- Tonight, on The Proof Is Out There.
A 50-year-old UFO mystery.
What did a teenager photograph in the Swedish sky?
- We've never heard of an aircraft
that can do things like this.
- [Tony] It's not a bird, it's not a plane.
Is it really a dinosaur out west?
- Could a long lost species of reptile be hidden in Idaho?
- [Tony] A southern fried horror story,
headless goats sacrificed in a Georgia River.
- Who is doing this and why are they doing it?
- [Tony] And a woman bleeding from her hands and head.
Is it a sign from God?
- This mystical phenomena has been said to be miraculous.
[dramatic music]
- [Tony] Around the globe are videos.
- [Witness] What are those things?
- [Witness] It's moving.
- [Tony] Photos and sounds that defy explanation.
[electric static]
- [Kathy] We don't know where they come from,
who made them, or how they operate.
- [Tony] What are they?
- [MJ] Some sort of bizarre mutation.
- [Marc] What's exciting is nobody really knows.
- Extraordinary claims need extraordinary proof.
- I'm Tony Harris, and as a journalist
for more than 30 years,
I've followed the facts where they take me.
Now, I'm bringing that spirit of investigation
to the world's strangest sounds and images.
We'll analyze each one with top experts.
- It's a credible case, it's a credible video.
- [Tony] And pass a verdict on what it is.
- This video was clearly faked.
- The proof starts now.
[dramatic music]
Good evening and welcome to The Proof Is Out There.
When you think of Sweden, I bet the first thing
that comes to mind isn't UFOs,
but the country has a small
yet intensely dedicated UFO community.
We open tonight with one of their most enduring
and perplexing cases.
Ta en titt.
That means "take a look" in Swedish.
At least I sure hope it does.
It's November 11th, 1973, in the rural village
of Penttäjä, Sweden.
14-year-old Åke Lejon is roaming the countryside
with his niece's Instamatic camera
when he sees a group of strange objects in the sky
and he's able to capture one of them on film.
In a series of images, Åke captures a small black speck
moving slowly across the sky.
He has described it as a loaf of bread,
but with more pronounced edges.
It had a dark spot on top
and continued to turn and become flatter.
The rest of the body, he says, had a steel gray color
and seemingly a slight yellow glow underneath it,
and all of a sudden,
a triangular object ejects from the loaf UFO.
As Åke would later illustrate,
the triangular craft flies much faster
in an arched motion underneath the loaf
and in the opposite direction.
Åke claims it was a silver white color
and seemed like it was glowing.
Author and historian Amy Teitel says Åke's incident
wasn't as isolated as it may seem.
- This sighting ties in with a large number
of triangular shaped UFO sightings in Sweden
in the early 1970s.
In the summer of 1970, triangular phenomena
were seen and photographed over Jämtland.
A triangular object was also seen
and followed by a Lansen aircraft in June of 1971.
- [Tony] But out of all of these,
Åke's sighting in particular drew special attention
from Sweden's burgeoning UFO community.
- Åke's case was thoroughly investigated
by Gutenberg's Information Center
for Unidentified Flying Objects.
Their member magazine was known for its meticulous
investigation of aerial phenomena.
The investigation revealed that the negatives
hadn't been tampered with.
The images were authentic and the UFO was a genuine mystery.
- [Tony] In the 50 years since,
ufologists have spent decades trying
to figure out what Åke saw.
- Because the sighting was in such a remote location,
it's very possible that what Åke saw
was actually a secret military aircraft being tested.
Other militaries have also tested their aircraft
in the same region above the Norwegian Sea.
It's possible that what this is is actually a Russian aircraft.
Åke is 14 years old when this happens,
so it's also possible that Åke didn't understand what he saw.
Or it's possible Åke saw something more mysterious
and we don't know what it is.
- What is so compelling about these blurry photos
that we're still talking about them 50 years later?
Let's look at the loaf of bread photos first.
Each one is a bit different.
The lighting is different, the coloring is different.
You'd expect to see some of that in a moving object.
And then there's the triangle image here.
