02x06 - Titanic Phenomenon

[bunniefuu]

[Jeremy Wade] Could a
small piece of aircraft debris

found on a remote desert island

finally solve America's
greatest aviation mystery?

Is this part
of Amelia Earhart's airplane?

[Jeremy] Why are
space agencies like NASA

scouring the deepest parts
of the ocean

for signs
of extraterrestrial life?

We know more
about the surface of Mars

than we know
about our deep seas.

[Jeremy]
And what could explain

the hundreds
of mysterious ghost ships

washing up
on the shores of Japan?

Could the North Koreans be
sending spies to Japan in these boats?

[Jeremy] The underwater
realm is another dimension.

It's a physically hostile place,

where dreams of promise
can sink into darkness.

I'm Jeremy Wade,

and I'm searching the world

to bring you the most iconic
and baffling underwater

mysteries known to science.

The vast majority
of our ocean is unobserved,

unmapped and unexplored.

[Jeremy]
It's a dangerous frontier

that swallows evidence.

You have nowhere to run.

[Jeremy]
Where unknown is normal

and understanding is rare.

It's one of history's most
perplexing disappearances.

In 1937, aviation pioneer,

Amelia Earhart, vanishes
over the Pacific Ocean.

There are no traces
of what happened to her

or her aircraft.

This lack of evidence has opened
the door to nearly 100 years of rumor,

hearsay, and wild
conspiracy theories.

But now, can a small piece
of aircraft debris

found on the beach
of a remote tropical island

finally help solve this mystery?

July 1937,

Amelia Earhart and her
navigator, Fred Noonan,

are flying
over the Pacific Ocean

in their twin engine,
Lockheed Electra.

Amelia Earhart
is this glamorous,

exciting aviatrix,

who's breaking glass ceilings

with her adventures
and her flying.

[Dr. Beverly Goodman] She had
already become the first woman

to do a transatlantic flight.

She was on her way
to becoming the first woman

to circumnavigate the globe.

[Jeremy]
Earhart is 22,000 mile

into this
record-breaking journey,

only one thing stands
between her and glory...

The vast Pacific Ocean.

She was doing the hardest bit,

2,500 mile, over water flight

to a tiny island
in the middle of the Pacific

called Howland Island.

It's a tiny target
for them to reach,

but they're going to need
to refuel there.

[Jeremy] Luckily, Earhart and
Noonan have a helping hand.

Anchored off the coast
of the island is the Itasca,

a U.S. Coast Guard ship
equipped with a radio transmitter

to help guide them in.

But as Earhart closes in,

things start to unravel.

[Amelia Earhart over radio] We cannot
reach you by radio, on the line 1-5...

[Richard Gillespie] She
was unable to get a bearing

on the signals sent out
by the Coast Guard.

[Jeremy] There's a problem
with their radio transmissions.

Howland Island wasn't there
in front of them

when they expected it to be.

[Jeremy]
Earhart isn't receiving

or responding to the messages
being sent out by the ship.

Earhart was calling
in the Itasca.

Itasca was replying,

but Earhart was not
hearing their replies.

[Jeremy] The radio operators
can only listen in horror,

as the drama unfolds,

until all contact

is lost.

[static noise]

[Dr. Alexander Clarke] Where did
they go? What happened to them?

It's one of the greatest
mysteries of our time.

[Richard] When Amelia
Earhart was reported as overdue,

missing,

it was huge news

all over the United States,
all over the world.

[Jeremy] A massive
rescue effort is launched,

but after weeks of searching,

Amelia Earhart is officially
declared lost at sea.

It's concluded she must have
crashed into the water

somewhere close
to Howland Island.

The hunt for her aircraft
deep beneath the waves

continues to this day.

Many people believe
this lost at sea theory,

but no trace has
ever been found of a crash

around Howland Island.

[Jeremy] What if Amelia
Earhart and her navigator

didn't crash at sea at all?

