on our planet.

But their pioneering
submersible was rocked
by a sudden noise.

If the structure
is compromised,

they might soon be crushed
by the deep sea's insanely
high pressure.

So, would you scrub
the mission or go for it?

Here at the Explorers Club,
you probably know the answer.

[Josh] Just one unforeseen
weak spot at this depth

will only be compromised
further,

as Walsh and Piccard
take theTrieste deeper.

They know
if their sphere cracks
at this unprecedented depth,

it will trigger an explosive
change in pressure
that will vaporize them.

At some significant depth,
they actually did hear
a very loud bang associated

with the breaking
of a Plexiglas outer layer
of one of their windows.

Without getting
too grisly here,

what happens
if the sub hull fails?

Well, the good-bad news
if the hull fails is that
it will implode so quickly

that none of the crew
would even know
that anything had happened.

In fact, there's an adage
in submersibles where you go,

if you hear something
go bang, that's fine,

because on the bang
that would kill you,
you won't hear it.

Right.
It's that fast?

-It's that fast.
-Wow!

[breathing heavily]

We're so close!

We're still alive.

[breathing heavily]

We dive.

Yeah.

[Josh] Walsh and Piccard
decide to roll the dice
and continue their descent.

Gutsy call, considering
they're still a mile

from the bottom
of Challenger Deep.

TheTrieste's groaning
persists, but four hours
and 38 minutes

after their dive began,
the two men touch down

on the seafloor,
seven miles below the surface.

There are no historic words,
nothing comparable to
"The eagle has landed."

[both laughing]

[Josh] But what Walsh
and Piccard have achieved

is no less impressive than
putting a man on the moon.

One for the books.

[Josh] Life Magazine
has installed a camera
in the sphere,

and Walsh
and Piccard take a selfie.

Okay, it looks more like
a police mugshot than
a moment of great achievement.

But the grim expression
speak to the fact that

they still have no idea
if they're coming home alive.

They stay on the bottom
only 20 minutes.

But during that brief time,
they make a shocking
discovery,

something no one expected
them to find.

What is that?

[Josh] Through their porthole,
they see a foot-long flatfish

browsing in the silt,
as well as a large red shrimp.

That was the first life
that had ever been even
theorized at that depth.

People didn't believe
that life could live
at such a high pressure.

Isn't that incredible?

Seven miles down
and there's life.

There's life everywhere.

-Everywhere there's water,
there's life.
-[Josh] Yeah.

In fact, there is no place
on Earth we have found water

that we did not also
now find life.

[Josh] Walsh and Piccard's
ascent takes just over
three hours.

The sheer audacity
of their expedition
is evident,

in that it will be 52 years
before another explorer
ventures to the bottom

of Challenger Deep.
The explorer is club member

and renowned film director,
James Cameron.

Since Cameron's dive,
other Explorers Club members
have followed,

including a familiar face
from the club bar,
President Richard Garriott.

To date, at least 27 people
have visited Challenger Deep.

But in the world
of exploration,
the spotlight shines brightest

on the daring
who make the journey first.

The members
of this club have dived
as deep as you can dive

and climbed
as high as you can climb.

But there's up
and then there's way, way up.

I'm talking about
the threshold of space,

the highest point above
the Earth where you haven't
quite kissed gravity goodbye.

The same year
that Walsh and Piccard
made history,

a guy named Joe risked
his life flying
to that spot in a balloon.

Then he did something
even crazier, he jumped.

[Josh] The date,
August 15, 1960.

At Holloman Air Force Base
in New Mexico,
Explorers Club member,

Joe Kittinger,
prepares for a mission

so dangerous
it defies comprehension.

Hey, Joe, looking good.

Roger that, doc.

So, this is it, huh?

This is it.

Hmm.

You sure it's going
to hold up?

It should hold.

[Joe] It should.

It'll hold.

[Josh] Kittinger is the top
test pilot
of Project Excelsior,

a research study
for America's fledgling
space program.

Its goal is to see
if pressure suits
can protect astronauts

from the harsh environment
of space, and if a man
can safely eject

from a spacecraft
at high altitudes.

