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Can explosive new evidence prove that one of the worst maritime disasters in recent

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years was no accident?

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All they can find are lifeboats and people terrified in the water.

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Does the answer to one of America's most iconic aviation mysteries lie hidden in a mighty

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river?

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What happened to Cooper and the $200,000 of cold cash?

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And what are the bizarre growths on the deep ocean floor said to be worth trillions of

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dollars?

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They have enough rare metals to supply civilization for thousands of years.

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What are they?

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How did they get there?

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The underwater realm is another dimension.

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It's a physically hostile place where dreams of promise can sink into darkness.

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I'm Jeremy Wade and I'm searching the world to bring you the most iconic and baffling

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underwater mysteries known to science.

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The vast majority of our ocean is unobserved, unmapped and unexplored.

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It's a dangerous frontier that swallows evidence.

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You have nowhere to run.

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Where unknown is normal and understanding is rare.

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When disaster strikes at sea, even the most exhaustive investigations sometimes fail to

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get it right.

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With 852 lives lost, the sinking of the passenger ferry MS Estonia is one of the worst civilian

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sea disasters after the loss of the Titanic.

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Now, will modern underwater technology deployed by a daring team of investigators overturn

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the official version of events?

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September 28th, 1994.

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It's the dead of night and cruise ferry MS Estonia is making a routine crossing of the

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Baltic Sea.

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Taking almost a thousand passengers, she's five hours into her journey from Tallinn,

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Estonia to Stockholm in Sweden.

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Storm winds are creating 20-foot high waves.

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But the conditions aren't out of the ordinary for the 515-foot-long ship.

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It has made countless crossings across the Baltic in very stormy conditions.

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The journey on this particular day was nothing special.

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The Estonia is a huge ship.

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It's bigger than 12 buses or two-thirds the length of Titanic.

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But shortly after 1am, the Estonia is in deep trouble.

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The third officer reports that the ship is leaning dangerously to one side.

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Then, in a dramatic worsening of events, a total blackout.

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The ship loses all its lights, all its power.

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But amazingly, the third officer is able to still read the coordinates on the battery-operated

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equipment.

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Nearby vessels race towards the Estonia's coordinates.

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But they're too late.

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The ferry vanishes below the waves in a matter of minutes.

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It's a shocking and inexplicable event.

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How could this have happened?

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Is it possible something sinister is at play?

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All they can find are lifeboats and people terrified in the water.

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It's the Baltic and it's very, very cold and these people are really in the last minutes

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of hypothermia and are close to drowning.

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Rescuers work through the night to pull survivors from the water, but hundreds of passengers

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are missing.

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Of the 989 passengers on board, only 138 are rescued.

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No one understands how or why a ship this size could sink so quickly.

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It's unprecedented in modern maritime history.

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In all, 852 lives are lost in the tragedy.

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The sinking of the Emma Estonia was completely unexpected and out of the ordinary.

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Even the previous reliability of this ferry, it's shocking that it would sink in these

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conditions.

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What happened on that fateful night to cause one of the worst maritime disasters of the

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20th century?

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It's a question that many are still trying to answer.

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And there's strong suspicion that this was no accident.

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Two days after the sinking, a finished survey vessel finds the wreck using sonar.

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The Estonia is found resting on a side in the depth of about 230 feet.

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Plans are quickly made to get a closer look at the wreckage.

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Investigators deploy two remotely operated submersibles.

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The grainy black and white footage is difficult to analyse.

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But before long, officials uncover a clue.

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The Estonia is missing its bow visor.

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This is a critical piece of the front of the ship, but bizarrely, it's nowhere to be seen.

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The Emma Estonia had been built to transport vehicles as well as passengers.

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The bow would actually lift up and cars would drive inside the ship.

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If this weak spot in the hull was compromised, could it explain how the Estonia went down

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so quickly?

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It takes salvagers two weeks to find the bow visor.

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To their amazement, it's on the sea floor over one nautical mile from the Estonia.

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Why is it so far from the wreck?

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After raising it to the surface, investigators are confident that the damaged steel visor

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is the cause of the disaster.

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The official report found that because of the storm that the Estonia was in, the waves

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had smashed into the bow and this had weakened the locking mechanism, ultimately ripping

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it off.

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While this explains why the bow visor was so far from the wreck, some refuse to believe

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this version of events.

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For a start, there was a strange noise just before the Estonia started sinking.

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The officers reported hearing a loud bang just before the lights went out.

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And according to others, the passenger ferry may have been carrying a secret military cargo.

