Rogue Planets On a Collision Course | Doomsday: 10 Ways the World Will End (S1, E3) | Full Episode

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[screaming] male narrator: Like a biblical apocalypse, cities are incinerating in fire and brimstone. [screaming] The ground beneath our feet is being torn apart. [dark music] [screaming] The terrifying cause? A rogue planet heading toward Earth. ♪ - The cities, the continents, the entire Earth are all being destroyed at the same time. - Gravity would tear apart the Earth's crust. It would expose its flesh, and that's basically lava. [explosions] ♪ - It's a dangerous universe. There's a lot of ways the human race can go extinct. narrator: Will you be ready when doomsday strikes? Can any of us survive? ♪ [woman shouting] [screaming] ♪ 4.5 billion years ago, Earth was struck by another planet in a collision that created the Moon. But what if another planet struck us today? ♪ [man screaming] ♪ - You got ring particles showering down over the entire planet. [screaming] That's a disaster in and of itself, let alone everything else that's coming. [fierce winds blowing] - It would be like a rain storm. But now, imagine that each raindrop is a meteor. - [gasping] [screams] - You're torn apart by winds, buried in rubble. All hell is breaking loose. ♪ narrator: The weather report said it would be calm. But from Maine to California, flags flap in the breeze. In Florida, palm trees shake. ♪ And in the midtown areas of Boston and other cities, tall buildings turn streets into wind tunnels. - You wake up that morning, it's gonna be a little windier than normal. And all of a sudden, you're gonna notice that wind is blowing in a direction that it doesn't normally blow. [howling winds] ♪ narrator: As day turns to night, it's high tide in Boston Harbor. But this tide is higher and stronger than anything in the city's history. The waters swell up and surge through the streets. ♪ People scramble to get to higher ground. - Something very, very bad is going on. ♪ narrator: Normally, the moon's gravity controls Earth's tides. But tonight, there's another object in the sky, a huge planet, with much more powerful gravity. ♪ Three miles west of Boston, at the observatory in Cambridge, astronomers get a clearer view of the new planet. [unintelligible chatter] ♪ It's the size of Neptune: 30,000 miles in diameter, with rings of ice and rock. ♪ - Come look at this. Look, look. It has not changed a bit. It's the same trajectory. I'm telling you, this is huge. This is huge. ♪ - This is amazing. - It's about 17 times the mass of Earth, and about 4 times the size. - It's definitely the Goliath to our David. ♪ narrator: The naval base at the United States Territory of Guam. Almost 8,000 miles east of Boston in the northwestern Pacific Ocean. No one on this side of the Earth can see the giant planet in the sky... ♪ Including the crew of the USS "West Virginia," a nuclear submarine on routine patrol. But operating just below the surface, the crew follows the news of the planet's approach. ♪ According to astronomers, the planet once orbited a distant star, just as the Earth and the other planets in our solar system go around the sun. ♪ But millions of years ago, this planet went rogue. ♪ - Solar systems are not static, and so, over time, a planet can get kicked out due to the gravitational tug-of-war from other planets. - It's ejected out there into interstellar space. ♪ - Wandering the cosmos without any home star anymore, and that's what makes it "rogue." ♪ There are maybe twice as many rogue planets wandering between the stars of the Milky Way than there are actual stars in the Milky Way itself. ♪ - There are hundreds of billions of rogue planets. - And so, it's possible that these planets without stars may wander their way through the solar system. ♪ - We know from the history of our own solar system that such events do happen. narrator: But another collision between a rogue planet and Earth like the one over four billion years ago can have only one possible outcome for humanity. - Serious, serious disaster. ♪ - That rogue planet is coming, approaching us. But its gravity arrives first. ♪ narrator: All over our world, winds and tides are getting stronger. ♪ But as the Earth rotates, the people of North and South America can no longer see the rogue planet moving closer at 72,000 miles an hour. It's now less than 300,000 miles away. And on the other side of the planet, millions of people are witnessing a phenomenon they've never seen. - A rogue planet entering the solar system would be very beautiful for people on Earth to look at as it gets closer