- Tonight, on "The Proof Is Out There".
We're hunting Bigfoot on the bayou.
- Could this footage show an actual Sasquatch in Louisiana?
- [Tony] We are hunting UFOs on a country road.
- Some believe these are self-replicating alien drones.
- [Tony] We're hunting for miracles in a vial of blood.
- This ancient saint's blood is changing
from solid to liquid before our very eyes.
- [Tony] And we're hunting sea monsters on the beach.
- Could this possibly be
a body part of the legendary kraken?
(dramatic music)
- Around the globe are videos.
- [Witness] What are those things?
- [Witness] It's moving.
- [Tony] Photos and sounds that defy explanation.
(electric whirring)
- [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".
Let's talk Bigfoot, people.
Now, when you think of the legendary beast,
you're probably thinking of a deep forest,
and not the bayou, but our first story shows
that there may be a Bigfoot living just 35 miles
from the Big Easy.
Honey Island, Louisiana,
sometime in the late 1970s.
Retiree Harlan Ford has been documenting wildlife out here
with his Super 8 camera
and telling stories about monstrous,
hairy hominids he's encountered.
Today, he may have just captured the proof.
A large, bipedal, uniform colored creature,
about a hundred yards away from Harlan's vessel,
strides between the trees.
Let's take a better look.
We can see the strange, two-legged figure lumbering
through the thick swampland.
And while it's hard to tell
without any further visual reference,
some witnesses claim this creature
could be a monstrous eight feet tall
and could weigh up to 500 pounds.
Author Dana Holyfield is Harlan's granddaughter,
who discovered this footage of what's known
as the Honey Island Swamp Monster
after it had been locked away for decades.
- Growing up as the granddaughter
of the local monster hunter,
to me, it was like that's just a normal thing.
But it wasn't until I got older and grew up
that my grandmother would come out with this big box,
and it was all his wildlife photography,
and that's when we saw this eight millimeter film.
It was interesting to see
that he actually probably got closer
than what any of us really knew.
- [Tony] While reported theories
about the beast started spreading in the 1960s,
indigenous folklore that dates back hundreds of years
has described a hideous creature known to stalk this swamp,
looking to capsize vulnerable boats
and drag victims underwater
where it would feast on their flesh.
And for those who think the Southern swamps
are no place for a Bigfoot,
field researcher, Cliff Barackman believes
it's actually a perfect habitat.
- It is over 70,000 acres.
Most of it is government protected.
There are many nooks and crannies
that people just do not go into.
This could only be one of two things.
A Sasquatch in the wild,
or a person pretending to be a Sasquatch in the wild.
There are no other options.
- When the French colonists first settled in Louisiana,
they brought along some of their own monster mythologies,
legends like the rougarou, a human cursed
to haunt the Louisiana swamps as a wolf headed creature.
It was said to hunt down wayward Catholics
who broke the rules of Lent.
Let's see what our experts think about this bayou beast.
(tense music)
Could this just be a misidentification
of an animal typically found in the area, like a black bear?
Wildlife biologist Stephanie Manka doesn't think so.
- It seems to be walking pretty easily on its hind legs
and black bears, they can walk on their hind legs,
but it's not as effortless
as it appears to be in this video.
This is definitely not a black bear.
- [Tony] Professor of anatomy and anthropology,
Jeff Meldrum, approaches this footage cautiously.
- There are a couple of frames that suggest
a figure with something of a forward lean,
but it's kind of challenging
to identify any real, anatomical detail.
- [Tony] Even based on what he can see,
Meldrum wonders about a key ingredient missing
from this creature's exterior, a pronounced coat of hair.
- The detail that's present in the video
does not give a real good view
of what would be a hair covering.
Hair would certainly be advantageous
in terms of protecting it from the coarse vegetation,
and insects, and so forth.
It also gives a natural sort of camouflage to the degree
that an animal of this size and behavior would need.
- [Tony] It is widely believed that all Sasquatches
have hair instead of fur,
which is why, similar to other primates,
it doesn't frequently shed or molt.
But without a clear view of hair,
Meldrum can't rule out clothing or a costume.
Plus, Meldrum questions why,
if Harlan was lucky enough to get this elusive creature
on camera, would he film for such a short time?
- [Jeff] I would think that an intrepid hunter
would be motivated to pursue and investigate further,
and make the discovery of the century.
So it leaves a lot of unanswered questions.
(tense music)
- Our verdict, unknown humanoid.
