| 00:00:00 | --Captions by VITA -&www.vitac.com
Captions paid for bydiscovery communications
..
|
| 00:00:16 | ...On friday, december 21, 2012,
the sun will rise as it does every other
day.
|
| 00:00:23 | But on this solstice, it will align itself
directly between the earth and the center
of our galaxy.
|
| 00:00:33 | Welcome to the end of the world.
|
| 00:00:35 | Joseph: There are those who believe
that some cataclysmic fate willbefall the
earth or humanity,
that god is gonna flip the great "off" switch
in the sky.
|
| 00:00:46 | Narrator: By the end of the day,
the world will be blanketed in ash.
|
| 00:00:51 | Once-busy city streets will churn with riversf
lava.
|
| 00:00:57 | Massive earthquakes will have brought tall
cities
crashing to the ground.
|
| 00:01:03 | And enormous ocean waves will be rushing
in
to wash us away.
|
| 00:01:11 | This is just one version of an apocalypse
that some expect to see in our lifetimes.
|
| 00:01:18 | Why are so many convinced
that the end of the world won't happen randomly,
but precisely on december 21, 2012?
|
| 00:01:29 | The reasons whydecember 21, 2012
is so importantfor these doomsday scenarios
is the mayan calendar runs outon 21st december,
2012.
|
| 00:01:42 | Narrator:TODAY, ELABORATE CALENDARS
Are some of the few remnants
of the once-vastmayan civilization,
known for its advancementsin mathematics
and astronomy.
|
| 00:01:55 | Their very first calendarwasn't about the
heavens,
but it was ratherabout the human cycle.
|
| 00:01:59 | The first cycle th o cveouldbser
was from conception to birth.
|
| 00:02:04 | It's a count of 260 days.
|
| 00:02:06 | En lyev tu th,aley started farming,
and they needed to track the sun through
its 365 days.
|
| 00:02:12 | Then they had these two calendars together.
|
| 00:02:15 | Narrator: Other cycles yielded even more
calendars.
|
| 00:02:18 | The long count -- one of their longest calendars
--
tracks a period of 5,126 years.
|
| 00:02:27 | E thlong count isn't really
about any one particular celestial cycle.
|
| 00:02:33 | They wanted to create a system
where all of the cycles they had been tracking
come together.
|
| 00:02:38 | Narrator: Experts have determined
that the current long count probably began
in 3114 b.c.
|
| 00:02:46 | And will end on the solstice, december 21,
2012.
|
| 00:02:53 | Some say this will coincide
with the sun dramatically eclipsing
the center of the milky way.
|
| 00:03:01 | When it does,
they say we will be cut off from vital cosmic
energy
emanating from the black hole
believed to be the galaxy's beating heart.
|
| 00:03:10 | [ Sirens wail ]
some believe life on earth will be thrown
into upheaval
or wiped away entirely.
|
| 00:03:18 | Others disagree.
|
| 00:03:21 | There's not really any energy
that is reaching the earthfrom the galactic
center
to be blocked.
|
| 00:03:27 | And in fact, the actual perfect alignment
happened in 1998.
|
| 00:03:32 | The world didn't end then,
so there's no reason to believe
that this alignment that's going to occur
on december 21, 2012
will cause any sort of disruption.
|
| 00:03:43 | Narrator: But that doesn't mean that when
december 21, 2012 rolls around
that you can expect
to casually go about your last-minute holiday
shopping.
|
| 00:03:53 | Quite frankly, there could bea number of
things
out there in the cosmosthat have it in for
the earth,
one way or the other.
|
| 00:04:01 | Narrator: Our closest and most-likely threat
is a mere 93 million miles away.
|
| 00:04:08 | And at any moment -- unprovoked and without
warning --
it could go on the attack.
|
| 00:04:16 | Solar flares are these massive explosions
of energy.
|
| 00:04:21 | It's like tens of millions of hydrogen bombs
being detonated all at once.
|
| 00:04:25 | Narrator: But as powerful as these bursts
of radiation are,
they're sometimes only the beginning
of a solar temper-tantrum.
|
| 00:04:33 | Dr. Young: On top of that,
you can also have materialthat's flung away
from the sun,
and we call thisa coronal mass ejection.
|
| 00:04:41 | Billions and billions of tonsof hot gas,
magnetic field
that is pushed awayfrom the sun,
and it travels at speeds ofa million or so
miles per hour.
|
| 00:04:54 | Dr. O'Neill: Coronal mass ejection's almost
like popping a champagne bottle.
|
| 00:04:59 | There's an intense initial release of energy
in popping of the cork,
and we're basically looking down the barrel
of this cork shot.
|
| 00:05:08 | Narrator: rockets toward earth,
it drives a barrage of high-energy particles
in front of it.
|
| 00:05:16 | The environment around the sun is filled
with the solar wind --
these particles of the sun's atmosphere
that are streaming away.
|
| 00:05:23 | plows into this material
and creates a shock wave.
|
| 00:05:29 | And that shock then accelerates the particles
that are in front of the c.m.e.
|
| 00:05:37 | And if it's flying in our direction,
it means real trouble for the planet earth.
|
| 00:05:42 | Narrator: If the sun fires one at us in 2012,
you won't have much time to prepare,
evenifyou see it coming.
|
| 00:05:50 | will reach us in just
a few days.
