All language subtitles for The UnXplained S02E12 The Power of Gold 1080p AMZN WEB-DL DDP2 0 H 264-Kitsune_track4_[eng]

men have killed for it.

Entire cities were built of it.

And armies were formed

to find it.

What is it about the glittering
substance known as gold

that has made it
the most coveted of all metals?

In ancient times,
it was considered so precious,

it was called,
"the flesh of the gods."

Today, we use gold
for everything

from currency
to space travel to electronics.

But beyond its mere
commercial value,

could gold have a special power?

Something that draws us to it
and compels us

to hold it, own it,

even wear it on our bodies?

Well, that is what we'll try
and find out.

♪ ♪

SHATNER: While digging
an ordinary utility ditch

just off the
coast of the Black Sea,

a worker unearths a number of

unusual metallic objects
from the ground.

When archaeologists later
excavate the site,

they discover a vast necropolis

containing the oldest
gold artifacts ever found--

dating back to 4600 BC.

Analysis of the elaborate
burial ground indicates

that the ancient culture,

known as
the Chalcolithic Varna people,

had a fascination with gold.

Members of the elite were buried

with gold ornaments sewn
into shrouds,

and their bodies were placed
in graves

laden with exquisite
golden artifacts.

6,000 years ago,

Neolithic people were
fashioning jewelry out of gold.

Now, we can speculate
about what attracted them.

It was bright,
in probably a very dull world,

and it never corroded.

So it was, in a world in which
mortality was ever present--

sickness and want
and starvation--

here was something eternal,

never lost its luster,

beautiful, shiny, ageless.

SHATNER:
While the relics found at Varna

are the oldest processed
gold objects ever found,

they are certainly not unique.

Throughout virtually all
of recorded history,

gold was used in everything
from ornamentation

to the creation
of sacred objects.

It was cherished
above all metals,

especially because
of its warm, golden color,

which would, when polished,
glow like the sun.

The Egyptians took the view that
gold was the flesh of the gods,

so therefore, a--
very much a divine material.

It was
a very appropriate material

to use in funerary contexts,
because

ultimately people-- by being
reborn in the next world--

had become gods,
to a greater or lesser degree.

And the kings, in particular.

SHATNER:
The ancient Incas also linked gold to the heavens.

They believed it was made
from the actual sweat

of their sun god, Inti.

BRIEN FOERSTER: Gold was
the most precious metal

of the Incas, not because
it had any kind of value,

like money, but because
it was the sweat of the sun.

The sun was the highest deity
of the Inca, and therefore,

the sweat of the sun
represented

the most sacred possession
imaginable.

SHATNER:
According to stories contained in the Hebrew Bible,

gold objects were used

not merely to show a symbolic
connection to the divine,

but to actually embody the power
of God himself.

And to this end,
one golden object in particular

became infamous
as the most sacred

and most powerful
and mysterious of all:

The Ark of the Covenant.

The Ark of the Covenant
is the central shrine

to ancient Israel.

According to the Bible,
it's a wooden box

made of acacia wood
that is overlaid in gold.

Inside of the Ark
of the Covenant

are said
to be a couple of things--

the pieces
of the Ten Commandments

that were smashed by Moses,

a jar of the manna,

and Aaron's rod was also kept
in the Ark of the Covenant.

The idea was that wherever
the Ark of the Covenant went,

that's where the power of God
would be.

SHATNER:
Is it possible

that objects made of gold
actually have some sort

of cosmic significance,

a power that literally connected
ancient people to something

or someone beyond this world?

But if so, how?

Perhaps the answers
can be found by examining

the ancient writings of the
first known human civilization:

The Ancient Sumerians.

JASON MARTELL:
The Sumerians had a very intricate writing system

called "cuneiform" script.

One of the interesting points
about the Sumerian culture is

the thousands of tablets
and pictograms

they've left us
describing their daily lives.

SHATNER:
For decades,

historians and archaeologists
remained frustrated

in their efforts to translate
the Sumerian cuneiform texts.

But one man believed he had,
at last, cracked the code.

After years
of exhaustive research

and countless hours
spent translating hundreds

of cuneiform tablets,

in 1976, author and researcher
Zecharia Sitchin

published a book entitled,
The 12th Planet.

