All language subtitles for What.on.Earth.S05E01.1080p.DSCP.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.H.264-BTN_track3_[eng]

Narrator:
They're watching you.

More than 4,000 satellites
Circle the earth.

Every day, they uncover new,
Mysterious phenomena

That defy explanation.

[ beeping, distorted music ]

Toxic hailstorms and the mystery
Of the vanishing lake...

Chamberlain: that's insane.

It really does look like
You're standing on the moon.

Narrator: ...The walking dead
Seen from the skies...

Something is wrong here,

Really, horribly wrong.

Narrator: ...And space diamonds
In the sahara.

It looks as though
There was a giant claw

Tearing the desert floor.

Narrator: baffling phenomena.

Mysteries from space.

What on earth are they?

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

[ beeping ]
[ camera shutter clicking ]

[ whirring ]

Captions paid for by
Discovery communications

**

[ frequency warbles ]
[ whirring ]

July 3rd, 2016.

A satellite 380 miles above
California captures an image

Of strange patterns
In a valley below.

Schuttler:
This image is truly bizarre.

I've never seen anything
Like it before.

This looks a lot like a giant
Bird dropped its feathers,

And that makes
No sense at all.

Narrator: analysis of the wider
Area adds to the mystery.

Let's zoom out.

And, whoa.

Looks like it's kind of
A post-apocalyptic environment.

You have pinks and maroons.

This almost looks like
A wastewater pond

For a chemical plant.

Narrator:
The weird shapes, colors,

And evidence of desolation

Are being investigated
By science journalist

Haley chamberlain.

Well, an area like this,

That looks like it has
So many things going on,

Raises concern because it's sort
Of turning into this wasteland.

Narrator:
Chamberlain travels towards
The sierra nevada mountains.

**

Across these peaks,
150 years ago,

Came scores of prospectors
In a lawless,

Desperate hunt for riches --
The great gold rush.

It looks like the wild west.

There's literally tumbleweed
On the side of the road.

Narrator: chamberlain
Has traveled far across

The sierra nevada gold fields
When she spots something --

A ghost town.

**

It's a little bit eerie.

It looks like this
Maybe was once

Kind of a bustling community.

**

Very desolate-looking
All around here.

Narrator: many dwellings appear
To have been suddenly abandoned,

Once-valuable machines
Left to decay.

It looks like the people here
Were forced to leave town fast.

**

Chamberlain continues towards
The weird shapes and colors

In the image.

**

What she finds stuns her.

Chamberlain: wow!

Narrator: a seemingly endless
Expanse of barren land

Covered in some strange
Substance, encrusted and white.

**

Chamberlain:
And it just goes on and on.

**

As far as the eye can see
Is crusty, flat, dry land.

Narrator: chamberlain struggles
To think of anything else

On earth
That looks like this.

Chamberlain: I have to wonder
What's going on here.

It really does look like
You're standing on the moon.

Narrator:
The cracked surface suggests
The historic presence of water.

If this was a lake,
It was truly gigantic.

**

It covered perhaps
100 square miles.

Yet it seems some unknown force
Has made it disappear.

From the satellite image,
I know that this lake

Used to be absolutely massive.

That's pretty incredible.

What happened to this lake?

**

Narrator:
As chamberlain heads out across
The moonlike landscape,

She discovers something
Even more puzzling.

Chamberlain:
Oh, take a look at that.

Looks like the ground
Is bleeding.

That's insane.

**

The effect is really
Kind of eerie and beautiful.

Narrator: in the far distance,
Chamberlain sees something...

...A tornado making its way
Steadily across the flat ground.

This valley sits in between
Two escarpments of mountains

That are both wedge-shaped,
Creating this tunnel of wind

That just gets filtered
Right through here.

Narrator: over a dry lunar
Landscape like this,

Dust devils can grow
Into dangerous twisters.

With all this wind kicking up,
It's really easy to imagine

All this really fine dust
Being kicked up into the air,

Swirled around, and making
A jagged, hellish sandstorm.

Narrator: local medical records
Reveal that the area

Has experienced infernal
Dust storms for decades,

Many so fierce they rip
The skin from your face.

What's more, they can kill.

This dust is laden with heavy
Metals and toxic minerals,

And it's such a fine particulate
That once you inhale it,

It embeds in the lungs,

Forming all kinds of issues,
Even cancer.