Much harder edges, more aerodynamic,
almost more menacing.
Let's see how our experts take on this 50 year mystery.
[tense music]
First, we asked Rich Hoffman
of the Scientific Coalition for UAP Studies
if Åke could have stumbled upon a remote test
by a secret military aircraft.
He's uncertain if we're looking at a human aircraft at all.
- You can't really make out any kind of propulsion.
No engines, no nothing that's keeping it up in the air.
It's the lack of clarity on the actual photos
that makes it very hard for us to determine anything about it.
- [Tony] One thing that could add clarity
to the grainy photos is this collection
of sketches from the witness himself.
Some have pointed out that the triangular silhouette
and the triangle craft he drew
both resembled the Saab 37 Viggen jet,
a Swedish combat aircraft developed in the 1960s.
- And that could have explained this
triangular shaped object if they were
flying around in that area.
That was very much a double delta winged aircraft,
very much like this.
- [Tony] But that wouldn't explain the object's ability
to morph into different shapes,
as shown by both Åke's drawings and photos.
Could we be looking at a speck of dust inside the camera?
Well, those would create the same
shape of artifact on each photo,
and in these images, the object is clearly changing shape.
So maybe the speck was something like a gnat
that was so close to the camera that it appeared out of focus.
But our photo expert, Andrew McCarthy, doesn't think so.
- Åke was using an Instamatic,
which was a very popular point and shoot
film camera at the time.
This point and shoot camera had a very small aperture lens.
It was designed to be able to shoot at infinity
easily without requiring any kind of manual focus.
If this object is more out of focus,
it'd be more transparent and have less contrast.
So since this is as dark and as defined as it is,
we know that any blur that we're seeing from this object
is most likely caused by motion blur.
- [Tony] So what could we possibly be seeing?
- While I don't think these photos are a hoax,
there is no plausible explanation for them.
We have no explanation for why this loaf shaped UFO
just hovered for a few minutes
and why this triangular shaped UFO was ejected from it.
There's just not enough information in this story
to make a conclusion.
This photo is a true UFO.
[tense music]
- Our verdict?
We're calling this a genuine UFO.
The journalist who documented Åke's sighting
concluded there was no reason to doubt his information.
He left it to his readers to decide
and we leave it to you, the viewers.
Now we pivot, from an old UFO to a new UFA,
an unidentified flying animal.
The fossil records show that at least
six different dinosaurs lived in Idaho
millions of years ago,
and this video suggests that one creature
from the Cretaceous age might still be living there today.
September 4th, 2015.
Boise, Idaho.
A pedestrian is walking on a crisp gray day
when they notice something alarming overhead
and record this.
A large pterodactyl like creature
with a massive wingspan glides overhead.
The wings pull back then flap several times
before the animal soars out of view.
Let's watch that again.
There's a notable triangle shaped face
leading to a point on the back of the skull.
And beyond the massive wings,
there appear to be two legs.
We can clearly see the brownish skin
as the creature dives then glides past the trees.
Field researcher Ken Gerhard is excited to see such footage.
- So this clip is really near and dear to my heart
because for decades I have been actively researching
accounts of living pterosaurs or pterodactyls.
I've interviewed dozens of people that swear
that they've seen these giant flying reptiles,
not birds.
- [Tony] The pterosaurs, who supposedly went extinct
65 million years ago,
were neither bird nor dinosaur.
- 70 million years before birds came on the scene,
the first flying vertebrates were the pterosaurs.
And they were a highly specialized form
of flying reptiles.
They evolved into these massive pterodactyls
with wingspans up to 36 feet long,
making them the largest flying animals ever.
- [Tony] Pterosaur fossils have been found
on every continent including Antarctica.
But how the heck could one be flying around Idaho today?
Gerhardt is reminded of another sighting,
one that became famous in the days of the Wild West.
- There's a famous story from 1890.
Cowboys riding in the Whetstone Mountains
sighted this giant creature.
They'd supposedly shoot this thing
with their rifles and kill it,
and they brought it back to town.