In it, he claimed that

contained within the Sumerian
ancient writings was

a profoundly unique account

of mankind's origins
on planet Earth.

According to Sitchin, the
so-called Sumerian gods were,

in fact, visitors
from the planet Nibiru,

who landed on Earth
in Mesopotamia

more than 450,000 years ago.

The Anunnaki are among
the most mysterious

and powerful beings of myth
and sacred tradition.

We're told
that the Anunnaki had

these enormous life spans
of thousands of years.

They came to Earth
on a special mission

to bring wisdom and
also to mine certain materials

from the Earth plane itself.

Now one of
the interesting proponents

of the story of
Zecharia Sitchin's research

isn't just the Anunnaki,

but where the Anunnaki
actually come from.

The Sumerians were very clear

in diagramming
all the known outer planets

in our solar system
accurately.

However, they included
an additional planet

which they called "Nibiru."

The Anunnaki had damaged
their atmosphere.

And by using gold,

they found that they could
patch these atmospheric holes--

hence becomes the story
of our humanity.

The Anunnaki literally came
to Earth to mine the gold.

And when realizing
it was such a toil to do so,

created us as a worker
race to do that for them.

SHATNER:
Zecharia Sitchin's hypothesis--

that the Anunnaki came
to Earth to mine gold

and then created humans
to perform the task for them--

was both bold
and controversial.

If true, it would mean

that mankind's near-obsession

with everything gold
had an historical foundation.

But this incredible notion--

that humans were formed
to retrieve gold

and present it to the gods--

was not merely a theory
created by Sitchin.

Believe it or not,

there is
archaeological evidence

to suggest that ancient people
did exactly that.

SHATNER: Believed to be the site
of an ancient meteor crater,

this circular-shaped mountain
lake was once the site

of remarkable ancient rituals
involving gold, centuries ago.

Lake Guatavita was within
the territory of the Muisca

or the Chibcha people,
which was a chiefdom,

not quite as high
a civilization as the Incas

or as the Aztecs,
but a chiefdom

with civilization itself
that had a lot of gold.

SHATNER:
The ruler in the southern half

of the Muisca territory
was known as the Zipa,

who was responsible

for performing the Muisca's
most sacred ritual.

According to legend,
the Zipa would float out

on a royal barge in the middle
of Lake Guatavita

to make offerings of gold

to a god believed to live
at the bottom of the lake.

DEYERMENJIAN:
It was said that the chief, adorned with resin,

and then adorned with gold dust,
would then

jump into the water in order
to wash the gold dust off.

And that this gold would
accumulate in that lake,

and that golden objects,
as sacrifices,

would be thrown
into that particular lake.

SHATNER:
In 1911,

an excavation
of Lake Guatavita was led

by British engineer
Hartley Knowles.

Knowles reported that he had
recovered some $20,000 worth

of treasure from the bottom
of the lake,

including golden artifacts.

Could this remarkable find
have offered tangible proof

that ancient peoples mined gold
for the purpose

of offering it to their gods,
just as Sitchin's translations

of the ancient Sumerian tablets
had indicated?

Perhaps.

But there is another theory--

one that suggests
mankind's obsession with gold

is not due to some mere
historical connection

that stretches back
to our ancient past,

but due to the genuine power
that gold possesses--

a power that, if unleashed,

could unlock the mysteries
of the universe.

BILL STILL:
Is there any gold in Fort Knox?

like its color, its shine,
its conductivity,

there is one factor that
makes it among the most prized

and valuable
of all precious metals.

It is genuinely very,
very scarce.

HART: Now, how much mined gold
actually is there in the world?

Considering that
we've been mining it

for 6,000 years,

not all that much.

In fact, if you...

took all the gold ever mined
in all of history,

melted it down
into a single block,

it would probably cover
a tennis court

to a depth of about 30 feet.

That's it.
That's the whole total.

SHATNER: The reason
why gold is so hard to come by

is that every ounce of gold

that has ever been found
on Earth

did not actually originate
on our planet.

DERRICK PITTS:
There is gold in space.

There's no question about it.

In fact, all of the elements
that we know of

have been created
at the cores of stars.

The more heavy elements
are created

in the explosion of a star

when it goes supernova.

All the elements
that we know of,

including gold,
are made in this fashion.