|
| 00:05:56 | But those particles that are accelerated
by the c.m.e.
|
| 00:05:59 | Are accelerated to close to the speed of
light.
|
| 00:06:03 | These particles can take
somewhere on the order of tens of minutes
to hours.
|
| 00:06:14 | Narrator: When it reaches earth,
the shock wave of energized particles
will slam into satellites in orbit,
shorting out their electronics.
|
| 00:06:23 | If we were staring down the barrel
,
it could take out a lot of our satellite
network.
|
| 00:06:33 | Narrator: With several thousand planes
at any given time,
the consequences could be much worse
than just losing your satellite television.
|
| 00:06:45 | Planes that were looking to come in for a
landing
might suddenly find that their gps units
had stopped working.
|
| 00:06:52 | At the wrong time,
that could cost people their lives.
|
| 00:06:55 | Narrator: But losing the satellite network
could just be the beginning of our really
bad day.
|
| 00:07:02 | Once the shock wave has passed,
the bulk of the c.m.e.
|
| 00:07:06 | Will crash into the earth's magnetic field.
|
| 00:07:10 | The earth has a protective magnetic field
THAT SHIELDS US FROM THESE C.M.E.s.
|
| 00:07:14 | "
Narrator: This natural barrier
normally prevents charged particles
from reaching the surface
by deflecting them around the earth.
|
| 00:07:26 | is big enough,
our planetary protection could come at a
high cost.
|
| 00:07:33 | A geomagnetic storm, basically,
is a temporary disruption of the earth's
magnetic field,
called the magnetosphere.
|
| 00:07:39 | When charged particles from solar storms
hit the earth's magnetosphere,
they can become trapped in the field.
|
| 00:07:47 | Narrator: We see the intense clash
between these charged particles and the magnetic
field
as the aurora, or northern lights.
|
| 00:07:55 | you
neighborhood,
it could be a warning sign of imminent catastrophe.
|
| 00:08:03 | Having a huge influx of charged particles
hit the magnetosphere
causes the magnetic fields to move,
and that, in turn, will cause electric currents
on the ground.
|
| 00:08:14 | Dr. Young: These currents can cause power
fluctuations,
cause transformers to be shorted out,
and this would then bring down the power
grid
and cause blackouts.
|
| 00:08:24 | Narrator: But this won't be just another
minor, temporary power outage.
|
| 00:08:30 | Today, the power grids around the country
and around the world
are much more interconnected than they used
to be.
|
| 00:08:37 | Narrator: If we're hit by a solar blast powerful
enough,
cascading failures in power systems
could fry the electric grid the world over.
|
| 00:08:47 | Rolling blackouts could sweep over entire
continents.
|
| 00:08:51 | Rennie: People sometimes say, "well, I've
survived blackouts before.
|
| 00:08:57 | "
but this would be different.
|
| 00:09:00 | Narrator: According to a recent report
issued by the national academy of sciences,
full recovery could take 4 to 10 years.
|
| 00:09:09 | If entire countries fall victim to an unrecoverable
blackout,
the consequences could be devastating.
|
| 00:09:18 | If you had a solar storm
that struck in the dead of winter,
people coulduddenly find themselves freezing
to death.
|
| 00:09:23 | Dr. O'Neill: We're gonna start losing food.
|
| 00:09:25 | I mean, refrigerators work on electricity.
|
| 00:09:28 | Freezers work on electricity.
|
| 00:09:29 | Eventually, that food is gonna run out.
|
| 00:09:32 | And there's only so many baked beans in the
world.
|
| 00:09:34 | Suddenly people wouldn't have water for drinking
or for agriculture or for sewage.
|
| 00:09:40 | Narrator: Modern civilization
would be hurled back into a literal dark
age.
|
| 00:09:45 | The result could be anarchy.
|
| 00:09:49 | It's most likely that, in many places,
we would see martial law break out.
|
| 00:09:52 | We could be looking at the breakdown of society
as we know it.
|
| 00:09:56 | Joseph: With each passing year,
we become more vulnerable to this kind of
mishap
because the electrical power grid is more
and more burdened
with greater and greater loads of electricity.
|
| 00:10:07 | So, we are cruisin' for a bruisin'.
|
| 00:10:10 | We really, really are.
|
| 00:10:12 | Narrator: Every 11 years,
the sun reaches a maximum level of activity,
when it can typically fire off
TWO OR THREE C.M.E.s EVERY SINGLE DAY.
|
| 00:10:25 | And at the end of 2012,
it's expected to be getting itself ready
to enter the next solar maximum.
|
| 00:10:33 | And basically the sun gets very, very angry
at the peak of these solar cycles,
and as you reach solar maximum,
it becomes a very bad time to be in space.
|
| 00:10:43 | Dr. Gilbert: We don't really know what this
next solar maximum will be like.
|
| 00:10:48 | It might throw us some surprises.
|
| 00:10:49 | Narrator: If the sundoeshave some surprises
in store for 2012,
the consequences could be far more destructive
than just turning off our technology.
|
| 00:11:02 | So, whilyoumu're fthbling in the dark for
your candles,
wondering what just happened,
brace yourself,
it only gets worse from here.
