595: Dark Oxygen | CIA Deep Sea Secret Could Trigger the Next Extinction Event (STRIPPED)

You ever hear about the 1950s flight that vanished into thin air over Lake Michigan?

No wreckage, no trace, nothing?

Or the theory that Robin Hood might have actually been real, sneaking through underground tunnels to rob the rich?

Yeah, same here.

On Expedition Unknown, a podcast from Discovery, Josh Gates travels the globe to uncover the truth behind some of history's most bizarre and iconic legends.

With direct audio from the hit TV show, you'll join him on authentic roughshot adventures.

From diving into the disappearance of Amelia Earhart to chasing Captain Morgan's treasure through Panama.

And the stories just keep coming.

Like uncovering our ancient origins in Africa, diving into the Bermuda Triangle's most baffling disappearances, and chasing lost treasure tied to a legendary warrior queen who nearly defeated the Roman Empire.

If you're drawn to real-world mysteries, historical anomalies, and stories that blur the line between legend and fact, this show will pull you in.

Gates brings the boots-on-the-ground investigation that makes these tales come alive.

Listen to Expedition Unknown wherever you get your podcasts.

Two and a half miles beneath the Pacific Ocean is total darkness.

No sunlight reaches there.

No plants grow there.

So when oxygen sensors on the ocean floor came back positive, the scientists thought it was an equipment failure.

They tried again.

Same result.

Oxygen was being created not by plants or sea life, it was coming from rocks.

Ancient metallic rocks that generate electricity, they produce enough current to split water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen.

They called it dark oxygen.

This changes everything we know about the Earth's early atmosphere and about the evolution of life and about where we might find alien life.

In 2024, the dark oxygen study stunned the scientific community.

Researchers from dozens of fields and hundreds of organizations scrambled to understand the implications.

But one organization wasn't surprised.

They've known about these electric rocks since the 1960s.

They even mined them in the 1970s.

That organization is the CIA.

The Clarion-Clipperton Zone, or CCZ, looks like an underwater desert.

It stretches across 1.7 million square miles of the Pacific.

It's bigger than India, almost two miles down.

Cold, dark, pressure that would crush any living organism.

Or so we thought.

In 1968, a Soviet submarine carrying nuclear missiles sank in the Pacific.

The Soviets couldn't find it.

The U.S.

government wanted that sub.

The CIA launched Project Azorian to locate the sub.

They needed a cover story.

Deep sea mining fit perfectly.

Eccentric billionaire Howard Hughes built a massive ship.

They called it the Glommer Explorer.

The public thought it was a mining vessel.

It wasn't.

Its only task, recover that Soviet sub.

The crew spent months searching for it.

On March 8th, 1974, they found it.

But they also found something else, something far more important.

The seabed was covered with strange metal-rich rocks called polymetallic nodules, each one about the size of a softball.

To maintain cover, they actually studied the nodules.

They weren't expecting to find anything unusual.

That's when a simple recovery mission became a scientific breakthrough.

These aren't ordinary rocks.

They're ancient.

A single nodule takes millions of years to form.

Some are older than the oldest forests on Earth, older than the dinosaurs.

They've been sitting on the ocean floor for millions of years, silently generating electricity.

Each nodule generates about a volt, not much on its own.

But they don't exist alone.

They form vast fields.

Billions of nodules clustered together, connected through seawater, like batteries wired in series.

Their power multiplies.

The CCZ has about 21 billion tons of nodules.

This could generate about 20 megawatts, enough to power a small city.

Unlimited clean energy.

Fast forward to 2022, marine biologist Andrew Sweedman was studying seafloor ecosystems.

His sensors detected oxygen where none should exist.

Not just trace amounts.

The levels tripled in just two days.

His team confirmed the nodules generated electricity, strong enough to split water molecules, to produce oxygen in total darkness.

The scientific community was shocked.

The Pentagon wasn't.

The CIA kept their research classified for decades.

And the reason was simple.

These metallic rocks have electromagnetic properties useful for weapon systems, for power generation, maybe even gravity manipulation.

But there's a bigger mystery.

Oxygen, water, and electricity are fundamental to life.

These nodules might be the original source of Earth's oxygen.

the original spark for life.

And if they exist on Earth, they exist everywhere else.

On frozen moons with underground oceans, on distant planets orbiting distant stars.

NASA knows this.

They're already redesigning their alien life detection instruments.

Their next mission to Europa won't just look for microbes.

It will look for electric rocks, for dark oxygen produced without sunlight, on a moon hundreds of millions of miles from Earth.

You ever hear about the 1950s flight that vanished into thin air over Lake Michigan?

No wreckage, no trace, nothing?

Or the theory that Robin Hood might have actually been real, sneaking through underground tunnels to rob the rich?

