Man and Metals • 2013 • episode "8/12" • Mankind Decoded

48:54

Many people believe the Hiroshima atomic bomb instantly incinerated nearly everyone in the Japanese city. That was true at ground zero, but not everywhere. Hiroshima government officials have been tirelessly collecting records on those killed to find out how they died. Using this "big data", NHK created a visualization of the movements of the 557,000 victims of the 6th August 1945 attack. Some did indeed perish instantly. Others burned to death in collapsed buildings. But what about the people who died in a strange "donut zone of death" days after the bombing and in areas more than 2 kilometers from ground zero? This documentary goes beyond big data to provide heart-rending accounts from people close to victims and survivors, revealing the true story of what happened on that dark day more than 70 years ago.

2017 • History

46:55

Tales of Cold War Britain, from nuclear threat to upper-class spies, eerie ghost bunkers and our very own Chernobyl. In Cold War military buildup Britain constructed bunkers for the civilian population and created its own nuclear missile defense. Professor Alice Roberts explores the UK's response to the threat of nuclear attack during the early years of the Cold War in the 1950s, when a network of upper-class spies began merrily sharing British military secrets with the Soviet Union. We also visit a nuclear-bomb-proof command center and inspect the legendary Avro Vulcan jet bomber.

S1E3 • Fortress Britain • 2022 • History

44:18

For decades, scientists believed that humans were forced to wait until the end of the last Ice Age before they could enter the Americas. Evidence suggests that 11,000 years ago they crossed the Bering Land Bridge by foot, into what is now modern-day Alaska. Those peoples were called the Clovis, and their arrival and hunting practices were blamed for the sudden disappearance of many large mammals, from mastodons and woolly mammoths to giant ground sloths and sabre-toothed tigers. In recent years however, tantalizing – but often frustratingly inconclusive – evidence of an earlier human migration into the Americas has begun to emerge. It is an incredible revelation – to think that ancient humans could somehow have managed to get past a sheet of ice four kilometres thick. In this fascinating documentary, Canadian anthropologist and adventurer Niobe Thompson takes us inside the incredible scientific discoveries that are finally unraveling these mysteries

S50E10 • The Nature of Things • 2011 • History

25:17

Great Air Escapes Some of the remarkable escapes which people have had from air disasters including the tail gunner who fell 12,000 feet without a parachute and survived. More than half the passengers in plane crashes escape with their lives... but how? Flying in a plane is not only the fastest way to get to a destination, it's also the safest. Despite this fact, engine issues, bad weather, and even pilot errors can occur and lead to a plane crash. But even when these rarities occur, there are often survivors who make it off the plane alive.The greatest escapes from disasters in the air are truly breathtaking. These stories of plane crash survivors are proof that even when the odds are against people, they can still find a way to make it out of unimaginable circumstances. Chances are very high that most of us will never have to experience a plane crash, but there are plenty of people who have and have lived to tell the tale. From the Hindenburg airship disaster to the tail gunner who fell 12,000 feet without parachute and survived, these remarkable tales of survival are a testament to the fact that surviving an air disaster is against all odds.

13/20 • The True Action Adventures of the Twentieth Century • 1996 • History

26:50

Through public relations spin, revisionist history and censorship. Soviet autocrat Joseph Stalin found a certain flexibility with the truth useful.

S1E4 • How to Become a Tyrant • 2021 • History

52:00

On June 28th, 1914, the assassination of an obscure Austrian archduke in Sarajevo triggers the most disastrous conflict the world has ever known. Germany becomes an enemy to France, invades Belgium, and in September arrives at the gates of Paris.

S1E1 • Apocalypse: World War 1 • 2014 • History