All language subtitles for What.on.Earth.S05E06.1080p.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.

Hunting jack the ripper
From space...

Woman: [ screams ]

With more certainty than ever,

We can show that he was
Most probably jack the ripper.

Narrator: ...Fear stalks
A vanishing city...

Every night, they go to sleep.

They don't know
If they're gonna wake up

In the jaws of a giant lion.

Narrator:
...And signs of a visitation

From another galaxy...

Is this some space visitor
That's traveled

Perhaps thousands of light-years
Through space

And crash-landed here?

Narrator: ...Baffling phenomena,
Mysteries from space...

What on earth are they?

**

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

Captions paid for by
Discovery communications

Narrator: since 1970,
Serial killers have

Murdered over 8,000 americans.

Many of these slayings
Remain unsolved.

There are 25 to 50 active serial
Killers at any time in the u.S.

Think about this.
This is absolutely astounding.

Narrator:
Law enforcement agencies

Are increasingly turning to
Eyes in the sky

To identify
And hunt down these psychopaths.

[ indistinct conversations ]

A revolutionary new method
Of tracking down

These cold-blooded killers
Is being trialed across the u.S.

It's a form of satellite imagery
Called geographical profile.

Narrator: decades of studies
Have enabling criminologists

To categorize
Serial killer behavior

Into a series of
Complex psychological profiles.

Geographical profiling
Uses algorithms

To integrate these profiles
With satellite data

Obtained from crime scenes

To identify
The killer's place of residence.

Vaughn:
All humans follow patterns.

Geographical profiling
Is the idea

That you can look into these
Patterns and understand

Where someone is
Or where they'll be.

The end result is a highly
Detailed satellite image

Of the killer's hunting ground.

The red spots indicate
The most likely area

Where he's operating out of.

Narrator: in recent years,
Experts have used geoprofiling

To help identify
Numerous murderers.

The technique comes to
International attention

Following a case
In the late 1990s,

When a geo-profiler suggests
A serial killer is responsible

For a series of disappearances
In downtown vancouver.

In 2002, police arrest
Robert pickton on his pig farm

15 miles out of town

And subsequently charge him
With the murder of 27 women.

Geographical profiling has been
Demonstrated multiple times

To be useful in identifying
Modern serial killers.

It's a method that could also
Be applied to serial killers

From earlier time
Periods as well.

Narrator: for investigators,
Historical murder cases

Are notoriously hard to crack.

Clues disappear
And witness memories fade,

Meaning that some 200,000
U.S. Murders from the last

60 years remain unsolved,

But gps data never changes.

That's why some criminologists
Believe geoprofiling

Is ideally suited to cold cases.

This is perfect because
It models where the offender

Operated out of based
On his crime scene locations,

And it needs little else
Beyond that.

Narrator: to see whether
Geoprofiling can help clear

Unsolved historical murders,

Wesley english wants to test
His latest algorithm

On one of the most
Notorious cold cases in history.

From space, he's hunting
For jack the ripper.

**

Victorian london --

The east end is a noisy,

Bustling labyrinth of
Thoroughfares and twisted roads.

It's the place where
Upper-class londoners

Come to get their lowlife fun.

[ indistinct conversations ]

But in 1888,
A series of terrifying murders

Makes the white chapel district
A place of pure terror.

Woman: [ screams ]

**

All the victims except one
Were horribly mutilated.

Three of the victims had all
Their internal organs

Removed in a very
Surgical manner.

Narrator: to this day,
No one knows for certain

How many women died
At the hand of jack the ripper.

His identity has been
The subject of wild speculation.

Over 400 people,

Including aristocrats
Linked to the royal family,

Have fallen under suspicion.

Over 100 years of
Painstaking research

Has still not revealed
Jack the ripper's identity.

Narrator: if his algorithm
Is going to work,

English needs to
Familiarize himself

With the killer
And his hunting ground.