During the so-called
late heavy bombardment period,

some 3.8 to 4.1
billion years ago,

billions of tons of heavy metals

and these rare elements rained
to Earth through meteorites

and asteroids impacting
the planet.

These meteorites are
what brought gold, tungsten

and other precious elements
to our planet.

SHATNER: But while gold is
a genuinely rare commodity

on our planet,
it is by no means the rarest.

MICHAEL DENNIN: Platinum has
great conductive abilities.

It's rather rare.

It's actually one of
the rarest elements we have,

and it's a very useful metal
in a lot of what we do.

SHATNER:
Platinum is considered

to be 30 times more rare
than gold,

and yet, it is not unusual
for the price of gold

to be higher
than that of platinum,

particularly in times
of economic uncertainty.

But why?

The origins
of this primitive desire

to love and value
and treasure gold,

that you can scratch
your head over forever.

All we know is that our
distant preliterate ancestors

were attracted to it,

and somehow
that's come down to us.

SHATNER: Perhaps a clue as
to why we are so passionately--

and almost illogically-- drawn
to gold above all other metals

can be found
in our collective tendency

to adorn our bodies with it,

as if it had some kind
of magical properties.

The Museum of Pre-History
and Early History acquires

a glittering artifact

from an anonymous
Swiss collector--

a tall, cone-shaped hat,

crafted from a thin sheet
of gold

and embellished with dozens
of Sun and Moon symbols.

It is one of four
that have been unearthed

at various sites
throughout Europe,

and is believed by historians
to date back

as far as 1000 BC.

What is so important about them
is that they indicate

that there was a common culture.

The images on them
represent astronomy,

the study of the stars.

They also have complicated
mathematical implications,

suggesting a level
of philosophical development

that's very advanced
for what we thought

was available at that time.

SHATNER: German researchers
carefully studied the symbols

on the golden hat
and concluded they represent

a complex mathematical table,

one that can accurately
calculate the long-term cycles

of the Sun and the Moon.

But how could ancient people

have been able
to make such advanced

and highly sophisticated
astronomical predictions?

And why was it so important

that they construct
this incredible hat out of gold?

ANDREW COLLINS: The suggestion
is that they belonged

to what might be referred to
as oracles--

people that could fall
into an altered state

and prophesize--
could come up with statements

relating to the future
or otherworldly situations.

There's also this idea
that certain metals

resonate or vibrate
at certain resonant frequencies.

So if you wear a lot of gold,
it gets you connected

to the broader energy fields
that we all live in

and move through
on a regular basis.

So the golden hats
are kind of interesting,

because if gold is something

that actually enhances
your connection with energies,

then the wearing
of a golden hat,

especially in a conical shape,
would tend to amplify

the signal that you were getting
from on high.

SHATNER: Ancient oracles
using golden hats

to receive esoteric knowledge
about the universe?

While this may seem like
a farfetched notion,

it is just one of many instances

in which ancient cultures
believed that gold adornments

held a special power within them

and could bestow that power
upon those who possessed

these gold ornaments.

HENRY:
Throughout history,

people have adorned themselves
with gold,

because it symbolizes power,
wealth, beauty.

But ultimately,
gold is considered

a very good conductor
of electricity.

PITTS: Gold is one
of the best conductors there is.

The other thing that's very
important about it is that gold

is an inert material--
it doesn't react with anything.

And since there's no corrosion,

electrical contacts
can remain clean and good.

When you really want the best
electrical connectivity,

we always buy
our gold-coated connectors.

It's incredibly easy
to work with,

you can make it very thin--
gold leafing is something

we're very familiar with--

and you don't need a lot of gold

to get
good conductive properties.

HENRY: So it's possible
that when you're wearing gold,

that you are able
to better conduct electricity,

and might possess
amazing powers.

SHATNER: If you think
that the belief in gold objects

having some sort
of intrinsic power

is the quaint notion
of a bygone era,

well, you'd be wrong.

After all, we still reward

our nation's
highest athletic achievements

with gold medals.

Gold jewelry is still more
desirable than that of silver

or platinum.

And monarchs still wear
gold crowns on their heads.

These are very ancient symbols
of power,

and this set off
the great scramble for gold,

the great search, the lust,

the desire to have gold.

That's what installed gold

as something that was central
to our whole culture

and way of life.