Without further evidence, our findings remain inconclusive.
But Harlan Ford's granddaughter
is still convinced this film is genuine,
and the number of Bigfoot sightings
in Louisiana continues to increase.
Now to something else trending up,
we see UFOs in all shapes and sizes on this show,
but lately, we've been noticing a real spike in spherical UFOs.
Many of these sightings were captured
by US military cameras,
and this next puzzling video also purports
to show something spherical interacting
with American jet fighters.
Should the Pentagon be alarmed?
January 10th, 2023.
A video clip captioned, "Nothing to see here,"
uploads to social media and goes viral.
The video appears to show a dark colored,
low flying, spherical object passing over
a remote country road.
Suddenly, two fighter jets scream toward the object
in hot pursuit as the object disappears.
Let's see that again.
The sphere looks to be only about 15
to 20 feet off the ground,
which would make it much smaller in size
than the fighter jets.
As journalist, MJ Banias, is quick to point out,
spherical UFOs are more relevant now than ever.
- The '50s had flying saucers,
the '90s had black triangles,
we live in the era of the sphere UFO.
There was a hearing in April of 2023 where Sean Kirkpatrick,
who runs the Pentagon's UFO office,
presented to Senate a graph
between the dates of 1996 and 2023,
and 52% of all UFO sightings
that the AARO office has been investigating
were made up of spherical or orb-like UFOs.
- [Tony] While not every orb sighting is this dramatic,
they can still be quite puzzling.
Case in point, this footage from December 19th, 2022.
Rad Muradpejohi is in Mountains Edge, Nevada,
driving home from work,
when he spots something unusual in the sky.
He pulls over to record it.
The video shows a perfectly circular,
dark colored object hovering high up above a house.
- It was a pretty large, spherical,
definitely spherical like, black dot in the sky.
It didn't really have any gloss, it didn't reflect any light.
- [Tony] Unlike the orb in the first video,
this sphere is completely, eerily still.
- Just kind of suspended up there in the air.
No propulsion, no engine, no noise.
- [Tony] So what are these spheres?
Many seem too small to carry occupants,
so are they perhaps some kind of alien probe?
If so, there may be a surprising reason
why we're seeing so many.
- With this uptick in spherical sightings,
there's been a lot of internet chatter about
this sort of science fiction object
called a von Neumann probe.
- [Tony] John von Neumann was a mathematician
and physicist who speculated an advanced civilization
could explore by creating probes
that build even more probes from common materials
found on moons and planets throughout the galaxy.
- von Neumann posited that if an interstellar species
wanted to essentially map out a star system
or distant planets, one probe could replicate itself
as it traveled through space.
- Now, while more than half of UFOs are reported
as round or spheres, they don't all look or act the same.
We'll turn it over to our inner circle
to investigate these two very different sphere sightings.
(tense music)
Physicist, Dr. Michio Kaku,
thinks this viral UFO video is actually too down to Earth.
- The sphere is located very close to the ground.
Usually these encounters take place
high up in the atmosphere,
and so there's something suspicious here.
- [Tony] However, aviation expert,
Tim McMillan, says there's a certain logic
to a probe flying this low.
- The object that is flying extremely low level,
it's flying underneath the kind of envelope
that radar would be operating at,
because of how low altitude it is,
it's small size, and it it's relatively slow speed,
- [Tony] But it's that speed that has astronomer
and video effects designer, Marc D'Antonio,
crying foul.
- Let's watch that again.
'Cause see how it's moving through the sky, kind of slow,
and the jets are going way fast.
Now hold on, if they were going that fast,
they should have caught up to it very quickly,
But we didn't see them catch up to it.
- [Tony] Not only can't the jets catch the orb,
but the orb suddenly disappears from sight.
- There is one way it could happen,
and that is if this object wasn't there at all
and was generated later.
I have to say, unfortunately,
I don't believe it was a real video.
- [Tony] That first video may seem too good to be true,
but what about Rad's video?
D'Antonio thinks he's found the answer by simply spotting
what the eyewitness seems to have missed.
- Down the bottom here,
you can see there's this little protrusion sticking down, okay?
And it doesn't show until you actually run the video
and see the video in motion, then you can see it,
like right there, is a perfect shot of it,
you see this little tiny thing sticking down.
I think that we're looking at a tethered balloon.
(tense music)
- Our verdict, the first video is a clever product of CGI.