and closer. ♪ narrator: Tourists in Shanghai gather in the Oriental Pearl Tower's observation deck, called the Space Module, to get a better view. 1,148 feet above the windy streets of the city, they take pictures of the rogue planet, and the moon that's passing directly between it and the Earth. - You think you're going to be witnessing an astronomical event, like a-- something we would think of more like a comet. You know, it's something you look at. Or, uh, or a meteor shower. narrator: Then, incredibly, the moon starts to tremble in the night sky. ♪ The rogue planet's gravity reaches down through the lunar surface. The strain becomes too great. ♪ - The body of the moon itself is being twisted, and pulled, and distorted, and cracked, and broken. ♪ narrator: An Apollo lunar module, which had been expected to stay on the Moon forever, lifts off. ♪ - You're hanging out, taking selfies with the rogue planet and the full Moon, and suddenly, everyone starts to scream. You turn around, and the moon is being ripped to shreds. ♪ - It gets crushed along its diameter, and becomes pieces. ♪ - The gravity becomes so strong that as it's getting sucked toward it, it heats up, stretches out, crumbles, and explodes. [explosions] ♪ - It's unlike anything we've ever experienced. ♪ narrator: What was once the Moon disappears into the atmosphere of the rogue planet. - And, uh, it is no longer there. ♪ - The moment the moon goes away... [popping] Done. Your--your brain just goes bye-bye. Anything else beyond that is like-- if you have a moment to put a coherent thought together after that second, I applaud you. narrator: As the images go viral, billions wonder, "Is this really what's going to happen to the Earth?" Is there any way to survive what's coming next? [explosion] [screaming] [dramatic music] narrator: 4.5 billion years ago, a rogue planet struck Earth. What if the same thing happened today? ♪ Could you survive? ♪ - There's an object the size of Neptune coming in from the outer solar system, barreling toward the Earth. ♪ narrator: Coming in at 72,000 miles an hour, the rogue planet is now 250,000 miles away. ♪ Its intense gravitational pull has just ripped the moon apart... ♪ Terrifying billions of people. - This horrible thing has eaten the moon. ♪ Humanity will panic, and that's just the first step, because it's coming closer. That's going to happen to us. ♪ narrator: People from China to South America run for safety, to basements, bunkers, and old bomb shelters... ♪ Stockpiling as much food and water as possible. ♪ [static crackling] Then, in an instant, TV sets all over the world go black... - What the hell? - What the... - You're watching the news about this approaching planet, and you're losing the satellites. You're losing the communications for them. ♪ narrator: The rogue planet is now so close, its gravitational pull has thrown communications satellites into disarray. ♪ - The satellites that are orbiting the Earth would effectively be sprayed in all directions. ♪ Many of them would be ejected into interplanetary space. ♪ - There are still some local stations out there, and for a little while, at least, those are still gonna be in play. Some of the Internet communications would still work, but a lot of blackouts are gonna start happening. ♪ narrator: GPS satellites have also been hurled out of orbit. [electronic beeping] ♪ And so, off the coast of Guam, the USS "West Virginia" suddenly finds itself without GPS, the sub's primary tool for navigation on and near the surface. The commander radios to Naval Base Guam for advice. He is ordered to dive. America's entire submarine fleet is being ordered below the surface for protection. - 500-foot dive. 10 degrees. - Aye-aye, Captain. ♪ - Once they go underwater, they have maps, they have sonar. They have the ability to navigate, but communication is cut off. ♪ This submarine, full of America's finest, would probably be the last bastion of rationality that's available. These men are trained, incessantly, to live, breathe, and survive in this pressurized metal capsule when all hell is breaking loose. ♪ narrator: Having disrupted satellites, the rogue planet starts to make the Earth shake. - Gravitational forces are pulling on the rock of the Earth and are causing tectonic activity. [rattling] - The earthquakes start small... ♪ And they start subtly. narrator: In San Francisco, windows rattle and tall buildings sway. Tremors roll through Los Angeles. [rumbling] Quakes also rumble through the country... [car alarms blaring] From Denver to Boston, and across the Atlantic, to the streets of Rome. [screaming] - There would be regions