Original subtitles

Narrator: They're watching you.

More than 4,000 satellites Circle the earth.

Every day, they uncover new, Mysterious phenomena

That defy explanation --

There's something weird Going on here.

It's suspicious.

Narrator: ...A giant head From the dawn of civilization...

2,000, 3,000 years older

Than some of The great pyramids of egypt.

Narrator: ...Raises the fear Of primeval monsters...

People firmly believe That they are there.

Narrator: ...Instilling terror In the locals...

Hoyle: they all died.

One of the hikers had Her tongue bitten out.

Narrator: ...Mysterious islands Just off florida...

There's no evidence That in the history of humanity

Have we had the capability To do engineering at this scale.

Narrator: ...And the rock Creatures transforming earth...

Those bugs are still down here.

Narrator: ...Weird, Giant lumps in the jungle...

Kourounis: It looks like reptile skin,

Like scales on a snake Or a lizard.

Narrator: ...And the black hole That came down to earth.

Kourounis: It's mind-blowing.

Narrator: baffling phenomena, Mysteries from space,

What on earth are they?

**

-- captions by vitac -- Www.Vitac.Com

Captions paid for by Discovery communications

Narrator: a satellite detects A looming shape

In a remote spot on a vast Russian mountain range.

[ satellite warbling ]

Kourounis: that's huge.

Whoever built this went To a lot of trouble.

Narrator: analysts believe This shape is not accidental.

It represents something,

Something that could shed light On the savage rituals

And mystical beliefs practiced

At the dawn Of human civilization.

These people would've made A representation of an animal...

[ bear roars ]

In order to gain protection From it.

Narrator: legend has it The shape summons up

The specter Of a long-dead monster...

[ thunder crashes ]

Blamed for the terrifying fate Of mountain explorers.

One of the hikers had Her tongue bitten out.

And they all died.

[ people screaming ]

Narrator: 2007.

A satellite camera captures A shape carved into a mountain

In a remote region Of southwest russia.

Kourounis: I can see an outline,

But I'm not exactly sure What it's meant to be.

It's hard to tell.

The shapes that are forming it Look far more man-made

Compared to something You might get from nature.

Narrator: at first glance, It appears to be a woodland path

Or an off-road track.

But if the image is rotated, A familiar figure emerges.

It looks like It's some kind of horned animal.

It looks like a moose or an elk Or some type of antlered animal.

Narrator: analysis reveals The animal-head shape

Is over 700 feet tall.

It covers an area the size Of 10 football fields.

That's huge.

Imagine trying to take a drawing That you've made

And upscale it to that size And have it still make sense.

Whoever built this went To a lot of trouble.

Narrator: the image comes From the ural mountain range,

100 miles northwest of the Russian border with kazakhstan.

The area is home To the mansi people,

A rugged, nomadic tribe of whom Only a few hundred survive.

But they have lived here For over 800 years.

Before they became subjects Of the russian empire

And forced to convert To christianity,

The mansi performed sacrifices To supernatural beings

And sought the protection Of animal spirits,

The elk and the bear.

To me, The most logical explanation

Is that this elk On the mountainside

Is like a totemic animal That's protecting them

In their everyday life.

It's possible These people would've made

A representation of an animal

Or phenomenon That they feared...

[ bear roars ]

In order to gain protection From it.

Narrator: in 2012, A team of archaeologists venture

Into the russian Forest wilderness

To examine the giant form Up close.

What they find amazes them.

The animalistic figure is Far more sophisticated

Than it appears from space

And far older even Than the ancient mansi tribe.

Horton: when the archaeologists Went and checked it out,

They discovered these aren't Just a few scratches in the soil

But really elaborate, Megalithic structures.

It was a major piece Of civil engineering

With huge boulders being brought

To outline The shape of the animals.

Narrator: among the boulders, Archaeologists find

More than 100 Prehistoric stone tools.

Some of the stone tools found With it suggest

That it's very old indeed

And maybe contemporary

With a whole series Of megalithic cultures.

Narrator: the tools And style of the stonework

Dates the structure To 4,000 b.C.

Put in broad perspective, This is, what,

2,00, 3,000 years older

Than some of The great pyramids of egypt.