SHATNER:
Truth is, gold objects have tremendous power

in our world,

perhaps even a more profound
power than we've realized.

And there are those who believe
that this extraordinary power

can be best appreciated
while examining

a bizarre behavioral phenomenon
known as...

"gold fever."

SHATNER:
Carpenter James Marshall

is building
a water-powered sawmill

on the banks
of the American River

when he makes an unexpected

and understandably thrilling
discovery.

Flakes of gold are floating
in the water.

When news gets out,
people from all over the world

head for California--

more than 300,000
in just six years.

It is the start
of the California Gold Rush,

a frenzied hunt
for an estimated $2 billion

in buried treasure.

HART:
In ten years,

they mined 850 tons of gold.

Now, when we think
of a gold rush,

we generally think of what
they call in the business

an "area play."

Gold is discovered
in one place--

people rush to that place to see
if they, too, can discover gold.

That's how the California
Gold Rush worked.

SHATNER:
The California Gold Rush

is perhaps
the most famous example

of what is known
as "gold fever,"

a phenomenon which has compelled
people and even entire countries

to embark on a quest for gold,

often with only
the slightest chance of success,

and sometimes
even less than that.

Gold's a very big metal
in the human imagination.

They call it
the "emotive metal"

in the bullion business,

because it tends
to follow emotions.

There is this possibility
of winning the lottery,

of getting some extraordinary
fortune that was just found.

Symbolically,
it may mean even more.

Maybe psychologically,
within ourselves,

a sense of self-esteem,
or the value of life.

GANZ:
You have people willing to go

to every extreme known to man

in order to acquire gold.

You have the Roman legion

that traveled
throughout the known world

to try and get gold.

You have the Crusaders who went

into the Near East
and the Far East,

searching for gold.

You had Cortez enslave
Indian peoples

of Latin America
in order to mine it,

extract it
and send it back to Europe.

And, of course,
in the 20th century,

you have explorers diving
under the sea

in order to get gold
that was lost in storms

400 years before.

If you look at what people
have done to get gold,

it's everything
that you can imagine,

and then some things
that you probably can't.

SHATNER:
It is perhaps safe to say

that throughout history,

there is no limit to the lengths
that humans will go

to possess gold.

And if they couldn't acquire it
by traditional methods,

there were some who thought
that it was possible

to make it artificially,

by means of a strange,
mysterious process

known as alchemy.

DENNIN:
The alchemists, their main goal

was to turn lead into gold.

Lead was viewed
as kind of a boring, dull,

not important metal,
and gold, of course,

was very valuable and precious.

So you try and get various
chemical reactions to occur

and turn the lead into gold.

SHATNER:
For thousands of years,

kings sought out
a magical substance

that could transform common,
ordinary metals into gold.

Scientists and alchemists spent
centuries trying to invent one.

Over time, this mythical object
became referred to

as the philosopher's stone.

A.J. SHAKA:
The philosopher's stone was an idea that you could have

a magic kind of material
do the alchemy.

And the thought
that one could do that

is attractive in and of itself.

And if somebody tells you
that something exists

and you're smart,
like Isaac Newton,

you might think,
"Well, I'm smart enough

to figure it out for myself,
so I should go looking for it."

And I think that motivated
a lot of the early scientists

to get distracted by this idea.

We have a kind of guidance
coming from beyond

our ordinary knowing,

a whole series
of sacred mysteries involved

in this rather simple form.

The philosopher's stone was
this simple material, a stone,

out of which something
very powerful can emerge.

It has rich
psychological symbolism.

SHATNER:
A simple stone that can turn anything into gold?

It sounds outlandish.

So outlandish, you might think
the philosopher's stone

is a symbol of how the pursuit
of gold can cause people

to lose their grip on reality.

But believe it or not,

this is one fantasy
that has actually come true.

In an early experiment
with nuclear energy,

Professor Hantaro Nagaoka

directs 150,000 volts
of electricity

at a mercury isotope
isolated in the laboratory.

His goal, to remove a proton
from the nucleus of the mercury

and produce a new element: gold.

Incredibly,
the experiment is a success.

SHAKA:
In prior times,

the idea of turning
a base metal like lead into gold

was extremely attractive

because one could make
a lot of money by doing that.