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My witnesses claim they saw military vehicles being loaded onto the vessel in the weeks

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leading up to the disaster.

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What were they carrying and was there an explosion?

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The answer could point to a shocking act of sabotage and an international cover-up.

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The only way to know for sure is to return to the wreck, 230 feet beneath the Baltic Sea.

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The sinking of the passenger ferry MS Estonia cost 852 lives.

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The official investigation claims rough seas weakened the ship's bow visor, causing it

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to come loose.

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But reports of covert military smuggling on board and rumors of an explosion have caused

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people to question the official narrative.

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There are theories there was an explosion on the vessel because people heard a big, sharp

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bang.

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Is it possible that a secret military cargo exploded?

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Was the ship sabotaged by ex-Soviet forces?

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Or, even more shocking, was the cause of the sinking closer to home?

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Not long after the disaster, European officials put forward controversial plans to bury the

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Estonia on the sea floor.

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These decide that they actually want to entomb the wreck so that nobody can access the wreck.

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And of course, this immediately raises suspicion.

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The only motivation I can think of for entombing a shipwreck would be to cover up something

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that had occurred before the ship sank.

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Fortunately, the entombing is stopped after a backlash from victims' families.

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Instead, authorities declare the site a grave, prohibiting anyone from approaching it.

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If people want to go visit this wreck site to honour their lost loved ones, why should

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that be stopped?

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Some are still determined to uncover the truth.

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And in 2019, two Swedish filmmakers hatch a daring plan.

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They approach the wreck site in defiance of the law and patrolling vessels.

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They deploy a high-tech underwater drone, far more advanced than the equipment available

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in 1994 when the ship sank.

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These new ROVs have much higher resolution, so this allowed researchers to be able to

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see the Estonia like it had never been seen before.

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Using the video feed from the surface, they explore the outer perimeter of the Estonia.

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And it's not long before they make a shocking discovery.

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All of a sudden, they see this astonishing fact that there is a big hole in the ship,

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a significant hole.

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Estimates suggest the massive hole in the hull is 13 feet tall and 4 feet wide, straddling

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the waterline on the starboard side.

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This was a total surprise because it has never been reported that there is a hole in the

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ship's side.

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In a bid to understand what could have created this gaping hole, Jorgen Amdahl was asked

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to scrutinise the findings.

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I am professor at the University of Science and Technology based in Trondheim, Norway.

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We were asked to conduct an analysis of this damage and we made a model of the side.

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The first observation Jorgen makes is that the force that ruptured the hull could not

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have come from inside the ship.

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The damage points inwards, so I am very convinced that it has been an external action that has

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caused it.

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And not, for example, an internal explosion.

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So it's possible that something struck the Estonia.

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The force is equivalent to a collision with a freight train.

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What could have created such an immense impact?

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Scans of the seabed reveal there are no rocks capable of gouging a hole this large.

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If it is not due to something that happened on the seafloor, if there is something that

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hit it on the sea surface, then there is a different situation.

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Some speculate that only one seafaring vessel could cause this type of damage without being

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detected.

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A submarine.

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There were no other ships nearby.

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It's possible that a submarine may have actually ran into it.

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There have been speculations about submarines.

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We don't know.

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We don't know which object that could be.

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Why would a submarine strike the Estonia?

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Were Russian forces unhappy with military smuggling?

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Or was it a devastating maritime mistake that European powers are trying to cover up?

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The hole found in the side of the wreck, at present, there is no known explanation for

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it.

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There are a lot of theories, but it still remains a mystery.

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For now, there's no further evidence to confirm or rule out the theory that the Estonia was

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struck as she crossed the Baltic.

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But for many, this previously unreported hole throws suspicion on the findings of the official

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investigation.

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This hole is completely unexplained.

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One wonders if the authorities have something to hide.

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The hole in the Estonia's hull raises more questions than it answers.

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With demands growing for a new investigation, perhaps soon we'll get to the bottom of one

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of the world's most devastating ocean disasters.

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In 2016, the FBI closes the file on one of the most infamous heists of all time.

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DB Cooper's notorious jump from a hijacked plane has puzzled official investigators for

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half a century.

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But now, have amateur sleuths found evidence that can finally solve one of America's most

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puzzling cold cases?

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November 24, 1971, a well-dressed man going by the name of Dan Cooper boards a Northwest

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Airlines flight in Portland, Oregon, bound for Seattle.

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Once in the air, Cooper hands the stewardess a note.

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There's a bomb in his briefcase.

