All language subtitles for What.on.Earth.S05E04.1080p.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 ]

Death and terror in the town
That time forgot...

It has the feeling of a site
Of some kind of apocalypse.

They take people and push them
Out of helicopters.

Narrator:
...Zombie ancestors rise
From their frozen graves...

How terrifying would this be?

You buried your grandmother,
And then she's back.

Narrator: ...And who teleported
The eiffel tower to china?

Munoz: this is just too weird
For words.

I mean, I can't explain it.

Narrator: baffling phenomena.

Mysteries from space.

What on earth are they?

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

Captions paid for by
Discovery communications

**

February 17th, 2016.

As the worldview 3 satellite
Passes over the arid,

Desolate atacama desert, chile,

It photographs a strange
Sprawl of structures.

This is amazing.

We're here in the middle
Of the atacama desert.

It's incredibly dry, yet what
We seem to have is a huge city.

**

Narrator: there are parts
Of the atacama desert

Where there is no record
Of a single drop of rain

Ever having fallen.

What would possess anybody
To want to build a city

In one of the driest

And one of the most
Hostile places on earth?

Archaeologist mark horton
Identifies a possible clue

In the origin of a similar
Mystery settlement

In neighboring peru.

Well, I immediately
Would compare it

To a place like chan chan
A bit further north in peru,

Which is also in the desert

And also laid out
In a very similar kind of way.

**

Narrator: in the 14th century,
Chan chan is the capital

Of the mighty kingdom of chimu,

Whose rulers governed one
Of the largest empires

In the ancient andes.

Chan chan once held
A thriving population of people.

However, digs outside
The walls of the city

Have uncovered
The horrific dark past.

Narrator:
In 2011, excavations near
Chan chan revealed

The horrifying remains of 140
Children savagely slaughtered

In a bloody orgy
Of ritual sacrifice.

What they found
Is absolutely shocking.

Bodies of children,

Their sternums ripped open,
Hearts ripped out,

And it's possible that they
Were alive when it happened.

Narrator:
Historians think chimu's
Superstitious priests

Butchered the children
As a gift to the gods

To stop the el nino storms
That terrified them.

It's the biggest single act
Of mass child sacrifice

Ever recorded.

Could there be a similarity
In what happened in chan chan

To what happened
Just across the border

In the city
We're looking at here?

Maybe that teardrop shape
Was used

For these
Ritualistic sacrifices.

**

Narrator: hooked by the image,

Archaeologist karen bellinger
Strikes out for northern chile,

Hoping to explain
The weird desert structures.

Bellinger:
I'm headed out on the ground
To see if I can perhaps find

Any physical evidence
That might shed some light

On the mystery of this site.

Perhaps it has dark
Secrets of its own.

Narrator:
Bellinger's journey takes her
Across an unearthly landscape.

This desert so closely
Resembles the surface of mars

That nasa prepares here
For missions to the red planet.

What kind of civilization
Would have chosen this spot,

Much less thrived here?

Narrator: it takes 8 hours
To navigate a route

Through the desert badlands.

Looks as if the road is gone.

Wow.

**

Narrator: as she approaches
The settlement's walls,

The archaeologist is drawn
To what looks like

Some kind of ceremonial
Or ritualistic structure

In the satellite image,

But that's not what she finds.

This is certainly not any sort
Of arena or theater

Or ritual site.

There's debris on the ground.

There's abandoned wire rope,

So 20th century, certainly.

I think we're looking clearly
At something

More industrial in nature,
But the question is what?

**

Narrator:
Bellinger heads further
Into the settlement.

These are no ancient ruins.

This is a weird ghost town
Decaying under the desert sun.

Bellinger:
This place is so strange.

I mean, it has a really
Foreboding sense.

This was clearly a really
Prosperous town at one point.

There's a great deal of evidence
Of former grandeur.

Narrator:
The carcasses of huge machines
Left in the open,

Dozens of abandoned cars.

It appears something forced the
People here to leave town fast.

**

Bellinger's sense
Of foreboding increases

When she makes a discovery
On the edge of town:

A huge iron graveyard
Unlike anything

She's encountered before.

**

Bellinger:
The scale of this is stunning.

I mean, it's proof that many,

Many, many people
Lived in this site

And many people died
Here as well.