Joe isn't a household
name like John Glenn
or Neil Armstrong,

but what he's about to do
will pave the way

for the future
of America's space program.

How high are we going again?

Target altitude
is 102,800 feet.

No pressure.

Yeah, literally no pressure.

[Josh] The plan is to ascend
19 miles to the edge of space,

then attempt history's longest
freefall parachute jump.

Project Excelsior's head,
Dr. John Stapp, knows
he's asking a lot of Joe,

but nothing crazier than
he's asked of himself.

In the 1950s,
Stapp volunteered

for a series of rocket
sled trials, testing pilot
safety equipment.

In 29 runs, he broke his ribs,
tailbone and wrist.

Stapp was the kind of guy
that would have scoffed
at crash test dummies.

His most insane ride
came in 1954
when he accelerated

to 632 miles per hour,
then stopped in barely
over one second.

He endured more than 46 Gs,
the force equal to a driver
slamming into a brick wall

at 120 miles per hour.

The ride burst every
blood vessel in Stapp's eyes,
leaving him temporarily blind.

Stapp is a hard act to follow,
but Joe's mission will take
extreme to a cosmic new level.

At a staging area
in the New Mexico desert,
Joe suits up with layer

after layer of warm clothing,
because the temperature
at his destination altitude

of 102,000 feet
will be 94 degrees below zero.

He'll be breathing
supplemental oxygen
the entire flight because

I just like Everest,
there's not enough

of it in the thin air
to keep you alive.

At Joe's target altitude,
the air pressure is roughly

equivalent to the surface
of Mars.

His problem is the opposite
of Walsh and Piccard's.

The higher he goes there
won't be too much pressure,
but too little.

This means that equally
crucial to Joe's survival
is his pressure suit,

which contains multiple
inflatable bladders

that will press tightly
around his body,

compensating for the near-zero
air pressure at high altitude.

Above 50,000 feet,
there is so little pressure
that without protection,

your blood circulation
will slow to a crawl

and your body
will swell up like a balloon.

You won't explode,
at least the experts
say you won't,

but you will be
in excruciating pain

before you eventually
pass out and die.

Where do I sign up?

[Josh] Joe is relying
on his pressure suit
to prevent that grisly fate.

To learn more about
the extreme hazards
of Kittinger's leap,

I'm meeting a man
who has taken the ultimate
walk at altitude,

a spacewalk that is,
club member and former
astronaut, Mike Massimino.

And when we say
pressure suit, like, how...

what is this thing doing?

We need some pressure
around our bodies to exist.

And the altitude
he's at,
there's like no pressure.

Yeah, so where he was,
he was almost at the vacuum.

There was very
little pressure.

There was no way
he could survive
without a pressure suit,

like the spacesuit
that I wore,

-it was pressurized
with oxygen.
-Right.

[Mike]
And there was a regulator

that would keep you
at the right pressures.

-[Josh] Right.
-So in his case, I think
what they used was bladders.

Like...

like actual pressure
things pushing against him.

Yeah, to try to maintain
the pressure on the skin...

-Wow.
-...to keep him alive.

Crazy.

-Absolutely insane.
-Yeah.

I mean, you're an astronaut,
so I use you as the,
as the gauge for this.

[Mike] Yeah.

-[Josh] Would you do this?
-No, I would not.

[Josh] At 5:29 in the morning,
Joe Kittinger is up,
up and away.

It will take 90 minutes
to reach his target altitude.

All goes well until
Joe hits 43,000 feet.

[grunting]

His pressure suit
is failing him.

His right glove
has not inflated.

Inside, his hand
is swelling grotesquely.

And he knows
that as he rises through
the stratosphere,

the problem
will only get worse.

But Joe also knows,
if he alerts his boss,
Colonel Stapp,

on the radio,
he'll abort the mission.

[groaning]

The idea of flying
a balloon to the edge
of space sounds like fantasy.

But in 1960,
Explorers Club member,

Joe Kittinger,
was doing it for real.

It is hard to comprehend
just how high he was going.

To put it in perspective,
the highest altitude
of the Boeing 707,

America's first jet airliner,
was 45,000 feet.

1960s newest jet fighter,
the F-4 Phantom,
topped out at 56,000 feet.