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When they touch down, he exchanges the passengers for $200,000 in cash and four parachutes.

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They have no idea what's going to happen.

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Cooper instructs the pilot and crew to fly south to Mexico so he can evade capture.

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But not long into the flight, somewhere over the state line between Washington and Oregon,

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Cooper does the incredible.

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He jumps from the back of the plane with a parachute and his ransom money.

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This is the biggest skyjacking in US history.

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The plane lands safely, but what becomes of Cooper after his jump is a mystery that has

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perplexed and fascinated the world ever since.

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Did D.B.

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Cooper fall to his death?

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Did he escape, never to be seen or heard from again?

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What happened to Cooper and the $200,000 of cold cash?

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Authorities launch a full-scale manhunt.

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The FBI do this huge search for D.B.

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Cooper.

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A hijacking in an airplane is not the best thing to do if you're a criminal because you

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are going to have the full power of the federal government come down on you.

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Initial calculations place Cooper's landing zone in the area of the southernmost outreach

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of Mount St. Helens.

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Not only is this a vast mountainous wilderness, it's also crisscrossed by mighty waterways.

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I've explored the Pacific Northwest.

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Its rivers are powerful and treacherous, and its forests populated with deadly bears.

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I think I'm going to make a graceful retreat.

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It's hard to imagine being dropped into this environment without any means of survival.

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They focus searches through the woods, boats on the lakes, up and down the rivers looking

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for any bits of evidence.

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Despite an extensive search, investigators come up empty-handed.

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Cooper disappeared without a trace.

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While public interest in the case never goes away, eight years pass without a significant

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breakthrough.

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Then, on February 10th, 1980, a chance discovery changes everything.

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A young boy is building a campfire on the banks of the Columbia River.

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As he digs into the sand, he discovers three bundles of cash, totaling almost $6,000.

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His parents took that cash to the FBI, and it turns out that the serial numbers match

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the cash that was involved in the ransom.

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The discovery of the money could be the ticket to solving this enduring puzzle.

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How more than 50 years on, can new cutting-edge scientific analysis of the cash finally tell

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us what became of D.B. Cooper?

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The mystery of D.B. Cooper and his $200,000 ransom takes a strange turn when some of the

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money is found on the banks of the Columbia River.

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But despite this incredible breakthrough, the cash creates a new conundrum.

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In terms of where the money was found, it was actually 18 miles away from the proposed

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drop zone.

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Investigators are puzzled.

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How did the cash travel from the drop zone to the beach where it was found?

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The leading theory is that it went on an epic river journey.

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Initially they think the cash flowed into the Columbia River, but there's a problem

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with this.

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The cash could not have fallen into the Lewis River within the drop zone, because it joins

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the Columbia downstream of where the money was found.

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Some argue that the cash could have entered the Washougal River Valley to the east, washing

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into the Columbia and down to the beach.

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But there's a problem with this too.

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Experts don't believe that the cash could have remained so well preserved after such

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a journey.

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The bills still have rubber bands around them, and bundles of cash seem to be buried on top

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of each other.

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How were they all washed down river over months and stayed intact?

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Still no closer to answering what happened to D.B. Cooper and his cash, in 2016 the FBI

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shuts down the investigation.

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In their place, a determined group of amateur sleuths keeps the search alive.

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In 2020 armed with an electron microscope, researcher Tom Kaye examines the bills in

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closer detail than ever before.

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And he finds a stouncing.

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So what new science have you been able to bring to this case?

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Under the microscope, we found this form of algae called diatoms.

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They're not the slimy algae you're used to seeing.

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The diatoms form a glass shell like a shoe box around each individual cell.

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Most rivers have dozens of species of diatoms.

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They die and fall to the bottom of the river, but the glass shell remains.

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So many years later we can pick them up and identify what species of diatoms are there

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in the river.

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Throughout the year, the types of diatoms in a river change depending on the season.

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Crucially, Tom detects a specific species that doesn't match the time of year that Cooper

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jumped.

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The particular type of diatom that we found on Cooper's cache was Astrianella formosa,

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a Latin name, but that particular diatom is only found in the spring, not in November

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when Cooper jumped.

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The lack of winter diatoms indicates that the money couldn't have become submerged in

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November when the hijack happened, suggesting a significant time delay between Cooper's

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jump and his cache getting exposed to river water.

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This tells us that the money spent at least six months somewhere other than getting buried

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where we don't know yet, but that's what adds to the mystery of the case.

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The money can't have been floating in the water after Cooper landed.