It's important to actually
Go on site, though,

To understand
The geography of the area,

How easy or difficult it is
To traverse from point to point.

It's also important
To understand

How the geography of the area

Relates to jack the ripper
As a person himself.

Narrator: for a profile based
On geographic data,

The ripper case poses
A unique challenge.

**

Since 1888, london has changed
And a number of the ripper's

Crimes took place on streets
That no longer exist.

**

To help capture this historical
Data for his algorithm,

English is meeting
Ripper expert john bennett.

Even for an area like
The east end of london

Which had high rates of crime,

It's the way they were murdered
That made it stand out.

Can you tell me what
This was like at the time?

A dark, unpleasant place,
I have to say, oppressive

And also dangerous.

Narrator:
The ripper left few clues

Other than the complex geography
Of his appalling crimes.

We are now in mitre square,

Which is the scene of the murder
Of catherine eddowes

On the morning
Of the 30th of september.

Narrator: english and bennett
Visit the location

Of each killing
In chronological order,

Familiarizing themselves
With the crime scenes

And possible escape routes
And logging the data they need

To begin the geoprofile.

All right,
I'm gonna take a gps reading

Of this exact spot, then.

Narrator: from his studies on
Contemporary cases,

English knows that
Serial killers often rely

On a mental map of their hunting
Ground to evade detection.

Serial killers try to hide
Their tracks,

But they can't
Escape being human,

And all humans follow patterns,

So geographical profiling
Is just looking at lots of data

To try and uncover
Those patterns.

Narrator:
In the late 19th century,

London's 8,700 policemen
Patrol the streets

In fixed patterns at set times.

The ripper is unlikely to have
Used escape routes

That he did not know.

Running from the scene
Of a crime,

No criminal wants
To find himself

Trapped up a blind alley
Or wondering where to turn next.

You need to know where
The police conducted

Their beats and such like,

So I think local knowledge,
Certainly in this case,

Is an important part
Of the makeup.

Narrator:
Bennett describes how at least

Two of the ripper's victims

Drank at the ten bells pub,
Which still exists today.

A crucial part of
The software's algorithm

Is that it factors
In everyday life patterns

And places the person might
Hang out such as a pub.

Given the ten bells' proximity
To all the crime scenes,

It's likely that
This is the place

That jack the ripper
Would go for a drink.

Narrator: geographic profiling
Assigns values to pubs

And other landmarks
Based on the likelihood

The killer frequented
Or used them.

His profile factors in data

Such as the fact
That all of the victims

Lived within a couple
Hundred yards of each other.

It's not just murder scenes

That your geographical profiler
Needs to look at.

They need to look at every place
The murderer has been

Or passed through.

Narrator: english believes there
May be enough data

For an accurate
Geoprofiling result.

Could he be the space-age
Detective

Who finally solves
The ripper mystery?

**

Coming up,
Battle of the big guns

In the land of the bible...

It's big because that barrel
Is over 100 feet long.

**

Narrator: ...And the ripper team
Closes in on its quarry.

That's quite remarkable,
That is.

We may have found
Jack the ripper.

**

**

Narrator:
Geo-profiler wesley english

And ripper expert john bennett

Are in london's east end
Using satellite data

And the latest homicide
Investigation software

To identify the most notorious
Serial killer in history --

Jack the ripper.

Every location relevant
To the murders must be plotted.

Bennett directs
English to the spot where,

On september 30, 1888,

Police discover
A key piece of evidence.

Woman: ah! Ah! Ah!

Narrator: at 1 a.M., the corpse
Of elizabeth stride

Is found in dutfield's yard
Off berner street.

[ shouting indistinctly ]

Less than an hour later,
A second body,

That of catherine eddowes,
Is found in mitre square,

A 15-minute walk away,
Her throat sliced open,

A kidney,
And the uterus removed,

But this time,
The police find a clue.

[ whistle blows ]

It was just over there
In that doorway

Where a piece
Of evidence was found.