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| 00:13:17 | Narrator: The burning out of the world's
satellite network
and the frying of power grids
initial beating we might
take in 2012.
|
| 00:13:28 | Lately, there have been fears
that our planetary security guard
is falling asleep on the job.
|
| 00:13:34 | Rennie: Given how important the earth's
magnetosphere is to all of us,
it's a little disconcertingto see
that it appears to begetting weaker all the
time.
|
| 00:13:43 | Narrator: One huge dip in the magnetosphere
allows harmful solar particles
to penetrate closer to the earth's surface
than anywhere else.
|
| 00:13:53 | This vast chink in the earth's armor
stretches across the atlantic ocean --
from south america all the way to africa.
|
| 00:14:03 | But the south atlantic anomalyis like a hole-punch
compared to the giant ripin the earth's magnetic
field
that we discoveredjust recently.
|
| 00:14:12 | Narrator:IN THE SUMMER OF 2007,
Astronomers discovereda magnetic weakness
10 times larger than anythingthought possible.
|
| 00:14:21 | The entire daylight sideof the magnetosphere
was temporarily breached bya magnetic blast
from the sun.
|
| 00:14:29 | It basically leaves the surfaceof the earth
open to a massive influxof radiation from
the sun.
|
| 00:14:36 | And it almost becomes a game of russian roulette,
because you just don't know
when this magnetic hole's gonna open up over
your head
and drench you with radiation.
|
| 00:14:44 | Narrator: But what if it's even worse than
that?
|
| 00:14:47 | What if all this weakening is a warning sign
that the field is about to undergo
an even more radical transformation?
|
| 00:14:55 | Dr. Young: Some have speculated
that this decrease in the earth's magnetic
field strength
may be a sign of the earth'spolarity flipping,
okay?
|
| 00:15:07 | That is -- the northand south magnetic poles
changing position.
|
| 00:15:12 | Narrator: When the poles flip,
north becomes south and compass needles reverse.
|
| 00:15:19 | Rennie: A lot of doomsday fanatics
confuse that with the idea
that the north and south physical poles
are suddenly going to swap places.
|
| 00:15:25 | They suddenly imagine that the earth is going
to start spinning
in a completely different direction.
|
| 00:15:31 | That is not what happens at all.
|
| 00:15:33 | The continents
and the orientation of the earth in space
stays exactly the way that it does.
|
| 00:15:38 | Narrator: But a reversal in the magnetic
field
could still turn life on earth on its head.
|
| 00:15:45 | In the process of the magnetic field flipping,
there will be a point at which it's very,
very low,
it's very weak.
|
| 00:15:51 | If the magnetic field is significantly small,
it could be quite devastating.
|
| 00:15:55 | Dr. O'Neill: If we have this weakening magnetic
field of the earth,
this means when the earth is hit by solar
particles,
they're gonna be able to penetrate deeper.
|
| 00:16:05 | These particles are gonna slam into the outer
atmosphere,
the stratosphere,
and create nitrates,
and these nitrates are gonna start eating
away at ozone.
|
| 00:16:18 | Narrator: Without the magnetosphere's protection,
each consecutive solar burst
would do more and more damage to ozone molecules.
|
| 00:16:28 | Our ozone layer would be ripped to shreds.
|
| 00:16:32 | radiation,
photosynthesis in plants would drop,
and ocean plankton would die.
|
| 00:16:43 | Rennie: Plankton may not seem very important
to us.
|
| 00:16:45 | We don't routinely sit down to a big steaming
bowl of plankton
but the fact is -- a lot of ocean life does.
|
| 00:16:52 | And if the plankton all die,
the entire food chain of the earth is disrupted,
and that would lead to massive starvation
and the collapse of the ecosystem as we know
it.
|
| 00:17:02 | Narrator: As the field struggles to gain
back its strength,
north and south poles could start popping
up everywhere.
|
| 00:17:11 | Compasses would point every which way.
|
| 00:17:15 | You won't just get lost on your next camping
trip.
|
| 00:17:18 | You might see entire species become extinct.
|
| 00:17:21 | Rennie: Migratory animals, very commonly,
use their own readings of the earth's magnetic
field lines
so that they can navigate.
|
| 00:17:30 | If anything threw off the earth's magnetic
fields,
suddenly a lot of life
would literally not know where it was supposed
to be migrating
during the winter months.
|
| 00:17:41 | Narrator: There's good news and bad news.
|
| 00:17:45 | The bad news is the magnetic field
HAS PULLED 180s ON US BEFORE, AND IT WILL
Flip again.
|
| 00:17:52 | Rennie: This happens periodically.
|
| 00:17:55 | It's a very natural occurrence.
|
| 00:17:57 | Civilization, of course,
has never lived through a reversal like this.
|
| 00:18:01 | The good news is that, most indications are,
that these kinds of geomagnetic reversals
typically take thousands and thousands of
years
to play out.
|
| 00:18:10 | It's not like, suddenly, one day you wake
up,
"
Dr. O'Neill: So, we've got quite a long time
frame,
and that's assuming that it's gonna continue
at this rate.
|
| 00:18:21 | No evidence
that suggests, in 2012,
there's gonna be any flipping of the magnetic
field.
|
| 00:18:29 | Dr. Gilbert: Nor do solar storms
have much of an effect on accelerating the
reversal.
|
| 00:18:34 | And even if the mainmagnetic field on the
earth
were to go to zeroas it reversed,
which it probably won't,
we have our atmosphere,
which will protect us fromthe influx of charged
particles.
