PBS Terra
Meet the Fire Lookout of Big Sky Country
- Title
- Meet the Fire Lookout of Big Sky Country
- Runtime
- 8:09
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to: http://to.pbs.org/DonateTerra.
↓ More info below ↓
Check out PBS Terra’s new series Weathered: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=giDX6ByhWO8
Are real-life fire lookouts, like those popularized by the successful adventure game Firewatch, becoming obsolete with modern technology like aerial observers and observation satellites?
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Meet Mark Hufstetler, a fire lookout at Baptiste Tower in Flathead National Forest, Montana, who believes human observation is still imperative in fire detection and management.
See how people like Mark have been protecting our forests for over a century and continue to play a vital role in protecting our natural resources.
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Hosted by Joe Hanson from It's Okay to be Smart, Overview uses incredib...
- Title
- We Can't Stop Wildfires—But Here's How We Live With Them
- Runtime
- 10:16
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Check out our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/cw/PBSWeathered?utm_medium=unknown&utm_source=join_link&utm_campaign=creatorshare_creator&utm_content=copyLink
As wildfires become more destructive, we look to design solutions and indigenous knowledge to become safer. Subscribe and get ready for the next disaster: https://bit.ly/3mOfd77 More info below ↓↓↓
In 2018, the Camp Fire sent a shower of embers through Paradise, California, burning down 18,000 structures and killing 86 people. Now the 2020 fire season looks even worse, devastating communities, forcing thousands to evacuate, and choking the air with smoke. In this episode of Weathered, scientists and Native leaders tell us what we can do to reduce the harm fires can cause through design, building materials, and listening to the land. We’ll even watch researchers burn a home in their lab to identify weak points and make them stronger.
Weathered, produced by Portland’s Balance Media...
- Title
- How to Think Like an Octopus
- Runtime
- 5:25
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to: http://to.pbs.org/DonateTerra.
↓ More info below ↓To understand how extraterrestrials might think, one researcher points to the octopus.
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More info below ↓↓↓
The place that the octopus evolved — the bottom of the sea — is so alien to us that it might as well be another planet. Some scientists, like Dominic Sivitilli, think it’s the closest we can get to understanding how extraterrestrials might think. The octopi’s sophisticated nervous systems and sensitive suckers allow it to do incredible things like escape aquariums — but Sivitilli is learning how each of an octopus' eight arms might actually have a mind of its own. We don’t know yet if alien life exists, but if they do, they might think like an octopus.
Human Elements, produced by Seattle-based KCTS9, is a show about the...
- Title
- Why Are These Mountains BLUE?
- Runtime
- 6:54
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to: http://to.pbs.org/DonateTerra.
↓ More info below ↓
This is our premiere episode of Overview, a show that will be publishing every three weeks on Terra.
There are a LOT of trees in the Blue Ridge Mountains, and they’re responsible for that dreamy blue haze on the horizon.
Trees produce fine mists of volatile organic compounds (VOCs), which scatter blue light waves. But these compounds are also a key ingredient in ground-level ozone, and in the mid-90s the area had serious air quality issues. Not only was it dangerous to breathe, but the hazy blue was also disappearing from the horizon.
But it wasn’t just the tree's fault. Here’s what happened...
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Hosted by Joe Hanson from It's Okay to be Smart, Overview uses incredible 4k drone footage to reveal the natural phenomena ...
- Title
- This is TERRA (Trailer)
- Runtime
- 0:57
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- PBS Member Stations rely on viewers like you. To support your local station, go to: http://to.pbs.org/DonateTerra.
↓ More info below ↓
Terra is the home for science and nature shows from PBS Digital Studios. Join us and explore the frontiers of science and be inspired by the world around us to better understand what makes it tick.
Premiering September 24 is Overview hosted by Joe Hanson from It's Okay to be Smart. Overview showcases incredible 4k drone footage to reveal the natural phenomena and forces shaping our planet from a 10,000 foot view--literally.
Launching on October 1 is Human Elements. The world of science is full of facts and figures, but behind the study are the people. Human Elements is a show about capturing the connection between scientist and subject, from intelligent octopi to telescopes that can see into the past.
And finally, starting October 5 is Weathered. From wildfires to hurricanes to tornadoes, we are de...
- Title
- Antarctic Penguins: Overrated? | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 14:05
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- When in Antarctica, meeting penguins is an absolute must. But it’s not always easy.
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Finding — and filming — penguins was hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez’s top priority during their month-long stay at McMurdo Station. With four species of penguin living in Antarctica, including the Adélie, the most widely-distributed penguin species in the world, tracking down these waddling wonders might sound simple.