At that altitude,
Joe was barely halfway
to his objective.

[Josh] An hour
and a half after lift-off,

now in a near vacuum,
Joe has lost all feeling
in his swollen right hand,

but he finally reaches
his goal, 102,800 feet.

The black canopy of space
is just above him.

After completing
a 46-step checklist,

he switches
on the gondola's movie
cameras,

then positions himself
at the open hatch.

A placard is secured
there that says it all,

"This is the highest
step in the world."

Joe does one final thing
that's not on his checklist.

He utters a prayer.

Lord, take care of me now.

I've sky-dived,
but it would take
an electric cattle prod

to make me jump
from that height.

Joe Kittinger required
no such nudge that day.

He walked the fine line
between bravery
and insanity simply

because it was what
his country asked him to do.

[breathing heavily]

Okay. So...

so he takes the leap.

How fast does he fall?

He ends up going
614 miles an hour.

Sorry, he's falling
614 miles an hour?

Can you imagine?

It's almost like,
he almost broke the sound
barrier doing it, falling.

You know,
he's not in an airplane...

-Right.
-...or a spaceship.

He's just out there flying.

[Joe groans]

[Josh] Joe has no sense
of his insane speed.

Falling in a virtual vacuum,
there's no flutter

to the fabric
of his pressure suit.

[breathing heavily]

[Josh] His free fall seems
endless.

Two minutes pass,
then three, then four.

After four minutes
and 36 seconds,
slowed at last by friction

from the increasingly
heavier air,
Joe's 28-foot main

parachute deploys
at 14,000 feet,

and history's highest
and fastest freefall
is in the books.

His swollen hand soon
returns to normal size
and he regains its full use.

His jump proves that pilots
and astronauts can eject

without injury
at high altitudes
and advances

the development of safety
equipment that will save
countless lives.

Kittinger's record leap
will stand unchallenged
until 2012,

when at the age of 84,
he helps to break it.

At New Mexico's Roswell
Airport,

he acts as a mission
consultant for an Austrian

skydiver named,
Felix Baumgartner.

Baumgartner begins parachute
jumping in his teens,

before honing his skills
in the Austrian military.

Eventually,
he adds BASE jumping
to his repertoire,

setting several world
records along the way.

To say Baumgartner
feels at home hurtling

through the atmosphere
is an understatement.

But nothing compares
to the feat
he has planned next.

Baumgartner will jump
from an altitude
of 128,000 feet,

26,000 feet higher
than Kittinger's leap in 1960.

Joe is his primary
radio contact.

[Kittinger speaking on radio]

[Josh] His presence lends
a touch of retro to a showcase
of 21st century high-tech.

Decades after
Kittinger's jump,
Baumgartner has access

to creature comforts
not available in Joe's time.

The capsule is fully
climate-controlled.

Baumgartner's suit provides
him with pure oxygen
and utilizes composite

materials to maintain a steady
pressure on the descent.

[Joe Kittinger] All right,
stand up on the exterior step,

keep your head down
and our guardian angel
will take care of you.

[Felix speaking]

[Josh] Everything seems
to be going according to plan.

But then, in the first minute
of the jump, Baumgartner

begins tumbling
out of control.

He is now in danger
of blacking out.

[Kittinger speaking on radio]

[Felix speaking]

[Felix breathing heavily]

To advance cutting-edge
scientific research,

Discovery has pledged
nearly $2 million to fund
Explorers Club expeditions.

Dr. Nina Lanza is heading
one such mission as part

of the ongoing search
for signs of life on Mars.

Her destination
is the Haughton crater
in Northern Canada

where a comet
or an asteroid crashed

into the Earth
23 million years ago.

The 14-mile wide hole
is the only terrestrial impact

crater in such a frigid
environment.

Sitting at the lowest point
in the Arctic,

it's the closest thing
to Mars on Earth.

Haughton Crater is the
ideal place for Dr. Lanza

to test out an assortment
of new aerial drones

and high-tech biosensing
equipment.

If her state-of-the-art gear
works there,

chances are it will work
on Mars.

