00:00This sleek, state-of-the-art submarine named RUN was sent to explore the depths of Antarctica.
00:07But as soon as it discovered something, it mysteriously disappeared.
00:11So what happened?
00:15It all started when scientists wanted to explore one of the most remote and mysterious places
00:19on Earth, the Dotson Ice Shelf in West Antarctica.
00:24This ice shelf, silent giant, stretches 30 miles wide.
00:28That's almost the length of New York City.
00:30It stands between two icy promontories, the Martin and Bear peninsulas.
00:35And it hides an entire world of geological mysteries.
00:40If you think that Antarctica is nothing but a desert of super-thick snow and ice, you're
00:45wrong.
00:46There are entire landscapes hidden deep down there.
00:49The underside of the Dotson Ice Shelf is a rugged, dynamic terrain shaped by the slow,
00:54relentless forces of nature.
00:57There are towering ice formations, deep troughs, and bizarre structures stretching for hundreds
01:02of feet.
01:04Scientists are super curious about it, but as you can imagine, this landscape isn't
01:08easy to explore at all.
01:11To find out more, we have to scan the area with satellites or try drilling through the
01:15snow, trying to collect the big picture, piece by piece.
01:20But these methods only gave us vague hints.
01:23The real breakthrough happened when scientists came up with the idea to let the submarines
01:27explore it.
01:28Autonomous submersibles could swoop deep into the icy waters beneath the Dotson Ice Shelf
01:34and tell us what's up down there.
01:37These robotic explorers have fantastic advanced sonar systems.
01:41It's that thing that bats or dolphins do.
01:44They can use sound to see the world.
01:46Basically, they send out sound waves underwater, and when those waves hit something, like the
01:51ice shelf above or the seafloor below, they bounce back to the system.
01:57Animals feel how long it took for the sound waves to return and how they changed.
02:02And this helped them understand what's located where.
02:05For example, clicks that dolphins send out tell them where the fish are.
02:10We copied this crazy evolutionary trick and adapted it to our underwater exploration.
02:16Only our version is much cooler, with a higher level of precision.
02:20So we created detailed maps of the environment.
02:24The RAN submarine was one of those robotic explorers.
02:27It was named after the Norse deity of the sea.
02:30RAN had been meticulously programmed to navigate a treacherous landscape of Antarctica.
02:36But even with all this training, its journey led to an unexpected and eerie end.
02:42In 2019, RAN was sent to explore the depths beneath the Dotson Ice Shelf.
02:47It was a hero, the first one to go on a mission like this.
02:51The team said it was like seeing the other side of the moon.
02:57For 27 straight days, it worked tirelessly.
03:01It traveled over 620 miles beneath the thick ice.
03:05That's like a journey from Paris to Berlin.
03:08RAN went further and deeper than anyone could have imagined.
03:11At one point, it reached over 10 miles into the glacier's belly.
03:15And what it discovered down there was astonishing.
03:19Scientists thought there would be some smooth, uniform ice surfaces.
03:22But RAN revealed an underside marked by huge cracks, ridges.
03:27There were formations that looked like sand dunes, frozen in time.
03:32And finally, it found some mysterious swirling and teardrop-shaped patterns.
03:37They all looked more like art than geology.
03:40This actually tells the story of ice shelves and the ocean around it.
03:45Warm water sneaks in under the ice and melts it from below.
03:49Sometimes it smooths the ice out, but other times it carves out these weird, uneven shapes
03:53that look like patterns and drawings.
03:56And some of these shapes are huge, over 1,300 feet long.
04:00That's about three and a half football fields.
04:04The reason why they look like swirling doodles is because the Earth spins.
04:08It makes the water turn in special ways, bending the shapes and drawing these spirals.
04:14It's called the Coriolis effect.
04:16Imagine you were on a merry-go-round and tried to throw something like a ball.
04:20It would go in a curve, not a straight line.
04:23Same thing happens with the water on Earth.
04:26Later, scientists found similar patterns in other Antarctic ice shelves, though they weren't
04:31as epic as the ones under Dotson.