To find Adélies, Caitlin and Arlo set out on a quest to Cape Royds, home to the southernmost Adélie penguin colony in the world. There, they meet with expert Jean Pennycook to learn about why people love these black and white birds and how Antarctica’s penguin populations are indicators of climate change. But non-ideal conditions and gusting winds put a damper on their plans (and the penguins they do come across seem to be either busy pooping or getting busy with each other). Caitlin and ...
- Title
- Exploring Antarctica's Active Volcano Mt. Erebus | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 7:29
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- What’s covered in ice, soars 12,500 feet, and sometimes features a bubbling lava lake in its crater? Mount Erebus, of course.
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Antarctica is an otherworldly land of extremes. But perhaps nothing there is as extreme as Mount Erebus, one of Antarctica’s two active volcanoes and the southernmost active volcano on Earth. Conveniently, Erebus’ summit is a mere 25 miles from McMurdo Station, Antarctica’s largest research base.
Hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez join Jessie Crain, a National Science Foundation Antarctic research support manager, on an exhilarating helicopter trip from McMurdo to Erebus’ summit and then land on its flanks. At altitude in -30° F conditions, they embark on foot and see firsthand how breathtaking (literally) Erebus is — and why an active volcano in a land of ice is a scientific wonder. Together, Caitlin and Arlo discover Dr. Suess-like ice towers (gas-emitting fumarol...
- Title
- What Do You Eat in Antarctica? | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 12:51
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- If you’re a penguin or other seabird in Antarctica, there’s plenty of fish (and some seal placenta) to go around. But what do the people eat?
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Generally, an adult human consumes around 1,600 to 3,000 calories daily. But in colder climates, people need to eat more: Keeping our warm-blooded bodies warm requires a lot of energy. It’s so cold in Antarctica that the average person needs to consume 3,200 to 5,000 calories a day (watch out, Michael Phelps). And because the continent is frozen, no food grows there naturally.
So how do the hundreds of scientists and support personnel who visit Antarctica’s McMurdo Station each year stay fed?
Throughout their one-month stay in Antarctica, hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez discover the secret sauce of Antarctic cooking from exper...
- Title
- Why Don’t Fish Freeze in Antarctica? I Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 12:02
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Under the ice in Antarctica is a world few people ever get to see.
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Bizarre creatures—ancient sponges, gigantic jellyfish, sea spiders, ribbon worms, and notothenioid fishes that manage not to freeze—make their home here. “Every time I come down here, every year, I always find something I haven’t seen before,” diver Steve Rupp says.
To discover Antarctica’s dazzling hidden underbelly, host Arlo Pérez meets with Steve and his fellow Antarctic diver Rob Robbins, while host Caitlin Saks explores the McMurdo Aquarium with evolutionary physiologist Chi-Hing Christina Cheng. Arlo and Caitlin learn that the Antarctic marine realm is not only spectacular to see, but fascinating for scientists to study. The water is so cold that fish inhabiting it should freeze like an icicle, a phenomenon that evolutionary biologist Paul Cziko uses supercooled water, snow, and fish guts to demonstrate.
...
- Title
- Where Does the Poop in Antarctica Go? | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 13:07
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- What happens to all the garbage—and human poop—in Antarctica?
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Antarctica is home to McMurdo Station, the U.S. Antarctic Program’s base of operations, and a handful of other research stations. These stations are occupied by scientists and other staffers, all of whom generate a whole lot of waste. And every scientist and staffer, like everybody else on Planet Earth, poops. (If you didn’t know this, maybe give “Everyone Poops” a read after you watch this episode.)
Under the Antarctic Treaty System, an international agreement to protect the continent, waste of any kind—garbage, human poop, you name it—can’t be left on the continent. So what happens to it? To find out, Caitlin and Arlo embark on their most peculiar Antarctic quest yet.
At McMurdo Station, as Caitl...
- Title
- Exploring Antarctica’s Glaciers (with a PlayStation Controller) | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 10:40
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Beneath Antarctica’s glaciers, a 12-foot-long robot named Icefin explores places neither boats nor divers can reach.
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Icefin is testing technologies designed for exploring Jupiter’s icy moon Europa. But before its successors go into space, this robot has a serious job on Earth: taking measurements from under a glacier so researchers like Georgia Tech astrobiologist Britney Schmidt can better understand how climate change is affecting Antarctica’s vulnerable ice. NOVA’s Caitlin Saks and Arlo Perez meet with Britney and her team of young scientists and engineers on the 8-mile-long Erebus Ice Tongue to discover how this robot is gathering data before its “grandkids” leave our planet.