Narrator: The local mansi people did not Create this giant carving.

It's the work of a previously Unknown prehistoric people.

When archaeologists dig deeper,

They discover the remains Of ancient fire pits.

The presence Of ancient fire pits

Adds credence to the notion

That this was used For ritual purposes.

[ people chanting indistinctly ]

Geoglyphs would've been The perfect sacred site

For the gathering Of communities.

And within some belief systems,

There would've been Ritual sacrifices.

Narrator: The rituals carried out here Date back to neolithic times.

Bloody shamanistic sacrifices

Were supposed to ward off Evil spirits.

But if this giant Mountainside symbol was meant

To protect its creators,

The question is, "From what?"

According to local legend, A large, prehistoric being,

A survivor From the last ice age,

Still roams these mountains.

Larger than a man, upright But ape-like in appearance,

The russians call This terrifying beast the menk.

People firmly believe That they are there,

And there isn't evidence That they're not.

Narrator: Could the prehistoric animal Carved into the mountainside

Be there to protect the ancients From the legendary menk?

You could speculate That this hill figure

Is to warn off Scary, yeti-like folk.

Narrator: scientists have Dismissed the menk as mythical.

But a menk-like beast Has been blamed by some

For the terrifying events That took place in 1959...

In the very same ural mountains

The prehistoric Animal carving is located.

The dyatlov pass incident talks

About a team Of experienced hikers.

At one point in the expedition, Something went seriously wrong.

Sleeping in their tents,

The hikers seem To have been disturbed

By something terrifying. [ people screaming ]

Some of them cut themselves Out of their tents

To escape something.

[ wind howling ]

Narrator: what happened next Will never be known

Because not one of the explorers Survived to tell their story.

One of the hikers had Her tongue bitten out,

And they all died.

Narrator: archaeologists hope That further investigation

Of the ancient, magical Animal symbol spotted from space

Will shed light on a lost world,

A world of strange creatures,

Strange beliefs,

And savage practices.

The field of archaeology Has expanded so much recently,

Especially using Satellite imagery

To see things That we've never seen before.

That's exactly How this site was discovered.

Narrator: coming up, the mystery Of the moving desert.

It's this collection Of dark marks and shapes.

It's very strange.

Narrator: and something's up With the minutemen.

It's very "Dr. Strangelove."

Narrator: two images from space, One weird phenomenon --

Mystery islands geologists say Shouldn't be there

And don't appear natural.

There's no evidence That in the history of humanity

Have we had the capability To do engineering at this scale.

Narrator: the caribbean islands Off the florida cost.

The location of the first-ever "James bond" movie,

In which dr. No plans To attack america

With an atomic radio beam

From his lair In a dormant volcano.

A lot of the islands In the caribbean are made

From volcanic processes

Because they're situated Along an active tectonic margin.

The reason There are volcanic islands

In the caribbean is because You have one plate

That subducts Underneath the other.

Narrator: the islands, Produced by volcanic activity,

Are formed by searing magma Spewing out of the earth

And then cooling To form the mountain peaks

That rise dramatically From the waves.

The islands are the tops Of these volcanic mountains.

**

But there's One chain of islands

Close to florida That doesn't fit the pattern.

The bahamas look like

A picture-perfect Tropical paradise.

It sucks you in. It's hypnotic.

It's the turquoise And the white and the blues.

It's just spectacular.

Narrator: the bahamas, sitting Just 150 miles off florida,

Are the wrong shape.

There are no mountains,

And the islands become Even more mysterious

When seen from space.

Stott: they don't have That same island look to them.

There's something unique And just different

About the way they look From space.

Porges: when you first look down

And you see The bahama banks from space,

You have to ask yourself, "What is that?"

It doesn't look like land At all.

It's this collection Of dark marks and shapes.

It's very strange.

Narrator: the bahamas Cannot be volcanic.

They like north Of the active plate zone.

Yet there's no obvious,

Natural, geological explanation For them.

They shouldn't exist.

So, then, Who or what created them?

Muller-karger: Man-made islands are not A far-fetched idea at all.

We construct And try to gain territory

From the ocean all the time.

Narrator: Christopher columbus recorded Their existence in 1492.

But could a primitive society Have possessed

Such incredibly advanced Technology?