In fact, the only physical
Piece of evidence

Found in the entire case.

They found a bloody piece
Of cloth

Which apparently came
From catherine eddowes' apron.

Police believe it may have been
Used to wipe the knife.

Narrator: what english is
Interested in is not the cloth

But where it was found,
Goulston street,

Back towards an area
Swarming with police

Searching for stride's killer.

He was going back
Into the stend,

A very risky thing to do.

The only reason why he would be
Headed back in that direction

Is if he felt safe.

Maybe he's headed
Towards home.

Narrator:
English's geoprofiling software

Is like a chess program,

Analyzing the size of the area
And its complex street patterns,

Assessing a bewildering
Number of possibilities.

**

It also incorporates data
From known murder sprees,

Effectively using the power
Of artificial intelligence

To understand
Criminal behavior.

The pattern of murders
Puts the ripper

In a category of killer known
To criminologists as a marauder.

Marauders kill in an area
They know well,

Whereas commuters travel
To a faraway place

To find their victims.

Ted bundy is probably
The most famous example

Of a commuting serial killer.

Narrator: english believes
He now has enough information

To construct
A solid geoprofile.

His algorithm processes data
From the primary

And secondary crime
Scene locations

Against the profiles of hundreds
Of possible ripper suspects.

**

The software quickly
Identifies a short list.

Based on
The geographic profile

And our assessment
That he is a marauder,

We've narrowed it down
To seven suspects.

We're gonna enter these
Into the profile

And see who is most
Likely of those suspects.

Narrator: as the algorithm
Crunches more data,

English overlays the results

Onto a map
Of london's whitechapel.

All the crimes are here in this
Cluster, this concentrated area.

Narrator: his calculations
Factor in something called

The principle of least effort,

The theory that marauders,
Like the ripper,

Will not kill too far
From their home.

Marauding serial killers
Will eventually reach a point

Far away from the house

Where it's unlikely
That he'll commit a crime,

So they have that boundary,

But then they also have
An inner boundary,

A buffer zone, where it's too
Close to their home.

They won't commit a crime
Within that buffer zone

For fear of being caught.

Narrator: the computer
Translates its computations

Into a heat map.

The darker the red indicating
The stronger likelihood

That the killer resided
At a particular location.

Incredibly, by far
The deepest red patch

Sits directly over the home
Of one ripper suspect.

You couldn't get any more
Middle than that.

That is absolutely
In the hot spot.

We typically see suspects
In the red area

And know to focus on them

But to have it fall literally
Almost on top of his house?

Who is it?

That's nathan kaminsky.

Narrator: nathan kaminsky.

Polish by birth,
Kaminsky was a cobbler.

According to records, it would
Seem that any prostitutes

He used gave him
More than sexual gratification.

Nathan kaminsky,
That's an interesting suspect,

And he lived
In black lion yard,

And one of the things we do know
From workhouse records

That he was
A syphilis patient.

Syphilis,
At this time in history,

Means that he probably had a lot
Of contact with prostitutes,

And then you take
Into account the fact

That neurosyphilis
Causes your brain to break down

And make you act
Very irrationally.

Narrator: kaminsky, it seems,

Also went by the name
Of david cohen

And was known to be a violent
Character and a hater of women.

A month after the final murder,

Cohen is admitted
To colney hatch insane asylum,

Where he dies 10 months later.

It's been suggested that
The two may well

Have been one in the same.

Cohen was an extremely
Dangerous, violent man,

And the records
In the asylum suggest that.

Narrator:
For almost a century and a half,

The identity of jack the ripper,
The merciless butcher of women,

Has been a mystery
That has fascinated the world.

Has the space-age
Finally found him?

That's quite remarkable,
That is.

Now we may have found
Jack the ripper.

So we can't go back in time
And interview nathan kaminsky,

But with this new technology,
With more certainty than ever,

We can show that he was most
Probably jack the ripper.

**

Narrator: coming up,
Clash of the megabeasts...