There was a photograph which appeared
in the Tombstone Arizona Epitaph newspaper,
and this photograph purportedly shows something
that looks exactly like this animal.
What's really strange though is that the photograph
seems to have disappeared.
- [Tony] While hundreds of people claim
to remember seeing this photo,
there's still no physical evidence of it to this day.
However, a number of strange photos featuring cowboys
and winged creatures have surfaced over the years.
Although most, like this one, were easily proven fake.
- If the famous Tombstone photograph does exist,
it actually does prove that these animals
did survive in the modern times.
- [Tony] Gerhardt points to another possible theory,
not from the Old West, but from a dystopian future.
- There are some people that have
actually tried to construct drones
that have a very organic appearance,
resembling birds or other animals.
In fact, technicians at New Mexico State University
have been actively working to build
what's called an ornithopter,
which is essentially a mechanical flying device
which utilizes wings like birds and pterosaurs
and other animals.
- [Tony] These ornithopters are using
actual bird carcasses for the casings of their machines
as a way to blend in and monitor wildlife.
Could we be looking at similar tech?
- I think we can't discount the possibility
that this is in fact a modified
and actually a very cool looking drone.
- Idaho isn't the only place
where sightings like this have been reported.
In a prior season, we investigated a supposed
raptor running around Florida,
and a living pterosaur has allegedly been seen
flying above Papua New Guinea and its surrounding islands.
As for this Idaho footage,
let's let our experts swoop in and do their thing.
[tense music]
Wildlife biologist Stephanie Manka
is skeptical that what we're seeing here
is a 65 million year old creature.
- If a creature this large were able to survive,
it would need prey to survive on,
like cows or calves, sheep or goats.
Because it would need to hunt for food across a large area,
it would most likely be seen by humans
before this one video.
- [Tony] Manka also suggests that some of these
creatures movements are anything but organic.
- So here it looks like this pterosaur
is going to dive down,
but then it lifts its head back again
without really being able to recover.
It would need more distance from the ground
to go back up again.
They're not able to defy gravity,
and it definitely makes me question if this is real.
- [Tony] So could this be a taxidermied drone,
like the ones being created at New Mexico State University?
- The idea of using real birds as drones is enthralling,
but although birds do have a hinge right here,
their wings don't bend upwards like that.
That would be like me being able to bend my elbow backwards.
This is not anatomically correct.
This isn't a drone and a taxidermied bird.
- [Tony] Our next stop was to see
what video forensic analyst Michael Primeau
could tell us about this aerial enigma.
- A software program created this file,
not a digital video camera.
This video definitely appears to be processed.
There's no direct source of light
that in theory would produce these tonal values
underneath the wings.
So that would be more of an indication
that something was changed on the underside of those wings.
- [Tony] Although Primeau thinks this is a fake,
even he has to admit it's a pretty impressive one.
- The metadata and structural analysis doesn't give us
any kinda indication as to what program may have done this
or how it was done.
This could very well be one of the best CGI videos
that I have ever analyzed.
[tense music]
- Our verdict, based on Manka's observations
and Primeau's video analysis,
we're calling this a hoax.
But be warned, now that AI has entered
the field of photo manipulation,
generating fakes like this will soon be as easy
as typing a sentence.
We'll do our best to stay one step ahead of the charlatans.
- Our next story is a strange one,
and it includes graphic images of mutilated animals
some might find disturbing.
Viewer discretion is certainly advised,
but viewer attention is encouraged.
2018.
We are in my home state of Georgia
in the town of Austell, just outside Atlanta.
This is the area where the Chattahoochee River
runs underneath the I-20 Interstate.
Jason Ulseth, the Chattahoochee River keeper,
documents anything that doesn't belong here.
This certainly qualifies.
There's not one, not two, not three,
but many, many dead goats floating downstream
or washed up on riverbeds.
And take a closer look, if you can.
They're all missing their heads.
- This was something that was clearly decapitated
and then purposely put in the Chattahoochee,
which we've never ever seen that before.
Knowing that somebody had brutally
cut the head off of this animal and purposely
dumped it in the river is pretty unsettling.