|
| 00:18:46 | Narrator: The magnetic fieldmay not flip
on us in 2012,
but the fact that it's changingcould be a
warning sign
of other, more-immediate danger.
|
| 00:18:59 | Rennie: When the earth's magnetosphere
is starting to go through some kind of a
change,
it means that the normal dynamic inside the
planet
is being shaken up in some way.
|
| 00:19:08 | Narrator: Some believe that, if the field
is changing,
then the earth's core must also be in flux.
|
| 00:19:16 | It's the churning rotation
of molten iron in the earth's core
that generates the magnetic field.
|
| 00:19:23 | So, as we measure the earth's magnetic field
and it's gradually weakening,
is something going on
in the core.
|
| 00:19:30 | Narrator: And drastic changes in the earth's
core
could put a world-ending crimp in your day
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| 00:23:49 | Narrator: The sun clashing with the earth's
weakening magnetic field
could have disastrous consequences.
|
| 00:23:56 | But what if they were just the first steps
in a chain reaction of catastrophes
touched off by a solar rampage in 2012?
|
| 00:24:06 | According to one controversial new theory,
a burst of electromagnetic radiation from
the sun
might have the power to trigger huge earthquakes.
|
| 00:24:18 | What happensis the electromagnetism
is conducted by metalin the crust
and sucking in the energydestabilizes the
crust.
|
| 00:24:30 | Narrator: If it's true,a solar attack around
2012
could jump-start quakesworldwide
wherever fault linescontain a lot of metal.
|
| 00:24:41 | Rennie: This brand new fluxof magnetic radiation
might actually just be enough
to nudge the balance of forcesholding those
plates in place.
|
| 00:24:53 | And suddenly you might then get
a magnetically induced earthquake.
|
| 00:24:59 | Narrator: We've seen the carnage earthquakes
can cause
time and time again,
so you may want to get all of your sightseeing
in now.
|
| 00:25:08 | If large-enough fault lines start shifting,
ti
our biggest cities
could quickly be reduced to heaps of twisted
metal.
|
| 00:25:18 | Rennie: The ground underneath them
might suddenly seem to liquefy,
and entire buildings would zigzag across
the street
and then collapse.
|
| 00:25:27 | The people who are living in there would
suddenly find themselves
surrounded by falling brick and mortar,
the ground constantly shifting beneath their
feet.
|
| 00:25:35 | Narrator: But even if you somehow escape
the carnage of quakes,
the earth still won't be through dishing
out the punishment.
|
| 00:25:43 | Massive earthquakes could just be the trigger
for the next wave of the apocalypse.
|
| 00:25:50 | [ Metal squealing ]
Rennie: Earthquakes aren't a danger
only when they happen right underneath your
feet.
|
| 00:25:55 | Some of the most devastating seismic events
have been ones that happened deep out at
sea,
under the ocean floor.
|
| 00:26:03 | Narrator: In northern sumatra, 2004,
one of the largest earthquakes ever measured
struck off the coast.
|
| 00:26:19 | More than 227,000 people died.
|
| 00:26:24 | But it wasn't the earthquake itself that
killed so many.
|
| 00:26:29 | It was the massive tsunami
triggered by this underwater quake.
|
| 00:26:35 | Tsunamis are among the most destructive forces
known to man.
|
| 00:26:40 | The sudden shift in the ocean seafloor
may be such that the ocean floor rises --
maybe just a little bit, maybe just an inch
or two.
|
| 00:26:49 | But in the process,
it's displacing an enormous amount of water.
|
| 00:26:57 | Narrator: But don't cancel your cruise just
yet.
|
| 00:27:00 | If a tsunami strikes, you'd actually be safer
out at sea.
|
| 00:27:04 | It's not until the colossal mass of water
approaches shore,
where the ocean becomes shallower,
that the wave suddenly rises up.
|
| 00:27:14 | And it starts to pull water away from the
coastline
and form itself into a gigantic, devastatingly
strong wave.
|
| 00:27:24 | So, imagine -- one day, you're sitting on
the beach,
enjoying yourself.
|
| 00:27:29 | Clear sky. having a perfectly good time.
|
| 00:27:32 | And you look down toward the shore,
and you suddenly notice that the ocean is
receding.
|
| 00:27:37 | Fast. faster maybe than you could run.
|
| 00:27:41 | Going way back out, miles and miles and miles.
|
| 00:27:45 | If you saw that,
well, that will probably be
one of the very last things you will ever
see,
because that means that a tsunami is coming
in.
|
| 00:27:56 | Narrator: If 2012 brings more and more earthquakes,
they're sure to cause more and more tsunamis.
|
| 00:28:05 | Dr. O'Neill: Say, if a fault in the center
of the pacific
suddenly shifts,
cities could be underwater in a second.
|
| 00:28:14 | Say, if the faultsuddenly shifts
in the centerof the atlantic ocean.
|
| 00:28:17 | The whole east side of the united states
is gonna be open to a tsunami.
|
| 00:28:22 | Narrator: And quakes aren't the earth's only
tsunami factories.
|
| 00:28:28 | Volcanic eruptions at sea can also set off
these deadly waves.
|
| 00:28:34 | And some scientists believe one potential
killer
is lurking in the atlantic ocean
on the canary islands off africa --
an active volcano called cumbre vieja.