Narrator: one burial place
Enables bellinger

To establish
The age of the town.

Bellinger:
This grave dates to 1913,

And there's a little baby
Buried here,

1 year, 1 month
And 20 days.

Narrator:
As bellinger makes her way
Through the graveyard,

Something disturbing
Becomes evident.

I'm struck by how many of these
Graves are really tiny.

**

What was causing children
And babies to die

In such disproportionate
Amounts in this place?

**

Narrator: coming up,
Mountain of the damned:

Zombie activity
In the land of santa.

One minute, a herd of
Healthy reindeer,

And then, bam!
Corpses.

Narrator: and karen bellinger
Uncovers the horror story

Behind the freaky desert
Ghost town.

They are being forced to play
Russian roulette.

Every imaginable horror
Is taking place in these camps.

**

**

Narrator: archaeologist
Karen bellinger has traveled

To the atacama desert
To investigate

A ghost town
Captured by satellite.

She wants to find out why it was
Abandoned in such a hurry

And why the weird rusty
Iron graveyard

Is full of children and babies.

At the edge of the settlement,
She discovers a clue.

Walking on the ground,
It crunches underfoot

Like broken glass
Or something.

Bellinger
Digs into the ground.

What she finds is not dry
Desert sand,

But some other substance.

If you just take that outer
Surface off,

It's really just
Brilliantly white underneath.

Narrator:
For bellinger, the rock's color
And large crystalline granules

Suggest it's one of two things:
Borax or sodium nitrate.

I'm crushing my sample
Really fine

So that I can put it
Through a materials test,

See if I can narrow it down.

She mixes the powdered rock
With sugar

And puts a flame to it.

[ match strikes ]

Bellinger: oh!

And that looks like
Sodium nitrate!

[ rock sizzling ]

Smells like burnt marshmallows.

So this is what they were mining
And processing here.

It's the only thing
That makes sense.

Narrator: sodium nitrate
Is a type of salt.

It gives life,
But it also kills.

Bellinger: it could be used
To fertilize crops,

And it's even used
To create explosives.

Narrator: the incredible dryness
Of the atacama

Helps to make this desert

One of the world's
Biggest known deposits

Of sodium nitrate,
Known as chile saltpeter.

Nitrate deposits have been
Referred to as white gold

For a very good reason.

Narrator: this ghost town
Was built on white gold.

To mine it, thousands of workers
Were brought here to labor

In the fierce desert heat.

This area exploded into bustling
Towns just mining nitrates.

This place, it was like
California during the gold rush.

Narrator: yet this gold rush
Comes at a terrible price.

Workers and their families
Endure brutal conditions.

A shocking number of children
Died here

Before their first birthday,

Twice as many as
In 18th century england.

I've seen that in
Comparable sites in england

Of this time period,
And the very young population

Suffered disproportionately.

Narrator:
The lust for white gold
Brings death to the atacama,

But the white gold mined here
Will go on

To kill many millions more.

[ explosions, gunfire ]

One of the main uses of nitrates
Is gunpowder,

And during world war I,

The whole world
Was in a shortage.

Narrator:
Industrial mining of white gold

Allowed the mass production
Of shells and bullets

On a scale never seen before,

Enough to feed millions
Of machine guns.

The british navy stops shipments
Of white gold reaching germany,

But german chemists
Find a way of producing

A synthetic alternative.

The invention of synthetic
Nitrates sounds the death knell

For chile's nitrate industry.

Pepper: nobody wants to buy it,
And so all these towns

Just went completely bust.

**

Narrator:
But bellinger discovers the
Graves of children and babies

Is not the only sign of horror
In this ghost town.

As she passes by some empty
Buildings,

She notices something
On the walls.

**

God, those are bullet holes.

**

Why would there be bullet holes
In the walls

Of a mining settlement?

Narrator: the bullet holes
Are clustered in groups.

Many of them are in a wall that
Faces the town's central square.

It makes me wonder if people
Were gathered here

To witness
A really terrible thing.

Narrator: it appears there was
No sanctuary,

No mercy for the people
Who were murdered here.

Looking at the shape
Of the building

And these curved walls...

Oh, it looks like
This was a church.

"God, where were you when
Your temple burned?"

Something pretty awful
Must have happened here.