The qing dynasty in china did it Several hundred years ago,

And even before that In mesoamerica

There were efforts To do reclamation of lands

In central america.

Narrator: over 600 years ago,

The aztecs in nearby mexico Reclaimed vast lakes.

They grow crops by building Massive platforms in the water.

But not even Modern island builders

Have the technology To create something

As big as the bahamas.

Muller-karger: The bahamas is huge.

There's no evidence That in the history of humanity

Have we had the capability To do engineering at this scale.

Narrator: the mystery deepens When scientists explore

A remote bay nestled Amongst the islands.

They find stromatolites,

A weird, very rare Kind of living rock.

Like something Out of "Star trek,"

It's part rock, part creature.

These are big rock structures Built by little, tiny microbes.

Narrator: stromatolites Did not build the bahamas,

But they provide a crucial clue To what did.

They're reefs built By cyanobacteria.

Narrator: these weird Rock critters are feeding,

And as they do They create limestone.

All of this island is Calcium carbonate.

It's calcium carbonate beaches, Calcium carbonate dunes.

These structures are Actively growing now.

And eventually Those platforms make reefs

That can be tens to hundreds Of kilometers long.

**

Narrator: but why here?

These tiny organisms Can be found

In other parts of the world And in other environments,

But they don't end up Building islands.

And there's something Even more strange.

Microorganisms, like all of us, Need nutrients to grow --

Very specifically iron.

The amazing thing About the bahamas

Is the very Nutrient-poor waters.

The main problem -- there's not A natural source of iron here.

Narrator: in theory, These tiny critters

Should struggle To survive in these waters

Because they need iron To grow and reproduce.

So the question is, "Where is it coming from?"

Narrator: when scientists Closely examine the iron

In the islands' living rock, They are amazed.

The only known match For this particular iron

Is actually the sahara desert 3,000 miles away.

[ satellite warbling ]

Narrator: The findings make no sense.

Until, that is, Scientists examine

Satellite images taken over The sahara region of africa.

Dr. Brand: if you look At a satellite image

Of the ocean Just off the coast of africa,

You'll see This plume of red dust.

The reason this dust is red

Is because It's really rich in iron.

Narrator: the desert winds Of the sahara whip up

An iron-rich sandstorm.

This red, iron dust cloud Heads out over the ocean,

Beginning a long journey Across the atlantic

And over the volcanic islands Of the caribbean.

So, the iron in the dust acts To fertilize the cyanobacteria

Living in the water column,

Causing them To go into overdrive

In terms of producing carbonate.

**

These weird rock creatures Are, in effect,

Eating the sahara desert, And as their numbers swell,

They create the swirling islands Of the bahamas.

It's so cool that the sand That's helped build them

Is coming from sand in africa.

Narrator: This extraordinary process

Has been unfolding For 100 million years,

Creating the beautiful, Twisting bahamas

Rising gently above the waves, Shaped by the wind.

Stott: one of The really mind-boggling things

About seeing the earth From the space vantage point

Is that you see This interconnectivity.

Porges: those bugs Are still down there.

They're still working. They are not done yet.

The bahamas are still Under construction.

Narrator: up next...

Many of these ancient sites have Been looted by treasure hunters.

Narrator: ...Monstrous bumps In the land of the giants.

Giant species known As andiorrhinus.

Narrator: a scientist exploring Colombia's prehistoric wetlands

Captures this startling image.

Kourounis: It looks like reptile skin,

Like scales On a snake or a lizard.

This is something I've never seen before.

Narrator: tens of thousands Of square miles are covered

In a vast mosaic Of reptilian green mounds.

What are they? What creates them?

Narrator: 2012 -- colombia.

Satellite images Reveal something strange

In the ancient Southern wetlands.

This is really weird.

The land is broken up Into these weird,

Geometric fragments that look Something like a jigsaw puzzle.

Kourounis: we're talking tens Of thousands of square miles

In a very remote part of A very remote part of the world.

Narrator: the images Were taken over swamps

To the east Of the andes mountains

Known as the los llanos plains.

The bizarre pattern Attracts the attention

Of biologist delphine renard.

Renard: the satellite images Were really, like,

The first step discovering These things.