where stresses, faults which have been building up, and which are released in normal earthquakes, would start to release with greater frequency. And so, perhaps the first signs, other than the fact that there's a planet looming in the sky, the first signs on Earth would probably be reflected in increasing frequency of relatively ordinary earthquakes. [rumbling] Earthquakes that are just about to go off would get that tiny bit of extra impetus that could cause the plates to slip. [rumbling] - And so, seismographs would start to light up as the geologists or geophysicists who are monitoring that sort of thing, their ears would perk up. And then, the seismic activity's intensifying. ♪ [indistinct chatter] [laughter] ♪ - [laughing] [rumbling] ♪ [indistinct chatter] ♪ ♪ narrator: As the Earth shakes, another threat arises. The rogue planet's rings, made of billions of pieces of ice and rock, are about to strike the Earth. ♪ In their direct path: hundreds of millions of people across the continents of Europe and Asia. ♪ Shanghai. Pulled by the rogue planet's gravity, the Huangpu River has surged over its banks. ♪ The flood waters tremble... ♪ As earthquakes shake the city. [shouting] Emergency crews struggle to help. [shouting in native language] narrator: Then, above the city... [all shouting] In a sudden, silent explosion, the black of night turns to day. ♪ The rogue planet's rings have hit the atmosphere. ♪ Air friction makes the particles explode into flame. It's what happens when any asteroid or meteor enters our atmosphere. But now, there are hundreds of millions of them. ♪ - You'd see a tiny dot in the sky, and it grows in brightness in less than a second to the point that it's overwhelmingly blinding. ♪ narrator: The sky appears to catch on fire, not just in Shanghai, but in every city in the path of the rings, from Asia to Europe. ♪ - These are very large chunks of rock coming into the atmosphere at an incredibly fast speed, punching holes into anything that they land on. The sound will be deafening. The sights will be apocalyptic. [screaming] narrator: Millions try to flee the rain of fire and terror from the sky. ♪ The mass murder of planet Earth has begun. - It has not changed a bit. It's the same trajectory. narrator: What if Earth was about to collide with a giant rogue planet with 17 times our mass? Its gravity has sent satellites out of orbit. Millions of TVs don't work... ♪ And there's no more GPS. [static] The rogue planet's gravity is also pulling on the world's winds and oceans, and triggering earthquake faults in cities like Los Angeles. The quakes have started out small. Fatalities are few. But as the quakes keep coming, panic spreads. But Americans have no idea that, on the other side of the Earth... ♪ Things are far worse. ♪ The continents of Europe and Asia are in the direct path of the rogue planet's rings. - Everything from London off to Tokyo. This ring system can have some things the size of school busses. You've got ring particles showering down over the side of the planet facing the incoming rogue world. That's a disaster in and of itself. That's gonna make the mother of all meteor showers. ♪ - It would be like a literal rainstorm. You would have that many things coming in. [whooshing] But now imagine that each raindrop is a meteor. [booming] narrator: As the larger particles hit the atmosphere, they too burn and explode. ♪ - It would be like thousands of times the Russian meteor, the Chelyabinsk episode that we all saw on our TVs. - Chelyabinsk was a asteroid impact, very simply. Something entered the atmosphere at a very high rate of speed and blew up over Chelyabinsk, Russia. [explosions] - This beautiful fireball in the sky had a shockwave. The shockwave exploded out glass windows. [explosion] [glass shattering] [woman screaming] Hurting 1,500 people. [glass shattering] - Think of that... times a million. - [speaking native language] narrator: Shanghai's population of over 14 million is under siege. - Any sort of rescue operation in a flooding city turns into catastrophe. This is not, "Hey, let's get some people to safety," because suddenly, fireballs are raining down on humanity. ♪ [all screaming] ♪ [huge explosion] - A huge fireball coming into a city effectively explodes. [explosion] [screaming] ♪ narrator: In Western Europe, cities are hit just as hard as Shanghai. - You would get the firestorm. You would get the hurricane-force winds. Buildings don't survive. [rumbling] - Big Ben and the Parliament, everything disappears-- it's leveled instantly. [explosions] [fierce winds blowing] - Let's say you're in Rome watching all of this