They're like velociraptors
In the ocean.

Narrator:
...And hoods in the heavens,

The low-flying gangsters
Invading america.

The volume of traffic
Was enormous.

**

Narrator: june 4, 2018 --

Orbiting high above arizona's
100,000 square mile

Sonoran desert,

The worldview-2 satellite
Captures this image.

We have this large circular
Structure in a godforsaken,

Remote area with one road
Leading into it,

No roads going beyond.

This is incredibly strange.

Zooming in, it looks like
A big sprinkler.

I don't know that I've seen
Anything like this before.

Narrator: intrigued
By the weird structure,

Military historian mike pavelec
Consults geographical records

And discovers a possible clue.

Based on
The coordinates provided,

This satellite photography

Is from the yuma
Proving ground in arizona.

It's a military base,
A big military base.

It's probably something that
The military would like to just,

You know, not have
Prying eyes looking at.

Narrator: the yuma proving
Ground is one of the largest

Military testing facilities
On the planet.

With 2,000 square miles
Of restricted airspace,

It's the perfect place
To develop top secret

Military hardware.

We know lots of weapons testing
Takes place in this area,

And if you zoom in
On the center,

It looks like it
Could be a gun.

Well, if it is a gun,
It's big

Because that barrel
Is over 100 feet long.

That would be
Absolutely massive.

Narrator: for ex-cia operative
Lindsay moran,

The massive structure
Bears the signature

Of an infamous weapons designer
With links to yuma.

It reminds me both in size
And shape of this weird weapon

That was developed
By an engineer

Named gerald bull.

Gerald bull is
A fascinating character.

He's an engineer who is
Closely associated

With the idea
Of building a supergun.

Bull was obsessed
With developing

A weapon powerful enough
To launch a satellite into space

Without needing a rocket
To get it there.

Narrator: in 1961, the canadian
Artillery expert

Convinces the united states
Government

To invest in his
Satellite-launching supergun.

Man: here's a model of
The martlet space shell.

Let's hope he finishes before
They fire the 470-pound missile,

Otherwise he'll be the first man
Without pants in outer space.

**

[ explosion ]

Narrator:
Six years after testing begins,

The escalating cost
Of the vietnam war

Forces the military to abandon
The project

Before it's completed.

Bull searches for alternative
Backers for his weapon.

As bull begins to look
For other sources of funding,

He is ultimately
Brought into contact

With saddam hussein in iraq,

And he forms a cozy relationship

That ends up being a little bit
Too cozy with saddam.

Narrator: the murderous dictator
Offers bull $25 million

To assemble the world's
Biggest cannon.

**

It's a hugely ambitious idea,

But if it can be made to work,
It's a game changer.

**

Narrator:
Nicknamed the babylon gun,

Declassified files reveal

It's 500-foot, 1,500-ton barrel
Is so big and heavy,

It would have to be mounted on
A hillside to fire accurately.

Bull maintains the gun is part
Of the new iraqi space program,

Yet it's 620-mile range
Also puts enemy states israel

And iran well within
Striking distance.

When bull begins to work
For saddam hussein,

The iranians and the israelis
Are suddenly turned against him

Because it looks like he is
About to share a technology

With the iraqi military

That it can then use to attack
Tel aviv or tehran,

And for that reason,
Gerald bull had to go.

Narrator: in 1990, assassins,
Rumored to be from mossad,

Kill gerald bull outside
His brussels apartment.

Those five gunshots
Brought the babylon gun project

To an abrupt end.

Martin morgan discovers
That during the 1960s,

The u.S. Military conducts tests

On one of bull's superguns
At yuma.

Maybe the u.S. Government
Has decided

To resurrect the babylon gun,

And maybe that's
What we're seeing.

Narrator: yet when ken joyce

Uses digitalglobe
Securewatch technology

To analyze the image,

He discovers another possible
Clue to the object's purpose.

As I look at this site,
Things get even weirder.

