- [Narrator] Shoplifting,
carjacking, bank robbery. These are the small-minded
matters of casual thieves with no imagination. It takes a truly daring
thief to go bigger. Today, I'll be sharing with
you the people who went above and beyond, pushing the
boundaries to the absolute maximum of just what exactly can be pilfered. Grab your loot bag and put on a balaclava, as I explore some of the
biggest things ever stolen. (gentle music) - Amazing! - [Narrator] Number 10, Easy Air Miles. May 25th, 2003. an entire Boeing 727 was stolen right off the runway of Quatro de Fevereiro
Airport in Luanda, Angola. It did not have clearance to fly, it did not communicate
with air traffic control, and it has never been seen again. It just veered precariously
onto the runway and took off, without any lights on. The FBI and the CIA
searched the globe for years and couldn't find so much
as an in-flight peanut. Two men were seen boarding
the plane before it took off American pilot and flight
engineer, Ben C. Padilla, and a mechanic from the
Congo named, John M. Mutantu. Neither of the men were
even certified to fly a 727, but both had been helping
to carry out renovations on the plane in the months prior. Padilla's sister has
stated that she believes he was somehow coerced
into stealing the plane and is now held against
his will somewhere. Others have speculated, based
on the fact that Padilla was previously found guilty of fraud, that the theft was a money-making scheme. The mystery to this day remains unsolved. Number nine, A Bare Bones Operation. In a bizarre court case known as, United States versus One
Tyrannosaurus Bataar Skeleton. The matter in question
was a stolen dinosaur. The ordeal began when
Florida man, Eric Prokopi, brought the fossilized skeleton
of a Tyrannosaurus Bataar a relative of the rex we know and love from Mongolia to the
UK, and then to the US. In customs, he claimed that
the bones came from UK soil. On reaching the US, Prokopi
auctioned off the dino for over $1 dollars. However, when the Mongolian
government became aware of the dinosaur's true origin, they prevented the sale being completed. According to Mongolian law, fossils are culturally significant and their removal without
official approval is illegal. As a result, Prokopi was
arrested on counts of conspiracy to smuggle illegal goods,
possession of stolen property, and giving false statements. He went to jail for three months, and the skeleton went back to Mongolia. For something that's been
dead for millions of years, the literal Tyrannosaurus
Bataar had quite the trip. Number eight, Crime of the Cen-Tree. Stealing a tree is never an easy task. But if this perplexing case
from 2012 is anything to go by, the older the tree, the
harder it is to steal. Indeed, it took a lot of planning
and patience for poachers to steal one particular red cedar tree from Vancouver Island, just off the South-Western Canadian coast. At 800 years old, the tree
was a full nine feet wide at the base, and the high
quality of its wood made it an unfortunate target for poachers. On a routine stroll, park
rangers had been baffled to find the tree cut
80% of the way through. It seemed someone had attempted
to steal the giant tree but had given up. Rangers brought in professionals and had the tree safely
felled to avoid it collapsing and crushing unlucky hikers, leaving it to decompose
and feed the forest. But this was all part
of the thieves' plan. With the tree felled safely, they returned and stole the whole thing. Speculation arose as to
how the thieves were able to source the heavy-duty
machinery necessary to transport the colossal tree
away, but however they did, it was never seen again. Number seven, Enlightened By Thieves. For Buddhists at a temple in
Tacoma, Washington, in 2015, enlightenment came as usual by letting go of material objects. Only, this particular
type of enlightenment was much more literal than
usual, as it involved the loss of a 3000-pound, 12-foot-tall
copper monastery bell. Police were baffled as to how
thieves managed the theft due to the bell's enormous weight and size. The temple abbot speculated that the people who stole
it wanted to make money with no consideration for
the significance of it and how important it is in
the presence of Buddhism. Indeed, bells are commonly
used to signify the beginning of meditation, making them
highly sacred to Buddhist monks. The thieves likely melted the
bell down to sell the copper, or may have turned to the
black market for a buyer. I doubt a pawn shop would
accept a suspicious, 3000-pound religious bell, but sometimes, a bargain's a bargain. After all, you never know what is gonna come through that door. Number six, Brick by Brick Blasphemy. Christianity also experienced
pious plundering in 2008, when thieves made off
with an entire church. The holy building had stood
in the village of Komarovo since 1809 and was hauled
off brick by brick. Initially, the theft went unnoticed, as the Church wasn't
being used at the time, and was located in a
remote area of the town. Church officials had been
considering resuming use of the building, but
that plan was dismantled before their very eyes. Of course, they could still gather in the open-air
foundations of the building every Sunday morning. In rural Russia, churches
are targeted more often than you'd think, as religious icons and building materials can
be sold off for a profit. I like to think it all
comes down to foul play between rival churches, but
you'll have to ask the Pope. Number five, A History Of Crime. In the 1980s, somewhere
in Tel Aviv, Israel, Major Arye Yitzhaki was restoring a World War II Mustang fighter plane for the Israeli Air Force. The plane was parked up
at a reserve airfield, waiting for transport to
Israel's Air Force Museum. After fixing it up, Yitzhaki
developed plans of his own for the vehicle. On an otherwise normal
day, he flew the antique all the way to Sweden and sold
it illegally for $331,000. Six years later, the Israeli government finally tracked it down and retrieved it. So at least this plane story
