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The Proof Is Out There - Season 6 - Episode 04: The Battle of Los Angeles, Chinese Dragon Discovery, and Celebrity UFO
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00:00Tonight on The Proof is Out There.
00:03It's a classic UFO mystery of World War II.
00:06What did the army shoot at in the Battle of Los Angeles?
00:09This photo alone can't possibly capture the sheer panic that was felt by everybody involved.
00:18Could the myths and legends be true?
00:20Are these the bones of an ancient dragon?
00:23The body of this animal looks almost reptilian in nature.
00:28Did a famous pop singer have his own close encounter with a UFO?
00:33This thing kind of floats and hovers in the sky and then very quickly just kind of shoots away.
00:39And is this nun's body actually proof of a miracle?
00:44Incorruptibility is when a person's corpse simply doesn't decompose.
00:54Around the globe are videos.
00:59Photos.
01:00And sounds that defy explanation.
01:08We don't know where they come from, who made them, or how they operate.
01:12What are they?
01:13Some sort of bizarre mutation.
01:15What's exciting is nobody really knows.
01:17Extraordinary claims need extraordinary proof.
01:22I'm Tony Harris, and as a journalist for more than 30 years, I've followed the facts where they take me.
01:28Now I'm bringing that spirit of investigation to the world's strangest sounds and images.
01:33It's coming towards us.
01:34We'll analyze each one with top experts.
01:37It's a credible case.
01:39It's a credible video.
01:40And pass a verdict on what it is.
01:43This video is clearly fake.
01:45The Proof starts now.
01:55Good evening and welcome to The Proof is Out There.
01:58In 1942, just after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, California was the site of a deadly incident now known
02:07as the Battle of Los Angeles.
02:08Some thought the Japanese headstruck again.
02:11Some thought it was a UFO invasion.
02:14And luckily for us, someone snapped a photo.
02:18February 25, 1942, Los Angeles, California.
02:24It's only a couple of months since the Pearl Harbor attack brought the United States into World War II, and
02:30fears of a Japanese invasion are running high.
02:33Around 2 a.m., military radar detects an unidentified object approaching the city.
02:40A blackout is ordered while air raid sirens blare, and the anti-aircraft artillery starts firing.
02:46As the chaos unfolds, one Los Angeles Times reporter captures this.
02:54Searchlights converge on what looks like a white craft.
02:57It appears to have a pointed top, tapered sides, and a domed bottom.
03:01The anti-aircraft fire peppers the surrounding sky.
03:06Whatever this thing is, they can't shoot it down.
03:09The photo makes headline news, and the incident becomes known as the Battle of Los Angeles.
03:15All over town, eyewitnesses insist something was in the sky that night.
03:20Some people, of course, particularly in more modern times, have thought, well, wait a minute.
03:25Isn't this a classic UFO sighting?
03:29At the time, people thought, my goodness, we're under attack.
03:32The Japanese are here again.
03:33In fact, just before the Battle of Los Angeles, a Japanese submarine had surfaced off the coast near Santa Barbara
03:42and had actually bombarded an oil field there, aiming for some of the storage facilities.
03:49So you can imagine, the feeling was no one's safe.
03:52And then it hit, and people started saying, there's something in the sky.
03:57And they're firing up.
03:59It's just, like, smoke, the sound, the lights.
04:04I mean, they're in the middle of a war zone here.
04:06And so this goes on for some hours.
04:10But it's a tragic story, because five people lose their lives in this.
04:15Two heart attacks and three fatalities in road traffic accidents.
04:22It's believed that, you know, the lights being out and so forth caused all sorts of chaos on the streets.
04:30More than 1,400 rounds of anti-aircraft artillery had been pumped into the sky.
04:35But once all the smoke cleared, there was no wreckage from Japanese planes or any indication of Japanese aircraft.
04:43Now we know Japan didn't fight the war with aircraft alone.
04:47In fact, they would later launch a new weapon against the American mainland.
04:51Balloon bombs.
04:53Japan did launch balloons designed to drop bombs over to the continental United States, most notably reaching Oregon,
05:01which makes people wonder, was what happened this night actually an early balloon or an early attempt by the Japanese
05:07to launch something toward the American mainland?
05:11In January 2018, Hawaiians received this emergency alert warning.
05:17Ballistic missile threat inbound.
