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Our planet is a place of constant change.
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Each year, the seasons shift and life is transformed.
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But there are places where the changes are so epic in scale
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they can be seen from space.
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In this series,
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we reveal three of the most miraculous transformations.
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The islands of Svalbard -
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within a few weeks, frozen wastelands burst into life.
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The African Okavango -
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a desert transforms into a magical water-world.
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And the mysterious forests of New England
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erupting in a blaze of seasonal colour.
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Life finds the most ingenious and surprising ways to thrive
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in the world's fastest changing landscapes.
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Svalbard -
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a frozen ice world,
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lying far beyond the Northern tip of Norway.
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A lonely group of islands,
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almost at the top of the world.
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For four months, because of the tilt of the Earth,
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Svalbard is cloaked in darkness,
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hidden from the life-giving light of the sun.
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But every year,
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a miracle happens here.
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As the sun returns,
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Svalbard undergoes an extraordinary transformation.
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From perpetual darkness to perpetual light.
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From frozen ice world to land of vibrant life.
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This is the story of how life survives one of the planet's
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most extreme changes.
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WIND HOWLS
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The Svalbard winter.
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A night that lasts for months.
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Without the sun's light,
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nothing can grow...
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..and ferocious winds are dragging temperatures to minus 40 and below.
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How can anything survive here?
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One animal is in its element.
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A polar bear has been sleeping peacefully through the storm.
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Its unique coat reflects heat back into its body just
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like a survival blanket,
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so it is quite comfortable, even at minus 40.
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And remarkably, for the polar bear,
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these are relatively good times.
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The sea ice is at its maximum,
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connecting the islands of Svalbard to the whole of the Arctic...
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..so the bear can stride out over the frozen ocean,
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its prey right beneath its feet.
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A ringed seal.
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Just a metre beneath the bear,
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but protected by the ice.
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Until it needs to breathe.
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The seal scrapes out a network of breathing holes
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dotted about the ice.
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It can hold its breath for 45 minutes,
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but then it must come up for air.
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The trick for the polar bear is guessing where it will appear next.
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But it only needs to catch one seal a week
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and it is very patient.
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Bears can wait at a single hole for days.
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Only a handful of animals are tough enough to survive the winter here.
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The Svalbard reindeer is the world's most Northerly herbivore,
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and that's a challenge when the land is locked in ice.
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They survive partly off their summer fat reserves,
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losing up to half their body weight during winter.
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But they do need to eat.
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With their sharp hooves, they chisel through the crust of ice
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and then literally chew the rocks,
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scraping off the coating of frozen moss and lichen.
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But after just seven or eight winters
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their teeth start to wear out...
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..and that's when many struggle to make it.
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When winter claims one life,
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another is quick to profit.
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An Arctic fox.
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It scavenges its way through the winter,
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visiting frozen carcasses like this,
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and following polar bears to feed on their leftovers.
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And this is the only bird to over-winter in Svalbard.
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The ptarmigan, a relative of the grouse, but tougher.
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Like the reindeer, they pack on extra fat in the autumn,
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but not for energy -
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for insulation.
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So they are 50% heavier in the winter.
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But now they're too fat to fly any distance.
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On feathered feet, they scuttle across the tundra,
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seeking out the tiniest shoots of plants
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lying dormant in the frozen ground.
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For everything but the polar bear,
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such conditions are hard to endure.
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For the first explorers who came here from Europe 400 years ago,
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the Svalbard winter felt like an eternity.
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They must have wondered whether the sun would ever return.
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For many, it never did.
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But there is light here.
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When the moon rises,
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it can stay up for a week.
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And every so often,
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the solar wind coming from the other side of the planet
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collides with the Earth's magnetic field,
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creating magical colours in the Arctic sky.
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Aurora Borealis,
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the Northern Lights.
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It's now mid-February
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and after four long months,
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the sun finally returns.
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At first, the sun is only up for an hour at a time
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so it brings little warmth,
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but it signals the beginning
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of Svalbard's miraculous transformation.
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As the sun's light reaches out across the landscape,
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the true nature of this
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extraordinary wilderness is revealed.
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Beautiful but brutal.