In fact, when we did a little digging,
we were able to trace it back to a visual effects artist.
As for Rad's video, we agree with D'Antonio,
we're most likely looking at a balloon.
So these two spheres weren't genuine UFOs,
but many others remain unexplained,
as does the recent uptick in sightings.
- Important discoveries and inventions
often come about purely by chance.
The strikable match, penicillin,
and even good old Viagra were discovered,
more or less, accidentally.
This next discovery may top them all.
It was made on a beach by a dog
and, well, you just have to watch.
October 2022,
it's a beautiful spring day in North Queensland, Australia
and Afri Gregory is walking her dogs on the beach.
As she passes by some of the lovely scenery,
she records this.
- [Afri] Warm, crystal clear waters, (bleep) mint.
Long, beautiful beaches, (bleep) mint.
Incredible views surrounded by mountains and nature,
(bleep) mint.
- [Tony] Yes, the scene sure is mint.
And for anyone not born in Australia this century,
that means cool.
But after one of the dogs starts sniffing
at something on the shoreline, Afri's video changes tone.
- [Afri] Giant, random animal part washed up on the beach,
(bleep) mint.
- [Tony] Let's run that back again.
Afri has stumbled upon something truly shocking.
It's fleshy, smooth,
and nearly the size of her whole leg.
- I had absolutely no idea what it was.
Thought, if there's something that's like that
washing up on the beach,
there's something that's out there in that ocean
that could potentially just be five times
the size of what I'm seeing here.
- [Tony] Journalist, Erin McCarthy,
has been following this story since
the initial TikTok was posted.
- Some have theorized that what we are looking at here
is actually a part of a sea monster,
specifically the kraken.
There are a number of historical accounts
about kraken attacks.
The French naturalist, Pierre Denys de Montfort,
described a kraken attack off the coast of Angola.
The sailors actually succeeded in cutting off
the kraken's arms and tentacles using swords and hatchets,
and then they had an artist create a depiction of the attack
that they placed in a chapel to St. Thomas in France.
- [Tony] While the kraken was thought to be a giant octopus,
others wonder if this could be part
of a different cephalopod, the elusive giant squid.
- People didn't think they were real
until a specimen washed up on the beach
in Newfoundland in 1878.
These creatures are wild.
Their eyes are 10 inches in diameter
and their tentacles can grow to 65 feet long.
Giant squid specimens have actually washed up
in New Zealand recently,
so we know that they are in this area.
- Giant squid can make very clever use of their tentacles.
They can lock them together, weave them into a claw shape,
even in one instance, a noose.
But is that what we're looking at here?
Our experts are on the case
and they're not about to get suckered.
(tense music)
Wildlife biologist, Floyd Hayes,
thinks he might be able to rule out some of our theories.
- A lot of people on the internet think this could be
a part of the legendary Kraken,
such as the tip of a tentacle.
Cephalopod mollusks, which includes squids and octopuses,
they have long tentacles that have a series of suckers
on them that help them grasp these objects.
However, we're not seeing any suckers
on that appendage there.
- [Tony] Cephalopod suckers have chemical receptors
that allow them to touch, taste, and smell all at the same time.
And an average octopus can have over 2,000 of them.
However, with no visible, noticeable suckers,
marine biologist, Shea Steingass,
spots a clue that points to a different species altogether.
- If you look at it, it actually looks like it's
a little bit bloody on the inside,
and that means it's probably from a mammal
or some other kind of vertebrate.
Cephalopods don't actually have blood,
they have a circulatory system that relies on water.
- [Tony] So what are we looking at here?
Well, the answer might make you blush.
- What we're seeing here is just a portion
of the male reproductive tract of a whale,
or just part of the penis.
(whale vocalizing)
Unbelievably, blue whales,
which again, are the largest animals on the planet,
can have penises that extend 10 to 12 feet.
It's possible that these appendages actually have
a place in cryptid and seafaring lore,
and that's because in many cases they may have been mistaken
for things like the kraken, or a giant squid,
or even a sea serpent.
And that's because they are these linear organs
that are tapered at the end,
and there's a few instances where humans might see these,
but it's very rare.
- [Tony] Yes, you heard that right.
Many scientists think sightings
of sea monsters actually might be penises of mating whales,
also known as dorks, sticking out of the water.
- So, often when whales are breeding, it is pretty violent.
You will see these organs protruding
above the surface of the water in a way
that maybe looked like an enormous sea creature
that is raising its head out of the water.