05:20Seek immediate shelter.
05:21This is not a drill.
05:22Panic spread.
05:23But it all turned out to be a false alarm.
05:27Similarly, some believe a false alarm triggered the Battle of Los Angeles.
05:31But then how do you explain that photo?
05:34Let's ask the experts.
05:40Considering the U.S. was at war, was this a Japanese air raid?
05:44I don't think that's what we're actually looking at here, because when we zoom in on this image, it doesn't
05:50look like a plane.
05:51It just looks like a whitish blob.
05:53And if it was a plane, you'd be able to see that it was a plane from these searchlights.
05:58But what about an early balloon bomb?
06:01Again, a balloon would be something that would be very well illuminated by searchlights.
06:05You will see the clear circular outline, and we just simply don't see that.
06:09And of course, if it was a balloon, it probably would have been shot down, because balloons don't move very
06:13fast, and they're very vulnerable to anti-aircraft fire.
06:17The Japanese later denied involvement in the incident.
06:20Even the U.S. military dismissed the so-called battle as a false alarm.
06:25Could that be all this is?
06:27We have to remember the radar was very much in its early days back then, and it was very slow
06:32scanning and very prone to error.
06:34So what might have shown up on the radar back then may just have been something like reflections of waves
06:39on the water or even birds.
06:42Of course, faulty radar doesn't explain the photo, though something else might.
06:47I think what we're actually looking at here is just simply a region of smoke from the anti-aircraft fire
06:53that's been illuminated by multiple searchlights at the same time.
06:57And that single bright area that all the searchlights concentrated on creates a shape that looks a little bit like
07:04a flying saucer, and so a legend was born.
07:09But that still leaves numerous eyewitness accounts of strange objects in the sky, objects that could not be struck down
07:17by anti-aircraft artillery.
07:19World War II fighter pilots in Europe would notice something similar two years later.
07:25They reported being confronted by mysterious glowing orbs that they called Foo Fighters.
07:31My best guess here is that either nothing was there and it's a false alarm, or that maybe it was
07:38a high-tech craft of some kind that never could be hit by our shells.
07:42And to this day, we can't discount the possibility that it might also have been an advanced craft that was
07:48eluding the guns.
07:54Our verdict? This is a split decision.
07:57We think the object in the photo is probably smoke from the anti-aircraft fire.
08:02But based on the eyewitness accounts, we believe something unexplained was also in the skies that night.
08:10Whether it's Smaug hoarding treasure in The Hobbit or the Targaryens riding them to victory in the Game of Thrones,
08:18dragons are among the most iconic creatures in legend and literature.
08:23But that's all just fiction, right?
08:27October 10th, 2017, Zhangjiyakou City, China.
08:32Villagers of this rural community gather around, smartphones in hand,
08:36after several residents claim to have made a bizarre discovery.
08:41We see what appears to be a 65-foot-long skeleton.
08:45It has a serpentine body, a head with antlers, and a set of prominent claws.
08:51The villagers are in awe, with some even straddling its head while posing for photos.
08:56This video went viral, and ultimately it got over 10 million views.
09:01But apparently many of the local villagers swore up and down that these were actually the remains of a real
09:07-life dragon.
09:09Many say this skeleton matches the anatomy of dragons from Chinese mythology.
09:14They were often depicted with horns or antlers.
09:18In primeval China, emperors were said to have descended from the bloodline of dragons,
09:25and these were known as the lung.
09:27It's a very powerful symbol in Chinese culture.
09:31One can wonder, where does this mythology stem from?
09:34Are we actually looking at the remains of a real-life dragon?
09:39Some argue that instead of looking to China's cultural history,
09:43we should look to its fossil record.
09:45In 2024, an international team discovered the fossilized remains of a new type of dinosaur,
09:54Dinocephalosaurus orientalis, nicknamed the Chinese dragon.
09:58This particular species lived about 240 million years ago.
10:03But what was really remarkable was that it had a very long neck like we're seeing here in the video.
10:08So are these the remains of some type of prehistoric creature?
10:40Let's ask the experts.
10:46This is really like no skeleton that I have ever seen before.
10:52Dragons are often depicted as having wings.
10:55For animals that have wings, like birds and bats, they're essentially like modified hands.
11:01And we're not seeing any indication of that here.