The problem was that,
at that time,

people didn't even
know atoms existed,

or that the number of protons
in the nucleus determined

the element and that one
would have to change those,

somehow, to do the alchemy.

SHATNER:
On the periodic table of elements,

gold is element number 79,
and mercury is number 80,

which is why removing
a single proton from mercury

can actually transform it
into gold.

But doing so requires
a staggering amount

of both electrical energy
and money.

SHAKA:
You have to get a nuclear reactor

or a particle accelerator
or something like that,

and it takes a long time
running the reactor

to make even
a tiny amount of gold.

If you irradiate for about
a day in our reactor,

you make three-tenths of a cent
worth of gold.

Since we charge $200 an hour
to operate the reactor,

you're pretty far in the hole.

SHATNER:
Whether it's panning a river

or harnessing the power
of a nuclear reactor,

humans are always searching
for new sources of gold.

But since creating gold
in a laboratory

is not yet
economically feasible,

maybe it's time
we ask ourselves

how much gold has
already been mined

and how can we acquire
a fresh supply?

Perhaps the answer lies
behind the sealed doors

of the largest gold depository
in the world, Fort Knox.

SHATNER:
U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin

and Senate Majority Leader
Mitch McConnell

visit the United States Bullion
Depository for an inspection.

They are part of the first
civilian delegation to lay eyes

on the country's gold bullion
reserves in more than 40 years.

But curiously, the media
is prohibited from the event,

which starts to raise
more questions than answers.

POWELL:
The depository at Fort Knox

is a symbol of perhaps
America's greatest secret.

Uh, you are more likely
to obtain

from the United States
government the blueprints

for the construction
of a nuclear weapon

than you are
to obtain any accurate,

detailed accounting
of the disposition

of the United States
gold reserve.

STILL:
Is there any gold in Fort Knox?

That's a good question,
and the government

certainly hasn't been helpful
in providing the answer.

One would think
that there would be

some sort of accountability.

But there's substantial evidence

that the government
is hiding something.

SHATNER:
By law, the U.S. Treasury

operates Fort Knox
under the direct orders

and supervision of the President
of the United States.

And not only does the Treasury
print money, collect taxes

and enforce trade agreements,

it also oversees America's most
precious commodity, its gold.

POWELL:
Militaries will pack

their pilot's survival kits
with gold coins,

not with paper currency,

because gold
is the universal money.

And its value determines the
value of government currencies.

Gold's value also, uh,
profoundly influences

interest rates, uh, and
the price of government bonds.

This is the primary reason
why governments

have always tried
to control the price of gold.

The gold price
is the determinant of the value

of all capital, labor,
goods and services in the world.

There is nothing else.

SHATNER:
As of 2020, the United States claimed

to have more than
8,000 tons of gold.

Worth trillions of dollars,

it is the single largest holding
in the world.

Not entirely surprising,
since there was a time,

in 1933, when U.S. President
Franklin D. Roosevelt

made it illegal
for American individuals

to own the precious metal.

GANZ:
In 1933,

America nationalized its gold.

In essence, it stole it
from the American people.

It required them to turn in
all the gold that they had.

PAUL URBHANS:
This was Franklin Roosevelt

bringing us
out of the Depression.

He gathered up gold coins
and other gold that people owned

and melted them down
into little gold bricks

that weighed
27 and a half pounds each.

Once he acquired all the gold
in the country,

he doubled its value.

You could do that
when you own it all.

GANZ: Overnight, the gold
went from $20.67 an ounce

to $35 an ounce.

The greatest robbery
in history wasn't

the mere confiscation,
it was revaluing the gold

after it was confiscated.

The difference is,
the government had the profit,

not the individual people.

And that was the way
that the New Deal attempted

to jumpstart the economy.

SHATNER:
Prior to this time,

every American dollar
was backed up by gold.

It even said so
right on the currency:

Payable to the bearer in gold.

But now, with America in the
grip of the Great Depression,

the government couldn't take a
chance that foreign governments

wouldn't trade currency for coin

and make off
with America's gold supply.

In less than two years,

FDR had consolidated the single
greatest concentration of wealth

in modern history.

And to house most of it,

he constructed the country's
strongest fortress--

Fort Knox.

The federal government
is taking no chances.

This is
the people's gold supply,

and they intend for it
to stay there.

There's a military unit
at Fort Knox

that is at all times responsible

if any attack was made
on the gold vault.