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Vast glaciers flow from lonely peaks,
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pulverising mountains and bulldozing their remains to the frozen sea.
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There are no forests or woodlands.
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But surprisingly,
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the same titanic forces that make this place
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so inhospitable have also drawn people here.
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Coal,
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brought right to the surface by the scouring of Svalbard's glaciers.
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A source of great wealth for those
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who can survive here long enough to get it.
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Svalbard belongs to Norway today,
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but in the past, many nations came
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to exploit its rich coal deposits,
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including Soviet Russia.
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But one grand scheme after another succumbed to this frozen land.
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This is Pyramiden.
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Once home to over 1,000 people,
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now a ghost town.
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Inside these buildings, Russian workers lived with their families.
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But today it all lies abandoned.
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The plan was to give the people of Pyramiden everything
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they needed to survive here through the long, dark winter.
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Including the world's Northernmost piano.
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But it couldn't last.
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These mines were never profitable.
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The cost of survival
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here at the frozen ends of the Earth
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was just too great.
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Today, Arctic foxes roam the streets
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where people tried to tame the Svalbard winter.
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Mid-March.
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The days have been getting dramatically longer.
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Only four weeks since the sun's return
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and there are already 12 hours of sunlight every day.
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Though temperatures are still well below freezing,
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the sun's energy is now strong enough to trigger a chain
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of events, fundamental to life in Svalbard,
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under the sea ice.
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These strange colours are caused by ice algae.
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It lays dormant all winter,
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frozen into the fabric of the ice.
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Just like a plant,
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it has the power to turn the sun's energy into food.
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As the sunlight starts to penetrate the ice,
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it energises the algae's green cells.
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The switch is flicked.
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From the dark depths, tiny creatures are now drawn to the ice.
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Copepods,
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just a couple of millimetres long.
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They may look unimportant,
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but they hold a key to life here.
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They've been waiting to gorge themselves on ice algae.
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Very soon they are chomping away in their millions.
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Now they take the sun's energy from the algae
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and concentrate it into a clear drop of fatty oil,
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which they store in a sack inside their bodies -
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bottled Arctic sunshine.
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For now, all that energy is locked away beneath the sea ice.
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But not for long.
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The intensifying sun heats from above.
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The warming water melts from below.
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CRASHING
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It's April and the door to Svalbard's rich waters is opening.
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It starts slowly at first,
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the silence of winter broken
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by the distant calls of seabirds.
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But quickly their numbers build.
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Guillemots,
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little auks,
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eider ducks.
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Around six million birds return to Svalbard every spring,
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travelling many thousands of kilometres
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from their winter homes in Europe,
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timing their arrival for just this moment.
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Right away they start to refuel,
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diving into Arctic water to
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feast on the oil-rich copepods.
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And beneath them,
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other life is stirring.
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Vast shoals of fish now come for the copepods' bottled sunshine,
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and in turn become food for more birds.
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The light from the strengthening sun has kick-started spring.
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When the birds first reach their nesting cliffs,
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they find them covered in ice.
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It's still bitterly cold here,
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but they need to stake their claim early.
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Very soon there will be no more space available.
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And they've got less than four months to
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raise their chicks before they'll have to be off again.
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So immediately they get straight on with the business of breeding.
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They don't have the luxury of time.
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It's now the middle of April
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and Svalbard's transformation is moving into a whole new phase.
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As the Earth travels further round the sun,
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spinning on its axis once every 24 hours,
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Svalbard now moves into permanent day.
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Welcome to the land of the midnight sun.
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Now that the sun is shining all the time,
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it starts to have an impact on the land.
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Under the snow,
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small plants are already absorbing the sun's light.
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As they warm up,
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they start to melt themselves out of their icy prison.
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The summer is short and it pays to get a head start.
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One strange plant has taken this trick to an extreme.
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This is the compass plant,
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one of the great survivors of the Svalbard tundra.
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It can live for over 300 years.
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Its success is down to a secret weapon -
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a central heating system.
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The spongy dome catches the sun around the clock,
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absorbing its energy.
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Though the air temperature is still hovering around freezing,
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the inside of the dome can rise to 30 degrees Celsius.
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But it doesn't heat up evenly.