11:05In fact, we're seeing forearms, and we're not seeing anything on its back.
11:11However, the dragons of Chinese myth were thought to be wingless.
11:15They'd fly by undulating through the sky.
11:18Impossible?
11:19Well, check out these airborne leaps made by paradise tree snakes,
11:23recently documented by researchers at Virginia Tech.
11:26But our experts still say no way.
11:30These bones seem really thick, and there's a lot of them.
11:35Even if this were a real dragon, it doesn't make sense for it to have such a dense number of
11:42rib bones.
11:43Its skeleton seems way too heavy.
11:46It doesn't seem physiologically possible for this animal to be able to fly.
11:52Okay, so maybe not a dragon as we know them, but could it be an undocumented, cold-blooded creature of
12:00some sort?
12:01The body of this animal looks almost reptilian in nature.
12:06You see a very elongated body like a snake, and it seems to have some sort of antlers.
12:10There's one snake out there which does have two seeming antlers on them.
12:15The snake is known as the venomous horned viper, Sarastes, named after a horned serpent of Greek legend.
12:23But those antlers, they're more cartilage-based, and they're fleshy tissue that would decay and dissolve with the rest of
12:30the body.
12:31If it's not a new species of reptile, is it possible this mysterious beast is actually very old?
12:39A dinosaur like that recently discovered Chinese dragon.
12:43Skeletons of dinosaurs are not actually bone anymore because the minerals from the surrounding rock have replaced the bone.
12:52If this is a real animal, this is one that would have had to have died very recently.
12:57If this was truly a recent kill, I would expect to see some sort of insect or decomposer in the
13:05area.
13:05My hypothesis is this is some sort of hoax.
13:09They either used fake bones or they took bones from other existing animals and put them all together to create
13:16the shape and illusion of a dragon.
13:23Our verdict?
13:25We agree with our experts that this is most definitely a hoax.
13:29There are just too many things that don't add up.
13:32And recent online posts from China indicate that this may indeed be a movie prop.
13:38So dragon shall remain the stuff of myths and legends for now.
13:45Every parent knows the anxiety of tending to a sick child, but it's even worse when the doctors can't even
13:52figure out what's going on.
13:53Well, in this next story, hundreds of children experience the same strange affliction all at once, setting the stage for
14:01one massive medical mystery.
14:04July 13th, 1980, Kirkby in Ashfield, England.
14:09Photographer Neil Lancashire is covering a children's band competition at the Hall & Wells Showground, where more than 300 kids
14:17are gathered with their instruments.
14:19But in the midst of this idyllic scene, disaster strikes, and Neil's camera captures this.
14:27All over the showground, children begin to collapse.
14:31Complete chaos takes over as people lie unconscious in the grass, and parents carry their children in their arms.
14:37As you can see in Neil's photos, young children appear to be doubled over in pain, as if sick to
14:44their stomachs, or possibly gasping for air.
14:48You don't understand what's really happening.
14:50You're in the moment and thinking, well, this is not right.
14:54Some of the children had come down without the parents, and there was only a big sister to look after
14:59them.
15:00They called in ambulances then, they took the children to the hospital, and the ambulances couldn't cope with the amount
15:08of children that fainted.
15:10All these kids just were falling over, really horrible, and it was really frightening.
15:15Thankfully, no one died.
15:17But what caused this in the first place?
15:20The health department theory?
15:22Mass hysteria.
15:23Mass hysteria has affected a lot of young people.
15:27There was a case in 1962 called the Tanganyika laughing incident, which occurred in Tanzania and East Africa.
15:35And in this case, up to 1,000 girls over a period of weeks couldn't stop laughing.
15:44They were also getting rashes and sores and sore throats and fainting and nausea, so people were very concerned about
15:52what it could have been.
15:54In 2014, 34 years after the Hollandwell incident, British politician Dennis Skinner claimed the incident was not properly investigated because
16:04the victims were working-class kids.
16:06He said if the children had fallen ill at a royal garden party, authorities would have handled it more meticulously.
16:13Let's see if our experts can discover anything those authorities might have missed.
16:22Could we really be looking at a case of mass hysteria?
16:26Mass hysteria, or mass psychogenic illness, is a very real phenomenon in which symptoms with no known cause spread throughout
16:34a community.
16:35Some believe that mass hysteria actually reflects the social fears and anxiety of a given time period.