In the days
following her disappearance,

something happens that
supports this possibility.

People were saying that
they were receiving signals,

radio signals

even after the disappearance
of the airplanes.

These calls go on
night after night.

They're hearing Amelia Earhart
very clearly saying,

uh, "SOS, SOS,
this is Amelia Earhart."

[Jeremy] But after finding no
trace of Earhart or her plane,

the official search dismisses
these radio messages

as false reports or hoaxes.

But what if they were real?

Did Amelia miraculously
survive and make it to dry land?

If so, the question is where?

Our best piece of information

about what happened
in the final moments,

hours of Earhart's flight,

are the radio logs.

[Jeremy] This real-time record

was transcribed
by the radio operators aboard

the U.S. Coast Guard vessel,

and it contains
a tantalizing clue.

The last thing
they heard her say

was, uh, "We are on the line

157337,

running on the line
north and south."

[Jeremy] These numbers
refer to a fixed navigation line

that runs directly
through Howland Island.

Amelia and Noonan
were using it to try

and get a fix on their location.

So they're running on the
line looking for Howland Island,

which is what
they should have done.

[Jeremy] Crucially, around


on the same line

lies another
small piece of land,

Gardner Island.

Gardner Island is...
Is a very small atoll.

It's got fringing reef
and an internal lagoon.

It's like an elongated triangle.

[Jeremy]
This uninhabited island

was searched back in 1937,

but only from the air.

Is it possible the official
search missed something.

For over 30 years, Ric
Gillespie has been leading a team

of multi-disciplined
researchers,

who think this might be
the case.

In the 1990s,

they launched a series
of ambitious expeditions.

We were the first people

to go to that island

and look for signs
of Amelia Earhart.

[Jeremy] They searched for
clues above and below the water,

using everything
from metal detectors

to state-of-the-art
sonar technology.

And they uncover
profound evidence,

including a 1930s pocket knife

and a glass bottle
that used to contain

women's anti-freckle cream.

What's all this stuff
doing there?

[Jeremy] But it's not
the decisive proof

Ric and his team have traveled
all this way to find.

Are there any signs
of Amelia's aircraft?

Everybody talks about a
smoking g*n in the Earhart mystery

has to be the plane.

Everybody wants the plane.

[Jeremy] Initially, there were
no signs of it on the island

or in the shallow reef
that surrounds it.

Then finally,

a breakthrough.

And there's this piece of aluminum
laying right there on the surface.

At that point, you don't know

whether it's
something important or not.

[Jeremy] The thin metal
sheet, has lines of rivet holes,

an unmistakable indication

that it came from an aircraft.

How did it get
all the way out here

to this uninhabited island?

Are these the remains
of Amelia Earhart's airplane?

Is it the proof that
she crashed somewhere near

or even on this island?

When a team of researchers
scour a remote Pacific island

for signs of the long lost
aviator, Amelia Earhart,

they find a vital clue.

A small piece of aluminum
with telltale signs

that it came from an aircraft,

raising the possibility

that Earhart crash landed
on the deserted island

and lived out her days
as a castaway.

Could this possibly be
part of Amelia Earhart's

Lockheed Electra?

[Jeremy] Ric's team begin
the laborious task

of comparing the rivet
patterns on the aluminum

with aircraft
from the same period.

We cannot forget that

World w*r II is virtually
contemporary with Amelia Earhart.

Wreckage from
World w*r II planes

litters the Pacific Ocean.

[Jeremy] Does the aluminum
sheet match with a Lockheed Electra?

The pattern doesn't quite fit.

It's like close but no cigar,
and it's got to be perfect.

[Jeremy]
But it doesn't appear to match

with any other aircraft either.

We were stuck.

We said, we don't know
where this thing came from.

[Jeremy]
It's a devastating blow.

What this piece of metal is

and where it came
from remain unclear.

Could the answer be hiding
in plain sight?

Footage from Amelia's
record-breaking journey

shows one easily
overlooked anomaly.