**

Narrator:
Chile has a turbulent history.

In 1973, the country's marxist
Government is overthrown

In a military coup.

Can this explain
Bellinger's discoveries?

[ speaking spanish ]

**

Narrator:
With the help of a contact,
She tracks down a local

Who is prepared to talk
About events in this region,

But only with
The promise of anonymity.

He reveals the signs of horror
Are the legacy of the man

Who overthrew the marxists:
Augusto pinochet.

Morgan:
Augusto pinochet came to power
In chile in 1973.

He exercises complete
And total control

Over the country through
A military dictatorship.

Narrator: bellinger
Learns that immediately

Following his rise to power,

Pinochet dispatches
An army hit squad

Known as the caravan of death
To arrest

Or execute
Political opponents.

Pinochet's rule is marked
By terror and struggle.

Anyone who speaks
Out against him

Is either intimidated
Into silence or they disappear.

Narrator: pinochet will later
Return chile to democracy,

But during his dictatorship,
He rules by terror.

His tyrannical regime

Establishes 1,000
Torture centers.

The town built on white gold

Where the babies
And children die,

The town that feeds the killing
Fields of world war I,

Now becomes the scene
Of unspeakable torture.

So here in the middle of
The driest desert on earth,

You have a ready-made
Concentration camp.

This camp becomes the stage

On which this theater
Of barbarism is played out.

Narrator: the miners' lodgings
Now echo with the screams

Of pinochet's victims.

Survivors of this hell on earth
Tell of brutal beatings,

Electrocution and unspeakable
Acts of degradation.

They are being forced
To play russian roulette.

They're having bones crushed
By being driven

Over by automobiles.

There's even times where
They take people

And push them
Out of helicopters,

So every imaginable horror
Is taking place in these camps.

**

Narrator:
The same bone-dry climate that
Created the atacama's white gold

Will preserve the ruins of this
Ghost town for centuries,

A grim desert memorial.

It's critical to preserve
And to honor sites

Like these where we've seen
The worst of human nature

In the hopes that history
Might eventually

Stop repeating itself.

**

Narrator: coming up:
The eiffel tower

Suddenly appears
In the middle of a desert.

Munoz: this is just too weird
For words.

I mean, I can't explain it.

Narrator:
And christmas get canceled.

They're all dead.

Sorry, santa.

**

Narrator: august 2016,
Flying over hardangervidda,

A vast desolate mountain plateau
In norway,

A helicopter crew
Films the terrain.

At first, I didn't see anything
Weird about this image.

It just looks like
A rocky landscape.

Narrator: but when the chopper
Flies lower,

The cameras capture
Something terrible.

They're all dead.

It looks like an entire herd
Has been wiped out,

And all together, all at once.

Narrator: the crew lands
For a closer look.

They discover
A scene of carnage.

**

More than 300 reindeer dead.

It's probably the most reindeer
You've ever thought of

In your brain all at once,
And all of them instantly gone.

Narrator: analysts
Struggle to find a cause

For this bizarre
Mass annihilation.

Wolves for certain
Cannot have done this,

And it's unlikely this
Is the work of humans.

Reindeer are a lifeline
To people in this community,

So it's insane to think
That they would even kill one

And just leave it be,
Let alone over 300.

Narrator: zoologist eleanor
Spicer rice scours the records

For any other examples
Of reindeer mass deaths.

She finds one which occurred
On similar terrain

In the frozen tundra
Of northeast russia.

In 1941, there was a terrible
Outbreak of anthrax.

Anthrax is a bacteria,
And it's a very hardy bacteria.

Anthrax can infect
Your respiratory tract,

Your digestive tract,

Lead to lesion and
Eventually can lead to death.

Narrator: anthrax spores
May have caused one of the great

Biblical plagues
Of ancient egypt.

Just one pinhead-sized dose

Is lethal to reindeer
And humans.

It's no surprise that a number
Of nations

And sick individuals
Have weaponized anthrax.

It's ruthlessly efficient,
And it's deadly.

Narrator:
In 1941, the arctic tundra
Cryogenically freezes

The anthrax-infested
Reindeer carcasses.

The tundra is a layer
Of frozen ground,

So anything
That gets put into it,

It's like a biological time
Capsule, perfectly preserved.