|
| 00:28:47 | If it blows,
lav you should
worry about.
|
| 00:28:52 | Rennie: If cumbre vieja should suddenly erupt,
most geologists think there's a very good
chance
half of that volcanic mountain will slide
down into the sea.
|
| 00:29:03 | Narrator: The massive landslide
would cause a dome of water
close to 3,000 feet high and several miles
wide
to rise up and then collapse.
|
| 00:29:15 | The result would be a megatsunami --
a wave higher than any in recorded history
--
traveling close to 500 miles per hour.
|
| 00:29:25 | Dr. Young: We're talking about a mega-tidal
wave --
something that would be hundreds and hundreds
of feet high.
|
| 00:29:31 | So, if something like thatwere to travel
from the atlantic
and head towards the east coastof the united
states,
head towards europe,
then miles and miles of shoreline
would be completely inundated with water.
|
| 00:29:46 | Narrator: The carnage worldwide could be
unimaginable.
|
| 00:29:51 | Roughly 40% of the world's population
lives within a few dozen miles of a coastline.
|
| 00:29:58 | Our cities would be like sand castles along
a beach shore
and, suddenly, waves just coming and crashing
down
and destroying them completely.
|
| 00:30:07 | And when it went back out,
it would pull out everything that was in
its path.
|
| 00:30:11 | cities would
be flattened.
|
| 00:30:16 | Narrator: As catastrophic as an eruption
of cumbre vieja could be,
you should count yourself lucky
if that's the only hotspot that goes off.
|
| 00:30:27 | Rennie: saint
helens,
we know can be tremendously destructive all
on their own.
|
| 00:30:33 | But ordinary volcanoes are a pale shadow
"
Narrator: If one of these behemoths blows,
wis for a tsunami to come and wash
the fire away.
|
| 00:31:22 | Kirsten.
|
| 00:31:23 | One day an idea came to me.
|
| 00:31:24 | And I was sitting right there.
|
| 00:31:26 | Working on my PC should be easier.
|
| 00:31:29 | Just like that, Windows 7 comes out.
|
| 00:31:31 | Check it out. It's got this cool little taskbar.
|
| 00:31:35 | I can see everything I have open.
|
| 00:31:36 | Makes working on a bunch of things at once,
easier.
|
| 00:31:40 | I know what you're thinking.
|
| 00:31:41 | Microsoft used Kirsten's idea.
|
| 00:31:43 | Know who else is thinking that?
|
| 00:31:45 | (laughing) Kirsten.
|
| 00:31:47 | I'm a PC and Windows 7 was my idea.
|
| 00:32:22 | everyone's
money.
|
| 00:32:26 | Switch to Nationwide Auto Insurance,
and you can save up to $43 every month.
|
| 00:32:30 | We'll look at every detail
and help you get the right coverage at the
right price.
|
| 00:32:34 | Our first priority is looking out for you.
|
| 00:32:37 | Our second is looking out for your wallet.
|
| 00:32:40 | I am Kerry Mullin, and I am on your side.
|
| 00:32:44 | Switch to Nationwide Insurance now.
|
| 00:35:23 | [ Screaming ]
Narrator:EARTHQUAKES AND TSUNAMIS
Are by no meansthe largest natural disasters
that could be triggered in 2012.
|
| 00:35:38 | Imagine an explosion so big,
it's like 1,000 hiroshima-size atomic bombs
going off every second.
|
| 00:35:49 | In an instant,
the shape of north america is altered forever.
|
| 00:35:53 | Ordinary volcanoesare almost nothing
compared tothe most awesome phenomenon
of the supervolcanoes.
|
| 00:36:01 | We all have a picture in our mind
of what a volcano looks like.
|
| 00:36:06 | In contrast, a supervolcano can have an area
that is hundreds or thousands of times larger
than that of an ordinary volcano.
|
| 00:36:14 | Narrator: But unlike typical volcanoes,
supervolcanoes are deceptively camouflaged.
|
| 00:36:23 | Of the dozens we know to exist,
most are hidden away on ocean floors.
|
| 00:36:30 | Those we can see on land
take the shape of a huge depression in the
earth's crust,
called a caldera.
|
| 00:36:38 | You could be standing on top of one and never
know it.
|
| 00:36:43 | In fact, many americans are.
|
| 00:36:46 | Heasler: Most visitors who come to yellowstone
don't realize
that they're visiting
one of the world's largestactive volcanoes.
|
| 00:36:53 | That takes a lot of energy to power all the
hot springs,
mudpots, geysers, and steam vents.
|
| 00:37:01 | And that heat comes from the molten rock
that is relatively near the surface of the
earth
in yellowstone.
|
| 00:37:08 | Narrator: One look at yellowstone's rap sheet
shows it to be a violent repeat offender.
|
| 00:37:16 | Lately, it blows its top
approximately every 600,000-to-800,000 years,
and its last catastrophic eruption
struck about 640,000 years ago.
|
| 00:37:29 | We know thatthe yellowstone supervolcano
has moved into the red zone,
meaning that it could nowerupt at any time.
|
| 00:37:38 | Narrator: But supposing there were a way
for the sun to set off earthquakes in 2012.
|
| 00:37:44 | Might it also be able to trigger
the next cataclysmic yellowstone blast?