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As the sun circles the horizon, its intensity varies.
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The south side of the plant gets much more warmth than the north.
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So when the flowers come,
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they erupt in synch with the sun,
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from south to north.
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It was the early explorers who first noticed this and
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used the strange plant to help find their way,
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just like a compass.
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As the snow melts further,
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it reveals a pile of old mining carts.
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For plants that don't have their own central heating,
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the carts offer shelter from the biting wind.
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A tiny walled garden where spring can really start to take hold.
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And as the sun's warmth increases further,
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the whole tundra starts to bloom.
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By the end of May,
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a greener Svalbard is emerging from the ice.
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After such a long wait,
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for Svalbard's animals, the arrival of spring is miraculous.
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The reindeer desperately need the grass that the melt is uncovering,
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but at first they seem a little unsure of this new, green world.
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They still have their thick winter coats.
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As temperatures rise,
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it's getting a little hot for them.
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So whenever they can,
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they take a break from eating
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and settle down on the remaining islands of cool snow.
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It's the latest arrivals who first really take
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advantage of the opportunities here.
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Barnacle geese.
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They've come all the way from Scotland,
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where they spent the winter.
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As the tundra is revealed,
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it offers an untapped source of rich energy,
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worth coming over 2,000km for.
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This little bird is a snow bunting.
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He too has come far -
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00:27:11,000 --> 00:27:13,400
all the way from Russia.
268
00:27:14,800 --> 00:27:17,680
And this is the object of his affection.
269
00:27:19,320 --> 00:27:23,760
Together, they have set up home in an abandoned miner's cabin.
270
00:27:32,120 --> 00:27:34,440
In the middle of a whale vertebra,
271
00:27:34,440 --> 00:27:37,840
hanging on the wall, is a cosy nest,
272
00:27:37,840 --> 00:27:43,120
and in that, a ball of soft reindeer fluff, ready to nestle tiny eggs.
273
00:27:46,000 --> 00:27:48,720
Now they are here, they are the Northern-most
274
00:27:48,720 --> 00:27:51,080
songbirds in the world.
275
00:27:53,280 --> 00:27:56,760
And theirs is the song of Svalbard's spring.
276
00:28:07,720 --> 00:28:11,440
As the Arctic fox trots out of winter,
277
00:28:11,440 --> 00:28:14,280
she sheds her coat quickly to avoid overheating.
278
00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:18,720
She has a lot to do.
279
00:28:21,560 --> 00:28:24,360
Foxes are nomadic in the winter,
280
00:28:24,360 --> 00:28:28,120
but now the race is on to establish her summer breeding territory.
281
00:28:35,120 --> 00:28:39,200
She even rolls up a ball of her fur,
282
00:28:39,200 --> 00:28:42,400
adding a dash of urine to help signpost her patch.
283
00:28:47,080 --> 00:28:51,160
And every so often she makes time to meet up with her mate.
284
00:28:53,040 --> 00:28:55,840
They got together in the middle of the winter.
285
00:28:57,360 --> 00:29:00,600
Very soon she'll be giving birth.
286
00:29:01,840 --> 00:29:06,440
And then she will have just 90 days to raise her family.
287
00:29:16,640 --> 00:29:20,320
It's now already June
288
00:29:20,320 --> 00:29:24,240
and off the coast of Svalbard the sea ice is breaking up fast.
289
00:29:48,920 --> 00:29:51,760
The polar bear's world is changing.
290
00:29:59,040 --> 00:30:03,720
Though a polar bear can smell a seal from over a kilometre away,
291
00:30:03,720 --> 00:30:08,120
in this constantly moving landscape, it's much harder to track it down.
292
00:30:20,360 --> 00:30:22,560
It must take to the water to navigate
293
00:30:22,560 --> 00:30:24,480
through the drifting maze of ice.
294
00:30:35,040 --> 00:30:38,000
Bears are excellent swimmers,
295
00:30:38,000 --> 00:30:39,680
but no match for a seal.
296
00:30:45,560 --> 00:30:48,520
Life is getting harder.