Narrator:
The records confirm that levels

Of atmospheric pollution
Around the dried lake bed

Can be 240 times higher than
Statewide safety limits.

The hell happened here?

Whatever it was left
All this salt and dust

All over the place,

And these towns were laid
To waste because of it.

Narrator: chamberlain returns to
The satellite image for clues.

She spots what looks like
A partly dried up river

And heads there
To investigate.

This is the dried up riverbed
That I saw

In the satellite image,
And I can see that it was once

Really wide from side
To side here.

Narrator:
As chamberlain rounds one bend,

She discovers the reason
For the lake's disappearance.

To think that all of this
Was a huge river.

Wow.

**

[ whirring ]

Narrator: coming up...

A cold snap at the ends
Of the earth...

Walters: one of the crew members
Developed gangrene

In both his feet,

And they actually fall off
Inside his boots.

Narrator: ...And the battle
For los angeles.

Merrit:
What we're seeing in this image,

That's the cost of saving l.A.

**

[ whirring ]

[ whirring ]

**

Narrator:
Haley chamberlain is in gold
Rush territory, california,

Investigating a ghost town
And a moonscape

With a blood-red substance
Beneath the surface.

She realizes that a vast lake

Must have stood here
In the past.

Following the route of a dried
Riverbed that once fed the lake,

She discovers the cause
Of its disappearance.

Chamberlain: that's insane.

Holy cow.

This water here
Is being diverted.

Most of it is heading off
In this direction,

Which, if my calculations
Are correct, is los angeles.

**

Narrator:
The diversion of a river can
Have devastating consequences,

Destroying livelihoods

And laying waste
To whole communities.

Returning to the image,

Chamberlain discovers
Not all human presence

Has been wiped out here.

It looks like it still has
A little bit of life.

It's not completely abandoned.

I think this is where I need
To go to find more answers.

Narrator: chamberlain
Arrives to discover

Some signs
Of scattered habitation.

Exploring one street, she finds
A home that's still occupied.

Hi, there!

There she meets a man
Calling himself zippy.

Hello.
Hi!

How's it going?

Zippy confirms that on
The apocalyptic lunar landscape

Once stood a lake
Called owens lake,

After one of
The first prospectors here.

So this entire area
Was a lake.

This was right on the beach.

This is where the beach was.
The beach was right there.

Yeah.
This place used to...

Chamberlain learns that
The man who locals blame

For the lake's disappearance
Is one william mulholland.

He was a business guy,
You know, like,

What we call
A modern-day ceo.

L.A. Was growing back then

And, you know,
They were looking for water.

In 1886, mulholland becomes head

Of the los angeles city
Water company.

At this time, l.A. Is a small
Town of just 50,000,

But over the following 30 years,
It expands more than tenfold.

This is where
The movie industry begins.

This is eventually where the
Aviation industry calls home,

And as people flood in, not only
Do these industries thrive,

But so does the need for water.

Narrator: to grow further,
This boomtown needs water.

So mulholland and mayor fred
Eaton scour california

For a body of water big enough
To quench l.A.'s thirst.

They find owens lake.

Morgan: mulholland feels this
Pressure to solve this crisis,

And so he's going to use
Any means necessary

To obtain access
To the water from owens lake.

Narrator: newspaper articles
Reveal that

During the early years
Of the 20th century,

Mulholland and his men
Stealthily buy up tracts of land

And water rights
Around owens lake.

They came about 1910 and betting
People against each other,

Buying the land, you know.

Mulholland, eaton,
And their cronies

Went and gobbled up this land.

They posed as ranchers.

They tried to pass themselves
Off as people

That were going to move
To the valley and live there.

Narrator: in 1907, mulholland
Begins construction

Of a mammoth
233 mile long aqueduct,

Which, by 1913,
Starts diverting the river

That feeds owens lake
To los angeles.

How much of the water
Was taken to l.A.?

All of it.

Mulholland's aqueduct starves
Owens lake of water,

And by 1926 the lake is gone.

It leaves behind a vast bed
Of dust and salt.

One of the few things
That can survive here

Is a kind of red bacteria
That feeds off salt.

This, it turns out,
Is the reason for the appearance

Of bleeding
In the satellite image.

Merrit: so what we're seeing
In this image,

That's the cost of saving l.A.

Narrator: with their lake dry,

Local ranchers take the law
Into their own hands.