stuff coming on in. ♪ You're gonna feel the heat from this event on your skin. ♪ - If you're within even 100 miles, you'll get burns. ♪ Then the shockwave hits, a pressure wave that would shatter windows and knock over cars. [explosions] And that's only one fragment. - We're talking about hundreds, thousands of rocky bodies, smashing up, entering the atmosphere, exploding. [explosions] Imagine just thousands of rocks and fire just raining down on St. Peter's. Just raining down fire on it. [fierce winds blowing] [big explosion] [fire crackling] narrator: The impact zone of the fireballs extends over thousands of miles from Britain to Japan, igniting millions of acres of parks and forests. ♪ - The Chelyabinsk encounter was energetic enough that people could feel the heat as it reentered the atmosphere. And so, if you multiply that ten, or a hundred, or a thousand, or a million-fold... - You will have fire basically everywhere. ♪ - The results would be absolutely catastrophic. ♪ narrator: And all the while, as the rogue planet gets closer, the winds get stronger and the Earth keeps shaking. ♪ - So, as we're going through the ring plane, all this is taking place in the background of a steadily mounting earthquake. [rumbling] - So it's not the same as what you see in Hollywood. It's actually much more devastating. ♪ narrator: The horror seems endless, and millions of people are dead. But it takes just five minutes for Europe and Asia to pass through the deadly rings of the rogue planet. ♪ Oceans away... ♪ In cities like Boston, Los Angeles, and Denver, the trembling Earth, high winds, and rising waters are only the first signs of what's to come. - And ironically, people forget that Earth is actually quite big itself, and so if this is all happening on the other side of the world, you would have no idea that it was going on. The only thing that you would experience... ♪ You would hear it. [explosions] Everyone walking around suddenly hears the string of firestorm explosions that appear to just come from nowhere and everywhere. And that's not the end. That's just the beginning. ♪ [lightning crashing] narrator: What if a rogue planet the size of Neptune were on a collision course with Earth? ♪ Its rings of rock and ice have already destroyed cities across Europe and Asia, killing millions. [explosions] But billions are still alive outside that zone of fiery destruction, including people in the United States. ♪ - On the other side of the planet, while all this is happening from London to Tokyo, over here in Boston, or San Francisco, you're not seeing the planet in the sky. You're not gonna see the meteors from the ring particles coming in, 'cause those are happening on the other side of the planet. ♪ [explosions] narrator: But nothing can save Boston from what's about to happen. ♪ The rogue planet's gravity pulls on the Earth's atmosphere, and what started hours earlier as unusually strong winds turns into something far more deadly. - The winds will mount until they become supersonic. narrator: Boston's Bunker Hill Bridge was built to withstand winds up to 400 miles an hour, nearly twice that of the strongest recorded hurricane. But now, assaulted by 770-mile-an-hour winds, something never seen or felt before, steel cables snap. At the same time, a gigantic earthquake shatters the bridge's base. [fierce winds blowing] ♪ - We will try to survive. We'll run into buildings. We'll try and get underground. But there won't be any buildings, and there won't be any underground very shortly. ♪ [indistinct chatter] [winds blowing] - A hurricane-force wind is one thing. You can escape from a hurricane by going into your basement as long as your house holds, but when the winds become supersonic in force, then the buildings tend to be blown over. ♪ - If you get into a building, that building won't exist shortly. And then, if you manage to get out of the building, the winds will blow you off your feet. These are supersonic. Any kind of building falling down in an earthquake will get blown aside. - The supersonic winds are going to be blowing debris around. The fragments of trees and pieces of buildings and billboards are flying around. So you're battered to bits by flying debris. ♪ - There's no escaping this. ♪ narrator: The city of Boston is nothing but swirling rubble, its population of more than 650,000 wiped out. It's the same everywhere, from Massachusetts, to California, to Hawaii. [winds blowing] But while Earth's surface is being destroyed by winds and quakes... ♪ The sailors of the USS "West Virginia," hundreds of feet under the Pacific Ocean, is unaware of the carnage above. [indistinct