16:40There have been many mass hysteria events throughout history.
16:43A famous one occurred in 1518 in Strasbourg, France, when a woman began dancing and didn't stop for a couple
16:50of weeks.
16:51More and more people began to join her until eventually there were 400 people dancing.
16:57Some of them died from overexerting themselves, and no one could figure out what had caused the event.
17:03Most recently, there was a mysterious condition called Havana Syndrome, which occurred in Cuba.
17:07U.S. diplomats there were suffering from dizziness and migraines, and they thought they might have been attacked by some
17:14kind of weapon.
17:16Officials came to the conclusion that this was some kind of mass hysteria, where people became sick because they thought
17:21they were exposed to some kind of threat.
17:24According to two U.S. intelligence agencies, it's possible that a novel weapon wielded by some kind of foreign adversary
17:30could be causing some cases of Havana Syndrome.
17:33Others, however, disagree.
17:35The reasons why I don't think this is a case of mass hysteria is that we see infants that are
17:41falling sick.
17:42Infants who are less than a year old are not going to be taken over by psychological manifestations of symptoms.
17:50In addition, there were individuals who felt sick when they got home.
17:54The symptoms continued even after people had left the scene, when they were not around other people who were sick.
18:03If mass hysteria can't explain what's happening, maybe chemistry can.
18:08According to reports, there was a powerful chemical smell coming from the recently cleaned bathrooms.
18:15People smelled a combination of ammonia and chlorine.
18:18Because they were smelling that combination, that gave people the idea that that was the major cause of this accident.
18:25The beauty of chemistry is that you could take two everyday normal household items, mix them together, and come out
18:33with something totally different.
18:35And that very well could be what happened here.
18:37When they were trying to clean the bathrooms and they mixed the bleach with the ammonia, they produced chlorine gas,
18:43which can be pretty terrifying.
18:45It was even used in World War I as a weapon.
18:50Now that sounds like a compelling theory, but that doesn't make this a closed case.
18:55After all, you can see in these photos, the kids were outside, in the open air.
19:01Those two gases would have dissipated long before they had gotten out onto the field where those kids were playing
19:06their marching bands.
19:07And there's just really no evidence to really determine what actually went on.
19:11Everybody has their own leading hypotheses, but there's really no strong evidence to point to any one particular thing.
19:22Our verdict? Unexplained mass illness.
19:27We're going with Dr. Anderson on this one.
19:29The Hall and Well incident remains one of the greatest medical mysteries of the 20th century.
19:37Skeptics often argue that UFO witnesses are lying about their experiences for fame and fortune,
19:43while believers argue that there's too much ridicule involved for that to be the case.
19:49But what does it mean when somebody who's already famous shares his UFO sighting?
19:54It means we need to investigate.
19:57It's spring 2024 in New York City.
20:00Grammy-nominated musician Jay Balvin is hanging out on the soccer field with some friends.
20:06Before long, they notice something strange in the sky and manage to record this.
20:12The camera zooms in on an object hanging in the blue sky.
20:16It appears triangle-shaped with rounded corners and a light or opening on its underside.
20:26The object pivots slowly, from side to side, as if scanning the area.
20:31Then, as Jay turns the camera away from his awestruck friend, the UFO zips away.
20:38Jay posts the video on Instagram, and you can guess what happens next.
20:43Jay Balvin is enormously popular.
20:45He has more than 50 million followers on his social accounts.
20:49So, when he posted this video, it spread like wildfire.
20:55Jay's sighting brings to mind a type of UFO that's famous in its own right.
20:59UFOlogists will point to kind of consistent shapes that UFOs have,
21:03and triangular is one of them, with sightings from around the world.
21:07From 1983 to 1984, even into 1985, residents of the Hudson River Valley area
21:14reported giant, triangular, or boomerang-shaped craft.
21:18This is important because this is not just grandma seeing some lights in the backyard.
21:23These are trained observers, highly trained individuals like law enforcement,
21:28even military personnel, all reporting being eyewitnesses
21:31to some of these, the most incredible UFO experiences and events in recent history.
21:39It's worth noting that while triangle UFOs typically have sharp edges,
21:44this one is a little different.
21:45Take a look at this.
21:47See how it has these rounded corners?
21:50And look here in the middle.
21:52Now, if you ask me, that looks like an opening going straight through the craft.