And they're available
all the time around the clock.

If you violated the security
and got into the vault,

then no way
you could get out of there.

You know, the reality
of the situation is,

I don't think that anybody
would ever try

to break into that building
to steal the gold,

because it would take
an incredible operation

to get that out of there,
and the guards used to tell me,

"You'll get in,
but you'll never get out alive."

SHATNER:
If someone was fortunate enough

to make it inside Fort Knox,
they would encounter a maze

of 21,000 cubic feet
of granite and concrete,

and more than 1,400 tons
of steel.

Underneath the first floor
is the gold vault,

whose door weighs several tons
and is 21 inches thick.

To unlock it requires
multiple treasury officials,

each with a unique,
secret combination.

Once inside, the vault is
divided into individual cells,

said to measure
ten feet by ten feet,

and reportedly stacked
from floor to ceiling

with gold bars.

But while no one would argue
that it's not important

to keep America's gold safe,

are all of these precautions
really necessary?

Or do they serve another,
more extraordinary purpose?

URBHANS:
It's what you don't know

that's more important
than what you do know,

as far as the gold vault
is concerned.

And there's been various myths
and rumors over the years

which have added
to that... secrecy.

SHATNER:
One of those rumors suggests

that after President Richard
Nixon removed the U.S. dollar

from the international
gold standard in 1971,

the gold in Fort Knox was
all but sold off.

During the 1960s,

when Charles de Gaulle was
prime minister of France,

he told other countries,
"If you owe me money,

pay me in American dollars."

And then he would turn those
American dollars in for gold.

That probably caused
the biggest drain

of gold
out of the bullion depository.

The U.S. gold reserve
was being depleted,

and in 1971,
President Nixon decided

that we could not afford

to keep losing our gold
this way,

and, basically,
he repudiated the obligation

of the United States
to redeem its dollars for gold

to foreign countries.

And since 1971,

the U.S. dollar
has not been explicitly backed

by any particular weight
of gold.

SHATNER:
But how much of America's gold supply was left?

Rumors that Fort Knox had been
steadily drained of gold

for decades began to spread,

and an anxious American public
demanded to know:

Did President Richard Nixon

pull America off
the gold standard

because the vault
at Fort Knox was actually...

empty?

NER:Director of the U.S. Mint,
Mary Brooks,

leads a carefully-selected group
of members of Congress

and news media on a half-hour
tour of the Fort Knox vault.

[indistinct chatter]

Its purpose:
to prove to Congress,

and the American public,

that the gold at Fort Knox is,
in fact, still there.

GANZ:
We arrived by bus, to drive up Bullion Blvd,

aptly named.

And as you approach
the depository, you see signs

that warn
that federal officers inside

are authorized to shoot to kill,

and that admission
is absolutely forbidden.

We went down
from the first floor

on by an elevator, went down

to the lower level where
the gold is actually stored.

And as we got off the elevator,

we just walked in right next

to the vaults themselves,

the cells full of gold.

SHATNER:
The delegation was ushered into one

of the smallest compartments--
Vault 13--

and directed not to approach
any of the other cells.

The thing that stands out
to me is just walking in

and seeing all this gold

from floor to ceiling
and realizing its value.

And we had an opportunity
to pick it up

and feel it and make sure
it was gold, and, uh,

it was amazing to me.

GANZ:
There's nothing

that was as breathtaking

as having the seal cut
on that door,

the vault door open,

and the floodlights
from the television

and from the still cameras,
flashbulbs popping,

going off the gold.

SIMMONS:
Well, they opened up the Bullion Depository.

But what they did was
they opened Pandora's box.

Everybody saw a bunch
of bars stacked up in a room,

and then immediately
started saying,

that's probably all there was,

and what you're looking at
is probably fake.

So, all they did was create
a bigger problem.

SHATNER:
Why had the visitors been shown only one cell?

And why was access
to certain corners

of the vault complex denied?

Over time,
photos taken during the event

began to circulate
in newspapers and magazines.

But rather
than reassure skeptics,

as the U.S. Treasury had hoped,
still more questions arose.

Some even questioned the quality
of the gold based on its color.

Others suggested that--
according to photos taken

at the event while the gold
was weighed on a scale--

the bars didn't weigh
27.5 pounds as reported,

but less than 22 pounds.