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The finding definitively rules out the theory that these bills came splashing down into

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a waterway with Cooper.

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That's not all.

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It removes any suspicion that Cooper landed on the ground and quickly buried some of

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the cache himself.

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Tom runs tests on $20 bills.

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His research shows that the diatoms couldn't have entered the bills once the bills were

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in the ground.

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The cache is submerged in the water months after Cooper jumped.

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Somehow, it winds up buried in the ground.

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This research creates a new riddle in the Cooper mystery.

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Why was there this strange time delay?

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How did the cache get buried?

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It's like Cooper is still messing with us more than 50 years after this event.

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While new evidence often helps to rule out long-held theories, this time it widens the

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mystery.

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People will never stop trying to solve the Cooper case, but now experts realise the answer

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may lie beneath the surface.

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The AE-1, Australia's first ever submarine, disappears at the start of World War One.

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It's the only naval vessel in the nation's history whose whereabouts remain unknown.

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Can a dedicated team uncover how the AE-1 vanished without leaving a trace?

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September 14th, 1914.

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What's now Papua New Guinea is divided into British and German-held territories.

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Australia's flagship submarine AE-1 is on patrol, scouting for German warships.

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World War One has just begun.

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The Australians are part of the British Empire and Australian resources are brought into

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the war effort.

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With 35 crew on board, the AE-1 patrols alongside the torpedo boat HMAS Paramata.

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The two vessels plan to rendezvous at 6pm once their watch is over.

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But at 3.20, the Paramata's crew loses sight of the submarine.

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The Paramata immediately tried to make contact with AE-1 by radio using Morris code, but

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was unable to make contact with it.

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By 8pm, there's still no sign of AE-1.

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Was she spotted and engaged by the enemy?

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Or did she get into trouble navigating around the area's many islands?

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In 1914, there was no radar.

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They didn't have technology like sonar.

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They didn't have any beacons like we do today.

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So basically you're looking for a needle in a haystack.

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The Australians searched for the vessel for three days.

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If any of the sailors remained alive on the submarine, by that time the oxygen would have

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been used up just through breathing.

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With no bodies and no debris found, AE-1 is declared lost at sea.

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For Australia, losing this iconic symbol of their emerging naval strength is a tragic

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blow, but it's also a perplexing mystery.

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AE-1's commander was known for having a spotless record at sea.

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And of all the vessels lost in the Navy's history, AE-1 is the only one still unaccounted

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for.

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This is a mystery that has haunted the Australian Navy for decades.

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After the course of a century, the search for AE-1 never truly stops.

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Twelve separate missions try and fail to find the sub and determine what happened.

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Then in 2017, a pioneering team armed with an autonomous underwater vehicle finally

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catches a break.

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Sea bed scans show a distinctive shape on the seafloor at a depth close to a thousand

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feet.

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It's the AE-1.

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This is the first sighting of the submarine since she disappeared over a hundred years

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ago.

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Not only is she sitting upright, the sub is in one piece.

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It turns out that the hull of the submarine was more or less intact.

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There was no sign of a debris field around it whatsoever.

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No bodies or wreckage was found outside of the submarine.

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It was completely in one piece.

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To some, this is a clear indication that AE-1 wasn't attacked.

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But despite finally finding her, we still don't know what happened.

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There is no enemy action.

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How does this submarine go down?

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After twelve failed missions, in 2017 the Australian submarine AE-1 is finally found.

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But why she sank with all 35 hands lost is still a mystery.

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Sonar images reveal that she's sitting upright at a depth of around 1,000 feet.

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Bizarrely, there are no clear signs she was attacked.

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If we can examine it, look at it, we may be able to discover what went wrong.

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During the 2017 expedition, the only underwater camera the team have is tethered to a winch.

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It limits them to a top-down view of the wreckage.

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But it's enough to reveal a vital clue.

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Several fins called hydroplanes that control the submarine's pitch are set in what's called

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the Hard to Rise position.

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That indicates there was a desperate attempt by the captain to get the submarine to the surface.

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More importantly, it reveals that AE-1 had executed a dive.

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It's a strange manoeuvre for a submarine that's only on a scouting mission.

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Theoretically, there's no real need for them to dive deep below the surface.

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Could it be that the submariners on AE-1 spotted an enemy vessel and is that why they dived to greater depths?

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Was the dive a training exercise?

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We know the crew was trying to train up and were hoping to be deployed to a more active theatre of conflict soon.

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They could well have been putting themselves through some very, very hard training to get themselves ready.

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In order to truly lay this mystery to rest, the team must figure out what went wrong.