chatter] - Every place on Earth is a bad place to be if we encounter a rogue planet. But in a pressurized submarine, deep below the surface of the water, there would be a chance that you would retain your existence for quite a while. ♪ narrator: Modern nuclear submarines have the capability of staying underwater not just for years, but for decades. They can generate fresh water and breathable air from sea water. The only real limit is food. ♪ The USS "West Virginia" has enough food to keep its crew of almost 12 dozen well-fed for 90 days. ♪ But these people-- and their planet-- don't have 90 days. ♪ On the surface, structures across the world are being destroyed by forces greater than anything humanity has ever seen. [creaking] [rumbling] ♪ - Pyramids would probably last for quite a while. They've been around for a long time. They'll probably last until we get very close to the end. ♪ - I would expect the pyramids to last longer than skyscrapers. Objects that are hollow or which are extremely tall are less stable. So the pyramids are quite stable, but strong earthquakes could bring them down. ♪ The pyramids would be shaken down. ♪ - Imagine the Giza pyramids, destroyed, flattened out. ♪ - And it just gets worse. ♪ narrator: The rogue planet is now less than 30,000 miles away, so close that its immense gravitational force is placing an impossible pressure on the very structure of our planet. ♪ - The amazing amount of gravity pulls on the rock, and that causes an astonishing amount of friction and heat, and that, in turn, creates volcanoes. ♪ - It's hard to comprehend, but in addition to all these earthquakes that are happening, you're gonna start to see every volcano on the Earth start to erupt. [low booming] narrator: There are more than 1,500 volcanoes on Earth. Now, from Washington State's Mt. St. Helens... [rumbling] To Mt. Shasta in California... [rumbling] To Pelée in Martinique and Mt. Fuji in Japan. Volcanoes don't just erupt. They burst apart. ♪ - Deep groundwater is suddenly heated up and flashed to steam, and that explodes. Like what we call a pyroclastic volcanic eruption. You've literally got elements turning into gasses and trying to escape while they're inside the rock. narrator: As our planet's landscape ruptures, even mountains are destroyed. - Mount Rushmore is near the super volcano near Yellowstone Park, so, because of the stresses involved, it could be a place that explodes during the process. ♪ - Imagine massive rippling earthquakes... [big explosion] Some of the most devastating explosions on Earth. [explosions] ♪ - It's not something that you can stand back and watch from a distance, because even in the distance, there's terrible catastrophes unfolding. So the atmosphere, the water, the cities, the land, the continents, the entire Earth, are all being destroyed at the same time. ♪ - You're either torn apart by winds, buried in rubble, or superheated to the point where you immediately crisp into a carbon biscuit. ♪ narrator: Then, suddenly, the winds seem to calm. ♪ But Earth isn't getting a reprieve. The rogue planet's gravitational force is sucking our atmosphere into space. ♪ - Even though the winds are blowing supersonic, you're not feeling them, 'cause there's almost no air left. - With less than 30 minutes left before impact, we're so close that the atmosphere begins to get ripped away from the Earth. ♪ narrator: Volcanoes still explode, but in silence. There's no air to carry any noise. All fires on Earth have died out. There's no oxygen to feed a flame. And without air to breathe, nearly all life as we know it, from humans, to animals, to plants, has perished. - By the time that the atmosphere gets sucked away, everyone's already dead. They've been incinerated, they've been crushed, they've been completely obliterated by material raining from the sky. narrator: All surface life has ended. And the Earth itself can't survive much longer. ♪ - Gravity would tear apart the Earth's crust. It would expose its flesh, and that's basically lava. ♪ narrator: 2,000-degree Fahrenheit magma from inside the Earth erupts onto the surface as the rogue planet's gravity literally stretches our planet to the breaking point. - This is the solid structure of the crust of the Earth itself breaking apart. ♪ - You would have destruction of cities within the context of continental crust floating on seas of lava. ♪ - Imagine the lava lakes that are in the centers of some volcanoes in Africa and Hawaii, and you see these little floating islands of rock with all the flowing magma around them. It's kind of like that on a global scale. ♪ narrator: But although