This organ has been entirely removed
and there's a series of cuts throughout it,
so that to me means it could be something
like a boat propeller collision
or maybe even just it was a dead whale
that was floating on the surface.
(tense music)
- Okay then, our verdict,
we're pretty sure this is a whale's penis,
likely severed from its body
by some unidentified object or creature.
And yes, we could be making
all kinds of juvenile jokes here,
but we won't, and you're welcome.
- Generally, when people think of ocean sounds,
they think of something relaxing.
The marine noises in our next story are anything but.
Let's see why an entire commercial fishing team
was shaken by what they heard echoing across the waves.
August 2021, the North Atlantic Ocean.
A Massachusetts fishing vessel makes its way
through the night when the crew begins
to hear an eerie noise.
One of the fishermen pulls out his camera and records this.
- [Tony] The camera pans across the black ocean.
- [Tony] Then, the haunting screams
of something off in the distance.
(high-pitched wailing)
- [Tony] When the video hits social media,
the first obvious theory was a whale song.
But many questioned if such sounds could ever be heard
this clearly above the water.
(high-pitched wailing)
- [Tony] Journalist, Eric Grundhauser,
says others speculated that it was
the cry of the legendary Sirens of Greek myth,
whose song could seduce sailors to their doom.
- With only 5% of our oceans having been fully explored,
is it possible that Sirens of Greek myth are still out there
on some lonely, craggy rock, waiting to be discovered?
- [Tony] Another theory posits that we might be hearing
the sound of a haunted ghost ship,
and this isn't just a fisherman's tale.
- Ghost ships are a popular legend,
versions of which you can find all over the world.
- [Tony] In October 1931,
a 230 foot cargo ship called the SS Baychimo
became trapped in ice off Alaska.
22 men were rescued, but 15 volunteered to stay behind,
hoping it would break free and they could save it.
These brave men were never seen again, but the Baychimo was.
- The workers thought that the Baychimo had sunk,
but a few weeks later, some hunters actually
spotted the Baychimo floating off the coast of Skull Cliff.
Some six months later,
a dog sled crew actually saw the Baychimo in the sea ice.
- [Tony] The abandoned ship had broken free of the ice.
It stayed afloat for decades,
scaring the locals wherever it went.
- The ship was last seen in 1969
when it was spotted by some coastal residents.
Could the sound in this video actually be the haunted sounds
of the ghost ship Baychimo floating somewhere nearby?
(high-pitched wailing)
- When it comes to ghost ships, nobody beats Japan.
For the past several years, hundreds of boats
filled with rotting corpses have mysteriously washed up
on western Japanese shores.
Spooky, right?
Items found on board led investigators
to believe these boats belong to defectors
or desperate fishermen from North Korea,
all of whom lacked the proper supplies to survive.
Let's see what our experts think about this oceanic oddity.
(tense music)
Forensic audio analyst, Rob Maher,
quickly rules out any human sound.
- Even a trained opera singer would have trouble making
a frequency this high from the soprano range.
(high-pitched wailing)
- [Fisherman] Oh my God.
- [Tony] So, he decides to test the sound
against something more mechanical,
exploring a possibility that perhaps they were hearing
another ship, or even their own.
- Comparing the sound to examples
of hydraulic machinery on a ship,
we have some similar frequency characteristics
and some plausible connection between the two.
(machinery whirring)
(high-pitched wailing)
But we don't see an example that exactly matches,
so we can't really guarantee
that the sound in the example recording
is from a mechanical source.
- [Tony] But before we say it's a mythical Siren...
- [Fisherman] Oh my god.
- [Tony] Marine biologist, Shea Steingass
brings the conversation back to whales,
but not in a way you might expect.
- Alaska is known as a biodiversity hotspot for whales.
(whale vocalizing)
What I think we're hearing here has only been documented
in a couple dozen individuals of humpback whales,
specifically in Alaska, and I think this might be
an example of collaborative feeding.
- [Tony] Collaborative feeding
is when whales use vocalizations and bubbles
from their blow holes to trap and stun fish for feeding.
(high-pitched wailing)
But how can this be heard above water?
- The frequency of sound doesn't actually change
between water and air, so we can hear noises
and they would sound the same to us on land
or on a boat as they do in the water.
- [Tony] To double check this theory,
we had Rob Maher run humpback whale sounds
through his spectrogram, and sure enough...