Morgan: these people are seeing
Their livelihoods

Literally running dry,

And that desperation will
Ultimately lead to violence.

Narrator:
Over the following years,

Ranchers repeatedly
Dynamite mulholland's aqueduct.

**

The battle for control
Of owens lake

Is known as the california
Water wars,

Immortalized in the movie
"Chinatown."

Mulholland and his associates
Get together an armed mob

And give them
Shoot-to-kill orders.

Things got ugly. We're talking
About the most savage water war

In american history.

Narrator: mulholland
And his gang prevail.

The people of l.A.
Get their water,

Their lawns,
And swimming pools,

But meanwhile, the valley
That once held owens lake

Turns into an otherworldly
Toxic dust bowl.

Ever since they did this,
There was dust storms

So thick that I couldn't
See you standing here.

**

For chamberlain,
One mystery remains --

The origin and function

Of the strange feather shapes
In the satellite image.

She heads to the southern end
Of the lake bed to investigate.

Chamberlain: oh, wow.

These are the patterns that
We're seeing in the sat image.

Narrator: the weird patterns
Are feather-shaped islands

Sitting in recently irrigated
Pools of shallow water.

Chamberlain believes
They are designed

To help encourage bird life

And to contain the toxic
Remains of owens lake.

Chamberlain:
The only thing I can really
Think of is that they want

To keep the bottom
Of the lake bed in one place.

Dennie: this is a simple
But ingenious

Solution to their dust problem.

If they can wet the soil
And slow down the wind.

That will help reduce the amount
Of dust in the atmosphere.

Narrator:
After a century of devastation,

This dead zone is starting
To breathe once more.

[ bird crying ]

Chamberlain:
This is absolutely incredible.

You can see life is returning
To this area

As the water is coming back.

It's ironic that we took all of
The water out of the lake

And created this problem,

And now the solution
Is to put the water back in

And essentially let nature
Take its natural course.

**

[ whirring ]

Narrator: coming up...

Seen from the skies
Over texas...

Dr. Albertson: they're clearly
Trying to send a message here.

They're trying to tell somebody,
"Hey. We're after you."

Narrator: ...And today's
Special -- ice pilots.

If you find yourself
In this part of the world,

You are now part of the food
Chain and not at the top.

[ growls ]

[ whirring ]

[ whirring ]

**

Narrator: may 1st, 2014.

A nasa plane is monitoring ice
Thickness over greenland,

An arctic wilderness more than
Twice the size of texas.

Below them, the crew notices
Something unusual.

We have this wide expanse,
But then there's an object.

It appears to be this blackened
Arm coming out of the ice.

**

Narrator: image analyst
Mark d'antonio dials up

The magnification and discovers
Something disturbing.

You can see a little bit more
Detail about what we have here.

This is actually
An aircraft wing

And part
Of an aircraft fuselage.

Kourounis: the idea of being in
A plane crash is scary enough,

But then imagining crashing
In a place like this

That's so desolate,
So remote,

That's got to be one of the most
Frightening things imaginable.

Narrator: but not as frightening
As what the team spots

In the snow
Next to the plane.

These are big animal tracks,
And in this part of greenland,

There's only one thing
That could make them --

Polar bears.

Narrator: polar bears can
Consume over 300 pounds of meat

In a single sitting.

That's roughly 1 1/2 pilots.

If you find yourself
In this part of the world,

Especially if you
Are sick or injured,

You are now part of the food
Chain and not at the top.

Narrator: aviation records
Reveal that there have been

No large plane crashes
In this area for decades.

A search of world war ii
Accidents yields

A possible clue.

There was a b-17 that was
Dispatched during world war ii

Looking for a cargo plane
That went missing.

That b-17 crashed
In this general area.

Baker: could this be it?

Is this the plane
That went down?

**

Narrator:
On november 9th, 1942,

A b-17 flying fortress takes off
From one of the u.S. Military's

World war ii air bases
In greenland

To search for a cargo plane
That crashed 4 days earlier,

But the b-17 also crashes.

The plane crashes,
But it's a controlled crash,

And the nine crewmen survive.

Narrator: the military
Dispatches a seaplane

Which rescues
Two of the stranded crewmen

Before returning
To pick up one more.

And then you're not going
To believe what happens.

That plane then crashes, and all
Three men onboard are killed.