You can see that there was
a repair done to the plane,

where there's a piece
of sheet metal that was added

that you don't see
in earlier legs of their trip.

[Jeremy] Earhart's plane
had a small navigation window

in the back right hand side
of the fuselage.

But in later pictures,

it's not there.

[Richard] They took
that window out

and covered the hole
with a plain aluminum patch.

[Jeremy]
This reignites interest

in the aluminum sheet found
on Gardner Island.

A custom repair job

might explain
why the rivet markings

don't match
with a Lockheed Electra

or any other aircraft.

Ric and his team
put this theory to the test

by checking the size
and shape of the window patch.

It's almost like
solving a puzzle

and trying to figure out
where the puzzle pieces fit.

[Jeremy] They find
that the size of the patch

and that of a mystery
piece of aluminum

are a perfect match.

It's the biggest
breakthrough yet,

but not conclusive proof.

For that,
direct evidence is needed

that ties this small piece
of aluminum

to Amelia's aircraft.

[Dr. Dijanna Figueroa] Now
we can use new technologies

to help us gather
more evidence, and hopefully,

help us solve this mystery.

[Jeremy] In 2021,

Penn State University

offered to analyze
the piece of aluminum

using their own nuclear reactor.

The team are using,

uh, neutron activation
analysis to understand

the construction of the metal.

[Jeremy] By showering it
with radioactive neutrons,

they may reveal subatomic clues

hidden on the surface
of the aluminum.

Things like tiny traces of paint

or indentations, for example,
from serial marks.

Things like that, which you just
wouldn't be able to see with the naked eye.

We've gotten some preliminary
reports from Penn State.

[Jeremy] The researchers,
Daniel Beck and Alison Portanova,

spot hidden inscriptions
etched into the metal.

Their system showed, what
appeared to be, three letters

on the surface of the sheet.

This new discovery
could be a game changer.

If these are tool marks or
even better yet, a serial number,

this could be a direct link
to Earhart's aircraft.

For now, what the letters mean
remains unknown,

but the scientists at Penn
State have plans to apply new,

more refined filters to their
neutron imaging equipment.

With better resolution
and more analysis,

Ric and his team
may be able to prove,

where this piece of aluminum
came from,

and the answer
could finally solve

one of the most puzzling
aviation mysteries of all time.

[water bubbling]

Over the past decade,

hundreds of abandoned boats
have washed up

on the shores of Japan,

from small wooden rowing boats

to larger steel vessels.

Where they come from and
what happened to their crews

is the subject
of global speculation.

But can breakthrough
satellite technology

finally help solve the mystery

of Japan's ghost ships?

Since 2017,

the number of abandoned boats
arriving on Japanese shores

has increased
to unprecedented levels.

There are sometimes hundreds,
every year, washing ashore.

[Dr. Dijanna] Where are
these boats coming from?

What has happened to their crew?

[Jeremy] Tragically,
they aren't always empty.

Some of these broken vessels
contain the bodies

of those who were sailing them.

These corpses
are occasionally found

in a strange condition.

Some are even
missing their heads.

Heads missing?

Ooh!

Ships are turning up

on the western coast
of Japan full of corpses.

What's going on here?

[Jeremy] The first step
in unraveling this mystery

is finding out where these
boats are coming from.

The local police launch
an investigation.

The results are perplexing.

The Japanese authorities
have identified

that the vessels come from North Korea,
because of the artifacts within them.

[Jeremy] It's a breakthrough that
only partially solves the puzzle.

North Korea lies
over 600 miles away.

How are these boats
ending up in Japanese waters?

For many Japanese citizens,

large numbers of mystery ships
arriving from North Korea

causes fear and paranoia.

The context here
is that relations between

Japan and North Korea
are very strained

because of years and years

of North Korean
ballistic m*ssile tests.

[Jeremy] In 2017,

these m*ssile tests ceased.