Yeah, same here.

On Expedition Unknown, a podcast from Discovery, Josh Gates travels the globe to uncover the truth behind some of history's most bizarre and iconic legends.

With direct audio from the hit TV show, you'll join him on authentic roughshot adventures, from diving into the disappearance of Amelia Earhart to chasing Captain Morgan's treasure through Panama.

And the stories just keep coming, like uncovering our ancient origins in Africa, diving into the Bermuda Triangle's most baffling disappearances, and chasing lost treasure tied to a legendary warrior queen who nearly defeated the Roman Empire.

If you're drawn to real-world mysteries, historical anomalies, and stories that blur the line between legend and fact, this show will pull you in.

Gate Springs, the boots-on-the-ground investigation that makes these tales come alive.

Listen to Expedition Unknown wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode of the Y Files is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Today, you chose to hit play on this podcast.

Smart Choice.

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The aggressive casualty insurance company and affiliates, not available in all states or situations.

Prices vary based on how you buy.

You ever hear about the 1950s flight that vanished into thin air over Lake Michigan?

No wreckage, no trace, nothing?

Or the theory that Robin Hood might have actually been real, sneaking through underground tunnels to rob the rich?

Yeah, same here.

On Expedition Unknown, a podcast from Discovery, Josh Gates travels the globe to uncover the truth behind some of history's most bizarre and iconic legends.

With direct audio from the hit TV show, you'll join him on authentic roughshot adventures, from diving into the disappearance of Amelia Earhart to chasing Captain Morgan's treasure through Panama.

And the stories just keep coming, like uncovering our ancient origins in Africa, diving into the Bermuda Triangle's most baffling disappearances, and chasing lost treasure tied to a legendary warrior queen who nearly defeated the Roman Empire.

If you're drawn to real-world mysteries, historical anomalies, and stories that blur the line between legend and fact, this show will pull you in.

Gates brings the boots-on-the-ground investigation that makes these tales come alive.

Listen to Expedition Unknown wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode of the Y Files is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Today, you chose to hit play on this podcast.

Smart Choice.

Progressive loves to help people make smart choices.

That's why they offer a tool called AutoQuote Explorer that allows you to compare your progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies.

So you save time on the research and can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you.

Give it a try after this episode at Progressive.com.

The aggressive casualty insurance company and affiliates, not available in all states or situations.

Prices vary based on how you buy.

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Europa, Jupiter's sixth moon, is covered in ice.

It's 390 million miles from Earth.

It's also the best place in our solar system to look for alien life.

Why?

Because under the ice is a vast dark ocean.

It's been there for billions of years.

It's 100 miles deep, 10 times deeper than any ocean on Earth.

But does Europa have polymetallic nodules on its ocean floor?

The answer is almost certainly yes.

Until recently, scientists thought finding life on Europa was a long shot.

No sunlight penetrates the ice.

There's no photosynthesis, no oxygen.

But the dark oxygen discovery changes everything.

Europa orbits Jupiter, the largest planet in our solar system.

Jupiter's massive gravity creates enormous tidal forces.

It squeezes the moon, makes it expand and contract.

This creates friction.

Friction creates heat.

Heat keeps Europa's ocean liquid.

These conditions are perfect for mineral formation on the sea floor.

But there's more.

Radiation from Jupiter bombards Europa's surface ice.

This triggers radialysis, radiation splitting water molecules.

This works in liquid water and solid ice.

In 2024, Russian scientists proved radiation creates oxygen in Antarctica's ice.

And if it happens in Antarctica, it happens on Europa and on Enceladus, Saturn's sixth-largest moon, and on countless other ice-covered moons and planets throughout the universe.

This changes the math for alien life.

Our galaxy has about 40 billion Earth-sized planets in the Goldilocks zone.

Not too hot, hot, not too cold.

Places where water stays liquid, where plants could grow, where sunlight could produce oxygen.

But that only counts planets where photosynthesis works.

If we include worlds with dark oxygen, that number jumps from billions of planets that could contain life to trillions.

The dead zones of the universe could be filled with life.

NASA's developing equipment to detect electricity on distant worlds, to find metallic distributions on alien sea floors, to detect electromagnetic fields from natural batteries.

The James Webb Space Telescope can't see these things directly, but it can analyze atmospheres, detect chemical imbalances that might indicate dark oxygen at work.

Polymetallic nodules don't just produce electricity.

They split water.

They generate oxygen.

And on Earth, wherever there's energy, water, and oxygen, there's life.

But any organisms evolved to use dark oxygen and this type of energy would be unlike anything we'd we'd recognize.

They wouldn't use DNA as we know it.

They would form a shadow biosphere, hiding in plain sight for billions of years.