Narrator:
Over the following weeks,

The military
Launches several attempts

To rescue the remaining
Stranded airmen.

All fail.

The six crew members
And a rescue sled driver

Who had managed to reach them

Must face the onslaught
Of an arctic winter

Protected only by the wrecked
Fuselage of their b-17.

They're there
For an entire month.

Now, what's it like being
For a month on the arctic?

It's hell.

Pappalardo:
It's minus-40 degrees.

You are in a world of hurt.

One of the crew members
Developed gangrene

In both his feet,

And they actually fall off
Inside his boots.

Narrator: tormented by hunger,
Frostbite, and delirium,

On january 4th, 1943,
The team splits up.

A month later, a search team
Finds three of them alive,

And on march 18th,
After 133 days alone on the ice,

The remaining crew
Find sanctuary.

Their absolutely
Remarkable survival

Is one of the great
Endurance stories of all time.

Narrator: analysts consider
If the image has captured

The crew's wrecked plane locked
In the ice for over 70 years.

Yet when d'antonio
Carefully studies its wing,

He casts doubt on this idea.

When you look at the size
Of the wingspan

From wing tip to wing tip,
This distance is about 140 feet.

That's too large for a b-17.

I would bank on this being
A b-29 superfortress crash.

[ engine roars ]

Narrator: aviation journalist
Joe pappalardo confirms

That b-29 superfortresses made
Frequent flights over greenland

As part of the united states
Cold war surveillance campaign.

They were dubbed ferret flights
Because they were trying

To ferret out information
About the soviet union

And all of their clandestine
Airfields.

Narrator: pappalardo learns
That in 1947, one of these

Superfortresses,
Called the kee bird,

Crashes near the site
In the aerial image.

This 11-man crew
Hits a very bad storm.

The b-29 comes down,
But everyone on board survives.

Narrator: the b-29 remains
Untouched for 47 years.

In 1994, a team of engineers
Arrive at the crash site,

Determined
To make her airworthy again

And spend months fitting new
Engines, propellers, and wheels.

Great idea, I suppose.

I don't know that I'd want
To spend 10 months

In those conditions
Rekitting engines on a b-29,

But that's what they did.

Narrator: on may 21st, 1995,

The team fires up
The superfortress' engines,

And she prepares
To take to the skies

For the first time
In half a century,

But then a fuel leak
In the fuselage starts a fire

That quickly engulfs the plane,
Destroying it in minutes.

D'antonio: that had to
Be heart-wrenching.

I can't even imagine
What they felt.

Baker: it's like greenland might
Be cursed, right?

I mean, you couldn't
Write that ending.

Narrator:
Today, the kee bird remains
Locked in the greenland ice,

A haunting relic
Of the cold war frozen in time.

Walters: in a way, I think it's
Fitting that she didn't fly off.

She's like a memorial
To all those brave men

Who flew those missions
Over that part of the world.

**

[ whirring ]

Narrator: coming up...

The cia parachutes
Warrior monks

Onto the roof of the world...

When you look at this thing,
It makes me think

That it was designed
To be seen easily from the air.

Narrator: ...And the lake
That time forgot.

It's basically impossible.
It shouldn't exist.

[ whirring ]

[ whirring ]

**

Narrator: november 14th, 2009.

The $150 billion
International space station

Orbits our planet at speeds of
Over 4 1/2 miles per second.

[ whirring ]

As it passes over a remote
Region of the sahara desert

In chad,
It captures a striking image.

[ whirring, beeping ]

This shape is bizarre,
This dark figure,

Almost like it's bursting
Out of the desert.

It looks as though
There was a giant claw

Tearing the desert floor.

**

Narrator: image analyst
Bronwyn agrios considers

If the black elongated shapes
Are a trick of the light.

Agrios:
This could just be shadows.

This is common, that we capture
Shadows in images

That come from space.

Narrator:
Eyes in the sky have captured
Bizarre optical illusions

Created by the setting
Saharan sun before,

Yet historical images reveal
This cannot account

For the mystery object
Captured by satellite.

We see that the dark areas
Don't change,

And that tells us
That they're not shadows

Because the shadows would move
From different times of the day.

Narrator: explorer
George kourounis has a theory.

Looking at these dark
Streak patterns,

I wonder if maybe they're caused
By a low-angle impact

Of something big
Crashing into the desert.