- [Tony] And this wasn't a one-time thing.
It's become a nearly daily occurrence.
- [Jason] Now, I've seen it thousands
and thousands of times.
I mean, I see so many of 'em, I don't even slow the boat down.
- [Tony] Anthropologist Kathy Strain
says some suggested a large local predator
could be to blame.
- In 2019, a 13 foot alligator was found near Atlanta.
It was so large that people thought it was a hoax,
but after the Georgia Department of Natural Resources
came in, they verified that it was a real alligator.
It's very likely that if a goat was there on the shoreline
and they were hungry, they would clearly go for it.
- [Tony] Others on the internet are reminded
of other similar livestock mutilations,
an alleged hallmark of alien activity.
- In 2016 in Brazelton, which is near Atlanta,
cows were found bloodless,
but they had these neat little circles
carved into their rear ends.
Usually aliens are the ones that are blamed for this.
That might explain what it is that we are seeing here.
- [Tony] Journalist MJ Banias discusses
another theory circulating the web
about who could be responsible,
practitioners of Santería.
- Santería originates in the Afro-Caribbean,
Latin American part of the world
and essentially involves the sacrifice of animals
for various mystical reasons,
like bringing good luck.
- [Tony] Down in Florida, similar incidents
have occurred wherein supposed practitioners of Santería
left the remnants of sacrificed animals
along railroad tracks for good luck.
- Whoever is doing this needs a significant amount of luck
if they have to sacrifice this many goats.
So who would have the ability to fund the purchase
or theft of these goats?
A lot of local press and a lot of investigators
have pointed to potential drug cartels
that are engaging in this practice.
It's no secret that Pablo Escobar would run drugs
from Miami, Florida into Atlanta, Georgia.
So if there are drug cartels vying
for territorial dominance,
any little bit of luck can help.
- Whatever is going on, it needs to stop.
This river is drinking water for 5 million people.
The water is much less polluted than it used to be,
thanks in part to the river keepers organization.
But this has the potential to turn things back around,
both environmentally and socially.
No one wants to see a headless goat
while they're paddling down the river.
Let's see if our experts have any ideas.
[tense music]
First, wildlife biologist Stephanie Manka
considers if this could be the work of a killer alligator.
- From the way these goats look,
it doesn't really look like they're taken by a predator.
It just seems like the head has been cut off.
It doesn't seem like it's been ripped or torn.
Also, if it were an alligator,
I would expect there to be tears across the body,
like tearing from pulling the fur
as it tried to consume the animal.
And why would a predator only take their heads?
- [Tony] So if it's not a gator,
could alien activity explain these creepy corpses?
- I have a hard time believing
that this was caused by aliens.
It doesn't seem like there was any
sort of advanced technology or lasers
to make a precise cut.
To me this cut looks like it could have been
easily done by a human with a knife.
The heads were almost, like, hacked away.
- [Tony] As for Santería,
we consulted with professor of social ethics,
Miguel De La Torre,
whose parents were practitioners of Santería.
- This, I don't believe is part of a traditional way
of sacrificing animals in Santería.
Whoever was doing this really didn't know
what they were doing.
It's not really the way the religion operates.
You may do a sacrifice once in your life
when you have a specific problem,
but you shouldn't be killing a goat
a couple of times a week.
- [Tony] De La Torre says these headless goats
are just the latest in a long line of animal mutilations
mistakenly blamed on Santería culture.
- You see movies that stereotype an entire Caribbean people
as being less than, when in fact,
this is a religious tradition
that have lasted for centuries.
This has nothing to do with Santería at all.
I have no idea what it could be.
[tense music]
- Our verdict, unexplained animal slaughter.
We're not totally sure why these goats
keep ending up headless in the river,
but we agree with our experts
that these cuts appear to be performed
by some untrained human hand.
Whatever's going on, we can only pray it stops.
- We've never done a story on stigmata,
the alleged appearance of wounds
on the bodies of devout Christians that correspond
to the crucifixion wounds of Jesus Christ.
While the phenomenon has been a central part
of Christian mysticism for centuries,
we just never saw any footage of it worth investigating.