04:34But RAN also discovered something horrifying.
04:38Turns out that these warm waters, aside from being great artists, are also a huge danger.
04:44The Dotson ice shelf isn't just hanging out serenely on the sea.
04:48It's part of a very delicate system, and acts as a protective barrier that holds back huge
04:54glaciers in West Antarctica.
04:57The ice shelf is floating on the ocean, but it's still connected to the land.
05:02As warm water sneaks underneath it and the ice melts, the Dotson can't hold on to the
05:06land as tightly anymore.
05:09The protective barrier starts to weaken, and this lets the glaciers behind it move faster
05:13into the ocean.
05:15When those glaciers flow into the sea, they add more water, which could cause sea levels
05:19to rise, eventually changing our coastlines.
05:24RAN stumbled upon huge pockets where the ice was melting at alarming rates, all due to
05:29powerful underwater currents.
05:31It was like seeing a ticking clock on the glacier.
05:35The stakes were high, but luckily the submarine was ready.
05:38This time, it managed to return.
05:41And then it worked for five more years, helping scientists with tons of useful data.
05:47The missions were daunting.
05:49There could be periods where RAN slipped into the pitch black cavity beneath the glaciers,
05:53spending 24 hours without communication.
05:56But it was mapping every peak and every valley.
05:59It gained experience from over 40 missions below ice.
06:04Then in early 2024, RAN went on a mission to the Thwaites Glacier.
06:09The mission was bold from the start.
06:11This place is also ominously referred to as the Doomsday Glacier.
06:16It's called that because it's slowly melting and has the potential to raise sea levels
06:20worldwide if it collapses, causing catastrophes everywhere.
06:25That's why RAN was dispatched to explore its underbelly, a place that had never been mapped
06:30so intricately before.
06:32The idea was to uncover the glacier's secrets, study how rapidly it was melting, and why.
06:40This was RAN's second time exploring Thwaites.
06:43During the previous visit, it became the first sub to ever map the glacier's underside.
06:49RAN was exploring the depths from 650 feet to 1,650 feet.
06:54It sent a lot of data about how the Doomsday Glacier was slowly melting due to warm ocean
06:59currents.
07:01While venturing into these icy depths, something went wrong.
07:06Out of nowhere, RAN vanished.
07:09Without warning, without a trace.
07:13One moment it was sending back crucial data, and the next it had slipped into the abyss.
07:18No distress signals, no final transmission, and it didn't return to the point it was supposed
07:24to.
07:26People sent extensive searches, helicopters soared overhead, drones buzzed through the
07:31frozen skies, but no sign of the submersible emerged from the glacier's grasp.
07:37After a while, RAN's batteries would certainly run away.
07:40So at this point, it had definitely been swallowed by the abyss beneath 1,500 feet of ice.
07:47That was a huge and sad loss for the scientific team.
07:50The scientists at the University of Gothenburg are now looking to replace RAN and continue
07:55their important research under Thwaites.
07:58To this day, scientists have no idea what happened to it.
08:02Some say it may have been trapped in the ice.
08:05Others believe it was pulled away by an unseen current.
08:08It also might have collided with something unexpected.
08:12Whatever the truth is, its disappearance has left scientists stunned, and it looks like
08:16the ice shelf will hold on to its secrets a little longer.
08:20At least we gained a treasure trove of knowledge from RAN's journey.
08:24Scientists keep exploring Antarctica, looking for history that hides under the snow.
08:29For example, they discovered that around 90 million years ago, a lush temperate rainforest
08:33thrived near the South Pole.
08:36They revealed an ancient world far warmer than they ever imagined.
08:40Deep in Antarctica, they unearthed fossilized roots, pollen, and spores preserved in the
08:46soil.
08:47All this shows that there was a swampy rainforest that flourished despite months of polar darkness.
08:54All these discoveries changed our understanding of Earth's climate, both in the past and
08:59the future.
09:00That's it for today, so hey, if you pacified your curiosity, then give the video a like
09:06and share it with your friends!
09:08Or if you want more, just click on these videos and stay on the Bright Side!
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