Narrator: kourounis
Searches for possible clues

As to what could have
Crashed here in the sahara.

He learns that in 2008,
A series of meteorites

Hit the desert
In neighboring sudan.

Kourounis: meteor impacts can
Happen anywhere in the world,

But when they happen
In the desert,

The dark color of the meteor
Really stands out

Against the surrounding sands.

Narrator:
Geologist devin dennie reveals

These were no
Ordinary meteorites.

Usually, the only ones
That are excited

About a strange new rock
Are us geologists,

But in this case,
Everyone got excited.

They're full of diamonds.

Narrator: analysis of the
Diamonds' composition

Suggests they formed
Deep inside a planet

That once circled the sun
At the dawn of our solar system.

Dennie: these came from
The ghost planet,

Our missing planet
That left our solar system

Many billions of years ago
And has been lost ever since.

Narrator: the sudanese
Meteorites raise

An intriguing possibility.

Could this be a whole pile
Of space diamonds?

Narrator: in 2010, a team of
Scientists heads into the sahara

To investigate the mystery
Objects in the image.

Their journey takes them across
Some of the most inhospitable

Terrain on earth
And through violent sandstorms.

Kourounis: the center
Of the sahara desert

Is as close to being
An alien world

As you can experience
Anywhere on earth.

Narrator:
On arrival, the team is greeted
By an astonishing sight.

The weird shapes seen
From space are lakes.

**

Why is there a body of water
In the middle of this

Really dry desert region?

Narrator: the lakes cover
Several square miles.

They're deep, clear, and filled
With fresh water,

Yet in this part of the sahara,

Less than 1/10 inch of rain
Falls each year.

It's basically impossible.

It shouldn't exist.

Lester: one of the puzzles here

Is that these lakes
Are not highly saline.

So clearly there's a source
Of fresh water,

But exactly where
That fresh water is coming from,

None of that is really clear.

Narrator: the team
Heads out onto the water

To study the lake bed.

It provides a vital clue.

What we've got here is just
The perfect set of conditions --

Groundwater percolating up,
Protected by sand dunes

And reeds
Floating at the surface,

And as the water evaporates
Ever so slowly,

It's replenished from below.

Narrator: scientists take core
Samples from the bedrock.

Like time capsules, they provide
A record of what the sahara

Was like thousands of years ago.

They reveal it was
Very different

From the desolation
We see today.

The world of 8,000 years ago
Was one of lush,

Tropical paradise.

There were lakes.
There were rivers.

There was lush vegetation.

Narrator: to the southwest
Of the site in the image,

A mighty lake rises,
Lake mega chad,

Which is four times the size

Of the largest
Of north america's great lakes.

Cerveny: this area was covered
By a mammoth sea, an inland sea.

There was actually a pretty
Thriving population

That existed in this area.

Narrator:
Around 6,000 years ago,

The lush sahara begins
To turn to desert.

Cerveny: it forced the people
Of that time

To places like the nile river,

Where they had consistent water
That they could grow crops,

And it eventually
Became the forerunner

To the egyptian
Civilization.

Narrator: today, winds carry
Millions of tons of dust

From the sahara
Across the atlantic ocean

Every year,

Dust laden with nutrients
From the desert's lush past,

Which now fertilize
The amazon rain forest.

But these lakes captured
From space

Are themselves relics
Of the sahara's former glory.

What blows me away is that even
With seven billion

People on planet earth,

There are little corners that we
Still know almost nothing about.

Who knows what else
Is out there?

**

[ whirring ]

Narrator: coming up...

America's secret war
In the land of the sky gods...

The cia uses old world
War ii planes

To carry out drops of weapons

To keep the guerrilla
Movement going.

Narrator:
...And dead bodies on the move.

This might seem totally weird,
But it is cutting-edge science.

[ whirring ]

[ whirring ]

Narrator: november 2017.

Aerial images taken over
A remote field in texas

Reveal something chilling.

**

Odell: something is wrong here,

Really, horribly wrong.

Human bodies strewn everywhere.

This is beyond unusual.

It's frightening.

Narrator: former intelligence
Officer trevor albertson

Considers if texas' location
On the u.S.-mexico border

Could explain
This human carnage.

Mexican drug cartels
Do have a growing presence

In the united states.

With all the drug cartel
Activity in the area,

I'm really not surprised
To see something like this.