Her observations
will further lay
the foundations

in the search for life
on the red planet
and possibly accelerate

humanity's push toward
extraterrestrial colonization.

[Josh] Daredevil Felix
Baumgartner is close

to shattering
Joe Kittinger's record.

But after things appear
to be going smoothly,

he risks losing
consciousness after
entering into a violent spin.

[Kittinger speaking on radio]

[Josh] Baumgartner must
alter his position on the fly,

no pun intended,
to rectify the spin.

But in a freefall
at such low air density,

the human body does not always
respond as intended.

[Kittinger speaking on radio]

[Josh] Baumgartner stays
conscious long enough

to reach denser air,
closer to Earth.

There, he manipulates
his body to increase
air resistance

and regains control one minute
and 23 seconds into his jump.

[announcer] Showing Felix
in a stable descent.

[cheering and applause]

[Josh] Thanks to help
in no small part
from a guy named Joe.

[Kittinger speaking on radio]

[cheering and applause]

Some explorers go high,
some go low.

But it wasn't until 2019
that one became
the undisputed master of both.

Victor Vescovo has been
to Everest's Summit

and to the bottom
of Challenger Deep.

He doesn't just have
an appetite for adventure,
he has a hunger for it.

With every new expedition,
he's making Explorers
Club history.

[Victor] We're doing it
because we're explorers,
because we want to see,

we want to push
the boundaries,
we want to learn things

that haven't been
learned before

and we want to do it together
and bring it back and share
it with other people.

[Josh] Vescovo aims
to follow in his fellow
club members' footsteps,

then go beyond them
in ways made possible
by modern science.

To retrace the voyage
of theTrieste,
Vescovo constructs

a new submersible loaded
with ground-breaking
technology.

He names itLimiting Factor.

Explorers Club archivist,
Lacey Flint has a piece

ofLimiting Factor's
structural frame
that makes it tailor-made

for deep sea exploration.

Welcome to the Explorers
Club archives.

[Josh] My favorite
part of the club.

Lacey, what is this?

This is syntactic foam, Josh.

Okay. I thought it was
syntactic foam.

I know you did.

For people who don't know
what syntactic foam is...

This is actually
the material
that you use to build

underwater submarines,
like the Limiting Factor.

And so,
what is this material doing?

So it's actually really dense,
really lightweight.

It's made of these tiny glass
spheres that are hollow.

And this is what helps you
float at the bottom
of the ocean

while withstanding
massive pressure.

So this is what makes trips
to the bottom
of the ocean possible?

It absolutely is.

-[Josh] Incredible.
-Yeah.

-And it's so light.
-Okay, put it down.

Okay.

[Josh] Limiting Factor's
strength and mobility helped

make Vescovo's plunge
into Challenger Deep
the deepest solo dive ever,

35,853 feet,

besting James Cameron's
record in 2012 by 66 feet.

Vescovo's dive to Challenger
Deep is just
part of the grander project

he's orchestrated,
The Five Deeps Expedition,

an exploration of the deepest
parts of the world's five
oceans.

[Victor] I've always
wanted to do something

that has never been
done before.

No one has actually been
to the bottom
of the five oceans.

[Josh] Joining him
on some of the dives
are Explorers Club President,

Richard Garriott,
astronaut Kathy Sullivan
and Kelly Walsh,

whose father Don commanded
theTrieste's historic
dive six decades earlier.

During The Five Deeps,
he and his crew discover

40 new species
of aquatic life.

[Victor] This is now
the deepest diving

operational submersible
in the world,

and we just took it where
no one's ever gone before.

So it's a great feeling.

[Josh] Vescovo hopes
to expand our growing
knowledge of the sea

with his next expedition,
a dive to the bottom

of the Mid-American
Trench off the west coast
of Mexico.

No manned descent
in the trench has ever been

attempted
and no one has ever laid
eyes on its deepest realms.

Victor Vescovo's triumphs
are the Explorers
Club's triumphs,

as are the feats
of Edmund Hillary,
Tenzing Norgay,

Jacques Piccard,
Don Walsh and Joe Kittinger.

Explorers are driven
to go to the blank
spaces on maps,

enjoying the highs
and enduring the lows
along the way.