has an uplifting ending. High-flier, Yitzhaki, on the other hand, had a much more grounded fate the terrestrial confines of a jail cell. Number four, A Bridge Too Far. Some people build bridges. Others burn them. In rare cases, some steal them. This was the case in 2012, when
two men with little respect for history were arrested for stealing 100-year-old bridge in China! The bridge was an easy target as far as stealing entire bridges goes because it was surrounded
by construction sites and received very little foot traffic. Eventually, one of the
bridge's few regulars attempted to stroll over the bridge and found that it no longer existed. A police investigation ensued, and after an eyewitness described seeing the culprits lingering near the bridge with a truck one night, the police were able to track them down. The thieves confessed that
they'd used two cranes and two trucks to pick up and move the 16 huge stone
pieces that made up the bridge. I just wonder if the bridge was sat pretty in a billionaire's garden
before the thieves were caught. Number three, You Wouldn't Steal A Ship. Some people just have a
taste for the biggest loot. And I don't just mean kids
stealing their parents' credit cards to pay for
upgrades on Fortnite. In 2017, Somali pirates with tastes on the large side managed to hijack a fully-loaded oil tanker. The ship, called, The Aris 13, had decided to take a time
and fuel-saving shortcut through what's known as the Socotra Gap. They soon regretted the
shortcut after their ship got hijacked by local pirates. In a scenario reminiscent
of a certain Tom Hanks film, ransom discussions soon
began, regarding both the crew and the ship's contents. Once the pirates realized the
tanker was under the employ of prominent Somalian businessmen, who Somali pirates tend
to avoid tussling with, they released the crew and
later the ship without ransom. Despite being one of the
biggest thefts of all time, the pay out was nothing but
deep water for the pirates. Number two, The USA's Underwater Heist. In 1968, for reasons still
unknown, Soviet submarine K-129 sank 16,000 feet to the
bottom of the Pacific Ocean, 1,600 miles northwest of Hawaii. At the time, Russian
technology was unable to locate or retrieve the warhead-laden wreckage, but their Cold War rivals
in the USA soon caught wind of the submarine's fate. The Americans weren't going
to miss this opportunity to get their hands on a
Soviet submarine laden with potentially-useful documentation, not to mention intact nuclear weaponry. To keep things hush, hush,
they assigned the CIA rather than the navy to the case. In 1974, with an
inflation-adjusted equivalent of $4 billion spent, the CIA had built the
Hughes Glomar Explorer. This essentially involved
grafting a giant skill crane onto a ship, to drag the
submarine up to the surface. The procedure wasn't perfect, and parts of the submarine
broke off during recovery and sank back down. But the chunk the CIA caught
on their expensive fishing trip did indeed contain nuclear torpedoes, as well as some of the sailor's bodies. Inquiries about the operation, which was initially
presented to the public as nothing more than a
manganese mining operation, had a surprising cultural outcome too. Covering the tracks of the
operation led to the development of the phrase neither confirm nor deny. This is now known as the Glomar response, after the name of the recovery vessel. Before I reveal the
biggest thing ever stolen, there are some honorable mentions that I'd be remiss not to acknowledge. While not enormous in the bigger picture, a special hat belonging to
Greg da Silva of Cape Town, South Africa was the largest of its kind. Made using a thousand eggs, Greg owned the largest egg
hat the world had ever seen. Tragically, Greg's eggs were
stolen during a 2011 trip to Germany, while he was
hospitalized with heat stroke. The hard-boiled summer
heat left him scrambled, and the theft was no yolk. You can only imagine what the
thief must have looked like, making a quick getaway,
presumably in a convertible. If that wasn't wacky
enough for you, in 2017, a 12-foot-tall inflatable gorilla with stylish shades
designed to lure customers into a car dealership was
deflated and stolen in Texas. While undoubtedly humorous,
the gorilla cost $10,000 and the thieves were never caught. This wasn't the first theft of its kind in the world of American
dealerships, with an even bigger, 35-foot-tall inflatable
gorilla being stolen in 2006. Harambe frowns down upon us all. Finally, there's The Great
Canadian Maple Syrup Heist. This robbery that took
place over several months at a facility in
Saint-Louis-de-Blandford, Quebec, between 2011 and 2012. In total, 3,000 tons of maple syrup, or $18.7 million Canadian
dollars' worth, was stolen. Adjusted for inflation,
this suspected insider job was the most valuable heist
in the Canadian history. Number one, A Mountain Of Crime. As far as Earthly objects go, things don't get much
bigger than mountains. So, for thieves who take the phrase, go big or go home a little too seriously, stealing a mountain is
the logical conclusion. Locals from the Humta village
in Eastern India are slowly but surely bringing the
aforementioned phrase to life, by stealing the peak of the
nearby mountain Humta Pahad. Locals chip away the rock to
sell to property developers and use the earnings
to feed their families. The village doesn't have much
else in terms of industry, so people work eleven
hours a day hewing the peak from a point into more of a stub. While this is in fact illegal,
local authorities tend to turn a blind eye, as the mountain is one of
the few sources of work in the area. A local businessman has even laid a claim of ownership upon the
mountain in an attempt to remove the criminal
edge from the operation, but the authenticity of the
claim is questionable at best. Unless something changes, the locals will eventually
have stolen an entire mountain. Impressive. Were you shocked by any
of these sizeable crimes? What's the biggest thing
you've ever had stolen? And more importantly, does
this egg hat make me look fat? Let me know in the comments section below. Thanks for watching! (gentle music)