Their end coincided
with the dramatic increase

of abandoned boats
finding their way to Japan.

But some people are convinced
this is no coincidence

and that instead of sending
rockets towards Japan,

the North Koreans are now
sending ships full of spies.

As hundreds of abandoned boats

wash up along
the western shores of Japan,

many local residents
suspect foul play.

One new theory suggests
these ghost ships

actually belong to an unlikely
group of people,

North Korean spies.

It's a suspicion,
born from years of distrust

between the two nations

and a long history of North
Korean espionage on Japanese soil.

Over recent decades,

the North Korean state has abducted
people from Japanese coastlines.

[Jeremy] No one knows how
many citizens have been taken,

but the authorities believe it
could number in the hundreds.

Are these so-called

ghost ships simply a new
tactic in this dirty w*r?

[Dr. Alexander] Could the North
Koreans now be sending spies

to Japan in these boats?

[Jeremy] To find out,
I'm talking to Prof. Araki,

an expert
in North Korean politics.

Have you investigated any of
these ghost ships yourself?

[in japanese]

Have you found anything
to support the idea,

they are being used by spies?

[in japanese]

Oh.

[in japanese]

Do you think
this hat belonged to a spy?

[in japanese]

[Jeremy] Prof. Araki's theory

is supported
by the fishing equipment

often found onboard
these abandoned vessels.

It also partially solves
another unexplained detail,

why some of these ghost ships

still contain the decomposing
corpses of their crew.

So we know where these vessels
are coming from

and who owned them,

but we still don't understand
what's happening to them.

Accidents at sea
kind of do happen,

but why so many North Korean
fishermen have been lost at sea

defies explanation.

[Jeremy] The Sea of Japan

is one of the most
fiercely contested bodies

of water in the world.

The location of international
boundaries is disputed.

And Japan, Russia, China
and both South and North Korea

all compete for the same fish.

To get an edge in this highly
competitive piece of water,

some of these countries
have been accused

of deploying
so-called dark fleets.

They are fishing vessels
that are doing their best

to stay off the radar.

[Jeremy] These flotillas can
comprise hundreds of ships,

and they often fish illegally
in other country's waters.

They don't want to be
detected by authorities

or anybody
that's monitoring them.

[Jeremy] Now, state-of-the-art

satellite technology
is helping researchers

find these
clandestine fishing fleets.

So the fleets
that were invisible

and very, very hard to track
now become trackable.

[Jeremy] Pictures
beamed from space

reveal huge numbers
of Chinese fishing vessels

operating in Korean waters.

These ill*gal fleets are
capable of decimating fish stocks

and displacing
North Korean fishermen.

What we think is happening
are these North Korean vessels

are going further and further
out into the sea

to try and make their quotas,
to try and catch

the amount of fish they need.

Most of these fishing vessels
are not properly equipped

for these sorts of
long distance voyages.

They don't have anything
to send out an SOS

if they get into trouble.

That crew, once they are
beyond sight of land,

are completely on their own.

[Jeremy] Equipment failure
and dangerous seas

may go some way
towards explaining

Japan's ghost ships.

But one strange question
remains unanswered.

Why are some of the corpses
found on board

missing their heads?

Around the world,
fishing conflict

is increasingly common.

[Jeremy] Have the international
disputes on the Sea of Japan

turned violent?

Or is there
a less sinister possibility?

Could there be a natural
explanation for this phenomenon?

[Jeremy] It's thought
many of these ghost ships

spend months at sea before
reaching the Japanese coast.

Some people have suggested
that these heads were removed

through natural
decomposition processes.

The tale of Japan's ghost ships

is something straight out
of a horror movie.

But satellite technology
has revealed that

this real life story
may in fact be about

our overexploitation
of the oceans,

and by exposing and
clamping down on ill*gal fishing,

we may be in sight of bringing this
gruesome phenomenon to an end.

In 2019, a swimmer
off the coast of Israel

spots something unusual
on the seabed.