Narrator:
Border states such as texas

Have witnessed
Many cartel-related killings

In recent years.

Victims are often dumped
In the open.

Dr. Albertson: they're clearly
Trying to send a message here.

They're trying to tell somebody,
"Hey. We're after you."

Narrator: yet closer analysis
Of the cadavers

Suggests this
Is no random killing.

Faylor: what seems strange to me

Is the exactness of how
The bodies are placed.

They're spread out,
Laid down, and arranged.

There's something
Very methodical.

Narrator: the deliberate
Arrangement of the bodies

Leads scientist reid faylor

To consider if a clue
Can be found in a mass death

In a neighboring state
2 decades ago.

[ siren wails ]

In march 1997, police officers
Entering a mansion

In rancho santa fe, california,

Find dozens of dead bodies
Neatly laid out on beds.

Faylor: everyone is dressed
In identical black jumpsuits,

And they're all arranged
Lying down.

Amid all of this
Horrible stench,

There's this willingness,
Like a voluntary massacre.

Narrator: officers discover they
Are members of heaven's gate,

A cult who believed
That their suicides

Would release their souls
To join the hale-bopp comet,

Which was about to pass the
Earth at 100,000 miles per hour.

They were basically
A sci-fi-obsessed cult.

Faylor:
Out of all your suicide cults,

The heaven's gate is
One of the nerdier ones.

Narrator: to release their
Souls, the cult's leader,

Marshall applewhite, instructs
His followers to consume

Applesauce laced with lethal
Doses of barbiturates,

Place shrouds over their bodies,
And await their grisly fate.

**

The neat arrangement
Of their corpses

Has eerie parallels
With those in the aerial image.

Where they were positioned,
What clothes they were wearing,

How they were facing
Relating to each other

Was all part of
The necessary steps

They believed were going to
Get them to the next plane.

Narrator: yet analysis
Of historical images

Shows this is no cult killing
And throws the mystery open.

The corpses are on the move.

Odell: someone is moving
These bodies around,

So this is a very active scene.

Someone is still here
In this area

Doing something
With these bodies.

Narrator: biologist eleanor
Spicer rice investigates.

In records from the nearby
Texas state university,

She discovers the site
Is called a body farm,

And there is method to
This apparent macabre madness.

At a body farm, what researchers
Do is they place human corpses

Into various places
Under various conditions

And observe how they decompose,
From the initial bloat phase

All the way
Until it's nothing but bones.

Narrator: spicer rice learns
That the university's forensic

Anthropology department

Scatter corpses
Around the body farm

And leave them to rot
In the name of science.

They place them
In trunks of cars.

They submerge them in water.

They cover them in brush.

They observe them
Across the seasons.

Narrator: scientists have
Learned that decay begins

Just a few minutes after death,

And bodies decompose twice
As fast in air than in water.

This might seem totally weird,
But it is cutting-edge science.

They're helping to paint
A very clear and interesting

And complicated picture of
The way that humans decompose.

Narrator: now the dead
Are fighting crime.

Scientists at the farm
Have learned

That as a body rots,

Nutrients leach into the ground,
Making the area more fertile.

This knowledge combined
With new drone technology

Can help police
Find buried bodies.

A decomposing body underneath
The ground actually shows

Different reflectance
On these infrared cameras.

Narrator: eyes in the sky could
Soon identify bodies

That murderers have hidden
In the ground for years,

Possibly decades, and help bring
The perps to justice.

They could just zoom one of
These drones over the area,

And they could
Find bodies faster.

This type of research
Is so important

In order to save lives,
Ultimately.

Narrator: in the u.S.,
More than 5,000 people

Are registered body farm donors.

This is one retirement home

People are literally
Dying to get into.

There is a chance
That you could end up being part

Of this scientific research.

You've got a future
In law enforcement.

**

[ whirring ]

Narrator: coming up...

Something big,
Round, and weird.

I haven't really got
The faintest idea what it is.

It's completely baffling.

[ whirring ]

[ whirring ]

Narrator: december 16th, 2013.

High above sichuan, near the
Border between china and tibet,

A satellite captures this image.

Bellinger: this is really weird.

It's a bunch of circles
Within circles

With nothing else around it.

Narrator:
Analysis reveals the structure
Is over 200 feet in diameter.

I haven't really got
The faintest idea what it is.

It's completely baffling.

Narrator: archaeologist
Karen bellinger studies

The weird circular object.