21:57That's different.
21:58But what will our experts make of this celebrated sighting?
22:07We always consider the most obvious explanation first.
22:10Could this be some sort of novelty balloon?
22:13Balloons can be any shape that you want them to be,
22:16but the balloon is going to be impacted by wind and wind changes.
22:20It would not be hovering in one spot.
22:22It would be up and down, and you don't see anything like that in this video.
22:26We know that paparazzi have started using drones to get shots of celebrities.
22:32Could they be targeting J Balvin?
22:34I would think that this drone would be a lot closer to the individual
22:37so that they could get good facial recognition and see who's part of his entourage.
22:43Also, I have tried zooming into this video,
22:45and I don't see any indication that this particular object is a drone.
22:50There's none of the lights.
22:51There's no sound.
22:52The typical things that you would see with a drone are not in this video.
22:56So if it's not any flying craft we know of,
23:00is it a famed triangle UFO?
23:03Not exactly.
23:04I don't think that it's a UFO.
23:06It's not the description that we typically get for triangular-shaped UFOs at all.
23:10It looks like it's relatively about the same distance from the camera
23:13as the water tower is, which is not that far.
23:17So it appears to be relatively small.
23:22Triangular UFOs are known for being massive,
23:25often described as the size of multiple football fields.
23:28So if this one is small, it doesn't fit.
23:31And that's not the only suspicious clue.
23:34In this video clip, there's a water tower, there's a tree, and then there's an object.
23:39When I zoom my camera in, I'm seeing the fact that the position of the actual object
23:46shifts and moves with the camera movement.
23:49See how in this stabilized version of the video,
23:52the object doesn't actually hold steady relative to its surroundings?
23:57Instead, it moves with a video frame.
24:00That's a telltale sign it was digitally inserted into the scene.
24:04None of the things matched up in terms of positions of where the object was.
24:10The moving away from that to take a picture of somebody,
24:13all that has the indications of it being a hoax.
24:20Our verdict?
24:22Hoax.
24:23If you're still not convinced,
24:25take a look at this photo from J Balvin's Coachella performance
24:29just four days after he posted the video to social media.
24:32Look familiar?
24:33That's the same UFO.
24:35Clever promo, Jay.
24:37But I think we can agree your talent is for music,
24:40not video fakery.
24:44Have you ever seen The Blob?
24:46It's a 1958 horror movie where a community is terrorized
24:50by an alien creature made of goo.
24:53This fictional blob consumes people,
24:55growing bigger and hungrier with each victim.
24:57Well, after seeing this next video,
25:00you might think something similar happened in Nebraska.
25:04June 20th, 2024.
25:07Scotts Bluff County, Nebraska.
25:09Chad Casey is out and about in the countryside
25:12when suddenly something on the ground starts moving towards him.
25:16It's like nothing he's seen before.
25:18So he takes out his phone and captures this.
25:25A brownish, blobby mass studded with white spheres crawls along the ground.
25:31Chad films it moving across the countryside
25:34as it spreads out in what seemed to be layers eating everything in its path.
25:38After it's posted, the video spawns a curious theory online.
25:44People drew comparisons between the video and the movie The Blob,
25:47which was apparently inspired by a real-life incident.
25:50On September 26th, 1950, two Philadelphia police officers saw an object falling from the sky.
25:57They called for backup and then pursued the object to where it had fallen.
26:01During a search of the area, they discovered an ooze that seemed to move.
26:06According to some reports, it even shimmied up a telephone pole.
26:09When one of the officers touched the ooze, it left behind a clear, sticky residue.
26:14After about an hour and a half, the whole mass simply evaporated.
26:18Because they had called for backup, there were actually four witnesses
26:21to whatever had gone down in that field.
26:26Think that's the only time a weird jelly fell from the sky and puzzled the world?
26:30Think again.
26:31In 1969, following a meteor shower,
26:34scientists in Australia were actually able to gather
26:36200 pounds of a jelly-like substance off the ground,
26:40which they then analyzed and discovered that it included amino acids,
26:44which are the building blocks of life.
26:46So is this some sort of natural substance from space?
26:50Or could it be possible it was created in a lab?
26:53After all, we've seen synthetic blobs like this magnetic putty,
26:58which appears to have a life of its own.