Beneath him
is a strange stone tablet

covered in what looked like
ancient hieroglyphs

from the time
of the Egyptian pharaohs.

Can an ongoing investigation

help reveal
what this bizarre artifact is?

Is it genuine? And if so,
how did it find its way

to the bottom of the sea?

After his incredible
underwater discovery,

Rafi Bahalul alerts Israel's
antiquities authorities,

who dispatched a team to
inspect and recover the artifact.

The preservation is amazing.

When you look at it, it almost
looks as if it was made recently.

Like, perhaps
it could be a fake,

but in fact, it's just very,
very well-preserved.

[Jeremy] If genuine, it's a
wonder how this tablet has survived

in such good condition, but
that's not the only mystery.

It is covered in,
what is unmistakably,

ancient Egyptian hieroglyphs.

[Jeremy] Deciphering
these markings may help

reveal more about
this strange stone

and perhaps even its age.

Only a handful of characters
are carved into the rock,

giving Israel's leading
scholars very little to go on

to decode this puzzle.

Amazingly, they are able to use

the style of the hieroglyphs

to date the tablet
to a specific era.

The iconography
and the inscription

that was made on that slab

was done over 3,000 years ago.

[Jeremy] It dates
from the New Kingdom,

a golden age of ancient Egypt,

when this once mighty empire
was at its zenith.

The markings on this stone

refer to an ancient Egyptian
goddess called Seshat.

[Jeremy] Seshat is the goddess
of wisdom and knowledge,

a lesser known deity
seen less frequently

in ancient
Egyptian hieroglyphics.

She's usually only mentioned

in very important temples
that were built by pharaohs,

so her appearance on a tablet

found underwater
is very mysterious.

[Jeremy]
This vital clue suggests

that the stone tablet
is a small piece

of an ancient Egyptian temple.

Could the rest of it
still be here

in the same patch of seabed?

[Dr. Peter B. Campbell]
Is it a remnant of a lost city,

of a lost settlement?

Is it an Egyptian version
of Atlantis?

A strange stone tablet
is found on the sea floor,

close to the coast of Israel,

and some people think
its discovery might point

to a lost settlement

hidden beneath the water.

Could it be that
here we have a newly found

ancient Egyptian temple
or even a city

on the seabed?

[Jeremy] It's a tantalizing
possibility,

but the hopes of finding
an Egyptian Atlantis

are quickly dashed
by one critical anomaly

located at the bottom
of the stone tablet.

It has a hole cut
or shaped into its side.

[Jeremy] This circular feature
is a giveaway sign

of the stone tablet's
true purpose.

What we have is an almost
square, rectangular stone

with a large hole cut
through it.

In the Bronze Age, all
anchors looked exactly like this.

[Jeremy] It's a revelation that
helps explain why this stone tablet

was found under water,

but something
still doesn't make sense.

Most other ancient
Egyptian anchors

are plain and simple in design.

The mystery here is actually
the quality of the tablet itself.

The hieroglyphs
are beautifully carved.

They're very, very detailed
and very clear.

They must have been carved
by a highly-skilled stonemason.

They say to us that this is
something very special indeed.

You might want to ask
the question, well,

if it's this
beautiful inscription, why,

why do something
so mundane with it?

[Jeremy] Could the answer lie
in ancient Egypt's reputation

as a seafaring powerhouse?

Ancient Egypt is one of the first
maritime cultures in world history.

Then, as now, ships are great
symbols of wealth and power,

so often Egyptian pharaohs like
building really grandiose vessels

to display the monumentalism
of their reign.

[Jeremy] Is this stone anchor
from a mega yacht

of the ancient world,

perhaps even one
belonging to a mighty pharaoh?

It's an exciting theory,

but not one that
everybody is ready to accept.

So if you look
closely at this stone,

it's very clear that some of
the words are cut off in half.

[Jeremy]
Israel's antiquities experts

also noticed this subtle detail

and more.