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In 2018, they go in for a closer look.

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Could this be their chance to solve the 100-year-old mystery?

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Before long, the wreck of AE-1 comes into sharp focus.

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The first ROV sighting on HMAS-21.

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100 for three years in the making.

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The footage reveals for the first time the devastating forces that would have killed AE-1's 35 crew members.

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Researchers could see from the video that the forward section of the submarine had actually been crushed,

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much like if you squeezed a soda can.

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The submarine actually imploded.

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Before long, video from the ROV reveals a small but highly significant clue,

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an open vent above the sub's engine room.

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Archaeologist Dr James Hunter is watching the feed from the surface.

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As we're looking, we realize, wait a second, hold up, it looks like one of those might not be completely closed.

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It might be, you know, partially open.

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This is something we weren't expecting at all, and we realized this was a really significant piece of the puzzle.

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The vent may not look like much, but if left open when the submarine dived,

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it would have caused a catastrophic ingress of water.

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It no doubt short-circuited the electric engines, shutting them off.

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And as that water enters the submarine, it starts to create more weight in the stern,

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and that causes the submarine to start to sink by the stern.

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We suspect around 300 feet, the hull could no longer withstand the external water pressure,

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and the front end of the submarine imploded.

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We now know how sub-AE-1 met its end, but why the valve was left open is still unsolved.

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It could have been one of the crewmen forgetting to close it, and then realizing too late,

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or it could have been something like a piece of debris.

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Whether it was human error or sheer bad luck may one day be answered.

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For many, though, the most important mystery is solved.

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The AE-1 and a 35 Brave Submariners are found and not forgotten.

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In a world of dwindling natural resources, could the answer to our future renewable energy needs

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be hiding in the depths of our planet's oceans?

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Potato-sized metallic nodules, which contain the materials to power electric cars,

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cover vast areas of the ocean floor, and they're worth trillions of dollars.

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When people think of what's valuable on the sea floor,

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they most often think of shipwrecks and valuable treasures like gold and silver.

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But what most people don't realize is there's something more valuable.

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Mining finite resources from the Earth can make or break a nation's fortunes and even start wars.

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These nodules contain rare earth elements and some of the most precious metals known to humankind.

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00:33:13,680 --> 00:33:19,680
But what exactly are they, and is it possible to turn them to our advantage?

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The world is changing.

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As we transition to sustainable power and a technology-driven society,

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the demand for precious metals mined from the Earth is at an all-time high.

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But there is an alternative.

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Deep beneath the ocean, in the dark realm that's almost totally unexplored by humans,

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there's a mysterious crop of black potato-sized objects named polymetallic nodules.

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Scientists think these so-called nodules are millions of years old.

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But what's the difference?

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00:34:04,680 --> 00:34:09,680
Scientists think these so-called nodules are millions of years old.

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And there could be over 500 billion tonnes of them on the sea floor.

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What's more, they're loaded with highly valuable resources.

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Individual nodules are first discovered by early ocean explorers in the 1870s.

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They didn't know what they were.

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00:34:34,680 --> 00:34:43,680
They didn't have any feel for whether this was something created by an organism or whether it was just a rock.

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00:34:43,680 --> 00:34:53,680
Examining them reveals strange tree-like rings inside that suggest these small, mysterious objects are somehow growing

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00:34:53,680 --> 00:35:00,680
and that they contain concentrations of the precious metal manganese.

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00:35:00,680 --> 00:35:07,680
But without the scientific tools to investigate further, these unexplainable curiosities are filed away

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00:35:07,680 --> 00:35:13,680
and forgotten for a hundred years.

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00:35:13,680 --> 00:35:21,680
It's not until 1974 that they are thrust back into the limelight in a very unexpected way.

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00:35:21,680 --> 00:35:28,680
When US intelligence reacts to intel of a Soviet submarine wrecked at the bottom of the Pacific,

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1500 miles west of Hawaii.

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00:35:32,680 --> 00:35:40,680
In a bid to recover the sub and the Soviet secrets inside, the CIA launches a top-secret mission

408
00:35:40,680 --> 00:35:45,680
involving iconic entrepreneur Howard Hughes.

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00:35:45,680 --> 00:35:56,680
They wrangled in this eccentric billionaire and they claimed together that what they were looking for instead of the sub was polymetallic nodules.

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00:35:56,680 --> 00:36:04,680
The secret mission is a failure for the CIA who are unable to raise all of the sub from the sea floor.

411
00:36:04,680 --> 00:36:10,680
The ocean mining cover story, however, is a remarkable success.