We've been searching for alien life at all the wrong places, looking at planets bathed in sunlight, planets like Earth.

But we missed something obvious.

Most of space is dark and cold, far from stars.

If dark oxygen exists throughout the universe, life could be almost anywhere.

So we're probably not alone.

And we probably never were.

When biologists discovered life around deep-sea hydrothermal vents in 1977, they had to rewrite biology textbooks.

Here were creatures thriving without sunlight.

Tube worms with no mouths or digestive systems.

Blind shrimp.

ghost-white crabs.

a whole ecosystem powered by heat and chemicals, not light.

But the life around polymetallic nodules is even stranger.

In 2023, scientists completed the most extensive survey of the Clarion-Clipperton zone.

They found over 5,000 different species living in the area, and 90% of those species were completely new discoveries.

On the barren sea floor, in pitch darkness, two miles down, an ecosystem as diverse as anything on the surface.

This wasn't just a few hardy creatures surviving in a harsh environment.

This was a complex, thriving ecosystem.

Many species were found living directly on the nodules themselves, drawn to the oxygen and the electricity.

Specialized microbes had evolved to harness the electrical charge directly.

They don't eat organic matter like most bacteria.

They eat electrons.

They're called electrotrophs.

And this isn't science fiction.

These microbes exist on Earth right now.

Scientists have found them on shipwrecks, near undersea cables, and around the nodules.

They represent an alternative path for life itself.

While plants evolve to capture sunlight, these organisms evolve to capture electricity.

If this sounds strange, consider how vast and deep the ocean is.

It covers 65% of the Earth's surface.

It's the largest habitable zone on the planet.

And for billions of years, it's been mostly isolated from the surface.

Life would evolve evolve differently, adapting to survive enormous pressure, to survive without light, to use electricity as food.

Some scientists believe the nodules aren't scattered randomly.

They form networks, patterns.

The distribution resembles a global circuit, like a vast computer network spanning the entire ocean floor.

The nodules generate electromagnetic fields.

The fields interact.

They create a web of electrical connections, almost like neurons in a brand.

Scientists call it the seafloor neural network.

It's a controversial theory, but the evidence is compelling.

Satellite measurements show subtle electromagnetic patterns emanating from the deep ocean, patterns that shift and pulse, that respond to changes in the Earth's magnetic field.

Some scientists even link the nodules to maritime mysteries like the Bermuda Triangle, areas where ships and planes vanish without explanation.

Areas that happen to align with unusual concentrations of nodules and strong electromagnetic anomalies.

Now, most researchers dismiss this as pseudoscience, but the U.S.

Navy has documented navigation equipment failures in these regions.

Compasses spinning, electronics malfunctioning, the same effects you'd expect from powerful electromagnetic fields.

Now, whether you believe these fringe theories or not, one thing is certain.

These ancient electric rocks have been part of Earth's system for billions of years.

They've influenced our planet in countless ways.

And we're now destroying them.

Deep-sea mining companies are already harvesting millions of tons of nodules.

They're destroying in days what took millions of years to form.

This could disrupt electrical fields essential to deep ocean life, or essential to all life.

If the nodules produce oxygen, and they do, a sudden change in their activity could alter ocean chemistry in a way that could trigger an ecological collapse.

It's happened before.

The mining companies know this.

They're doing it anyway.

You ever hear about the 1950s flight that vanished into thin air over Lake Michigan?

No wreckage, no trace, nothing?

Or the theory that Robin Hood might have actually been real, sneaking through underground tunnels to rob the rich?

Yeah, same here.

On Expedition Unknown, a podcast from Discovery, Josh Gates travels the globe to uncover the truth behind some of history's most bizarre and iconic legends.

With direct audio from the hit TV show, you'll join him on authentic roughshot adventures, from diving into the disappearance of Amelia Earhart to chasing Captain Morgan's treasure through Panama.

And the stories just keep coming, like uncovering our ancient origins in Africa, diving into the Bermuda Triangle's most baffling disappearances, and chasing lost treasure tied to a legendary warrior queen who nearly defeated the Roman Empire.

If you're drawn to real-world mysteries, historical anomalies, and stories that blur the line between legend and fact, this show will pull you in.

Gate Springs, the boots-on-the-ground investigation that makes these tales come alive.

Listen to Expedition Unknown wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode of the Y Files is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Today, you chose to hit play on this podcast.

Smart Choice.

Progressive loves to help people make smart choices.

That's why they offer a tool called AutoQuote Explorer that allows you to compare your progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies.

So you save time on the research and can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you.

Give it a try after this episode at Progressive.com.

The aggressive casualty insurance company and affiliates, not available in all states or situations.

Prices vary based on how you buy.