27:01Scientists have also created a really creepy-looking, gooey substance.
27:05It's actually infused with metal.
27:08And so when you put it near magnets,
27:10it moves in a way that is really unsettling.
27:15In 2024 in Southern California,
27:18beachgoers spotted clusters of strange, oval-shaped blobs along the shore.
27:23These were identified as Valella valella,
27:26a small ocean predator related to jellyfish.
27:29But what about our terrestrial blob?
27:31It's nowhere near any ocean.
27:34Can our experts identify it?
27:41Could this blob be a man-made creation?
27:44It's got dirt in it. It's got ice in it.
27:46You can see that it's picking up material that's on the outside.
27:49This appears to be like a mud type of feature.
27:53It's more moving like a solid.
27:54It's so more like a mud flow.
27:55So it's more natural than it is a man-made type of feature.
27:59If it didn't come from a lab, where did it come from?
28:03I believe this has the appearance of hail.
28:06We're looking at some water.
28:08So this tells me we're looking at the beginnings of a flash flood.
28:12Flash floods might conjure up images of rushing water,
28:15but they can also create what's known as a debris flow.
28:25More than likely, we just saw a storm move across
28:31with flash flooding that is likely occurring in the background.
28:35We also probably just experienced a hailstorm
28:38that dropped quite a bit of hail across the region.
28:44Good theory, but how about some data?
28:47Well, we confirmed that a hail-forming storm front
28:51had passed through the region.
28:53Although this blob may seem quite scary,
28:55the most monstrous thing we saw was a severe hailstorm
28:58that impacted the Scotts Bluff area.
29:05Our verdict? Hail and ground debris flow.
29:09So this was no living goo monster,
29:12but there's a chance we'll soon see
29:14a different kind of blob come to life.
29:16Scientists in Japan have recently engineered
29:18a pink blob out of collagen gel
29:21to mimic living skin tissue for humanoid robots.
29:27On a previous episode,
29:29we investigated the case of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster,
29:33whose body was remarkably,
29:35some say miraculously, preserved after her death.
29:38Well, we have some developments to that story.
29:41Is it more evidence of divine intervention?
29:44You can make the last judgment.
29:48April 2023, Gower, Missouri.
29:51Four years after the death of Sister Wilhelmina Lancaster,
29:55the other sisters of her order
29:57decide to transfer her remains to the monastery chapel.
30:01But when they open her casket,
30:03they're stunned to find this.
30:07It's Sister Wilhelmina's body,
30:09but where one might have expected
30:11decayed and formless remains after four years,
30:14instead, her body is largely intact.
30:18Sister Martina Lee, who witnessed the exhumation,
30:21reveals that it's not just Sister Wilhelmina's body
30:24that seemed unscathed by the passage of time.
30:27Everything that she was wearing
30:29at the time of her burial,
30:31her veil and forehead piece,
30:32her entire habit was preserved intact.
30:35It's kind of like, you know,
30:36this is God's little sign that
30:38this person was so faithful to him
30:40that she didn't necessarily need
30:42to undergo the curse of corruption.
30:46Incorruptibility is when a person's corpse
30:49simply doesn't decompose.
30:51It's said to happen with people of the cloth.
30:54At the time, the story caught fire
30:57with media around the world.
30:58People were so excited that 25,000 people
31:02flocked to rural Missouri
31:03in the first month after her body was exhumed
31:06to pay their respects and see for themselves.
31:09When we first told this story,
31:11our verdict was that this was a potential miracle.
31:14Now, a new development.
31:16Fast forward to 2024,
31:19when a new medical exam of the remains
31:21has come up with some startling revelations.
31:24In the time since Sister Wilhelmina was exhumed,
31:26she has been examined by medical experts.
31:28Who, according to the church,
31:30couldn't find any reason
31:31for why her body would be so well-preserved.
31:34Now, a fellow Benedictine nun
31:35said that this is a miracle
31:36and she is actually gathering testimony
31:39from eyewitnesses to bolster the case.
31:42And that is just one of the steps
31:44towards canonization.
31:49In 2024, experts studying relics in Spain
31:53exhumed the body of St. Teresa of Avila,
31:56who died in 1582.
31:57They declared that her remains
32:00had not decomposed at all.
32:02A year later, the church presented the new evidence.