Until now.
It's 1987 in a suburb of Damascus, Syria,
23-year-old Myrna Nazzour is experiencing
a strange affliction.
If you're squeamish about blood,
you might want to cover your eyes.
With the cameras rolling, Myrna lies in bed
as blood pours out in a cross shape
across her forehead and down her nose.
There are also painful bloody cuts on the palms of her hands
and the tops of her feet.
Myrna says these mysterious marks first appeared in 1983
when she was 19 years old and a new bride.
- [Tony] Myrna says that after this first incident,
these strange wounds appeared again
on the next four Holy Thursdays,
when the Orthodox and Catholic Easters lined up,
each time lasting for only about three hours.
- [Tony] Author Alexis Brooks says many believe
that what Myrna has experienced over the years
is an example of stigmata.
- The term stigmata basically is a process
in which individuals can exude blood from their hands,
the crown of their head or forehead.
- [Tony] These wounds correspond with the wounds
Christ received from being nailed to the cross
by his hands and feet,
and being forced to wear a crown of thorns on his head,
according to the Bible.
The phenomenon has been noted throughout history.
- Probably one of the most famous is St. Francis of Assisi,
who was said to exude blood
from the palms of his hands as well.
- [Tony] A more recent reported case
is from the 20th century in Italy.
- In 1918, an Italian priest by the name of Padre Pio
was said to have blood emerge from his hands and feet.
Interestingly, it's said that the blood that emerged
from his hands smelled of roses.
The smell of roses is the odor of sanctity.
- As the debate continues on the miraculous
nature of these events,
the Vatican has announced a new dedicated commission
that will investigate mystical phenomena around the world.
The center will look into weeping statues
of the Virgin Mary, stigmata, and other apparitions.
For now, let's see what our experts conclude
about Myrna's recurring wounds.
[tense music]
First, Dr. Ed Hope considers if Myrna's condition
could be psychosomatic.
- Psychosomatic medicine deals with medicine
where the symptoms turn out to be
to do with something psychological.
It certainly could cause the symptoms of pain,
but what it's not gonna cause is this bleeding here.
That would not be possible just from
a psychological problem.
- [Tony] So since her condition is clearly physical,
could Myrna be suffering from a rare medical condition?
- One disease that can cause blood
to come out of nowhere is hematohidrosis,
which basically means blood coming from the sweat glands.
The tiny blood vessels around the sweat ducts
end up breaking open and the blood ends up
coming out on the surface of the skin.
I don't think it's what's going on here
because we can see a direct area
that the blood's coming from rather than a diffused area
that you'd get if you are bleeding from your sweat.
- [Tony] So since Myrna has visible wounds,
is it possible they were self-inflicted?
- We have to think of the possibility
of a factitious disorder imposed on oneself.
This is where people feign medical conditions
in order to get the intention of medical professionals
and medical care.
- Hope says that can be pulled off using carbolic acid.
- There's a highly caustic and corrosive substance
that would burn the skin and cause death of the skin tissue.
- [Tony] And Dr. Hope sees some notable differences
between Myrna's wounds and those of Christ on the cross.
- When we really think about
what Jesus would've actually experienced,
it would've been a puncture wound.
He had nails driven through his hands
rather than this very thin laceration here,
which looks like it's been created
by a very small and sharp blade.
And this practice actually happens in pro wrestling,
called blading or juicing,
where they create very fine nicks using concealed blades
that create a large blood flow.
- [Tony] But Catholic miracle researcher
Michael O'Neill points out that all the evidence
is caught on camera.
- Because they know exactly the dates when it will happen,
and scientists and doctors have been able to test
and videotape these occurrences,
they can see that there is no wound
and then the camera shows the wound appearing
and the wound closing.
There's absolutely no chance
that this is her inflicting the wounds on her own body.
This seems to be an authentic case of stigmata.
[tense music]
- Our verdict.
The Vatican has thus far made no official judgment,
but based on the film documentation
and eyewitness accounts of Myrna's experiences,
we're deeming this a possible miracle.