|
| 00:37:49 | Joseph: According to the theory,
a sudden, sharp massive injection of solar
energy,
as might well occur in 2012,
could be the electrical prick for the magma
balloon
that's ready to burst in yellowstone
or any other supervolcano that's in the red
zone.
|
| 00:38:08 | Narrator: If yellowstone blows,
the force of the blast
will annihilate everything in the immediate
vicinity.
|
| 00:38:17 | Miles of ground above the caldera will collapse,
creating an avalanche of molten rock and
superheated gas.
|
| 00:38:25 | This thousand-degree cloud can tear across
the ground
at 100 miles per hour.
|
| 00:38:32 | This is what's called a pyroclastic flow.
|
| 00:38:34 | And it is what will be the most devastating
phenomenon
for the people in the immediate vicinity.
|
| 00:38:41 | This huge wall of superhot rock
that will be flowing rapidly out of the supervolcano,
off in all directions, for tens of miles,
and destroying everything in its path.
|
| 00:38:55 | Narrator: Even if you live far from yellowstone,
you're still not safe.
|
| 00:39:01 | A gigantic plume of volcanic ash and gas
will be shot into the air.
|
| 00:39:08 | Most of the u.s.
|
| 00:39:10 | Would be buried under smoldering ash several
feet deep.
|
| 00:39:14 | Not even those watching in horror
on the other side of the world would be safe
for long.
|
| 00:39:22 | Picked up by the winds,
the ash and gas cloud would spread around
the globe.
|
| 00:39:27 | Rennie: The amount of soot and ash in the
sky
will be so huge
that, even at noontime, it will blot out
the sun.
|
| 00:39:38 | Once the atmosphereis filled with stuff,
there's not a whole lotyou can do about it.
|
| 00:39:42 | You just have to wait for itto dissipate.
|
| 00:39:44 | It would create what we would call a nuclear
winter.
|
| 00:39:48 | It will become cold. there will be no light.
|
| 00:39:50 | Plants and animals will start dying.
|
| 00:39:53 | And then you've got famine.
|
| 00:39:54 | And with famine, you have diseasewi
it would be as cataclysmic as when the dinosaurs
were extinct.
|
| 00:40:03 | But it's not the dinosaurs we're worried
about. it's us.
|
| 00:40:06 | Narrator: There may be no way to diffuse
this ticking time bomb.
|
| 00:40:12 | Noweo dt lio eev there's any method
that would help control an eruption.
|
| 00:40:18 | And, in fact, we don't even know
if, by attempting, let's say something like
drilling,
we may not trigger an eruption.
|
| 00:40:26 | You've got a balloon that's ready to pop.
|
| 00:40:27 | The last thing you want to do is prick it.
|
| 00:40:29 | Narrator: But even if you somehow managed
to survive
in the blackened, burned world post-yellowstone,
that still might just be the beginning of
the carnage.
|
| 00:40:41 | Some say that a supervolcanic blast
could pack enough punch
to alter the rotation of the earth itself.
|
| 00:40:49 | And when that shake-up is over,
almost no one will be left alive.
|
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| 00:42:29 | e
Narrator: Even a supervolcano might only
be one step
in a chain of escalating cataclysms
that could potentially end life on earth
in 2012.
|
| 00:44:14 | If a supervolcano blows,
an enormous amount of the earth's mass
will be blasted into the atmosphere.
|
| 00:44:23 | And some doomsday theories suggest
that, if the balance of earth's landmasses
is thrown out of whack, all of the ground
on the earth
could suddenly spin around the core of the
planet.
|
| 00:44:36 | That was the idea ofsomeone named charles
hapgood,
who had this theorythat the earth could --
had --
reorganized itself in just this fashion.
|
| 00:44:47 | Narrator: Below the earth's crust
is a thick layer of the mantle called the
asthenosphere,
where the rock is soft and malleable.
|
| 00:44:59 | Earthquakes normally occur
when two sections of the crust above it
scrape against each other.
|
| 00:45:08 | But in hapgood's theory,
a large-enough imbalance on the surface
could set the entire crust
sliding over the asthenosphere at once.
|
| 00:45:17 | Rennie: To hapgood, it seemed possible
that the crust could spin around
completely independently of the mantle itself,
so you could just roll the outer crust over
it.
|
| 00:45:29 | Of course, imagine what it would be like
trying t.liv on the crust when that happened.
|
| 00:45:34 | It would be very bad[chuckles] to put it
plainly.
|
| 00:45:39 | Some sort of quick, large-scale movement
of a piece of the crust
is gonna cause earthquakes.
|
| 00:45:46 | It's gonna cause tidal waves.
|
| 00:45:49 | It would be catastrophic.
|
| 00:45:52 | Narrator: This isn't just one version of
the apocalypse.
|
| 00:45:56 | This is every version at once.
|
| 00:46:00 | And hapgood theorized that the horrific destruction
would only be amplified
by the fact that the earth isn't a perfect
sphere.
|
| 00:46:09 | Dr. O'Neill: It bulges at the equator.
|
| 00:46:11 | If you imagine -- if you hada point on the
north pole,
and if you had a pointon the equator,
the point on the equatoris going around at
quite a rate.
|
| 00:46:20 | So, it has a higherangular momentum.
|
| 00:46:24 | If you have ever experiencedbeing on a merry-go-round
and holding onto the ends,it wants to pull
you off.