At the bottom of the stone,

the face of the goddess
appears to have been purposely

chiseled away.

What could explain
this unusual damage?

This is a common thing
that we see,

where certain iconography
that has meaning or has

some kind of religious
or spiritual power

might be removed,

usually by people who don't
believe in the same thing.

Unfortunately, this was all
too common in ancient Egypt,

when one deity
became less popular

or for political reasons,

people would go around
defacing images of them.

[Jeremy] If this stone tablet
is originally from a temple,

how did it end up in the sea?

This was clearly an architectural
element from a building

that was ripped off the building

and cut up to be reused
as a stone anchor.

[Dr. Peter] This appears to be
some form of ancient recycling,

where a sailor needed an anchor

and found this abandoned stone

and then created
an anchor out of it.

[Jeremy] The story
of this strange stone tablet

appears to be solved.

But one detail
remains unanswered.

The one piece that's missing from
this discussion is actually about the ship

that the anchor came from.

[Jeremy] The identity
of this vessel is unknown,

but archeologists suspect
it may have sunk in a storm,

explaining how this anchor
finally came to rest

on the seabed.

This stone tablet remains
an unparalleled discovery,

one of the best preserved ancient
Egyptian anchors ever found,

and researchers are planning
to return to the site

where the anchor was found

hoping to unearth more treasures

from the same shipwreck.

New findings may finally reveal

where the anchor came from
and who it belonged to,

thereby solving the last
pieces of this puzzle.

[water bubbling]

Are we alone in the universe?

It's one of life's
greatest mysteries.

With recent advancements
in space exploration,

we've never been
closer to knowing.

To find out where to look for
extraterrestrial life

and what it might look like,

astronomers are now turning
their telescopes around

and pointing them,
not at the stars,

but down into the depths
of the unexplored oceans.

[Jeremy] 2013,

an ROV operating
in the Indian Ocean

near a drilling site
records something strange.

[Dr. Dijanna] What am I
looking at here?

Is it an animal?

[Jeremy] It morphs shape
in front of their eyes...

...before putting on
a dazzling light display.

It's only once the footage
gets back to the surface

that this creature is identified

as a potentially rare
shape-shifting ctenophore.

This alien-looking life form
is known to science,

but what other strange creatures

could remain undiscovered

in our vast underwater world?

Seventy percent of
the surface of Earth

is covered in ocean,

yet 80% is unexplored,

unobserved and unmapped.

[Jeremy] The underwater realm

includes some of the world's
most extreme environments,

and it's filled
with bizarre creatures.

If we can find life,
even the smallest,

simplest examples of it

in unexpected places
on our planet,

this does raise the notion
that we could perhaps

find it in other places
within our solar system.

[Jeremy] 2017,

a survey team
drills holes to the seabed

through 3,000 feet
of Antarctic ice sheet.

It's a very, very
extreme situation,

both in terms of
temperature and lack of light.

[Jeremy] These pitch black
subzero waters

are one of the most hostile
environments imaginable

and an unlikely place
to find signs of life.

The scientists are here to collect
mud samples from the sea floor,

but they are stunned
by what they find

hidden away beneath the ice.

They spot


unknown to science,
clinging to the side of a rock.

Somehow in the darkness,

organisms managed to survive.

[Jeremy] How is this possible?

What are these
unknown creatures?

When researchers drill holes

beneath the thick Antarctic ice,

they find something
no one can explain.

What researchers see
underneath the Antarctic ice sheet

are living creatures

that are kilometers inside
the edge of the shelf.

[Jeremy]
These mysterious lifeforms

appear to be unidentified
types of sea storks and sponges.

Scientists do not expect to
see animals in this environment.

People are most familiar
with photosynthesis,

where organisms on planet Earth

get their energy from the Sun,

that would be your plants,
your algae, your phytoplankton.