What I see is this large shadow
On the ground

To the northwest of the circle,

And then just to
The east of the shadow,

I see what I believe
Is casting the shadow,

And it looks to be
A small blimp.

Narrator: the discovery baffles
Investigators.

Why would you have something
So random

Out in the middle
Of nowhere like this?

There has to be
Some plausible reason.

**

Moran: we're only 50 miles
From the mexican border here,

So there could be a link.

Maybe it's tracking something.

Narrator: experts consider if
The mystery blimp

And object in the image

Are connected to
The aerial transportation

Of drug shipments
Across this border.

Munoz: the cartels in mexico
Have fleets of small planes.

It's kind of one way they bring
Their drugs into the country.

Before he was captured,
Infamous kingpin el chapo

Had more planes than even
The mexican national airlines.

Narrator: in the 1980s,
Joaquín "El chapo" guzmán,

Rumored to be responsible
For up to 3,000 murders,

Founds the sinaloa cartel,

Mexico's largest
Criminal organization.

Police reports suggest
The feared drug lord

Operates a fleet
Of 600 small aircraft

To transport his narcotics
Across the u.S. Border.

And the volume of traffic
Was enormous.

So all these light aircraft
Come in low,

The idea being to fly close to
The terrain and avoid detection,

And so the customs
And border patrol, cbp,

Came up with what became
Known as the tars program,

Which is tethered aerostate
Radar program.

Narrator:
Along the southern border,

The tars program
Uses six blimps,

Hovering at 10,000 feet,
To detect unauthorized planes.

Each is tethered
To a ground-based structure,

Like the ones seen
In the satellite image.

U.S. Border patrol uses
These blimps

To basically monitor traffic

Going back and forth
Across the border.

Narrator: advanced radar
In the belly of each balloon

Can spot any low-flying object
Over eight feet long

Within a 200-mile range.

They're really an impressive
Piece of equipment.

Narrator:
Over the past four decades,

Tars has helped cut the number
Of illegal flights

Crossing the border
From 8,500 per year

To fewer than 10,

An almost impenetrable
Line of defense

Against aerial drug runners,
Captured from space.

It's impressive to think that
Something that looks so mundane

In the middle of the desert
Could actually be crucial

In the war
Against drug traffickers.

**

Narrator: coming up,

Megabeast mass death
In south america...

We're talking about something
That is potentially 1,000 times

More poisonous than cyanide.

Narrator:
...And a zulu lord of war.

He basically issues an ultimatum
To every tribe he encounters --

Join me or die.

**

**

Narrator: march 2016 --

25 miles southeast
Of johannesburg in south africa,

Aerial archaeologists
Take to the skies,

Deploying cutting-edge
Lidar technology

To scan the landscape.

Millions of laser beams
Penetrate the foliage

To create an image
Of what lies hidden below.

Stripping away the vegetation

That was blocking our view,

We can see that
What we have here

Are the remains
Of an actual city.

It looks fairly substantial.

There's a number of structures
That are quite evident.

We're not talking a few.
We're talking hundreds.

Narrator: yet despite its size,
There is no mention

Of this ancient settlement
In any early recorded history.

When archaeologists
Begin to excavate,

They find evidence
That someone or something

Forced the people here
To flee their homes.

The floors are scattered
With remnants of pottery.

People just don't get up

And leave
All these things behind

If they're leaving
In an orderly fashion.

Narrator: the artifacts
Date the ghost town

To the early 19th century.

This was a time when man
Wrestled beast

For control
Of the african savanna.

Experts consider if this could
Offer a clue to the mass exodus.

Humans are on the dinner menu

For many of the animals
That live in africa.

But nothing strikes fear in
The heart of people

Like the lion.

[ roaring ]

Narrator:
Over the last 50 years,

Lions have slaughtered
Over 12,000 people in africa.

An example of the terror

These apex predators
Unleashed on settlements

During the 19th century
Comes from kenya.