What was really stunning was The regularity of the mounds.

We didn't know What these mounds were,

How they were created.

So that was, like, Kind of the big question.

Narrator: someone or something Has transformed the earth

Into a vast And intricate pattern.

From space, the scales Or lumps look small.

But the mounds are Actually as high as 6 1/2 feet

And can reach 16 feet across.

Delphine and her team Examine the possibility

The strange shapes Were made by humans.

We know of earth mounds Created by humans

In mesoamerica And south america.

We know them, for example, In the coast of guianas.

In fertile wetlands, Farmers have been known

To make raised mounds

To stop their crops From getting waterlogged.

Was there a group of people

That were growing Something here,

Some type of grain or vegetable,

And this is just The remnants of their farms?

Narrator: there is no record of A settlement in this exact area.

But was there once?

New discoveries Are being made all the time.

A whole new lost city Is actually located

Up in the mountains Above cartagena.

It's a series Of very sophisticated

Irrigation terraces Along the mountainside.

Narrator: Discovered in 1972,

Colombia's so-called Ciudad perdida was built

On a man-made landscape Of over 100 raised terraces.

The dream Of a real-life el dorado

Has lured thousands Of treasure hunters

Into colombia's wilderness, And some have struck gold.

Horton: many of these Ancient sites have been looted

By treasure hunters And so forth.

Narrator: Is this scaly landscape Evidence of another hoard?

Delphine visits The site of the mounds

And tests the soil For evidence of farming,

Which would prove humans have Had an impact on this landscape.

But the tests show nothing.

We didn't have any indication

Of these mounds Being cultivated in the past.

Whatever made these mounds Was not human.

Investigators begin to suspect

That the mounds Have been created

By some kind of animal.

There's many species In the natural world

That are very good At constructing things.

Dr. Kays: In parts of africa,

You get mounds built By termites.

If you have enough termites Concentrated into one area,

They can build structures that Can actually be seen from space.

I've been to africa.

I've seen termite mounds,

And some of them are huge, Taller than me.

Narrator: termites are known To live in dry savannahs,

But they can also be found In wet tropical forests.

[ thunder crashing ]

A lot of termites build mounds To prevent being flooded

During the rainy season.

Narrator: delphine And her team dissect the mounds,

Which locals call surales,

To see if termites Are responsible.

When you cut a surale Into two parts,

You can see That the surface is, like,

Kind of crumbly, and the inside,

There is not a lot of galleries And chambers

That would be characteristic Of a termite nest.

Narrator: Termites were present,

But they are not making The mounds.

Instead, Delphine's team discovered

That the monstrous structures Have themselves been made

By a monster --

A gigantic worm.

We found one species Of earthworm especially big

That can be able to produce These very big casts.

The earthworms here are A giant species

Known as andiorrhinus.

These south american earthworms Can be up to five feet long.

Narrator: These are monster worm casts

Created by monster worms.

Kourounis: [ chuckling ] These are piles of worm poop.

Who would've guessed?

You got to hand it To these earthworms.

You can see the effects Of their poop from space.

Narrator: the giant worm casts Are rich in nutrients,

Encouraging an explosion Of growth on top of the mounds,

Which helps bind them together.

It's all caused by millions Of these invertebrates.

Narrator: the mystery Of the mounds is solved.

The new mystery

Is the monster worms That created them.

We still have a lot to do In this landscape

To know more About the earthworm in itself.

This is A very exciting place to be.

Nature is amazing.

Narrator: still to come, Don't look now --

It's america's nukes...

Moran: it's easy to imagine

Why the u.S. Air force Would want to hide this.

Narrator: ...A giant vortex Sucks up the arabian sea...

Kourounis: I see an image like this,

And it makes the hairs On the back of my neck stand up.

Narrator: ...And area 51 in the jungle.

Dr. Pavelec: why is it so Dangerous to even report on it

If you're a journalist?

Narrator: rural montana.

A commercial satellite captures A crystal-clear image

Of an isolated Military facility.

D'antonio: You can see building structure.

You can see light poles.

And these are the shadows Of the light poles.

Narrator: but an image Of the same location

Taken some time earlier shows A striking difference.