every human on Earth's surface is dead, deep under the Pacific, more than 140 people on the USS "West Virginia" are still alive. They're out of radio communication with the surface. But unknown to them, there's no one left to communicate with. And the ocean that surrounds and protects them is about to become the rogue planet's next victim. ♪ ♪ narrator: What if the Earth were on a collision course with a rogue planet? ♪ It happened 4.5 billion years ago, and it's happening again right now. ♪ The gravitational pull from the rogue planet has already whipped up supersonic winds, mega quakes, and volcanic blasts... [rumbling] And stolen Earth's atmosphere, killing nearly all of mankind. ♪ As the surface of the Earth cracks into pieces, there is one group of survivors. A thousand feet below the Pacific, the crew of the USS "West Virginia" are in a pressurized nuclear-powered submarine with its own oxygen supply. They are unaware of the apocalypse unfolding above them. Suddenly, they are thrown back... [alarm blaring] As the rogue planet's gravity now claims its next victims: Earth's oceans. - You're seeing the oceans and any other body of water wanting to flow and lift off toward the rogue planet. ♪ The oceans and everything in them leaving planet Earth and floating away, merging into space. ♪ That submarine crew become astronauts in this big zero-G fishbowl floating off toward the planet. ♪ [fire crackling] narrator: Now there are only 1,200 miles between the two planets. After almost 4.6 billion years, Earth is in its final moments. But there will be no actual impact with the larger planet. The end is something far more destructive. - It's not something coming in and smacking. The gravity becomes so strong that the Earth gets sucked toward it, and as its getting sucked toward it, it heats up, stretches out, crumbles. ♪ - Gravity is pulling harder on Earth the closer it gets, and the rogue planet, there's so much gravity that it actually pulls on one side of the planet more than the other. - The Earth itself is being crushed, and cracked, and pulled, and stretched. ♪ narrator: Finally, the pull of the rogue planet's gravity is so strong, Earth can no longer hold its shape. - The Earth gets ripped apart. [rumbling] - Pieces are fanning off and things are, like, drifting away. ♪ - There will be recognizable little bits of skyscrapers, palm trees here and there. ♪ - And so the Earth would degenerate into a meteor storm that's falling and burning up in the atmosphere of this other world. ♪ - Everything that goes into the giant planet gets crushed out of existence. narrator: The remains of Earth, now nothing more than cosmic debris, barely make a ripple in the rogue planet's atmosphere. ♪ The light from the destruction takes several minutes to travel to Mars, where a robot rover takes a few pre-programmed photos of Earth. [mechanical whirring] These are the last pictures that will ever be taken of our planet. [camera shutter clicking] - What you would see from Mars is you would see that rogue planet as a very small sphere. You would see the Earth as a very bright star. And you would see them draw closer and closer until they sort of merged, and then you would see a pinpoint of light, similar to the light of the sun. [mechanical whirring] ♪ ♪ narrator: But amazingly, some people are still alive. ♪ Part of Earth's oceans still float in space. [indistinct shouting] Which is why the sailors of the USS "West Virginia" have just survived the end of the world. ♪ - Captain, what are we doing? ♪ - As acceleration ebbed, you would enter a period of free fall, and effectively, weightlessness. - Captain? narrator: But how much longer will these brave souls survive? [alarm blaring] As the Earth comes apart, and its molten core is exposed to space, the intense heat--more than 10,000 degrees Fahrenheit-- begins to vaporize the sub's protective shield of water. ♪ [indistinct shouting] ♪ The dying Earth is about to take the last people with it. But even in the face of a world-shattering collision with a rogue planet, is there a last chance for humanity to escape? ♪ ♪ narrator: What if the Earth collided with a rogue planet the size of Neptune? The gas giant's gravity has already ripped Earth apart, destroying all forms of life. ♪ But the destruction isn't over. ♪ Incredibly, the crew of the USS "West Virginia," pulled into space along with Earth's oceans, is still alive. - No signal! narrator: But as the Earth's molten core is exposed to space, the enormous heat boils away the ocean water around the submarine. ♪ [alarm blaring] - If you're these last few surviving humans, you're going to