(whales vocalizing)
- The recordings with a hydrophone underwater
of the humpback whale have very consistent frequency
with what's observed in the example recording.
(whales vocalizing)
(high-pitched wailing)
And characteristics of the sound seem to match up.
(tense music)
- Our verdict, our experts agree
what we are hearing is a very rare example
of humpback whale vocalizations,
but that doesn't mean there aren't any ghost ships
or Sirens out there, so make sure you're prepared
to batten down those hatches.
- [Tony] Lions, and tigers, and sharks, oh my.
These apex predators are supposed
to be at the top of the food chain.
So when we find footage of a shark falling prey
to a mystery predator, it's time to dive in deep.
May 2015, Exuma Sound in the Bahamas.
A small group of sharks is seen swimming
around an enclosed area at the bottom of the sea,
but then it turns into a fight for survival.
A shark tail flails from just out of frame.
Moments later, a thrashing beast spins into view.
Let's zoom in a bit and slow this down
so we can see what's happening through the stirred up sediment.
A creature that looks straight out of a sci-fi horror flick
has latched around the shark's head.
After several moments of struggle,
finally the shark appears to go limp,
predator turned prey.
So what is this thing attacking sharks on the sea floor?
Field researcher, Cliff Barackman has some ideas.
- We can see here that it looks
like a giant isopod of some sort.
The isopods are arthropods,
but imagine a pill bug on steroids times a thousand.
They have seven sets of legs,
and the front two legs are used for grappling prey
and bringing it up to their layered jaws.
- [Tony] But Barackman feels it's not a perfect fit.
- Giant isopods are known to grow
to about a maximum of 16 to 20 inches at most,
but the average shark is somewhere
between five and seven feet.
So how large is this animal?
- [Tony] So he does a deeper dive
on other known sea dwellers.
- The largest known arthropod is Jaekelopterus.
It grew up to eight feet long
and it is in the family of sea scorpions.
These were voracious predators.
- [Tony] These creepy creatures were said
to cannibalize smaller members of their own species,
so they likely could have also devoured a person
and certainly a shark on the smaller side.
- Jaekelopterus were more than just scavengers,
they were hunters.
Anything that swam
or moved in front of them was likely game.
- [Tony] Okay, so this Jaekelopterus
seems a likely match,
but Barackman says there's a catch.
- These sea scorpions are thought
to have gone extinct at the end of the Permian era,
which was millions of years
before the dinosaurs even evolved.
But it seems like a very reasonable presumption to think
that there are some species down there
that are thought to have gone extinct long ago.
- According to some researchers,
we have only explored 5% of our global oceans,
but if that's what it's like,
I say we leave the other 95% alone.
For now, let's see if our experts can
make sense of this unsettling video from the sea floor.
(tense music)
First we ask our resident marine biologist,
Dr. Shea Steingass, if this could be an animal
we thought was extinct.
Turns out, there's some precedent.
- The Monoplacophora was rediscovered
in 1952 in Costa Rica
after only having been seen in the fossil record
up to 375 million years ago.
- [Tony] The Monoplacophora a type of small mollusk
with a cap like shell that lives at the bottom of the ocean.
It first emerged around the same time
as Barackman's giant sea scorpion,
but Steingass has doubts that a rediscovered Jaekelopterus
is what we're seeing here in the Bahamas.
- If we were to think about the idea
of this being a Jaekelopterus,
what we would expect is to see kind of a tapered,
complex body form,
but what I see here is something that's really round
and looks a bit like a semicircle or an oblong circle,
so it's got a fusiform body,
meaning it doesn't have any really defined appendages.
- [Tony] To Steingass, it looks like
the other arthropod in our lineup.
- What I see here to me strongly resembles
a deep sea isopod,
and these are incredible animals
that actually have extremely strong, claw-like legs,
and they have mouth parts
that can essentially rip prey to pieces.
- [Tony] That still leaves the issue that it seems
to be the wrong size, but Steingass has a solution.
- We have to think about scale here,
assuming that this is up to a 20 inch isopod,
that does give us a little bit of size reference
for what we're seeing here
in terms of the shark that it's attacking.
- [Tony] Biologist and shark enthusiast,
Dr. Floyd Hayes, agrees.
It all comes down to the type of shark.
- When we freeze the frame here,
we can see that there is a keel on the side of the base
of the caudal fin or tail,
and that indicates that this is a dogfish.
They are relatively small sharks,
typically two to three feet at the most.