|
| 00:46:30 | And that's the same forcethat the spinning
object,
such as the earth,is experiencing.
|
| 00:46:34 | So, it's pulling the materialcloser to the
equator
and having it slightly bulge outat the middle.
|
| 00:46:40 | Given that the earthis not perfectly round
and the crust hugs itvery solidly,
well, that means that areas thatwere moving
across the equator
would suddenly nowhave to stretch.
|
| 00:46:53 | They would most likely startto break open.
|
| 00:46:55 | And we would be looking at severe earthquakes
and giant fissures that would periodically
open up
as the crust was trying to stretch.
|
| 00:47:04 | You can imagine what would happen
to any cities that were built along those
areas.
|
| 00:47:11 | It could be a very, very bad day on earth.
|
| 00:47:12 | We just simply cannot deal with something
this big.
|
| 00:47:18 | Narrator: When hapgood's theory was first
PROPOSED IN THE 1950s,
Albert einstein thought it deserved such
serious attention
that he wrote the foreword to hapgood's book
himself.
|
| 00:47:30 | Luckily for you, scientists today disagree.
|
| 00:47:35 | This is not a very well-respected idea
among geologists.
|
| 00:47:39 | Dr. Young: All the evidence from geology
is that that's not how the crust works.
|
| 00:47:45 | Even if you assumethat theory is correct,
the amount of energythat it would take to
cause that
would kill us instantly.
|
| 00:47:51 | You wouldn't have any time to worry about
the poles shifting.
|
| 00:47:58 | Narrator: Megaearthquakes and supervolcanoes
may still be in the cards for 2012
they're just not likely to be caused
by an enormous crust displacement or the
sun.
|
| 00:48:10 | It's not going to be
the thing that causes those types of catastrophes.
|
| 00:48:15 | Even the very strongest flares that we've
seen up to date --
in 2003 -- cities didn't crumble to the ground.
|
| 00:48:22 | There wasn't mass destruction.
|
| 00:48:24 | We seem to weather those pretty well.
|
| 00:48:27 | Narrator: But the sun may not be our only
threat in 2012.
|
| 00:48:32 | There's probably only one scenario
that could cause world-ending destruction
on par with crust displacement.
|
| 00:48:40 | Pretty much the only thing that you could
imagine
that would flip a planet over on its side
like that
would basically be a collision
with, well, almost another planet.
|
| 00:48:49 | Narrator: Unfortunately for earth,
space is full of really big things
just floating around, looking for something
to slam into.
|
| 00:48:55 | Me
and doomsday prophets have a 2012 prediction
about that, too.
|
| 00:49:43 | You seeing this?
|
| 00:49:49 | (soldier) HEY, GUYS...
|
| 00:49:51 | It's snowing!
|
| 00:49:55 | So, what'd you ask for?
|
| 00:49:58 | Something for dad.
|
| 00:50:00 | (announcer) TO ALL OF OUR TROOPS AND THEIR
Families, thank you.
|
| 00:50:02 | .. we are all living betr.
|
| 00:50:03 | Te
this is onstar reporting a stolen blue chevy
tahoe,
south on i-75, near exit 5.
|
| 00:50:26 | We're on it.
|
| 00:50:32 | Onstar, we may have that tahoe.
|
| 00:50:34 | Ok, I'll flash the lights.
|
| 00:50:35 | We got it. it's in the clear.
|
| 00:50:37 | I'm sending a signal to cut the power.
|
| 00:50:44 | We got him.
|
| 00:50:47 | ross, the police havere recoved your
tahoe.
|
| 00:50:49 | Co
(announcer)WE
it
and at ge it meansinnovating, inventing
and building things.
|
| 00:51:01 | It means everything from
shipping a new wind turbine
every 4 hours
to creating someof the world's
most advanced healthcaretechnologies.
|
| 00:51:09 | MANUFACTURING ISPART OF GE's BELIEF
That theamerican renewal
is making things righthere in america.
|
| 00:51:15 | The american renewal ishappening right now.
|
| 00:51:48 | Narrator: December 21, 2012.
|
| 00:51:51 | The sun erupts,
firing off super flares
that blow away the magnetosphere.
|
| 00:51:57 | Geomagnetic storms disrupt the earth's core
and crust.
|
| 00:52:02 | Earthquakes, tsunamis, and supervolcanoes
annihilate the land.
|
| 00:52:08 | The global imbalance
is enough to send the world spinning out
of control.
|
| 00:52:15 | Life on earth comes to an end.
|
| 00:52:18 | This is the waythese doomsday theories work.
|
| 00:52:21 | They take one tenuous linkbetween each one
and suddenly makeglobal disaster.
|
| 00:52:26 | Nd if we are to believe this chain of events,
the worl.i gonna end in 2012.
|
| 00:52:31 | Narrator: It's a good thing then
that scientists believe each step in this
doomsday chain
gets progressively less and less likely to
ever happen.
|
| 00:52:41 | Dr. Gilbert: When large solar storms occur,
there's no reason to believe that this directly
impacts
what's going on in the core of the earth.
|
| 00:52:50 | It's not really gonna bethe catalyst
to causing major volcanoesor earthquakes.
|
| 00:52:56 | It's not an impossibility
that there could besome sort of effect,
but it's just incredibly unlikely.
|
| 00:53:04 | And the reason it's unlikely probably is
because
the strengths of the effects are so little.