[Jeremy] Finding life here
is so strange because

unlike most other food chains,

no light penetrates this far
beneath the ice sheet.

Right now,
scientists can only speculate

how these creatures survive,

but they think they might have
evolved a unique way

of gathering energy.

We call it chemosynthesis,

the ability for organisms
to get energy from chemicals

that they're surrounded with, as opposed
to getting energy directly from the Sun.

[Jeremy] If life
can survive on Earth

in even the coldest
and darkest environments,

could it also survive
in places even more extreme?

The bottom of the ocean
is a very mysterious place,

about which we know very little.

[Jeremy] Its deepest parts are well
over six miles beneath the surface.

In this hostile environment,

it's not just the lack of light

that makes it so hard
for life forms to survive.

They have to be able to cope
with the high pressure,

because of all of that water
weight coming from above.

[Jeremy] It's a place that even
scientists struggle to reach.

At these depths,
the pressure is the equivalent

of putting one ton of weight
on the tip of your finger.

[Jeremy] It takes specialized,
reinforced submersibles to explore,

but the few people brave
enough to venture this deep

have reported weird
and wonderful encounters.

Life in the deep ocean

takes on forms
that sometimes are even

beyond our imaginations.

[Jeremy] And incredibly,
it's not just in the water,

where we are making
groundbreaking discoveries.

In 2020, scientists examine
core samples

taken from hundreds of feet
below the sea floor

in a remote part
of the Pacific Ocean.

[water bubbling]

What emerges stuns them

and biologists around the world

and could reshape
our understanding of life.

When a team of scientists
drill down deep beneath

the floor of the Pacific Ocean,

they find something
they never expected,

life.

The core samples that emerge
contain colonies of bacteria,

somehow thriving
in ancient volcanic rock

below the seabed.

We're talking about rock that
could be anywhere from ten million

to 100 million years old.

[Jeremy] Stranger yet,
the bacteria were found

more than 400 feet
beneath the sea floor...

Leaving the puzzle
of how they got here

and how they survive.

When these rocks formed
and then cooled on the seabed,

microcracks appeared, which
were later infilled by clay minerals.

[Jeremy]
Trapped deep underground,

it's speculated that
the bacteria extract energy

from chemicals
in the surrounding clay.

Their discovery could have
radical implications

for our search
for extraterrestrial life.

The key thing here is that

conditions in
the deep ocean beds

are quite similar to some of
the conditions on Mars.

[Jeremy] All evidence suggests

Mars was once a water world,

and though it lost its vast
oceans billions of years ago,

it could still have similar
types of rock below its surface.

If life can manage to survive
within rocks

that are ten
to 100 million years old

in the deepest parts
of the ocean, then certainly

they should be able to handle
the conditions that we see

on many other planets.

[Jeremy] The discovery of
these incredibly hardy bacteria

could also add weight to
an even more radical theory.

Could life survive
in the vacuum of outer space?

[Jeremy]
Some scientists speculate

that simple life could be
incubated on asteroids

and other space debris

in a similar way
to the bacteria found beneath

the Pacific Ocean.

We know that life first
emerged on Earth

at least 3.5 billion
years ago,

but the exact mechanisms

and nature behind the emergence

of the first Earth life forms
remains mysterious.

[Rob Rondeau] The conventional
theory is that life emerged

deep in our oceans,

around hydrothermal vents,

which spewed minerals and heat

into the surrounding water.

But there are alternative

and more controversial theories.

[Dr. Dijanna] There's one
theory called panspermia.

That's the idea
that life could potentially

travel from one planetary body
to the next.

The idea of panspermia doesn't
have a lot of evidence right now.

However, some believe
that this might actually be

a reasonable explanation
on how life

began here on Earth.

Discoveries being made in
the deep corners of our oceans

are radically changing
our understanding

of where and how
life can survive.

And these insights are helping
scientists continue their search

for life elsewhere
in the cosmos,

and may soon even
lead us to the discovery of

alien life on other worlds.