Narrator: seven decades later,

An exceptional heat
Wave hits siberia.

Wildfires
Rage in its grasslands,

And something is thawing
In the icy earth.

These bodies that had been
Buried for 75 years

Began to defrost.

The anthrax reanimated.

The zombie outbreak had begun.

**

Ninety people who were exposed
To the spores were hospitalized,

And one 12-year-old boy died.

Narrator: is it possible that
Some kind of zombie life-form

Has risen up
And killed the reindeer

In the norwegian mountains?

This feels like this
Is something

From a science fiction
Horror movie,

Diseases that were long
Since dead

And buried coming back
To life and killing again.

Narrator:
Terror rising from the ice

Is not without precedent
In this country.

In norway in the 1950s,

This whole town that had been
Built on permafrost discovered

Their past
Was coming back to them.

Narrator:
The town is longyearbyen,

Where the dead past threatens
To rise from the grave.

Residents become terrified
That melting permafrost

Will bring their buried dead
Ancestors back to the surface.

Nelson: bodies coming back to
The surface completely intact,

How freaky is that?

Usually when you bury somebody,

They start to decompose
Relatively quickly.

Here, they're buried
In the permafrost.

It's like putting
That body on ice.

They look like zombies.

How terrifying would this be?

You buried your grandmother,

And you think that
She's at rest for eternity,

And then she's back.

[ crow caws ]

Narrator: terrified that their
Diseased zombie relatives

Will turn into killers,

The townsfolk of longyearbyen
Take incredible measures.

The authorities handled this

In the most
Bizarre way possible.

If the dead couldn't
Stay buried,

They would just ban them.

You're not allowed to bury
People anymore in this town.

They even discourage
People from dying.

So now, if you're dying, they
Ship you off to another town.

That's one of the weirdest
Laws I've ever heard of.

Narrator: 1,200 miles south
Of the town that banned dying,

A zombie virus may have
Infected the reindeer

In the
Hardangervidda mountains.

Fearful of this horde
Of undead ungulates,

The norwegian scientists
Have only one option:

They hack off their heads.

Chamberlain: they had to sample
The brain tissue,

And in order to do that,
They had to decapitate these

And takes samples from there.

Sorry, santa, cupid,
Donner, blitzen.

It's for the good of science.

Narrator: in another twist,
Postmortems indicate

The reindeer brains are normal.

Climatologist
Randy cerveny considers

If the tight grouping
Of the bodies

Offers a clue to
Another possible cause of death.

The sound of thunder, the flash
Of lightning can be threatening

To herbivores
Like cattle and reindeer,

And that might have been
Part of the reason

Why they were
All clumped together.

Narrator: data from weather
Satellites confirms

That 3 days
Before the aerial images,

A huge lightning storm
Pounded the mountain plateau.

The investigators may have
Found their killer.

In this particular case,
When an object

Near these reindeer were struck,

The lightning was able to flash
Through the entire herd

And actually kill them all
With one single stroke.

Narrator:
A lightning storm can unleash

Hundreds of billions
Of volts of electricity,

More than enough to rain death
On to these terrified reindeer.

One minute, a herd of healthy
Reindeer, and then, bam!

Corpses.

**

Narrator: coming up,
Something otherworldly

Is stirring in the arctic.

It's incredible, like,
An alien world here on earth.

Narrator: and satellites capture
The eiffel tower going awol.

Morgan: I believe I can speak
For the world

When I express astonishment
To see the eiffel tower

Out in the middle
Of inner mongolia.

**

Narrator: march 2015,
The gobi desert, northern china:

Half a million square miles
Of scorched, barren wilderness.

So what on earth
Is this doing here?

**

I believe I can speak
For the world

When I express astonishment
To see the eiffel tower

Out in the middle
Of the vast desert

Wastelands of inner mongolia.

Munoz: this is just too weird
For words.

I mean, I can't explain it.

Narrator:
Conspirists claim that in 1943,
Us navy scientists succeeded

In making an entire
Battleship disappear.

Reports of the so-called
Philadelphia experiment

Have been widely discredited,
Yet the satellite image suggests

That china has made
The eiffel tower vanish,

Then reappear
5,000 miles away.

Hmm, in northern china,
We have an eiffel tower.

Okay, why?