One thing that comes to mind
Is a similar structure

That was discovered
In northwest china.

Narrator: in june 2017,

Archaeologists
Near tian shan mountain

Uncover a giant
3,000-year-old circular

Altar built to honor
A solar deity.

A sun altar is basically
Just a set of stone circles.

It is a shrine dedicated
To the worship of the sun god.

Narrator:
According to chinese mythology,

The world was created
With 10 suns in the sky.

They scorched our planet,
And nothing would grow.

A hero named hou yi shoots down
Nine of them and saves humanity.

The practice of honoring
The sun god in china

Dates to 1,500 years
Before the birth of christ.

Bellinger: so the sun altar at
The foot of mount tian shan

Is really quite similar to what
We're seeing in this image.

Is this another
Sun altar located

In a part of northwest china

Where we haven't seen
Sun altars before?

Narrator: ex-cia officer
Lindsay moran isn't convinced.

To her, the mystery structure
Appears to have

A more recent origin.

When you look at this thing,
It makes me think

That it was designed
To be seen easily from the air

And potentially could be some
Kind of target or landing zone.

[ cheers and applause ]

Narrator: with over two million
Active duty troops,

China has the largest
Standing army in the world.

Yet a wider search of the area

Reveals there are no chinese
Military bases

Within hundreds of miles of
The site in the satellite image.

We have to consider who might
Require an air-drop site

In such a location.

There's no surrounding
Infrastructure,

Which makes me think

That it might not be
Functioning currently,

But it could be
Some sort of historic site.

Narrator: moran searches through
Declassified military records.

She discovers that a clandestine
Conflict took place here

Following china's invasion
Of tibet in 1950,

One that had covert
Cia involvement.

Moran: china invades tibet,

Expecting to be able
To take over it very easily.

What they don't count on

Is a group of influential
Tibetan traders

Who come together
And essentially mobilize

Into a guerrilla army.

Narrator:
Following the invasion,

The guerrilla fighters,
Known as warrior monks,

Launch a series of attacks
On their communist invaders.

**

Their daring raids attract
The attention

Of intelligence officers
In the u.S.

Now the cia see an opportunity

To work
With the tibetan guerrillas

To fight against
The communist chinese.

The cia uses old world war ii
Planes to carry out

Secret drops of weapons
And materials

To essentially keep
The guerrilla movement going.

Narrator: in the spring of 1958,

The cia's special activities
Division

Begins to extract groups
Of tibetan rebels

And train them back in the u.S.

Not long ago, the warrior monks
Had never seen a plane.

Now they're parachuting
Into the mountains

To kill communists.

Moran: it's an incredibly
Risky operation.

Drop zones and sites
Are very hard to maintain

And to see
In the mountainous terrain,

And the chinese army
Is always on high alert.

Narrator: the killer monk army
Swells to 80,000.

But in 1972, president nixon
Cuts all support

For the brave warrior monks,

Leaving them to face
The full force of red terror,

All so that nixon can win favor
With his new friend,

Communist dictator mao zedong.

It was an incredibly bloody
And brutal war of resistance,

And almost no one
Knows about it.

It makes me wonder if this
Could have been a cia drop zone.

Narrator: but mike baker doesn't
Think this is a legacy

Of the agency's covert
Warrior monk program.

I don't think it's a landing
Zone of any sort

For this conflict.

It's too noticeable.

When you're going to mark
Out a zone,

It's a very quick process,

And you don't want
Any trace of it.

Narrator: historian mark horton
Returns to the image.

He wonders if the structure
Is linked to a nearby site

Which has strong
Tibetan buddhist significance,

One which is made from stones
Inscribed with prayers.

Horton:
When I look at this circle with
All these different colors,

It reminds me of structures
Where people inscribe prayers.

One local tradition is that
It was established

After a battle
That took place in this valley,

And the first stones
Were placed there

To release the souls
Of the fallen out of purgatory.

Narrator: the prayers are
Offerings to spirits.

Horton considers if
The colorful structure

In the satellite image fulfills
A similar religious function.

The feature of tibetan buddhism
Is the use of many colors,

Textiles of all sorts of really
Bright fluorescent colors.

Narrator: for now
This is just a theory.

Until investigators journey
To the remote mountain location,

The origin and purpose
Of the structure

Captured by satellite
Remains unknown.