There are dozens of accounts of
Lions eating humans in africa,

But there are none more famous
Or infamous

Than the tsavo man-eaters.

Narrator: in 1898, two lions
Repeatedly attack a camp of men

Building a railway line between
Mombasa and lake victoria.

**

It became common for these
Workers to find the grisly

Remains of their colleagues in
The bushes just beyond the camp.

These lions were so efficient
And so deadly that people began

To think that
They weren't real lions at all,

But they were
Supernatural beings.

Narrator:
The terrified workers named them

The ghost and the darkness.

Every night, they go to sleep.

They don't know if they're
Gonna wake up

In the jaws of a giant lion.

[ roars ]

Narrator: according to
The camp's british commander,

The two beasts attack,

Kill, and feed on over
130 people in just nine months.

**

If two lions could terrorize

A camp of hundreds of men,

Then it's possible
That a whole pride

Could stalk this entire town.

Narrator: but others disagree.

It's possible lions can scare,
Say, a small village,

But we're talking
About a town here.

Thousands of people lived here,
So I don't think it's possible

That lions could have scared
That many people away.

**

Narrator:
Consulting historical texts,

Archaeologist karen bellinger

Discovers the date of the city's
Abandonment coincides

With a period of countrywide
Unrest called mfecane,

Meaning the crushing.

Tribes dispersed, abandoning
Their villages and their crops,

Just trying
To escape the violence.

Narrator: the brutal conquest is
Led by south africa's

Most infamous warrior,
Shaka zulu.

**

Shaka zulu is this
Really remarkable leader.

He's almost mythical
In his stature,

But he actually was
A real man of the zulu tribe.

He was born illegitimately,
And so he and his mother

Were kind of ousted
From the zulu tribe.

Narrator: driven by revenge,
Young shaka trains

As a warrior
With his adopted people,

Rising to prominence as a great
But ruthless military leader.

He pioneered a new spear
For close-up combat,

And he would force his soldiers
To run across sharp thorns

To toughen their feet.

Narrator:
The story goes that after

Assassinating his half-brother,

He seizes control of the zulu
Tribe that once rejected him,

But this is just the beginning

Of shaka zulu's
Fearsome ambition.

His goal was to rule the people
Of south africa,

To rule the native population
And to expand his empire.

And he basically issues
An ultimatum

To every tribe he encounters --

Join me or die.

Narrator:
Shaka's merciless army conquers

All who refuse to submit.

Terrified rivals scatter,

And the mighty zulu kingdom
Is born.

He caused so much chaos

That those who were
Not assimilated or killed fled,

Creating a mass
Migration crisis.

Narrator: for a man hell-bent
On conquering

All the people
Of his known world,

A settlement of thousands,
Such as the one in the image,

Would've been a prime target.

This town may have
Been abandoned because,

One day, they literally saw
The zulus coming on the horizon.

It's extremely likely that this
City fell victim to shaka zulu,

And the people either were
Killed or fled for their lives.

**

Narrator: coming up, close
Encounters in the antarctic...

If it didn't come from below,
Did it come from above?

Narrator: ...And the giant
Slayer from the deep.

It causes paralysis,
Then you die.

**

**

Narrator: june 23, 2015 --

An observation plane flies

Over the atlantic coastline
Of patagonia, chile,

100,000 square miles
Of pristine wilderness.

As it passes above
A remote inlet,

A camera captures a series
Of white anomalies

On the shore below.

There are these large objects
Lying all across it.

It's hard to tell
Exactly what they are.

Narrator:
When the crew flies lower,

They discover a scene
Of true horror.

[ whirring ]

Hundreds of whale corpses
Litter the secluded shoreline.

**

This is a lot of whales.

337, that's unthinkable.

This is an unprecedented
Biological catastrophe.

Narrator: experts are stunned.

This is one of the largest mass
Whale deaths

In recorded history.

Something very big had
To have happened

To affect this many whales
At the same time.