Narrator: it transpires
That several chinese cities

Contain large scale replica
Western landmarks.

One, sky city,
Features near-perfect

Copies of the champs-elysees
And the eiffel tower.

The chinese have long idealized

Paris as some sort
Of romantic dream.

The reality is crushingly
Disappointing.

**

Narrator:
The story of china's obsession
With western architecture

Begins in the mid 20th century

When the communist rulers
Led by mao zedong

Preside over an era of cultural
And physical destruction.

Munoz: china went to war
With everything tradition.

What comes with conformity
And uniformity is you lose

All these incredible elements
Of chinese architecture.

Narrator: the communists
Ransacked china's temples

And razed its beautiful
Ancient buildings to the ground.

In their place, they erect
Featureless concrete eyesores.

They replaced these beautiful
Structures with ones

That basically reflected
The ideology of communism,

Which was conformity
And uniformity.

Narrator:
In the 1990s, the chinese
Government begins to relax

Mao's architectural dogma,

And the now wealthy nation
Is hungry for western goods,

Culture and architecture.

All of a sudden,
You had a country

With a lot of people
With disposable income

And willing to spend it
On things

That they personally wanted,

Which includes unique homes
And buildings.

Narrator:
Yet the weird eiffel tower
In the satellite image

Is nowhere near
Any human settlement.

Moran: this area of china
Is incredibly remote.

Nobody would want to move here,

Even if they rebuilt
The whole of paris here.

I am not convinced that this is
The start of a new city.

Narrator: when analysts examine
The wider area,

The mystery of the tower grows.

When you look around the area,

You start to see clusters
Of buildings

That look like they might
Have some military function.

It is within operational range
Of asia's largest

And most
High-tech military base.

Narrator: zhurihe military base:

It sprawls across 411
Square miles of inner mongolia,

An area almost 20 times
The size of manhattan,

And the eiffel tower is sitting
Right in the middle of it.

This image could be evidence
Of china

Expanding its military
Training operations.

The question is,
Where does the tower fit in?

Narrator: image analyst
Marc d'antonio is puzzled

By another set of structures
At the base near the tower.

D'antonio:
This is a segment of some type
Of city, which is really odd.

Then moving down, we see
A similar construction here.

This is not an actual city
But rather a mock-up of a city.

**

Narrator: scouring the street
Layouts of worldwide cities,

Analysts discover
That the structures

Resemble the presidential office
Building in taipei,

Capital of the island state
Of taiwan.

The discovery fuels fears
That they and the tower

Serve a sinister purpose.

Why would the chinese need to
Build these large scale replicas

Of culturally significant
Landmarks from france

And from taiwan?

There's got to be a military
Reason for this.

Narrator:
Military analysts confirm
That mock city training

Is often a precursor
To military invasion.

There's the marine corps base
Known as 29 palms in california.

They have full-up replicas
Of a village you'd run

Into in helmand province
In southern afghanistan.

There's absolutely nothing
Like having a replica

Of what your target
Looks like on the ground

So that you can prepare
For the actual terrain.

Narrator: china's relationships
With western powers are tense,

And it makes no secret
Of its desire

To bring taiwan back
Under communist state control.

Taiwan and china have
Basically been at a state of war

Since the communists
Took over the mainland

And the non-communists

Were forced into
Political exile in taiwan.

Narrator:
A chinese invasion of taipei

Could have terrifying
Global implications.

Munoz: if the chinese do act,

The united states
Would be forced to respond,

And you have a situation where
This escalates into all-out war.

Narrator:
This satellite image could
Indicate that a taiwan invasion

Is just the beginning.

Do they have plans for paris
That we need to know about

Because it's kind of
What this suggests.

Ideally, we would just call
The chinese government

And find out exactly what
This tower is being used for,

But they're not really known
For being too open

With their information.

Narrator: small comfort,
If you're a citizen of paris.

**

Coming up: unexplained circles
In the new mexico desert.

Really looks like a giant
Dartboard,

But the question is,
What game are they playing here?

Narrator:
And clues to alien life
In the frozen arctic.

It almost looks like
An infection.

**

Narrator: september 11th, 2017,

Flying 480 miles
Above new mexico,

An earth observation
Satellite photographs

A series of strange circles
In the desert.