297
00:30:48,520 --> 00:30:53,080
As the ice cover falls below a critical 50%,
298
00:30:53,080 --> 00:30:56,680
the bear spends more energy catching seals
299
00:30:56,680 --> 00:30:59,160
than he gets from eating them.
300
00:31:08,520 --> 00:31:12,680
While the breaking ice makes life more difficult for the bear,
301
00:31:12,680 --> 00:31:16,720
it allows Svalbard's heaviest resident to access the land.
302
00:31:24,560 --> 00:31:27,600
Walruses.
303
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:29,160
At one and a half tonnes,
304
00:31:29,160 --> 00:31:31,800
they can be three times the weight of a polar bear.
305
00:31:34,120 --> 00:31:37,800
After spending the winter at the edge of the sea ice,
306
00:31:37,800 --> 00:31:41,400
they now return to Svalbard's shores.
307
00:31:41,400 --> 00:31:44,480
They haul out on their favourite beaches for the first time
308
00:31:44,480 --> 00:31:45,920
since last autumn.
309
00:31:48,640 --> 00:31:52,000
Both males and females have tusks,
310
00:31:52,000 --> 00:31:53,680
some over a metre long.
311
00:31:55,480 --> 00:31:58,280
The bigger the tusks, the more important you are.
312
00:32:00,240 --> 00:32:05,200
They're also a good defence against polar bears,
313
00:32:05,200 --> 00:32:10,440
and useful props for a heavy head.
314
00:32:10,440 --> 00:32:13,240
THEY GRUNT
315
00:32:17,200 --> 00:32:19,720
It's their handsome whiskers
316
00:32:19,720 --> 00:32:23,400
and extraordinary mouths that are their most important assets.
317
00:32:25,480 --> 00:32:29,640
But they don't come into their own until they go out foraging.
318
00:32:31,920 --> 00:32:34,160
And they're in no hurry.
319
00:32:35,320 --> 00:32:40,200
Walrus siestas can last a week.
320
00:32:54,800 --> 00:32:58,200
When they finally decide to go for a swim,
321
00:32:58,200 --> 00:33:02,360
there are some novel ways of getting all that way down to the water.
322
00:33:33,680 --> 00:33:35,640
Once they're in,
323
00:33:35,640 --> 00:33:38,240
their strange features begin to make sense.
324
00:33:40,560 --> 00:33:43,840
The giant body becomes weightless.
325
00:33:43,840 --> 00:33:46,680
With just its nose on the seabed,
326
00:33:46,680 --> 00:33:50,000
it blasts away the mud with high-pressure jets of water
327
00:33:50,000 --> 00:33:55,040
forced through its nostrils, feeling around with its 500 highly
328
00:33:55,040 --> 00:33:59,080
sensitive whiskers for its favourite food -
329
00:33:59,080 --> 00:34:01,640
clams.
330
00:34:01,640 --> 00:34:04,280
It just loves clams.
331
00:34:17,720 --> 00:34:19,600
When it finds the clams,
332
00:34:19,600 --> 00:34:21,720
it sucks the flesh right out of them
333
00:34:21,720 --> 00:34:23,800
with its unique vacuum mouth.
334
00:34:27,360 --> 00:34:30,360
A walrus can consume over 1,000 clams a day
335
00:34:30,360 --> 00:34:32,600
without eating a single shell.
336
00:34:43,960 --> 00:34:46,120
But these extraordinary animals have
337
00:34:46,120 --> 00:34:48,320
only recently been making a comeback.
338
00:34:51,280 --> 00:34:55,280
Not long ago, they were brought to the brink of extinction.
339
00:35:00,200 --> 00:35:03,040
Just beyond their beach
340
00:35:03,040 --> 00:35:06,000
are strange lumps of what appears to be concrete.
341
00:35:13,280 --> 00:35:16,320
In the middle of these rings were once great
342
00:35:16,320 --> 00:35:20,240
cauldrons in which the blubber from Svalbard's sea creatures was
343
00:35:20,240 --> 00:35:23,160
melted down into precious oil.
344
00:35:26,640 --> 00:35:30,720
Year after year, as the oil spilled over,
345
00:35:30,720 --> 00:35:35,000
it congealed with the surrounding sand and set into stone.
346
00:35:40,880 --> 00:35:44,320
Nearby is the evidence of the scale of this destruction.