Then, Britney, her team, and Icefin head to the Florida-sized Thwaites Glacier on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. Thwaites is one of the most remote places on Earth, but this so-called “Doomsday Glacier” is on the front line ...
- Title
- What is it Like to Live in Antarctica? | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 9:42
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Antarctica is cold, windy, isolated, barren, and often downright dangerous. Yet somehow, people manage to live there. (Some even enjoy it!)
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People have been visiting Antarctica for over a century—and hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez can actually see what living there used to be like, because some of the early explorers left all their stuff! Ernest Shackleton’s ill-fated ship Endurance was only recently rediscovered, but the 1910-1913 expedition led by Robert Falcon Scott (more commonly known as the Terra Nova Expedition) left its “home-base” hut still intact, and it’s now a museum. Inside one finds all the trappings of early Antarctic life: seal blubber, science experiments, and of course a desiccated penguin.
Today, living in Antarctica is a bit different. But still, an eclectic band of scientists and support personnel are drawn to the continent and, every year, a crew makes their home on ...
- Title
- Why is this Antarctic Glacier “Bleeding?” | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 10:01
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Did you know that Antarctica has a glacier that bleeds red? (At least, that’s what it looks like.)
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Five stories high and emerging from the Taylor Glacier in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica, Blood Falls seeps into an ice-covered body of water called Lake Bonney. It’s one of the continent’s most enigmatic natural features and has fascinated scientists for decades. What makes it red? Does it always flow? And can anything actually survive near it? To find out—and see just how bizarre Blood Falls is with their own eyes—Caitlin and Arlo travel to the Dry Valleys, about 60 miles from McMurdo Station. There, they meet with microbiologist Jill Mikucki and hydrogeologist Peter Doran to investigate why this glacier looks the way it does, what lives there (spoiler: CHARISMATIC MICROBES!), and what clues it holds for finding and understanding life on other planets and moons in our solar system, like Mars, Ju...
- Title
- How Antarctica’s Cutest Baby Seals Grow Up I Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 10:51
- Date posted
- 6 years ago
- Description
- Penguin lovers, take note: Baby Weddell seals might actually be cutest animals in all of Antarctica (and we’re talking a continent the size of the United States and Mexico combined).
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And for more baby seals, check out NOVA's Polar Lab: https://to.pbs.org/3aLUMS1
Inhabiting the Ross Sea—as far south as McMurdo Sound—Weddell seals (Leptonychotes weddellii) have the most southerly distribution of any mammal on Earth. Scientists began studying a breeding population of Weddell seals in 1968 and quickly found out these pinnipeds don’t always have it easy. Giving birth and raising young is particularly challenging in Antarctica’s extreme conditions, forcing Weddell moms and pups to bear sub-zero temperatures and prevailing winds. How do they manage to do it so gracefully? (OK: they’re admittedly way more graceful in the water than on land.) To find out, NOVA hosts Caitlin and Arlo travel to...
- Title
- How We Got to Antarctica | Antarctic Extremes
- Runtime
- 14:11
- Date posted
- 7 years ago
- Description
- Antarctica: It’s the home of penguins, seals, and a weird, rusty-looking glacial waterfall called Blood Falls. It’s the most remote natural laboratory on Earth—which means getting there is no easy feat.
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In the premiere episode of Antarctic Extremes, join hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez as they follow in the footsteps of the brave scientists that have made McMurdo Station, an otherworldly Antarctic outpost, their research base and their second home. Five days, 12,000 miles, and seven time zones with hundreds of pounds of camera gear in tow, Caitlin and Arlo temporarily leave their day jobs as NOVA producers and go on a mind-boggling journey to the bottom of the world. They fly halfway across the planet, pick up extreme cold-weather gear (and gloves made specially for wiping away snot), and learn...
- Title
- Antarctic Extremes I Trailer
- Runtime
- 1:45
- Date posted
- 7 years ago
- Description
- Journey to Antarctica in a new digital series from NOVA and PBS Digital Studios, and discover what it takes to do science in Earth’s remotest natural laboratory.
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Hosts Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez set up shop at McMurdo Station, the largest research base in Antarctica, and embed with scientists and support staff to find out what it’s like to live, work, and do science on our southernmost continent. Fun, quirky, and at times deeply personal, Caitlin and Arlo reveal the true Antarctica: a land where science and survival intersect. They join researchers to investigate the secret to seal pup survival, the mystery of a blood-red glacier, and "Icefin," an underwater robot that might offer clues to how fast Antarctica will contribute to sea level rise. As they explore magnificent locations—from the depths of an ice cave to the peak of Mount Erebus, an active Antarctic volcano—they reveal the trials and...