|
| 00:53:10 | These are just doomsday scenarios
because the interior of our earth
is still a big mystery to us.
|
| 00:53:16 | NarrorBU: T the earth doesn't have to be
destroyed from within.
|
| 00:53:21 | It could be shattered
by a disastrous traffic accident in space
in 2012,
a catastrophic run-in with another planet,
..
|
| 00:53:34 | A mysterious doomsday missile known only
"
planet "x" is a hypothetical planetary body
that's traveling
through the outer regions of the solar system.
|
| 00:53:47 | And basically, the theory is,
as this planet "x" passes through the inner
solar system,
its gravitational influence will have all
sorts of effects,
not only on the earth, but also on the sun.
|
| 00:53:58 | It could actually trigger
some planet-killer solar flares from the
sun.
|
| 00:54:04 | Almost every possible disaster
would happen simultaneously,in that case.
|
| 00:54:08 | Volcanoes, earthquakes,tsunamis --
everything you could imagine would break
loose.
|
| 00:54:14 | At that point, goes the theory,
planet "x" might actually be able to knock
the earth
into a different rotation, and it would be
a global cataclysm.
|
| 00:54:23 | Narrator: When it comes to planet "x,"
there's only one thing
standing between earth and total annihilation.
|
| 00:54:31 | Planet "x," in a word, doesn't really exist.
|
| 00:54:34 | didexist,
it would have to be so big that we would
have seen it already.
|
| 00:54:39 | Dr. Gilbert: Even if there was a planetary
object
that came speeding through the inner solar
system,
it would have to be really, really close
to the earth --
in fact, nearly impacting the earth --
for there to be any real gravitational effects.
|
| 00:54:54 | But it wouldn't cause immediate devastation
or destruction
or earthquakes or any of that.
|
| 00:55:00 | Narrator: So, it's most likelythat life after
2012
won't be much differentfrom life before.
|
| 00:55:08 | In fact,when december 21, 2012 arrives,
even the maya themselves
expect more of a new beginningthan an end.
|
| 00:55:19 | In the highlands of guatemala,
there are millions of maya
who are still followingcalendar traditions.
|
| 00:55:27 | To them, the calendar is a perpetual cycle.
|
| 00:55:31 | There's no beginning or end. it's a circle.
|
| 00:55:35 | These ends of great cycles were times of
change to them,
but they have no worries
that everything's coming to an end,
and there are no real specific predictions
about what will happen to us.
|
| 00:55:52 | Narrator: But while the maya
may not expect the end of the world on december
21, 2012,
that doesn't mean you've dodged the doomsday
bullet.
|
| 00:56:02 | R t biesggapocalyptic threat still lies close
to home.
|
| 00:56:10 | It probably won't rip the earth apart from
within,
but the sun's activity
will almost certainly start building
toward maximum intensity sometime around
the end of 2012.
|
| 00:56:23 | If anything is gonna happen, it will be caused
by the sun.
|
| 00:56:27 | Charged particles from the sun
interacting with the magnetosphere
can induce ground currents,
and it affects things that are sensitive
to such currents,
such as power grid lines and things that
conduct electricity.
|
| 00:56:40 | One blast, big enough,
could knock out the power gridfor months
or years,
and that's just an incalculable threat.
|
| 00:56:46 | Honestly, I think we're gonna take a sucker
punch to the gut.
|
| 00:56:48 | Es
and you know what?
|
| 00:56:52 | If it doesn't me in 2012, it's gonna come
soon.
|
| 00:56:56 | There's no question about this.
|
| 00:56:57 | Dr. O'Neill: We have been hit before,
and we're gonna get hit again.
|
| 00:57:00 | That's a fact. we're gonna get hit.
|
| 00:57:02 | And, quite simply, we're not prepared for
it.
|
| 00:57:06 | The sun, as an entity,
has absolutely no regard for the earth
and certainly not for the human beings
that are inhabiting it.
|
| 00:57:13 | Narrator: But that doesn't mean humanity
has to just sit around
and wait for the sun to char and blister
the world we've made.
|
| 00:57:21 | Dr. Young: There's a lot we can do to prepare
for something like this.
|
| 00:57:26 | Just like unplugging your television set
when lightning's gonna possibly strike your
house,
you can do the same sort of thing with power
grids.
|
| 00:57:32 | You basically turn them off or turn them
down.
|
| 00:57:36 | Narrator: So, n' yt itquour job and blow
your life savings
on one last wild party just yet.
|
| 00:57:44 | Scientists seem to agree --
you have the same odds of seeing the world
end tomorrow
or on any other day
AS ON DECEMBER 21st, 2012.
|
| 00:57:56 | we live in a very
chaotic universe.
|
| 00:58:00 | Anything can happen at any given time.
|
| 00:58:02 | Ultimately, there's nothing special about
december 21, 2012.
|
| 00:58:07 | We experience the end of a calendar every
year.
|
| 00:58:10 | The world doesn't come to end on december
31st every year,
and there's really no reason to suspect
that the world's gonna cometo an end on december
21, 2012.
|
| 00:58:24 | Narrator:BUT THE EXPERTS COULD BE WRONG.
|
| 00:58:28 | And if the doomsday prophetsare proven right,
the living may envy the deadin 2013.
|
| 00:58:36 | And as the worldcomes to an end,
|