You can't help but wonder,
What is this gigantic bull's-eye

Doing in the middle
Of the desert?

It really looks like a giant
Dartboard,

But the question is,
What game are they playing here?

Narrator: aerospace journalist
Joe pappalardo

Dials down the magnification
On the satellite image

To analyze
The surrounding terrain.

When you look at where this
Weird structure is located,

Clues start to emerge.

There's the fence line.

There's some of the military
Stuff, here is some radar.

It's on the grounds
Of kirtland air force base.

Narrator: intelligence experts
Reveal that since world war ii,

Kirtland has played a key role
In developing

And testing a series
Of revolutionary bombers,

Including the b-36 peacemaker
And the f-80 shooting star.

This thing looks like a target.

It's very possible that it could
Be some sort of area

Where bombing practices
Take place.

Narrator: ex-cia operative
Mike baker disagrees.

That's probably not likely.

There are no indications
Of any past use.

You know,
There's no cratering.

Narrator: military historian
Martin morgan uncovers

More possible evidence
About the origin

Of the mystery bull's-eye.

Morgan:
Kirtland air force base is known
For being home to the school

For the pararescue jumpers,

Special operators who
Are parachute-qualified

And among the most elite
In the american military.

Narrator: pararescuemen, or pjs,
Are combat medics

Dedicated to rescuing
And treating fallen comrades:

Part warrior, part savior,
100 percent badass.

The reason the pararescue teams
Are so elite

Is that they are more often
Than not behind enemy lines.

They come into a very
Dangerous situation,

Recover a pilot,
Recover classified information

And get the hell out.

Narrator:
The pj selection process is one
Of the toughest in the military.

It begins with 9 weeks of brutal
Tests of skill and endurance,

Culminating in a 20-hour-long
Ordeal known as hell night.

80 percent of potential
Recruits fail.

Training for the pjs is
An extremely grueling process.

It's everything
From scuba diving

To climbing mountains
To parachuting in on targets.

These guys are the best
Of the best

That the air force
Has to provide.

Narrator:
But baker is unconvinced
That the wide circles

Are an aerial target
For a precision parachute troop.

When they're dropping people,
They're more inclined to say,

"Okay, you're going to land
On this mountainside,

You know, 2 meters
To the left of that,

You know, big fir tree,"
Or whatever.

I mean, it's very technical,
And it's very precise.

Narrator:
Military journalist carlo munoz
Returns to the satellite image

To hunt for further clues.

Six miles northwest of the
Bull's-eye, he spots something.

Munoz: there's this large
White structure

With a long gangplank
Running up to it.

There's definitely some kind
Of military application for it.

Narrator:
Declassified us military records
Reveal that during the 1970s,

The giant structure played
A key role in the development

And testing of electromagnetic
Pulse weapons, or emps.

Emp weapons are designed
To basically take out anything

With an electronic circuit.

It essentially fries
Any kind of circuit

Within a certain radius.

Narrator:
The structure is called
The atlas-I weapons

Testing platform,
Codename trestle.

The $60 million construction
Is 1,300 feet long

And 120 feet high.

Munoz: it's made of wood
And glue.

You can't have metal parts to it

Because it would interfere
With the testing.

So you park a plane
On this structure.

You'd fire an electromagnetic
Pulse at it,

And then the scientists would
Basically record the results.

Narrator:
Military analysts speculate
That the circles were designed

To measure the radiating pulse
Of a top-secret emp weapon.

It can disable weapons.

It can ground helicopters
And fighter jets.

It's safe to say that
That is probably part

Of the american arsenal.

The idea that electromagnetic
Pulse testing

Is being done at kirtland
Makes complete and total sense.

Narrator: the atlas-I project
Was abandoned in 1990,

But rumors persist
The department of defense

Is developing an emp weapon
With the power

To cripple the electronics
Of an entire city.

People like to think that it's
A peaceful world out there,

But that's not how it works.
All right?

So as much as we'd like to think
That if we haven't gamed out

All the potential scenarios
For conflict,

That somehow if we don't do it,
Then other people

Won't do it either,
And that's just crap.

Narrator:
The purpose of the new mexico
Bull's-eye remains a mystery.

**

Coming up: hell from on high in
The jungles of southeast asia.

Faylor: it causes extreme
Birth defects,

And not just for
Your immediate children,

Three, four generations
Down the line.