Yet there is still not quite enough irrefutable evidence
to confirm Myrna's claims of being marked by God.
- Many people continue to wonder if there could be life on Mars.
But for the red planet to support life as we know it,
there would need to be some sort of water source.
Could this next photo prove
that our planetary neighbor not only has water,
but a whole plumbing system?
It's May 2000 on Mars.
NASA's Mars global surveyor probe is sending back photos
from its mission to study and map
the whole surface of the red planet.
But as researchers are going through the pictures,
one image is nothing like anyone could have expected.
In the right corner of the black and white photo
are what appear to be several long
tube-like objects embedded in the sand or rock.
Let's take a closer look.
They feature a series of parallel ridges
almost like a massive corrugated pipe.
Former aerospace engineer Mike Bara,
who has been studying Mars for more than two decades,
thinks this anomaly merits further attention.
- As a structural engineer,
what I saw was what looked like a series of repeating,
supporting structural objects
that don't look entirely natural.
- [Tony] Mike thinks it might be proof of the existence
of some sort of past Martian civilization.
- It could have been some sort of hydraulic tube.
It could be a way of moving water
around the very barren Martian surface,
or it could have even been a transport tube.
And when you look at this as a glass tube,
you see that there's like a compartment there,
almost like a little train that got stuck in this corner
and couldn't make the turn
and now it's sort of encased there forever.
- [Tony] Corrugated pipes can twist and turn.
So author Jason Martell says some suggest
this could have been an ancient aqueduct
that used gravity to divert water.
- NASA recently amazed the UFO community
with the announcement that there's evidence
for a contemporary liquid water movement
on the Martian surface.
- [Tony] NASA says it seems some dark streaks on Mars
are actually running water flowing downhill.
Still, others claim these formations aren't pipes,
but an entirely different sort of structure.
- Could these have been some type of a transport tube,
also known as pneumatic tubes?
Pressure is used to move objects through a network of tubes,
possibly from some type of sentient aliens
that had other worldly machine parts,
which now lay embedded in the red planet's dirt.
- NASA has been monitoring Mars since the 1960s,
yet thus far they haven't been able
to detect any indisputable signs of life.
Are their cameras missing the big picture?
Or is the idea of life on Mars
better suited for comic books?
Let's get a better read from our experts.
[tense music]
To kick us off, could these be broken
and ancient pneumatic tubes from an alien transport system?
NASA geologist Dr. Bob Anderson doubts it.
He says this design would be needlessly complex.
- If you look at modern transport systems
on Earth today, hyper trains and stuff,
you don't find these kind of injunctions here.
Why don't you just run it directly from A to B?
- [Tony] To be fair, if these are ancient tubes,
we may only be seeing fragments of them,
but why haven't they been seen elsewhere on Mars?
This likely also rules out them being something
like an aqueduct system.
- If this was created by an alien technology,
I would expect to find something that dug the hole up.
Any kind of a pumping system
to get the water to go anywhere.
But there's no parts laid anywhere
that could be in the image.
And also it's located in an area
where you're not near the polar caps
where most of the water is on Mars.
Therefore it doesn't even seem to be in an ideal location.
- [Tony] Yet astrophotographer Andrew McCarthy
believes that water does have something
to do with the solution.
- I think what we're looking at here is an ancient riverbed,
either formed from flowing water or flowing lava,
that carved out this shape in the Martian terrain.
Meanwhile, these lines were formed by sand
being brought in by the Martian atmosphere,
depositing it, much like sand dunes here on Earth.
- [Tony] And Anderson confirms this is not the only place
where we see this on the red planet.
- We do know that about maybe 3 billion years ago,
Mars had a very valid hydrologic cycle.
We had an ocean, we had streams.
But since Mars has dried up about 2 billion years ago,
what happens is that these channels
or these cracks are left behind
and because of the depression there,
the winds are flowing down those channels,
forming these beautiful lines.
So we've seen this all over the surface of Mars.
[tense music]
- We have more than scratched the surface on this one.