32:05Saint's corpse was put on display
32:07and some claimed that its well-preserved condition
32:10was proof of her incorruption.
32:12But can we say the same for Sister Wilhelmina?
32:20When we first covered this story,
32:22no medical exam of the body had taken place.
32:25But now, we've got forensic data.
32:28So what did that new exam reveal?
32:31The examining doctor was a doctor of pathology
32:34and was assisted by two other medical doctors
32:36and also by the local coroner.
32:39And they said that her body is truly atypical
32:42for what they might expect
32:43for the passage of approximately four years.
32:46To top it off,
32:47the team literally dug deep for more answers,
32:50conducting a soil analysis around the grave.
32:53They even addressed people's ideas about the soil.
32:58There are chemicals that will help preserve skin
33:01and help preserve tissue.
33:03But they came to the conclusion
33:04that there was nothing in the soil
33:06that would have preserved her body
33:08in such pristine condition.
33:10Additionally,
33:11the medical examiners interviewed eyewitnesses
33:14at the burial
33:15and did not learn of any other factors
33:17that could explain
33:19the body's remarkable condition.
33:21What's really remarkable
33:23about Sister Wilhelmina
33:24is that when they pulled out her coffin,
33:27there was a large crack down the middle.
33:30They found a large amount of moss
33:32suggesting really damp and wet environment.
33:35And you're going to see more bacteria,
33:38scavengers,
33:39all of these organisms
33:40that decompose the body.
33:42So the fact that her body was preserved
33:44despite the environment
33:45is unexplainable.
33:47I honestly don't have a medical explanation
33:49for what's going on here.
33:52So can we call this
33:54a real case of incorruptibility?
33:57Perhaps this is truly a case of incorruption
34:00in the great tradition of the Catholic Church.
34:03But throughout Christian history,
34:04we have 10,000 saints
34:06who have been canonized by the Catholic Church.
34:08A very small fraction of those
34:10have been declared incorruptible.
34:18Our verdict, unexplained phenomenon.
34:21As of 2025,
34:23the Catholic Church has not yet weighed in
34:25with a formal declaration
34:26on Sister Wilhelmina's perceived incorruption.
34:30But now that there's an American pope,
34:32maybe that could change.
34:35For centuries, medieval medicine
34:38has been dismissed as unsound.
34:40The time period itself
34:42is snidely referred to as the Dark Ages,
34:45suggesting that it was unenlightened
34:47by science or reason.
34:49So how could a 1,100-year-old medical book
34:53from this period
34:54hold the secret to curing modern illnesses?
34:592016, London, England.
35:02Scientists around the world are intrigued
35:04when the British Library announces
35:06it is releasing online
35:08the complete pages of Bald's leech book,
35:11a medical text that is believed
35:13to have been written
35:14in the mid-10th century.
35:16When the day comes,
35:18eager researchers log on to find this.
35:21It's a blend of Old English and Latin,
35:24and the remedies within it
35:25are totally wild,
35:27completely unorthodox.
35:29Among these cures
35:30is one for swollen eyes,
35:32in which it's recommended
35:33that the person whose eyes are swollen
35:35gets a live crab,
35:36cuts off the crab's eyes,
35:38and then holds those eyes
35:39to their neck.
35:40There's even a baldness cure,
35:42in which it's advised
35:43to take burned bees,
35:45willow leaves, and oil,
35:47make a salve,
35:48and spread it all over your scalp.
35:51Bald's leech book
35:52is actually one of the oldest
35:54surviving collections
35:55of medical knowledge in existence.
35:58Bald was the owner of the book,
36:00Leech refers to physicians.
36:02In this book,
36:03there's bald's eye salve
36:05to cure an eye infection.
36:07There was a very specific recipe.
36:09It had onion, garlic,
36:12English white wine,
36:14and the bile salts
36:15from a cow's stomach.
36:17How did this leech book
36:19come by its odd remedies?
36:20Some speculated it was witchcraft.
36:23Magic really was a part of life
36:25in the Middle Ages,
36:26really before the witch persecutions
36:29started.
36:30There were people who you believed
36:32worked magic,
36:33and you might go to them
36:35for cures,
36:36probably before you would go
36:38to any kind of physician
36:39who is out of your reach.
36:42But for some people
36:43who were coming up with cures
36:44during the Middle Ages,
36:46there was a real danger,
36:48particularly for women
36:49who were accused of witchcraft.