**

Narrator: july 2006,
As nasa's eo-1 satellite sweeps

Over ellesmere island,
Norther canada,

It photographs an anomaly
In the arctic:

A glacier unlike
Any ever recorded.

This is virgin snow.

It should be white,
But instead it's yellow.

Never seen anything like this.
This is unique.

It almost looks like
An infection.

Narrator:
The canadian arctic is home
To some big beasts,

But even a supersized polar bear
With serious bladder issues

Couldn't account
For this giant yellow streak.

Kourounis: we all know what it
Means when someone says,

"Don't eat yellow snow,"

But I don't think
That's what's going on here.

This is something
Quite a bit different.

At least, I hope it's something
Completely different.

Narrator: chemical scientist
Reid faylor uncovers

Declassified
Canadian military records

That could explain the origin
Of the mystery stain.

Faylor: well, it looks as though
Some kind of chemical

Has been sprayed on the land.

A document has come out that
Reveals that in 1966 and 1967,

The canadian government
Granted the united states

Military permission to test
Agent orange on canadian soil.

Kourounis: agent orange
Is a potent herbicide.

It's been used
As a chemical weapon.

It contains dioxin,
Which will strip

Vegetation completely bare.

Narrator:
The document reveals that tests
Of the toxic herbicide

At the camp
Gagetown military base

Continue for almost 3 decades.

It was pervasive.

They tested it for years.

With what we now know
About agent orange,

That was a staggering mistake.

Narrator:
Evidence of the horrors agent
Orange can inflict on a country

And its people
Comes from vietnam.

Between 1961 and 1971,
The us air force sprays

12 million gallons of agent
Orange on to the country,

Destroying 8,000
Square miles of jungle.

Agent orange was used to strip
Away all the jungle cover

So the vietcong
Had nowhere to hide.

Narrator: but the u.S. Has
Unleashed a chemical hell.

It's a slow onset disaster
With catastrophic ecological,

Economic and health impacts
That continue to this very day.

Narrator:
The noxious aerial mist kills
Or injures 400,000 people

And leaves 500,000 children

With severe deformities
Or genetic disorders.

Agent orange is a very
Dangerous chemical.

It can cause cancer.

It causes extreme birth defects,

And not just for your immediate
Children,

Three, four generations
Down the line.

Narrator:
Yet despite canada's dark
History of testing

The poisonous chemical,
Experts doubt it can account

For the stain
In the satellite image.

Major: agent orange is actually
Colorless,

But it was stored in barrels
With orange labels.

That's where it got the name.

Following the discovery of
The weirdly colored glacier,

Nasa dispatches
A team of scientists

To the canadian arctic
To investigate.

As it turns out,
What we're looking at is sulfur.

Sulfur is giving this glacier
Its yellowish color,

But that's not
The end of the story.

Narrator:
As the scientists explore
The chemical ice floe,

They find something unexpected:

Life, but not as we know it,
An organism that consumes

And produces different
Types of sulfur.

They process chemicals
As opposed to sunlight.

It's incredible, like an
Alien world here on earth.

This is a remarkable
Combination of things

That takes us
Straight to europa,

One of the moons of jupiter.

Europa is encased
In a shell of ice.

Its crust of ice
Is full of sulfur.

Narrator: the ice moon europa,

Floating in space about
390 million miles from earth,

Is the smoothest known object
In the solar system.

Like the glacier
In the satellite image,

Europa is covered
With streaks of sulfur.

Nasa believes its smooth
Frozen surface conceals

A liquid ocean
Up to 100 miles deep.

What if part of this sulfur
Staining that we're seeing

At the surface of europa
Is actually contributed by life

Living in this deep ocean
On europa.

D'antonio: europa is probably
A breeding ground

For a different type of life,

Maybe extremophile life
Below the icy mantle.

Narrator:
In 2024, the space agency plans
To launch an unmanned craft

To land on and study
This sulfurous alien world.

Who knows what the probe
Will discover

In the vanishing darkness
Of its bottomless oceans.

D'antonio: it's phenomenal.

Finding small life anywhere

Might lead
To multicellular creatures

Or other types of strange fish
In a strange alien ocean,

Or perhaps an intelligent being.

Maybe someday
We'll find that.