And although ancient aqueducts do sound interesting,
we're going to flow in a different direction
with our verdict and say that these
are windblown ripples in sand dunes.
Well, who knows? In another 2 billion years,
advanced plumbing systems may end up on Mars.
Stay tuned.
- Minnesota is home to some large attractions.
Lake Superior, the Mall of America,
and the legendary Paul Bunion.
But this next local hero is the most impressive Minnesotan
we have ever featured on the show.
Hands down.
It's August 2015 in Stacy, Minnesota.
52-year-old Jeff Dabe is at home being interviewed
about the unique feature that sets him apart.
- It's nothing new to me, I mean, it was from birth.
- [Tony] He looks like an ordinary guy,
5'8", 260 pounds,
until you see his arms and hands.
Jeff's hands are a massive 14 inches round
and his forearms measure 19 inches in circumference.
It's no wonder he's known as the real life
Popeye the Sailor Man.
Jeff swears he doesn't take growth hormones
and that his strength and size are all his own.
It's something he's been able to take advantage of
since he was young.
- [Tony] Jeff also picked up arm wrestling
and still competes today.
In 2021, he became a world champion.
So how does Jeff have these strong,
massive forearms and hands?
Some suspect he might have symptoms of gigantism
or acromegaly.
- Gigantism is caused by excessive production
of the growth hormone in childhood,
whereas acromegaly is characterized by
excessive production of the hormone in adulthood.
Both conditions are typically caused
by a tumor on the pituitary gland.
- Most people will recognize this next real life Colossus
who had one of these conditions.
- Andre Renee Roussimoff, better known as Andre the Giant,
was diagnosed with acromegaly in adulthood.
He was so big and so strong
that he actually used to move cars around as a prank.
- [Tony] Not only that, but Andre's fingers were so large
that he supposedly couldn't fit them into the holes
on rotary phones and had to use a pen to dial.
Jeff can surely relate,
but some wonder if he could have a different
rare congenital disorder.
Klippel Trenaunay Syndrome, or KTS.
- KTS affects the development of bones, blood vessels,
skin, muscles, and sometimes the lymphatic system.
It's characterized by a port wine birthmark,
a malformed limb, typically one of the legs,
but sometimes the arms as well,
and vein malformations.
- [Tony] And another theory, growing up on a farm,
it's possible Jeff may have been exposed
to radiation out in the fields.
The reason?
Radio isotopes and radiation have been used
in agriculture for decades,
fertilizers and pest control.
- Radiation exposure can cause congenital disabilities.
Azamat Kazizov was born in Mailuu-Suu, Kyrgyzstan.
It's essentially built on radioactive waste.
Kazizov has 12 fingers and 12 toes as a result of exposure
to this radioactive pollution.
- On top of using his oversized limbs to his advantage,
Jeff says he can do pretty much anything
a regular guy can do,
though he prefers using a flip phone
since it's easier for him to operate.
So how did Jeff get his huge forearms and hands?
Let's see what our experts have to say.
[tense music]
We first asked anatomy and anthropology professor
Dr. Jeff Meldrum if Jeff Dabe suffers
from gigantism or acromegaly.
- Oftentimes, this kind of a condition
will affect a single limb,
but not both limbs in such a symmetrical fashion.
And tests showed Jeff did not suffer from
a pituitary form of gigantism.
He has not displayed any excessive growth
in overall stature and size.
There's only this disproportionate growth
of just his forearms and hands.
- [Tony] So since it's not a pituitary gland issue,
Dr. Ed Hope weighs in on the possibility
this could be Klippel Trenaunay Syndrome, or KTS.
- KTS syndrome as a diagnosis for Jeff is not a bad one
because he also has some port wine stains,
but for me, he doesn't fit some of the other things going on
because he has both limbs affected
and also he doesn't have any kind of pain
or loss of function.
- [Tony] Then what about those environmental factors,
such as exposure to radiation?
- Radiation is something that can damage your DNA,
cause mutation and therefore lead to excess growth.
But it's not like the comic books.
You don't get this lovely perfect structured growth.
You get dysregulated disorder growth, you get cancers.