Dr. Miller: In comparing these two images,

We see that one is very clean, Very crisp.

The other is kind of blurry.

So something Obviously is going on here.

Narrator: this looks like Ordinary farmland,

But it's the secure area

Around the highly sensitive Malmstrom air force base.

No one goes in Or leaves this place

Without top-level clearance

Because operating Out of this base

Is the 341st missile wing

Of the u.S. Air force Global strike command.

This is one of the several U.S. Bases

Which house American nuclear missiles,

Specifically the minutemen, Minutemen iii missiles.

Man: door open.

Narrator: the minuteman iii is

An intercontinental Ballistic missile

Capable of destroying targets 8,000 miles away.

They're launched from carefully Camouflaged underground silos,

Barely visible Even in clear satellite images.

It's at the heart Of the united states' defense

Against nuclear war.

I mean, It's very "Dr. Strangelove,"

End-of-the-world type thing.

Narrator: The destructive capability Of the minuteman iii missiles

Makes them a truly terrifying, Apocalyptic weapon.

It's easy to imagine Why the u.S. Air force

Would want to hide this place.

But why would they want to Hide it only some of the time?

Narrator: but the u.S. Is A free, open society.

We already know they're there.

Even enemy powers know They're there.

The fact that blurring comes And goes suggests

It's not the site itself That is being covered up,

But some other activity Around it.

Moran: you've got to think That when the image is blurred,

The u.S. Air force Must be doing something

That they don't want anyone To know about.

Narrator: The minuteman nuclear missiles

Have been in service since 1970.

As far as intelligence goes, They're old news.

But the u.S. Military Has recently been developing

A top secret, radical Missile-defense system,

Which might explain The increased secrecy.

Moran: of course, It would make sense to use

A pre-existing launch facility

Where you already have A lot of the infrastructure

And technology in place

Rather than build A whole new one.

Man: 5, 4, 3, 2, 1.

Narrator: the ground-based Midcourse defense system,

Or g.M.D., Is designed to protect

The entire united states

With an umbrella Of defensive missile cover.

It's the latest evolution Of the star wars initiative --

High-tech space war.

Groundbreaking technology Enables interceptors

To destroy incoming missiles

Simply with the force Of their impact.

Moran: this anti-missile Defense system is

One of the most sophisticated In the world.

So the u.S. Government Is probably never going

To confirm or deny Any speculation related to it.

Narrator: this site could be A g.M.D. Silo.

But what if the cover-up is not About something being installed

But something being removed?

Marshall: it looks like A silo has been decommissioned,

Possibly filled in with gravel And then water.

Moran: a lot of these Old missile systems and sites

Are now being deactivated.

[ applause ]

Narrator: The end of the cold war Saw treaties that began

The long process Of decommissioning

70% of the world's Nuclear weapons.

The nightmare scenario

Is that decommissioned Radioactive material

Could fall into terrorist hands.

[ people shouting indistinctly ]

The destructive capabilities Of weapons like this

Are so great That it stands to reason

That even the decommissioning Of a facility is something

That needs to be wrapped In secrecy.

Narrator: the key ingredient To these weapons, plutonium,

Is one of the earth's rarest And most harmful elements.

If terrorists get their hands On radioactive materials,

They could construct What's called a dirty bomb.

Carlin: you're talking About one of

The most poisonous substances Known to man,

And it takes very little To do a lot of damage.

Narrator: a dirty bomb is A lethal, homemade cocktail

Of explosives And radioactive material.

Marshall: it would have Devastating effects

If you put that Into an urban area.

The terror you could create Is one of the reasons

Why is it one of the things

That keeps the security experts Awake at night.

Narrator: The u.S. Government admits

Nuclear-weapons decommissioning Is ongoing.

But which sites are involved Remains highly classified.

Coming up, the black hole That's bright green.

Talking about an ocean vortex

That's that large And that powerful --

You wouldn't want To be anywhere near it.

Narrator: february 2013.

As the worldview-2 satellite Orbits above the arabian sea,

It captures an image Which is as weird as it is big,

A giant green vortex spreading Over more than 500 square miles.

Kourounis: I see an image like this,

And it makes the hairs On the back of my neck stand up.

Narrator: scientists are amazed At what they see.