Narrator:
Marine biologist rob nelson

Studies the footage to identify

Which species has died
On these shores.

These are sei whales.

You can tell because
Of the dark gray

And the irregular white
Markings on them.

They get over 50 feet in length.

Narrator:
Weighing in at up to 28 tons,

Equivalent to four african
Bull elephants,

The sei whale is a true
Heavyweight of the seas.

Nelson considers what type
Of predator

Could take down
These colossal beasts.

There's only one marine mammal

Which will actively hunt
And kill a large whale,

And that's the orca
Or killer whale.

Narrator:
Orcas are only around a third

Of the size of sei whales,

But their brains
Are much bigger.

When size is not on your side,
Then you have to strategize.

They're like velociraptors
In the ocean.

**

They'll target a mother whale
With a newborn calf,

And they will separate the child
Away from the mother whale.

They're vicious.

Narrator:
In pods of up to 40 strong,

Orcas attack larger whales

By taking turns ramming

And biting their chosen victim,

Then they launch from the water
Onto their prey,

Blocking their blowhole,
Weakening and exhausting them.

They are fantastic hunters.

They basically work like
A pack of wolves in the sea.

Narrator:
Yet when science journalist

Haley chamberlain
Studies the image,

She contests
The killer whale theory.

A pod of orcas working together,
They can do big things,

But the sheer number of whales
That have been stranded here,

That's really unlikely.

**

Narrator:
Investigators examine cases

Of other weird whale mass deaths

And discover a common factor --

War games.

There's no doubt that
Military operations

Can and do cause some strains.

Narrator: nelson reveals that
In july of 2011,

British naval planes engaging
In bombing practice

Over a small island
In cape wrath, scotland,

Miss their targets.

Three wayward 1,000-pound bombs

Splash down in the middle
Of the ocean

And detonate on the seafloor.

[ wailing ]

You can only imagine
What effect an explosion

Like that would have
On an animal like a whale.

Super sensitive,
It's using sonar to listen

And hear its environment.

It'd be like getting hit
In the head with a baseball bat.

[ wailing ]

Narrator:
Deafened and confused,

39 pilot whales beach
Themselves on the shore.

The event has eerie parallels
With the one in patagonia.

**

We know along the southern
Coast of chile,

It's a great place to hide.

Potentially covert operations
Could happen down there

Without anybody knowing.

With all of these whales
That have been found dead

On this beach,
It's quite possible

That it could be the result
Of underwater military testing.

Narrator: when biologists reach
The isolated coves

To study the whales up close,

They find no evidence
Of the internal damage

Associated
With military testing.

**

But stomach
Samples yield a clue,

The presence of microorganisms
Known to cause

A toxic algal bloom
Called red tide.

Toxic blooms take place when
The conditions in the ocean

Are just right to allow
Particular species

Of algae
To start proliferating.

Narrator: red tides
Typically form in summer,

Fueled by the sunlight
They need to create energy.

The problem is these algae
Produce toxins that can kill.

**

Narrator: when shellfish feed
On the algae,

They accumulate deadly
Neurotoxins in their tissues,

And a toxic time bomb
Enters the food chain.

The result is something called
Paralytic shellfish poisoning.

**

Narrator: a single shellfish
Contaminated by red tide

Can be fatal to humans
Within two hours.

Sei whales can consume
Around 2,000 pounds

Of these aquatic
Invertebrates every day.

Investigators have found
Their giant-killer.

Scientists call it
Cumulative toxicity.

It means that if you ingest
Enough of something toxic,

At a certain point,
It will kill you.

Even something as big as a whale
Can eat enough

Where eventually it will die.

Narrator: in 2010,

Excavations unearth
The remains of 40 whales killed

By the same toxin on
The chilean coast

Nine million years ago.

The red tide, it appears,

Is a serial killer
Throughout history.

What worries me is that red tide
Is not an isolated event.

These mass deaths are going
To keep happening.