Jeff's had no history of radiation exposure
or any history of acute radiation syndromes.
He's also got no history of cancers or cataracts,
which also can be associated with radiation exposure.
[tense music]
- Our verdict, there's no known scientific explanation
for Jeff's condition.
It's possible he has KTS,
since he's never been tested for this syndrome,
though he doesn't have all of the symptoms.
So it seems just as likely he was simply blessed
with superhuman-like forearms and hands from birth.
But hey, if you've got it, flaunt it.
- Finally tonight,
our boss said we shouldn't have done this piece,
but we just couldn't resist.
It's out of Alaska, which is notorious
for anomalous occurrences.
In this case, a body of water appears
to have a mind of its own.
Or is your mind playing tricks on you?
It's December 2022, in Anchorage, Alaska.
A family is driving down the scenic Seward highway
along the Turnagain Arm of the cook inlet.
The car is paused for a moment,
but once it accelerates, something inexplicable happens.
- [Witness] When we start moving, it looks like
it's still, and then you can tell it's moving again.
- [Tony] Whenever the car goes forward,
the waves in the water seem to freeze.
If it weren't for the brush going past in the foreground,
it would look almost like a still photo.
- [Witness] So crazy.
- [Tony] It's probably just a trick of the eye,
but journalist Erin McCarthy says
some observers online have commented
that it looks like the water is buffering in real life.
- Some have theorized that what we're seeing here
is actually a rendering problem.
Think about when you're playing a video game
or you're trying to watch a movie on streaming
and you don't have enough memory.
And so what you're looking at kind of buffers,
or struggles to load.
- [Tony] McCarthy says some speculate that
if that's what we're seeing,
it could be because we're living in a computer simulation
rather than a 3D reality.
- So in video games, the environment renders
around the characters as they play.
The theory goes that the waves are lagging
because we live in a simulation
and the computer program running the simulation
doesn't have enough memory.
So it's struggling to render the environment
around the family.
- Here's what's blowing my mind.
If the water is moving to the right
and the camera is moving to the left,
you'd think it would appear that the water
is moving faster instead of becoming still.
But instead of getting our eyes checked,
I think we should check with our experts.
[tense music]
Forensic video analyst Michael Primeau
takes a closer look at the video to see if it's even real.
- I have no concerns as to whether or not
it was altered or manipulated
because there was sufficient metadata
as well as structural information about the file
to identify as well as verify the device that produced it.
Throughout that analysis of the metadata,
we also noted the GPS information
and what we've determined is this particular location
is at a lookout in Anchorage, Alaska.
- [Tony] So what this cell phone captured
and where appears to be accurate.
Does this mean we're in a matrix-like simulation
that's buffering?
Theoretical physicist Dr. Michio Kaku investigates.
- The simulation necessary to create the world of the matrix
far exceeds anything imaginable with the laws of physics.
Every molecule, every atom has to be choreographed exactly
to create the world of the matrix.
And that is far beyond anything
that we can imagine on the planet Earth.
- So physicist Dr. Matthew Szydagis considers
if this is just an optical illusion.
- In this video, we see effects caused by
the fact that motion is relative.
Our brain is going to assume
that the ground is not moving when the vehicle's not moving,
but will appear to move when the vehicle
of the person who's shooting this starts to move.
- [Tony] Primeau says what we're seeing
is what's known as the parallax effect,
something we've seen before with alleged cases
of islands moving through the water
and planes frozen in the sky.
- In order for the parallax effect to be dramatic,
which is essentially what we're seeing here,
the speed of the vehicle has to be almost identical
to the movement of that water.
What we can do here to eliminate this confusion to the mind
and the perception of motion
is to crop out the foreground area.
And that's where the human brain is focusing its attention.
And then we can see that the body of water
is actually still moving.
It actually never stops moving.
[tense music]
- Our verdict, this may look way cool,
but this is the handy work of our old friend,
the parallax effect.
Sorry, boss.
And that's our show for tonight.
If you have any cool videos for us to analyze,
please send them our way
and remember to keep those cameras rolling.
[dramatic music]