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00:36:10,680 --> 00:36:17,680
For the first time, scientists are able to examine the strange nodules in detail.

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00:36:17,680 --> 00:36:27,680
They find high concentrations of nickel, copper and cobalt and trace amounts of silicon, aluminum and titanium.

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00:36:27,680 --> 00:36:36,680
Now we know that these nodules are highly valuable because of the metals and the minerals that they contain.

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00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:44,680
And these are essential in today's modern technology, whether it's the car you drive or the cell phone that you use.

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00:36:44,680 --> 00:36:54,680
The nodules are so plentiful it's said that if we mine only 10% they'd keep the world supplied with key metals for thousands of years.

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00:36:54,680 --> 00:37:02,680
In one part of the Pacific Ocean alone, estimates of their worth run from 8 to more than 16 trillion dollars.

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As worldwide economies transition from using fossil fuels to more modern technologies, these metals are going to become increasingly important.

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This untapped underwater gold mine has the potential to transform the global economy.

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00:37:22,680 --> 00:37:32,680
But scientists still don't understand what these nodules are or how they've seemingly grown on the seabed since before humans walked the earth.

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00:37:32,680 --> 00:37:43,680
The mystery is how these nodules actually form. Are they biological? Are they an animal? Are they geological? Are they a rock?

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Could unlocking the secret of these mysterious nodules be the key to our technological future?

423
00:37:52,680 --> 00:38:12,680
In a remote part of the Pacific Ocean, a vast and mysterious crop of black nodules is said to be worth trillions of dollars.

424
00:38:12,680 --> 00:38:18,680
But what are they and why do they seem to grow at impossible depths?

425
00:38:18,680 --> 00:38:33,680
In addition to these nodules being very valuable, they're also very precious because on average they grow one centimeter per million years.

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00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:47,680
During X-ray examination in the 1970s, scientists discovered that the growth rings in the center of these mysterious nodules often formed around a piece of organic matter, like a shark's tooth.

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The deep ocean is a highly pressurized broth of dissolved metals and minerals. One theory is that some unknown microbial process draws them towards the tooth.

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The theory is that shark teeth act as a catalyst to cause these minerals to precipitate out.

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It's an astonishing thought. The metal nodules that could change the fortunes of humanity are the remains of a shark tooth graveyard.

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00:39:17,680 --> 00:39:30,680
Now, one might ask how many shark teeth can there possibly be on the seafloor? But the reality is, some species of shark shed over 35,000 teeth over the course of their life.

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00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:41,680
So if one shark can shed 35,000 teeth, imagine how many shark teeth there must be at the bottom of the ocean.

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00:39:41,680 --> 00:39:49,680
In another bizarre twist, scientists can't explain why or how the nodules stay visible on the seafloor.

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Over millions of years, ocean sediments should bury them out of sight.

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You would still expect sediment to be drifting through the water column and gently covering these nodules, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

435
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:14,680
Somehow this ancient deep ocean crop remains exposed on the seafloor. It's a mystery that continues to stump scientists.

436
00:40:14,680 --> 00:40:30,680
Some researchers have theorized that starfish or other invertebrates who live on the seafloor might be constantly clearing the seafloor sediment off of the polymetallic nodules, thus leaving them exposed on the seafloor for thousands, if not millions of years.

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00:40:33,680 --> 00:40:41,680
Although the nodules are still shrouded in mystery, the technology to harvest them from the seafloor now exists.

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00:40:42,680 --> 00:40:51,680
Today, deep sea mining companies are in a race to perfect the machines that will raise the nodules from the ocean floor on an industrial scale.

439
00:40:52,680 --> 00:41:02,680
At the moment, no one on the planet has the right to extract minerals from the seafloor. However, licenses have been given to explore whether it might be feasible.

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00:41:03,680 --> 00:41:17,680
International authorities are scrambling to figure out how the spoils of this modern-day gold rush should be divided fairly. But many fear this race to the bottom could have devastating consequences.

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Because for now, it's impossible to harvest the nodules from the seafloor without laying waste to the life around them.

442
00:41:26,680 --> 00:41:34,680
There are an incredible amount of sea creatures down there that remain undiscovered, and the ones that are discovered are poorly understood.

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We have to be careful that we don't cause other life forms to become extinct in the process.

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We're still trying to find out how these mysterious natural treasures grow and how they stay visible on the seafloor.

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Meanwhile, as humans reach into the deep to fill their pockets, what will this mean for the future of our oceans and our world?