It's much more vulnerable to predation
by a giant isopod.
(tense music)
- Our verdict, this is a particularly motivated,
some might say "hangry" member of the giant isopod species.
And let's just consider ourselves lucky
that the eight foot long sea scorpion died out
long before we humans walked the Earth,
or swam in its oceans.
- We haven't talked much about mummies on this show,
and now it's time to right that wrong.
Thanks to the discovery of a mysterious mummy
from before the time of Christ,
it is so perfectly preserved, some are wondering
if something supernatural might be the reason.
1968, Changsha, China.
Construction workers digging
an air raid shelter unsuspectingly stumble across
what appears to be a massive tomb.
Archeologists discover over 1,000 noteworthy artifacts,
including toiletries, carved wooden figures,
and this, a perfectly preserved mummy of a woman
with a full head of hair
and skin that is still soft to the touch,
all of her organs still intact.
The corpse was found inside three nesting coffins,
wrapped with layer upon layer of silk fabric
and submerged in a strange liquid.
And get this, experts believe this body
is more than 2,000 years old.
Researchers have determined that this corpse belongs
to a Chinese noble woman
from the Han Dynasty known as Lady Dai.
Historian, Gary Todd, has been studying this
confounding find for almost 20 years.
- Lady Dai left behind a body that's unique in the world.
And this is definitely one of the greatest
archeological discoveries in the world.
- [Tony] That still doesn't explain the mysterious,
pristine condition of this ancient cadaver.
Field researcher, Ken Gerhard,
wonders if Lady Dai could be the product
of an ancient preliminary version of cryogenic freezing.
There are some scientists who think that
by freezing living organisms at very low temperatures,
that they could be suspended indefinitely
and reanimated and brought back to life at a later time.
- [Tony] Just recently,
scientists were able to resurrect a worm
that had been frozen in the Siberian permafrost
for more than 46,000 years.
- There is a substantial amount of evidence
that the ancient Chinese were very familiar
with the benefits of ice
and low temperatures in preserving food,
and perhaps employed a form of cryogenics
in order to preserve living beings like Lady Dai.
- [Tony] One final theory suggests
that perhaps Lady Dai is simply proof
the ancient Chinese perfected the art of mummification.
- Lady Dai's remains have been found
in this very strange, mysterious liquid,
and it's believed that the acidic nature actually helped
to preserve her by killing bacteria and other organisms.
If so, this was an exceptional mastery
of mummification skills.
- Fun fact, the ancient Chinese believe
that jade has protective qualities to prevent
a body's decay and keep away bad spirits.
Royalty were buried in special suits
cut from the precious stone.
However, when these sarcophagi were discovered centuries later,
all that was left inside were dust
and the ashes of crumbled skeletons.
Let's see why our experts think
this unique noble woman could have lasted so long.
(tense music)
So could Lady Dai's corpse be the result
of some primitive form of cryogenics?
Archeologist, Ed Barnhart, is cold on the idea.
- This environment, it's cold, but it's also humid.
Cryogenics takes much more in the way
of constant temperature and very low freezing
at the initial cryogenic freezing part.
- [Tony] In fact, when modern bodies
are cryogenically frozen,
they are initially frozen in temperatures
as low as 238 degrees Fahrenheit to limit molecular motion
and to preserve the body's tissue
in a state of suspended animation.
Barnhart also points out that even today,
despite reviving those amazing worms
with their relatively simple physiology,
a more complex organism, like a person,
is still not able to survive
long periods of suspended animation, at least not yet.
- [Ed B.] As of today, the technology
to actually revive someone has yet to be created.
- Emergency medicine physician, Ed Hope,
explores Lady Dai's mummification process.
- We know she was wrapped in 20 layers of silk,
that silk will deprive any oxygen to the bacteria
that may be breaking the body parts down.
The burial chamber was underground 12 meters,
and this would also help preserve the body.
- [Tony] And as for that strange liquid
Lady Dai was submerged in...
- There's some evidence that this liquid does help,
because around about 300 kilometers away,
we found another mummy.
- [Tony] In 1974, the 2,200 year old remains
of Sui Xiaoyuan were found in a similar state
of preservation floating in a similar liquid.
- There's no conclusive evidence
of how this liquid got into the coffin
or what it's comprised of, but it's very likely
that it's slowing the decomposition process
and keeping it well preserved.
(tense music)
- Our verdict, unidentified liquid.