I've seen ocean whirlpools, But nothing on this scale.

Narrator: it's not just The shape and size

Of this mysterious vortex.

It's the color.

The livid green Immediately leads to speculation

Of some gigantic, Toxic, industrial disaster.

That bright-green color, it's The first thing you think of

When you think of toxic waste.

Kourounis: Is this naturally occurring

Or some huge Environmental catastrophe?

Narrator: lethal toxic spills Are often bright, dayglo colors,

The result of a deadly mix Of chemicals.

Nelson: we actually have images From argentina

Of a river glowing The same toxic green.

Narrator: the riachuelo river, Just outside buenos aires,

Is one of the most polluted Bodies of water on the planet.

There's no end To what has been done to this --

Filled with toxic waste, Garbage, who knows what.

Narrator: in 2010,

The noxious river Suddenly turned neon green.

What's amazing is That it's so bright green.

But what's interesting is that That green water

That we're seeing is

Actually not from the toxins In the water.

It's actually from dye, Colored dye,

That greenpeace put in there To help highlight

How polluted This area actually is.

The stunt makes headlines Around the world.

Dyeing a river To highlight pollution

Is kind of like bombing For peace.

But it turns out this dye is Actually very harmless

And in a few days Will be completely gone.

Narrator: but this green vortex Covers 570 square miles,

And the nearest human settlement Is the sultanate of oman,

Whose people trade In fish and dates,

Not industrial chemicals.

Oman typically has Very low levels of pollution.

Nelson: there's no reason Somebody would want

To pull a stunt like this there.

It's got to be something else.

Narrator: the vortex disappears As inexplicably as it appeared.

Scientists working For the sultan traveled

To the place The vortex was photographed.

The real "Eureka" moment Really happened

When the omani authorities Went out to this body of water,

Tried to sample it, Figure out what it was.

They discover the water Still has traces of green.

And it's alive.

Mysterious glowing seas Have been reported by sailors

For hundreds of years.

But most of these sightings Can be explained

As a simple natural phenomenon.

Bioluminescence is The effect of a protein

And an enzyme coming together,

And when they come together, They light up.

Narrator: in certain conditions, Vast blooms of microorganisms

Can emit eerie blue light Over areas big enough

To be seen from space.

Muller-karger: There's all sorts of life forms That have bioluminescence.

Why would organisms use Bioluminescence

Is still one of The big mysteries in science.

It's something That we don't understand.

Narrator: But these glowing creatures Are only visible at night.

The green swirl can be seen 'round the clock.

They discovered That it was tiny, microscopic,

Green algae swirling around In a giant ocean whirlpool.

Kourounis: It's pretty mind-blowing.

You've got these tiny, Microscopic organisms

That individually You can barely see

But in large numbers You can see from space.

Narrator: the invasion of algae Explains the green color

But not the giant vortex.

It looks like a black hole, And, indeed,

Scientists have discovered what They call black hole whirlpools.

Disturbingly, This black hole behaves

In ways similar To its astronomical counterpart.

Both types of black holes Suck in the matter around them.

In one case, light. In the other, water.

Hill: talking about An ocean vortex that's

That large And that powerful --

You wouldn't want To be anywhere near it

If you were in a small boat.

Narrator: the terrifying Maelstroms described

By old mariners were Once thought

To be nothing more Than fanciful stories.

Now, it seems, the old sailors Were telling the truth.

Black hole whirlpools Have been seen

In satellite images Of the south atlantic.

But the seas Off the sultanate of oman

Are believed to be too shallow For such whirlpools.

Scientists still debate What is really going on.

Still to come, something Dangerous hidden in the jungle.

What did they stumble upon

That the military Didn't want them to find?

A military satellite orbits 430 miles

Above one of the most Secretive states on earth.

Far from civilization,

In myanmar's dense, Forbidding jungle,

It captures an image Of something totally at odds

With its surroundings.

Moran: when you look closely At this image,

You can ascertain

That it is some sort Of high-security installation.

This installation is Very, very mysterious.

[ camera shutter clicking ]

Narrator: it's the extraordinary Levels of security

Which immediately cause alarm Among analysts.

Whatever is being done Or made here

Is being kept Completely under wraps.