347
00:35:49,960 --> 00:35:53,000
The bones of thousands of beluga whales.
348
00:36:01,360 --> 00:36:04,520
Long before it was known for its coal,
349
00:36:04,520 --> 00:36:09,280
Svalbard was one of the places to hunt whales and walruses.
350
00:36:15,040 --> 00:36:17,160
Their oil once lit the lamps
351
00:36:17,160 --> 00:36:20,200
and lubricated the machinery of industrial Europe.
352
00:36:25,000 --> 00:36:29,000
For 300 years, the slaughter continued
353
00:36:29,000 --> 00:36:32,320
until there was almost nothing left to kill.
354
00:36:40,480 --> 00:36:43,400
But it took its toll on humans too.
355
00:36:44,960 --> 00:36:47,080
As the ground repeatedly freezes
356
00:36:47,080 --> 00:36:50,000
then thaws every year,
357
00:36:50,000 --> 00:36:53,240
anything buried is pushed to the surface.
358
00:36:59,200 --> 00:37:01,600
A whaler's grave.
359
00:37:09,840 --> 00:37:12,000
Though the promise of wealth
360
00:37:12,000 --> 00:37:16,360
and adventure drew many to these remote whaling stations,
361
00:37:16,360 --> 00:37:19,520
life expectancy was so short,
362
00:37:19,520 --> 00:37:22,280
you even had to bring your own coffin.
363
00:37:43,720 --> 00:37:46,720
July is the hottest month.
364
00:37:49,120 --> 00:37:51,120
Even the great fjords that cut
365
00:37:51,120 --> 00:37:55,000
right into the mountains are free of sea ice
366
00:37:55,000 --> 00:37:57,480
and the summer heat kick-starts
367
00:37:57,480 --> 00:38:00,680
another chain of events that benefits life here.
368
00:38:02,840 --> 00:38:06,960
For so long, the land and sea were united by ice.
369
00:38:09,680 --> 00:38:15,640
Now open water laps against the faces of Svalbard's great glaciers.
370
00:38:25,360 --> 00:38:27,520
Behind the face, the glacier
371
00:38:27,520 --> 00:38:30,120
stretches into the distant mountains.
372
00:38:32,840 --> 00:38:36,440
Billions of tonnes of ice pushing down towards the coast.
373
00:38:40,560 --> 00:38:45,120
As the sun starts to melt the ice on the glacier's surface,
374
00:38:45,120 --> 00:38:48,560
water funnels downwards and lubricates the junction
375
00:38:48,560 --> 00:38:52,520
between rock and ice under the immense weight of the glacier.
376
00:38:57,560 --> 00:39:00,520
For some glaciers, the pressure gets too much.
377
00:39:01,960 --> 00:39:04,000
They start to accelerate.
378
00:39:07,240 --> 00:39:09,640
Svalbard's glaciers are unusual.
379
00:39:11,440 --> 00:39:15,600
Many remain motionless for years and then suddenly take off.
380
00:39:20,280 --> 00:39:25,200
These surging glaciers are some of the fastest on Earth,
381
00:39:25,200 --> 00:39:29,240
especially when summer melt-water lubricates them.
382
00:39:29,240 --> 00:39:33,560
They can reach speeds of up to 25 metres per day.
383
00:39:44,120 --> 00:39:50,360
At the face, the colossal weight of ice pushes from behind,
384
00:39:50,360 --> 00:39:54,040
while below, the warming sea erodes the base.
385
00:39:55,720 --> 00:39:58,560
Something has to give.
386
00:39:58,560 --> 00:40:01,480
CREAKING
387
00:40:55,400 --> 00:40:57,880
But this is not just a destructive force.
388
00:40:59,720 --> 00:41:02,080
Where the glacier meets the sea,
389
00:41:02,080 --> 00:41:04,280
it enhances life.
390
00:41:07,960 --> 00:41:10,760
In spite of the danger,
391
00:41:10,760 --> 00:41:14,800
kittiwakes and gulls are flocking in their thousands to the ice front.
392
00:41:16,480 --> 00:41:18,960
Right in the impact zone,
393
00:41:18,960 --> 00:41:21,320
they start to feed.