**

Narrator: coming up, a visitor
From another galaxy.

It's a really odd shape.

It's long and thin kind of
Like a cigar.

What is this?

**

**

Narrator: april 21, 2010 --

400 miles
Above the south atlantic ocean,

The geoeye-1 detects
An unexplained object

In the middle of
A vast field of snow.

There's something out of place
Right in the middle there

That doesn't look
Like it belongs.

It's long and thin.
It's a really odd shape.

Man, this is so confusing.
What is this?

Narrator: for rob nelson,
The object's shape

And remote location
Offers a clue.

Anybody
That's watched the movies

Has seen nuclear-powered
Submarines

Popping up in the ice.

It very well could be
A submarine

That we're looking at here.

Narrator: according to
Intelligence reports,

Seven nations operate around
45 of these subsea assassins.

**

Sea ice is a great place
To hide a submarine.

No one can see you from above,

And they certainly can't attack
You through the ice.

Occasionally,
They need to come to the surface

To launch a missile
Or to communicate,

And they can
Break through the ice sheet

Using their immense size
And power.

Narrator: submarines can punch
Through 10 feet of ice

But doing so while
Carrying nuclear material

Takes enormous skill
And bravery.

You have to basically control

A billion-dollar
Nuclear-powered machine

[ speaks indistinctly ]
One-six-zero feet.

...And crash it through several
Feet of thick, solid ice.

If something is gonna go wrong,

It would go very, very wrong.

Narrator:
A single miscalculation

Could mean instant death.

These particular subs use

A whole combination
Of high-tech instruments

To find weak points in the ice.

When it's time to surface,

They discharge
The ballast tanks,

Giving the vessel
Greater buoyancy

And smashing through the ice.

**

Man: whoo-hoo!

Narrator: yet when investigator
Jason major examines the image,

He notices something
Isn't right.

Submarines don't actively
Cut a path across ice.

Whatever this is has
A trail behind it,

So it can't possibly be a sub.

This looks to be like
Some sort of large object

Has skidded to a halt.

Narrator: this leads the space
Journalist to consider

If the object has another
Otherworldly origin.

If it didn't come from below,
Did it come from above?

**

Narrator:
Major reveals that in 2017,

Astronomers detect
A similarly shaped object

Traveling through space
At 54 miles per second.

The object that astronomers
Discovered was named 'oumuamua,

And it's kind of shaped
Like a large missile.

Narrator: all celestial objects
In our solar system

Are gravitationally-bound
By the sun,

Yet the mystery object is not.

This can mean only one thing.

It has journeyed
From another galaxy,

The first time such an object
Has been detected.

This object is so unusual
That some researchers thought

That it was important enough
To aim radio telescopes at it

To see if they could pick up
Any kind of radio transmission.

Narrator: as it passes the sun,
'oumuamua speeds up.

Scientists speculate the object
Is wrapped in an organic coat

And uses starlight
To propel itself through space

Like a kind of solar sail.

This could suggest it's
Controlled by intelligent life.

**

Astrophysicists think that
If there were

Interstellar visitors,

That maybe they would come in
A craft shaped like a cigar.

Narrator: before investigators
Can complete their analysis,

The intergalactic
Object vanishes.

The satellite image suggests
That 'oumuamua was not alone.

Could our mysterious ice object
Be some smaller space visitor

That's traveled perhaps
Thousands of light-years

Through space
And crash-landed here?

Narrator:
Meteorologist randy cerveny

Disagrees and believes a clue

To the mystery lies
In the surrounding landscape.

The most plausible explanation
Is that this is a chunk of ice

That broke off of an area that
Is much higher up in elevation.

It would have been like
A toboggan going down a mountain

Until it finally slowed up
And stopped.

Narrator: without independent
Verification, we may never know

Where the weird
Cigar-shaped object came from.

There's no way to be sure
Until we actually go there,

And being antarctica, it's
A very hard place to get to,

So it might be a mystery
Forever.

**