So, the first thing That arouses suspicion for me

At this place Is that there's a helipad.

This indicates that there are High-level officials

Who are probably visiting This facility.

There's A security checkpoint here,

Which means that they're careful About who they let in.

Narrator: but perhaps The most puzzling thing

About the facility Is its location.

The complex Is situated deep inside

The infamous, dense jungles

Of the republic Of the union of myanmar,

Known to most of the world As burma.

Jagan: it's very clearly In a secluded area.

It's one Where access is limited,

And therefore The most likely explanation is

That this is A military installation.

It makes you wonder what does The military have going on here

That they really don't want Anyone to know about?

Narrator: there's No good, commercial motive

To build anything Deep in the jungle.

Jagan: One would suspect initially

To have some kind Of sinister reason behind it.

Narrator: in an effort to find Out what this facility might be,

Two burmese journalists Make the long trek

Through the jungle.

Eventually, they reach The perimeter fence.

They are arrested,

Interrogated,

And sentenced To a decade of hard labor.

[ door slams ]

What did they stumble upon

That the military Didn't want them to find?

Jagan: there's no doubt That the reaction

From the military Makes one suspicious.

[ fanfare plays ]

Although burma Is formally a democracy,

The burmese state is, In reality, a military junta.

And burma's rulers Are oppressive.

To figure out What they could be hiding,

Analysts look for clues In the architecture.

To me, it looks sort of like A production facility.

There are these smokestacks.

There's a connecting tunnel To this other building.

What this looks like Is some enormous military

Or industrial complex.

Narrator: in response To growing concern

From the international Community,

Burma's military claims The complex is nothing more

Than a perfectly ordinary Ammunition factory.

But analysts are not convinced.

Moran: if this is Just a regular factory

Churning out bombs and guns,

You can understand The high security,

But what's the need For all the secrecy?

Narrator: To build a weapons factory

In the middle Of the burmese jungle

Surrounded by the highest levels Of security makes no sense.

Unless, perhaps, The weapons produced here

Were of a kind The burmese military

Doesn't want the world to see.

[ soldiers singing In native language ]

The reason the journalists went To investigate this facility

Is because of rumors that it was

A potential Chemical-weapons plant,

Something that the military

Would definitely not want People to know about.

Narrator: burma's ruling elite Has a grim record

Of human-rights abuses.

They are suspected Of using chemical weapons

Against rebel tribespeople In the north of the country.

Of course, the government Of myanmar flat out denies

Any involvement With chemical weapons.

But as we've seen recently In places like syria,

You can never be too sure.

The thing to remember Is that the myanmar military

Are one of the most Highly secretive militaries

In the world.

Dill: there are lots of features That such a facility would have.

This facility has All of those things,

But it is almost impossible To draw any conclusions

About a chemical-weapons Production facility

From satellite imagery alone.

Narrator: the satellite image Is inconclusive,

But most analysts believe This new complex

In the jungle serves Some sinister purpose.

Could this satellite imagery Be looking

At a new installation To house political prisoners?

That would explain the secrecy Surrounding this facility.

Jagan: If you look at the structure In the satellite imagery,

It could possibly be Cell blocks.

Dr. Pavelec: although On the surface it's a democracy,

Myanmar incarcerates Thousands upon thousands

Of political prisoners.

And there are also labor camps In that country

For the political prisoners.

Narrator: but despite Burma's shocking record

Of atrocities Against its own people,

Most analysts are not convinced This is a labor camp.

In recent years, Burma's military junta

Has been attempting to shake off Its reputation for state terror.

This is at a point In myanmar's history

When they had less need For prisons than previously.

They were releasing Political prisoners.

[ speaking native language ]

They were not preparing For new mass arrests.

[ cheers and applause ]

Narrator: as with area 51, The purpose

Of this facility remains A closely guarded secret.

Anyone foolish enough To visit the base faces

The prospect of arrest And imprisonment

In one of burma's Notorious jails.

Dr. Pavelec: why is it so Dangerous to even report on it

If you're a journalist?

Why all of the mystery?

Narrator: whatever is being Concealed in these vast sheds,

It's something so dangerous It must be surrounded

By razor-wire fences And armed guards

And hidden in the depths Of the jungle.