While we know that the key to Lady Dai's preservation
was the liquid she was found in,
where it came from and what it is remains a mystery.
One thing, however, is certain,
that Lady Dai doesn't look a day over 2,000 years old.
- Whenever some remarkable bit of good fortune comes our way,
we're tempted to call it a miracle.
But does God ever really make the impossible possible?
One church doesn't just say so,
it says it has proof and some very old blood.
It's September 2018 in Naples, Italy,
during the Feast of San Gennaro,
also known as Saint Januarius.
The Cathedral of the Assumption of Mary
is thronged with people fixated on the bishop
holding the silver reliquary.
Inside are two ampules or vials,
containing what is said to be the blood of Saint Januarius.
It's centuries old and this is what it normally looks like.
But check out what happens
when the relic is turned on its side.
(people cheering)
The crowd immediately cheers
as the centuries old hardened blood flows back into liquid.
Christopher Simonetti was there.
- There is a grand affirmation
where the people are just appreciative
of this manifestation of turning the solid into liquid.
There's a sense of their doom happening
in the greater community if this miracle doesn't take place.
- [Tony] This tradition dates back
to when Saint Januarius was martyred by the Romans
for his Christian beliefs in the 4th century.
- There was a persecution of Christians
carried out by Emperor Diocletian.
And Saint Januarius went to visit a friend who was in jail
and was himself arrested.
They beheaded him on September 19th, 305 AD.
- [Tony] According to tradition, after the beheading,
a local woman collected his blood in the two ampules
that are securely stored to this day.
- It then coagulated to a hardened state.
And it wasn't until a thousand years later in 1389
that the blood is said to have once again
turned to a liquid state.
- [Tony] Today, this ceremonial ritual
happens three times a year.
When the blood liquifies, it's a sign of good fortune.
And when it doesn't, it's seen as a bad omen.
- Some of the good events include
a visit from the Archbishop of New York in 1978,
and 2015 when Pope Francis came to visit.
Some of the bad omens include the tens of thousands
who died of plague in 1527,
and then in 1980 when another 3,000 people
died from an earthquake.
- Today, one of the vials is nearly empty,
because King Charles III took some of its contents
to Spain in the 1700s.
But the mystery of what causes this
coagulated substance to liquify remains.
Is the blood of Saint Januarius a miracle or a gimmick?
Let's see what our experts say.
(tense music)
First, Dr. Ed Hope analyzes if this blood is even real.
- The church won't let anyone open the vial
to find out what's in there.
There have been some tests done on the outside
by shining light in, what we call spectroscopy,
and they confirm that there is evidence
that there is some hemoglobin in there,
so the protein that is in your red blood cells.
- [Tony] So this substance probably contains
at least some real human blood,
but is it possible for it to literally melt?
- One of the theories is that when the ampule
is removed from its chamber and placed near candles,
that it's the temperature change
that is causing the change in state.
But actually with clotted blood,
I don't think that's enough temperature
to be able to induce that change.
- [Tony] Yet there's another hypothesis proposed
by Italian chemistry professor, Luigi Garlaschelli.
Thixotropy.
- Thixotropy is the property a chemical has
that the more stress you apply to it,
the less viscous the material is.
In simple terms, the more you stir or shake a liquid,
the easier it is to pour.
- [Tony] With a thixotropic material,
a gel becomes more fluid as you apply more force to it.
It's like how wax becomes liquid when a candle burns,
because the molecules of the solid candle
start to spread out and flow more freely as it melts.
- Garlaschelli's team actually created fake blood,
which demonstrated what we see here
in terms of reacting to movement.
And they did this using only compounds
that were available in the 14th century.
- [Tony] So could this be a thixotropic gel
rather than congealed blood?
We asked our expert miracle researcher, Michael O'Neill,
who witnessed this event in person.
He says, not so fast.
- Now with thixotropic gels, it depends on the concentration
or how the solution was made,
but those are only good for 2 to 10 years.
The vial related to Saint Januarius
has been liquefying for centuries.
As long as no scientific investigation is allowed
on the actual liquid, we may never know.
Is this a true miracle
or is there some other mystery at play?
(tense music)
- Our verdict, for now, we're going to call this
a possible miracle.
Sure, there's always a chance this is a centuries old hoax,
but it's unlikely fake blood would still have
the qualities of a thixotropic gel after all this time.
And that's our show for tonight.
If you have proof of anything wondrous,
please send it our way and keep those cameras rolling.
(dramatic music)