36:51The church and the patriarchy
36:53were not okay with this.
36:55They persecuted those women
36:57and sometimes even executed them
36:58for coming up with remedies
36:59and the kinds of things
37:00you'll find in bald's leech book.
37:05It's not the first time
37:06we've seen books like this
37:08ahead of their time.
37:09In the 70s,
37:10Chinese scientists found
37:11a malaria treatment
37:12in a text from the 4th century.
37:14Do the cures
37:16in bald's leech book
37:17work too?
37:18And how did they get there?
37:24How did the medieval healers
37:26behind bald's leech book
37:27come up with their remedies?
37:29Did they actually work?
37:30Bald's leech book
37:31isn't the only medicinal book
37:33from this period.
37:34We have other examples
37:35of books with remedies in it,
37:37and they actually came up
37:38with remedies that worked.
37:39The treatments devised
37:41by practitioners
37:42in the Middle Ages
37:43required gathering ingredients
37:45and experimenting with them
37:47until they found
37:48something that worked.
37:49Willow bark was used
37:50to calm inflammation.
37:52And today,
37:53a compound from willow bark
37:54is used in aspirin.
37:56Another example
37:57are the psychotropic
37:58plant compounds
37:59that were used
38:00in witches'
38:01quote-unquote
38:01flying ointment.
38:02But today,
38:03we use them as
38:04muscle relaxants
38:05and to cure motion sickness.
38:07A lot of this stuff
38:08has been around
38:09for a very long period of time.
38:11This book has a remedy
38:13for arthritis
38:14that contains nettles.
38:16And we know that nettles
38:17are a traditional
38:18Native American way
38:20of relieving arthritis
38:21and is also found
38:22in modern arthritic
38:24medicines today.
38:25So we know
38:26a lot of those herbs
38:27and a lot of those methods
38:28really are effective.
38:31Researchers at
38:32the University of Warwick
38:33actually tested out
38:35Bald's eye salve
38:36on a staph infection.
38:38To their astonishment,
38:40the staph infection
38:41was completely gone.
38:43And they repeated
38:44the experiment
38:45time after time
38:46and every time
38:47they found the same results.
38:49The eye salve
38:50was completely
38:51eradicating
38:52the staph infection.
38:53Scientists were
38:54even more surprised
38:55when they tested
38:56the salve on MRSA,
38:57a highly resistant
38:58bacterial strain.
39:00This is a superbug
39:02that is responsible
39:04for killing
39:04about 2,000 people
39:05a year
39:06and a major problem
39:07in the world
39:08of medicine today.
39:10And to their surprise,
39:11the eye salve
39:12killed 90%
39:13of the infection.
39:15How could an archaic recipe
39:17that includes
39:17white wine
39:18and bile salts
39:19from a cow's stomach
39:21accomplish this?
39:22Researchers found
39:24that allicin,
39:25a component of garlic,
39:26while it had
39:27the strongest
39:28bactericidal properties,
39:30did not work
39:31nearly as well alone
39:33as it did
39:35mixed with
39:35the other ingredients.
39:37Within the book's remedies,
39:38researchers have also
39:39discovered herbal ingredients
39:41that can effectively
39:42treat coughs,
39:44colds,
39:44and toothaches.
39:46But not all the recipes
39:47are created equal.
39:48There's another recipe
39:50where if you mix
39:51beetroot and honey,
39:53mash it together,
39:55smear it on someone's
39:56face,
39:57have them lay on their back
39:58in the sun,
39:59and let it drip down
40:00their face,
40:01that will cure
40:02their headache.
40:03I don't believe
40:04that works.
40:09Our verdict?
40:10There are some real,
40:11proven medical treatments
40:12in Bald's leech book.
40:14We haven't come across
40:15witchcraft
40:16or magic potions here,
40:18just evidence
40:19that the Dark Ages
40:20weren't so dark
40:21after all.
40:22Still,
40:22I think I'll pass
40:23on Bald's cure
40:24for warts,
40:25which says
40:26to apply dog urine
40:28and mouse blood
40:29to the affected area.
40:30No thanks.
40:32And that's our show
40:33for tonight.
40:34Thank you so much
40:34for watching.
40:35And remember
40:36to keep
40:37those cameras rolling.
40:38And you'll be thinking
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