394
00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:34,120
Where the melt water flowing under the glacier reaches the sea,
395
00:41:34,120 --> 00:41:38,080
it billows upwards, right in front of the falling ice.
396
00:41:42,960 --> 00:41:48,240
As this plume of freezing water rises, it stuns tiny plankton
397
00:41:48,240 --> 00:41:51,000
and brings them to the surface.
398
00:41:55,200 --> 00:41:58,080
A microscopic feast,
399
00:41:58,080 --> 00:42:01,280
so rich it's worth risking your life for.
400
00:42:05,120 --> 00:42:07,880
But you've got to keep your wits about you.
401
00:42:40,160 --> 00:42:43,000
It's not only birds that come here.
402
00:42:46,600 --> 00:42:49,120
Beluga whales.
403
00:42:49,120 --> 00:42:52,560
Young calves that don't yet have the white colour of adults.
404
00:42:57,160 --> 00:43:01,920
They swim in their family pods, feeding on fish that in turn
405
00:43:01,920 --> 00:43:05,440
eat the plankton at the foot of the ice cliff.
406
00:43:07,240 --> 00:43:10,920
Though the years of whaling almost wiped them out,
407
00:43:10,920 --> 00:43:14,960
in 1961 they were finally given protection.
408
00:43:16,640 --> 00:43:21,680
Today they are becoming a much more common sight,
409
00:43:21,680 --> 00:43:24,760
especially where the glaciers meet the sea.
410
00:43:38,640 --> 00:43:40,880
By mid-summer,
411
00:43:40,880 --> 00:43:44,320
there is more life on Svalbard than at any other time of the year.
412
00:43:45,720 --> 00:43:48,800
The bird cliffs are now at full capacity.
413
00:43:48,800 --> 00:43:50,960
Every ledge is taken.
414
00:43:53,640 --> 00:43:56,400
The chicks hatched three weeks ago
415
00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:59,000
and the race is now on to feed them fast enough.
416
00:44:00,640 --> 00:44:03,840
In just three more weeks, they must be out of here.
417
00:44:12,720 --> 00:44:16,320
Down below, the tundra too is alive with new life.
418
00:44:41,360 --> 00:44:45,280
The reindeer have finally got their cool summer coats,
419
00:44:45,280 --> 00:44:49,000
and the males are sporting impressive new antlers.
420
00:44:57,000 --> 00:44:59,680
The fox couple are busier than ever.
421
00:45:01,400 --> 00:45:05,080
They've had six pups and the pressure is on to feed them.
422
00:45:07,640 --> 00:45:11,120
They will need to be fully grown in less than a month.
423
00:45:15,000 --> 00:45:17,960
Arctic fox cubs don't like to share food.
424
00:45:19,480 --> 00:45:23,120
When the winter comes they will be completely on their own,
425
00:45:23,120 --> 00:45:26,840
so they need to learn to fend for themselves right from the start.
426
00:45:36,520 --> 00:45:39,640
But for the parents, now is the crunch time.
427
00:45:41,720 --> 00:45:44,720
As they work 24 hours a day,
428
00:45:44,720 --> 00:45:48,960
making many thousands of journeys to the den with food, they become
429
00:45:48,960 --> 00:45:53,400
exhausted, using up more energy than through the whole of the winter.
430
00:46:02,480 --> 00:46:05,000
In the skies above,
431
00:46:05,000 --> 00:46:07,840
aerial traffic has reached fever pitch,
432
00:46:07,840 --> 00:46:10,160
as the birds frantically try
433
00:46:10,160 --> 00:46:12,840
to keep up with the demands of their offspring.
434
00:46:15,840 --> 00:46:18,480
But as they shuttle back and forth,
435
00:46:18,480 --> 00:46:21,720
bringing food from the ocean to the cliffs,
436
00:46:21,720 --> 00:46:24,200
they do much more than feed their chicks.
437
00:46:31,920 --> 00:46:36,600
Some of the ocean's rich nutrients passes straight through the birds.
438
00:46:44,360 --> 00:46:48,680
As all that fertiliser is washed down from the bird cliffs,
439
00:46:48,680 --> 00:46:51,800
it has a profound effect on the land below.