be radiated by the incredible heat. ♪ - It would be similar to being close to the surface of the sun. - It's not a good place to be. They're doomed, but they've lasted longer than anyone else on Earth. ♪ - The submarine then starts to get more and more heat. The metal would rapidly conduct the heat and bake the contents of the submarine, and then the submarine itself would vaporize. ♪ narrator: Almost 4 billion years after life on Earth began, the last people are gone. ♪ But is it possible something from our world could still survive? - There may be some pieces of bacteria living in those little bits of rock before being completely vaporized, and some bacteria on Earth are pretty hearty and can live in some pretty extreme environments. It's maybe conceivable that some little bits of bacteria might survive this. ♪ narrator: One day after the destruction of Earth, the rogue planet continues through space as though nothing happened. ♪ But scattered throughout the solar system, there is still evidence that humans once existed. ♪ - So, we've sent probes across the solar system. We've sent probes out of the solar system. There's rovers on Mars. They would continue to function for a while, until their solar panels stopped working, until their batteries run down. There's a smattering of satellites that were orbiting the Earth, and that's it. That's our legacy. ♪ narrator: But there might be one other possibility. - In an event like this, when the Earth itself is ripped to shreds, the only way for humans to survive an event like this is to become a multi-planet species. ♪ - The old Orion Project is probably our best bet to survive. narrator: Project Orion was a US Air Force program from the 1950s and early '60s to create spaceships big enough to start colonies on distant worlds. Powering these enormous ships into deep space would take a controlled series of over 1,000 small-scale atomic explosions. ♪ - Recent Freedom of Information Act requests have revealed that the Air Force made it quite a bit farther than I think people understand in developing the Orion program. The idea went so far as to undergo practical tests at the Nevada test side. They used conventional explosives to take a model and prove the system would work, and it did. [explosions] narrator: While Project Orion was cancelled in 1965, its legacy provides the only hope that humanity could survive the deadly rogue planet. ♪ - It, uh... if we had fair warning, say a couple of years before the impact of a rogue planet that looked like it was gonna be likely, I could definitely see a scenario where you have a very big push, humanity's last gasp, to create a very large spacecraft. ♪ The "Mayflower" of the stars. Take enough people that could actually start a colony somewhere else. ♪ The realistic version is, I think you'd create three of these ships. You could probably take up a crew of maybe 60 people total? ♪ - I think you would need to go to Mars, and try to do the best that you could. It would be very difficult to have a colony that was really able to be permanently viable. Reduced gravity would be just one of a whole plethora of problems. ♪ - One of the great unknowns is how, actually, gestating a human child would work if you were outside of what we call 1G, or normal gravity environment on Earth. - Over time, you would see probably atrophying. You would see reduced lifespans. I think it's important to stress that the idea that we can escape the Earth and make a new start elsewhere is a very unrealistic hope. ♪ narrator: After the destruction of our home planet... ♪ A foothold on Mars could be the beginning of a whole new chapter in humanity's history. ♪ But there's a far darker scenario. That a hastily-constructed space colony, with no hope of backup from Earth, wouldn't be a new beginning, but humanity's final graveyard. ♪ [winds howling]

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Channel: HISTORY

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Keywords: history, history channel, history shows, history channel shows, doomsday: 10 ways the world will end, history doomsday: 10 ways the world will end, doomsday: 10 ways the world will end show, doomsday: 10 ways the world will end full episodes, doomsday: 10 ways the world will end clips, full episodes, history channel full episodes, apocalypse, armageddon, devastation, disaster, space, catastrophe, catastrophic, the universe, unprecedented disaster, humanity, end times, end of the world

Id: y0ZWGLDqEWU

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Length: 50min 8sec (3008 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 27 2022