You ever hear about the 1950s flight that vanished into thin air over Lake Michigan?

No wreckage, no trace, nothing?

Or the theory that Robin Hood might have actually been real, sneaking through underground tunnels to rob the rich?

Yeah, same here.

On Expedition Unknown, a podcast from Discovery, Josh Gates travels the globe to uncover the truth behind some of history's most bizarre and iconic legends.

With direct audio from the hit TV show, you'll join him on authentic roughshot adventures.

from diving into the disappearance of Amelia Earhart to chasing Captain Morgan's treasure through Panama.

And the stories just keep coming.

Like uncovering our ancient origins in Africa, diving into the Bermuda Triangle's most baffling disappearances, and chasing lost treasure tied to a legendary warrior queen who nearly defeated the Roman Empire.

If you're drawn to real-world mysteries, historical anomalies, and stories that blur the line between legend and fact, this show will pull you in.

Gates brings the boots-on-the-ground investigation that makes these tales come alive.

Listen to Expedition Unknown wherever you get your podcasts.

This episode of the Y Files is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

Today you chose to hit play on this podcast.

Smart Choice.

Progressive loves to help people make smart choices.

That's why they offer a tool called AutoQuote Explorer that allows you to compare your progressive car insurance quote with rates from other companies so you save time on the research and can enjoy savings when you choose the best rate for you.

Give it a try after this episode at Progressive.com.

The aggressive casualty insurance company and affiliates, not available in all states or situations.

Prices vary based on how you buy.

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The discovery of dark oxygen forces us to reconsider what we know about life on Earth and beyond.

But let's clean up some of the science.

Here are the established facts.

Scientists have confirmed that polymetallic nodules on the deep sea floor produce electric currents.

These currents are strong enough to split water molecules and release oxygen.

This happens without sunlight, without photosynthesis.

It happens in total darkness.

This process has been verified in laboratory settings.

The voltage has been measured.

The oxygen production has been documented.

The phenomenon is real.

The nodules contain valuable minerals, manganese, nickel, cobalt, copper.

They formed over millions of years in a process so slow, it's almost impossible to comprehend.

One centimeter can take several million years to develop.

The ecosystems around these nodules are diverse.

They contain thousands of species previously unknown to science.

Many evolved to live directly on or around the nodules.

But this is where certainty ends and scientific debate begins.

Some researchers believe dark oxygen played a crucial crucial role in the Earth's early atmosphere, maybe even before photosynthesis evolved.

They point to geological evidence that shows oxygen appearing in bursts, regardless of what types of plants, if any, existed at that time.

Others feel that dark oxygen, while fascinating, is a minor contributor.

Most of Earth's oxygen still comes from plants and other photosynthetic organisms like algae and bacteria.

Scientists also disagree about the ocean floor neural network theory.

Some see evidence of patterns consistent with a global system, but skeptics say they're seeing patterns where none exists.

Then there is the space connection.

If dark oxygen exists on Earth, it probably exists elsewhere.

On Europa, on Enceladus, on countless worlds throughout the universe.

This changes our search for extraterrestrial life.

We're no longer limited to the narrow band of planets where photosynthesis could occur.

The habitable zone expands dramatically.

So dramatically that any planet or any moon at any distance from any star could harbor life.

Even rogue planets and asteroids in between systems, there could be life present.

Then there's the environmental implications.

How dare you!

The mining industry says we have an urgent need for these minerals.

Cobalt, nickel, and manganese are essential for batteries, for renewable energy, for storage to power electric cars, homes, even aircraft.

They argue that deep-sea mining is less destructive than land-based mining.

No forests are cleared, no rivers are polluted, no communities are displaced.

Well, that's not exactly true, is it?

Regulations were just passed, and mining has begun just within the last couple of months.

Now, once harvested, these ancient formations can't be replaced.

Scientists have documented the test mining sites from the 1970s.

Even after 50 years, the damage is there.

The seafloor will heal, but it will take millions of years.

Now, maybe mining the seafloor is the right decision.

Maybe it's cleaner and safer than surface mining.

Maybe these electrified, oxygen-producing rocks can be removed without repercussions.

Or maybe disrupting this network could lead to an ecological disaster.

We really don't know.

In Earth's history, there have been five extinction events.

All of them coincide with changes in ocean chemistry.

And two of those extinction events were caused specifically by lack of oxygen in the ocean.

We're gambling with an ecosystem we barely understand.

But we do know that when the earth gets sick, it heals itself.

And it doesn't care who gets hurt in the process.

Bacteria, plants, animals, dinosaurs, 99% of all species that have ever existed are extinct.

And if we're not careful, we could trigger the sixth global extinction event.

And if we do, the next extinct species will be us.

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