440
00:46:56,800 --> 00:47:01,720
The grass that now fattens up the reindeer for winter.
441
00:47:01,720 --> 00:47:05,360
The soil that nourishes the plants.
442
00:47:05,360 --> 00:47:08,880
The richness of Svalbard's land,
443
00:47:08,880 --> 00:47:11,400
ultimately, comes from the sea.
444
00:47:20,840 --> 00:47:23,840
It's now late July
445
00:47:23,840 --> 00:47:28,200
and the last of Svalbard's summer visitors are only just settling in.
446
00:47:30,480 --> 00:47:33,000
Arctic terns have come all the way
447
00:47:33,000 --> 00:47:36,600
from the other end of the Earth, from Antarctica,
448
00:47:36,600 --> 00:47:39,760
the longest migration of any animal -
449
00:47:39,760 --> 00:47:42,280
over 30,000km.
450
00:47:45,520 --> 00:47:52,640
But in three weeks, they'll have to fly all the way back again
451
00:47:52,640 --> 00:47:55,600
and their chicks have only just hatched.
452
00:47:57,040 --> 00:48:00,360
In only 21 days' time,
453
00:48:00,360 --> 00:48:05,600
this ball of fluff will need to fly 30,000km.
454
00:48:09,640 --> 00:48:13,720
But it's well worth the parents travelling all this way.
455
00:48:20,000 --> 00:48:24,120
Svalbard's super-rich waters contain all the energy required.
456
00:48:25,920 --> 00:48:30,560
All they have to do is transport it from ocean to beak.
457
00:49:07,000 --> 00:49:09,880
As the adults fish nonstop,
458
00:49:09,880 --> 00:49:13,960
sometimes they have to leave a chick on its own,
459
00:49:13,960 --> 00:49:17,320
and because terns nest on the ground,
460
00:49:17,320 --> 00:49:18,960
that can make it vulnerable.
461
00:49:22,280 --> 00:49:26,080
The retreating sea ice has now forced Svalbard's largest
462
00:49:26,080 --> 00:49:29,280
predator onto the land
463
00:49:29,280 --> 00:49:31,560
and it's coming this way.
464
00:49:34,520 --> 00:49:38,320
Now is the toughest time for polar bears.
465
00:49:39,600 --> 00:49:43,560
It loses a kilo of body weight for every day it spends on the land.
466
00:49:46,120 --> 00:49:50,960
The great ice bear turned scavenger -
467
00:49:50,960 --> 00:49:52,960
and he's starving.
468
00:50:16,240 --> 00:50:19,200
Not a good moment to break your cover.
469
00:50:35,880 --> 00:50:38,680
SQUEAKING
470
00:50:38,680 --> 00:50:42,280
But the chick's cries for help have been heard.
471
00:50:47,440 --> 00:50:51,680
Terns may look dainty but they are highly aggressive,
472
00:50:51,680 --> 00:50:54,000
and totally fearless.
473
00:50:59,560 --> 00:51:03,200
Repeated attacks draw blood from the bear's sensitive nose.
474
00:51:10,800 --> 00:51:13,840
The Arctic's top predator,
475
00:51:13,840 --> 00:51:17,200
driven away by one of its smallest birds.
476
00:51:34,760 --> 00:51:37,040
As August arrives,
477
00:51:37,040 --> 00:51:40,680
Svalbard's transformation reaches its maximum extent.
478
00:51:43,440 --> 00:51:45,440
It's only a fleeting transition.
479
00:51:47,560 --> 00:51:49,440
By the end of the month,
480
00:51:49,440 --> 00:51:51,680
the sun will be setting again.
481
00:51:55,640 --> 00:51:59,840
The winter is just around the corner.
482
00:52:08,520 --> 00:52:13,760
But as Svalbard's yearly miracle prepares to come full circle,
483
00:52:13,760 --> 00:52:17,200
the summer sun helps trigger a final dramatic change.
484
00:52:20,920 --> 00:52:24,080
In the far north east of Svalbard
485
00:52:24,080 --> 00:52:26,640
is a place where it always feels like winter.