Of course Treasury came out
with a press release and said

"Oh, well, it was just
some cheap scale,

and so the scale
was inaccurate."

But if you magnify
the photograph,

you see that it was not
a cheap scale.

It was a standard
issue U.S. Postal scale.

SHATNER:
Most intriguing of all was the possibility

of a secret vault-- one hidden
not only from visitors that day

but one whose very existence
is denied,

even now.

There is this famous picture
of Mary Brooks taken

by an AP photographer saying
"Look, all the gold's here."

However, the room
that they showed

was gold vault number thirteen.

And if you just do a simple,
napkin-like calculation

of how many bars you see, and,

uh, there are about a million
ounces of gold in that room.

And yet, the latest
Treasury figures

from the Treasury website show

that there are 150 million
ounces of gold in Fort Knox.

So it would take 150
of those gold vault thirteens.

So clearly, something's amiss.

SHATNER:
Can Americans ever know for sure

how much gold is in Fort Knox?

Or whether most of the gold
has been sold off, or used

as collateral
to finance our national debt?

POWELL:
Secret things are done with that gold reserve.

That gold reserve is the...
It's public property.

It's the property of all the
people of the United States.

And the things that are done
with it are meant

to undertake secret policies

without any accountability
to Congress

and the people
of the United States.

That's objectionable.

GANZ:
I can tell you that when I was on

the congressional
inspection tour,

there was gold in Fort Knox.

But knowing
that the gold was there

in September of 1974
doesn't mean

that it's still there today.

SHATNER:
One thing is certain.

Something of value
is being heavily protected

inside Fort Knox.

And either it's the vast amount
of fabled gold bars

that serve as the contents

of the world's
greatest treasure fortress, or

it's the disturbing secret

that the vault is really empty.

But according to some experts,

it hardly matters,
because they claim

that the largest collection
of gold exists,

not in a vault on Earth,

but somewhere else.

Somewhere literally

out of this world.

SHATNER:
NASA announces a new venture

with The Trans Astronautica
Corporation.

The goal? To develop technology

for a special mining operation

in outer space.

We incorporated TransAstra
in 2015 when we saw

that SpaceX and Elon Musk

and Jeff Bezos
and other entrepreneurs

were developing low-cost,
really effective ways

to get into orbit.

WOMAN [over radio]:
Ignition. Lift Off.

SERCEL:
Once we have rockets that can get into orbit inexpensively,

then it makes sense
to start building

real industries in space.

And one of the first industries
is asteroid mining.

SHATNER:
In the near future,

TransAstra and other companies

intend to mine asteroids

for valuable minerals,
including gold.

But why asteroids?

Why not here on Earth?

According to studies compiled
by the U.S. Geological Survey,

there are 57,000 tons
of mineable gold on Earth

that have not yet been
excavated.

But with a global production
rate of an estimated

3,300 tons per year,
that would mean

that in less than 20 years,

there won't be any gold left
on our planet to find.

So, if you want to acquire
more gold in the future,

we will have to look for it

among the stars.

SERCEL:
Precious metals

that we really value
on the Earth,

things like gold and platinum--

they're called "precious metals"

because they're not around much.

Question is, where are they?

The answer is: asteroids.

A lot of the asteroids are
still in their pristine form

from how they first formed

at the beginning
of the solar system.

You get a typical asteroid, a
few hundred meters in diameter,

it will have more
of those rare Earth elements

than have been mined on Earth
in all of human history.

The asteroid belt could provide
for the needs

of our civilization
for many centuries,

maybe thousands of years
into the future.

HART:
Explorers are always looking for new gold sources.

And it was a search for gold
that ultimately led

to the discovery of America.

Gold has been there for a long
time, central to our culture.

Gold has been money
since 635 BC.

So, I guess the short answer
to the question:

"Why do we like gold?" is

because we always have.

Are we actually running out
of gold on this planet?

Well, there are some who believe

that one day, perhaps
in the not too distant future,

we might have to replace it
with something else

like platinum or palladium.

Or maybe,

as mankind continues its
exploration of the universe,

we will find vast new sources
of gold

on asteroids
or neighboring planets,

and we will have a limitless
supply of the glittering metal

whose mysterious power over us
has so far remained...

unexplained.

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