486
00:52:28,440 --> 00:52:30,880
A massive ice cap.
487
00:52:30,880 --> 00:52:34,000
A frozen monster.
488
00:52:34,000 --> 00:52:37,760
Like a giant fridge, it cools this whole area of Svalbard.
489
00:52:39,480 --> 00:52:44,520
Only now in late summer does the sun start to have any effect here.
490
00:52:47,160 --> 00:52:51,240
On the surface of the ice, melt water pools together
491
00:52:51,240 --> 00:52:53,200
and starts to flow.
492
00:53:18,040 --> 00:53:20,520
Where the ice cap meets the sea
493
00:53:20,520 --> 00:53:23,280
is one of the world's greatest wonders.
494
00:53:25,200 --> 00:53:28,080
The ice cliffs of Austfonna.
495
00:53:35,040 --> 00:53:39,480
For nearly 200km, they rise uninterrupted from the ocean.
496
00:53:53,920 --> 00:53:57,640
But recently, these cliffs have been changing.
497
00:54:00,240 --> 00:54:03,640
Something we can see most clearly from space.
498
00:54:08,600 --> 00:54:12,280
The very latest satellites can make precise measurements of ice
499
00:54:12,280 --> 00:54:14,560
thickness and speed of movement.
500
00:54:17,680 --> 00:54:19,800
What they reveal
501
00:54:19,800 --> 00:54:21,680
is astonishing.
502
00:54:25,560 --> 00:54:30,480
A massive tongue of ice, 50km long,
503
00:54:30,480 --> 00:54:33,120
is on the move,
504
00:54:33,120 --> 00:54:38,480
sliding downwards from the centre of the ice cap out into the ocean.
505
00:54:41,120 --> 00:54:45,240
A wall of ice, advancing half a metre every hour.
506
00:54:48,240 --> 00:54:50,400
4km a year.
507
00:54:55,560 --> 00:54:59,000
It's thought that massive events like this are part
508
00:54:59,000 --> 00:55:03,320
of a natural surge cycle lasting several years,
509
00:55:03,320 --> 00:55:06,040
but no-one knows exactly what sets them off.
510
00:55:09,120 --> 00:55:12,920
The latest research suggests that summer meltwater
511
00:55:12,920 --> 00:55:16,080
penetrating the ice cap may be a trigger.
512
00:55:21,040 --> 00:55:25,040
Svalbard's ice world is incredibly delicately balanced.
513
00:55:33,680 --> 00:55:37,640
Just tiny rises in global temperatures could have profound
514
00:55:37,640 --> 00:55:41,320
effects on the whole seasonal cycle of life here.
515
00:55:52,880 --> 00:55:57,360
Today, as Svalbard heads for the winter once more,
516
00:55:57,360 --> 00:56:01,600
its future lies on a knife-edge of just a few degrees.
517
00:56:21,040 --> 00:56:24,000
It's now the end of August
518
00:56:24,000 --> 00:56:26,880
and Svalbard is returning to the dark time.
519
00:56:30,880 --> 00:56:34,480
Svalbard's summer visitors must now leave.
520
00:56:36,920 --> 00:56:41,040
They've reaped the benefits of the rich summer,
521
00:56:41,040 --> 00:56:43,680
but if they stay here any longer
522
00:56:43,680 --> 00:56:45,520
they'll die.
523
00:56:51,560 --> 00:56:55,440
As parents now force their young to take flight,
524
00:56:55,440 --> 00:56:57,560
some before they're really ready...
525
00:57:01,000 --> 00:57:04,840
..foxes get a last feast before the lean time.
526
00:57:11,000 --> 00:57:13,720
Reindeer just keep on grazing.
527
00:57:15,040 --> 00:57:18,480
What they eat now decides whether they will make it through.
528
00:57:38,360 --> 00:57:42,240
Only one creature here welcomes the coming winter.
529
00:58:00,200 --> 00:58:05,360
As the sun drops below the horizon for the last time
530
00:58:05,360 --> 00:58:09,880
and Svalbard moves back on to the dark side of the Earth,
531
00:58:09,880 --> 00:58:12,560
the big change
532
00:58:12,560 --> 00:58:14,920
comes once more.
42024
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