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00:00What would happen if every human being on earth disappeared?
00:09This isn't the story of how we might vanish.
00:13It is the story of what happens to the world we leave behind.
00:19In this episode of Life After People, divine images rot from within.
00:29While Satan's minions multiply, can the forces of darkness bring down God's holy sanctuaries?
00:43Welcome to Earth, population zero.
00:59The streets of Earth are empty.
01:06And the faithful no longer fill the pews at millions of houses of worship around the world.
01:17The flocks are gone at St. Peter's Basilica in Vatican City, where a faith thrived for two millennia.
01:26In the hall, where the Shroud of Turin was displayed.
01:30And in America's megachurches, where millions once prayed.
01:39Mankind built his religious structures and monuments to last for eternity.
01:45Is a very long time.
01:56One day, after people.
01:58In Rio de Janeiro, high above the city of God, Christ the Redeemer remains one of the most awesome man-made sites on earth.
02:07Towering over a landscape that once was home to more than six million souls.
02:16Completed in 1931 and rising 130 feet, the statue has a secret.
02:24It seems to withstand everything nature can throw at it.
02:29Even frequent bolts of lightning.
02:38The statue seems poised for a long reign on earth.
02:45But one day after people.
02:47As power plants begin to shut down around the world.
02:51Will the Redeemer continue to be a light in the darkness?
03:02Two days after people.
03:05The image of Jesus Christ lives on around the world.
03:12In the time of humans, the most controversial was the Shroud of Turin.
03:17Many Christians believed the Shroud was the actual burial cloth of Christ.
03:27Millions of believers descended on Turin for rare public viewings.
03:32Held only about once every 25 years.
03:35In past years, the Shroud was rolled on a wooden dowel and stored in a casket covered with asbestos to safeguard against fire.
03:48It was determined that continued rolling of the Shroud onto this dowel and keeping it in this casket was not very good for its conservation and preservation.
03:58So a new container was designed and constructed.
04:00The new more than two-ton bulletproof case automatically monitors and adjusts barometric pressure, temperature, and humidity according to changing weather conditions.
04:13But when the electricity shuts down, so does the protection.
04:18With no one to return the container to its secured storage vault, it's now on display in Turin for eternity.
04:34Three days after people, in this empty church, the stained glass depicts one of the most important creatures of the Bible.
04:42Sheep thrived into the modern era.
04:47In the 21st century, their population had swelled to more than a billion worldwide.
04:53Now, sheep are suddenly in grave danger as predators line up for the feast.
05:01But some still have one chance for survival.
05:04For 6,000 years, Anatolian dogs were specifically bred to guard sheep from predators.
05:15If the dog's flock is threatened by bear or mountain lion or wolves, the dog will seek out the threat.
05:24The dogs have even evolved to resemble the sheep.
05:35Their light-colored coats and black muzzles help them to blend in,
05:40making it hard for predators to pinpoint their exact location.
05:45But how long will the canine shepherds tend to their flocks?
05:54Four days after people, in Rio de Janeiro, the night is fully returned to darkness.
06:11In the time of humans, unknown to the millions living below, this statue had a secret power.
06:24As part of a major renovation aimed to save the statue, workers gave the Redeemer an electric force field.
06:31In the year 2000, the statue was fitted with a cathode mesh system, which actually is a mesh of wires that was installed inside the statue.
06:45And then they were electrified with a low voltage charge.
06:48The low voltage charge actually draws corrosion away from the original steel reinforcement.
06:55And the wire mesh takes on that corrosion.
06:57Now, without its force field, how long can the Redeemer last?
07:07We know from the history of the statue that corrosion will take hold again very, very quickly.
07:15One week after people, in Rome, towering above all else is the dome of St. Peter's Basilica, reputedly built directly above the tomb of St. Peter, the first pope of the Roman Catholic Church.
07:39Designed by Michelangelo and completed in 1626, the 452 foot tall engineering marvel is still one of the tallest domed structures in the world.
07:54But it has been plagued by structural problems from the beginning.
07:57After construction, it formed cracks around the base because of the outward expansion of the dome structure.
08:06The solution to that was to insert chains and tension those chains to close up the crack as best they could.
08:15And they are still there today.
08:16The chains were designed to hug the inner dome, like the iron bands that hold a barrel together.
08:25Rather than actual links, the system uses interlocking iron bars.
08:31The chains themselves are wrought iron.
08:33Wrought iron will rust on the surface, but won't rust through.
08:38The rust on the surface protects the rest of the iron.
08:41The chains will maintain their strength for hundreds of years if left alone.
08:48Outside the Vatican, Rome's a creature once unwelcome on these streets.
08:56Black cats were long associated with pagan rituals.
09:01In the year 1233, Pope Gregory IX actually declared them instruments of the devil.
09:07Eventually, they were seen as bad luck.
09:13As recently as 2006, an estimated 60,000 were killed in Italy by superstitious citizens.
09:21In 2007, animal rights groups petitioned the Pope to renounce the slaughter.
09:28Now, with no humans to cross their paths, black cats will repopulate the country.
09:47Two months after people, the sun is setting on the tombs of the dead.
09:52In the time of humans, eternal rest wasn't always eternal.
10:01These poor souls are resting in pieces.
10:16What are these bones doing hidden in the floor?
10:19Unlike the wide open spaces of America, where burial plots could remain untouched, burial practices in modern Europe included an ancient method of maximizing space, the ossuary.
10:39Individuals are buried in a grave for a period of time until they skeletonize.
10:46The skeleton is removed from the burial site and moved to an ossuary.
10:50So you can just get more buried people in one area.
10:53And then the burial ground is reused.
10:55Evidence of ossuaries dates back well beyond 3000 BC.
11:03The very largest is the Paris catacombs, believed to contain the bones of more than 6 million people.
11:11There was a sense in Christian theology that sooner or later, there would be a day of judgment, a resurrection of the dead.
11:21And it was imagined that people would inhabit their former bodies.
11:28This is true with many religions today.
11:31We must treat the remains of the deceased properly and with respect so that they make a transition into the afterlife properly.
11:41The remains of these forgotten souls are now mingled forever.
11:48It's six months into a life after people.
12:01And even the modern cathedrals of God face an uncertain future.
12:05The Crystal Cathedral megachurch, just outside of Los Angeles, was one of the most recognized symbols of the Christian faith.
12:19With a worldwide television broadcast attracting 20 million followers.
12:26Seating nearly 3000 worshippers, it's one of the largest glass buildings in the world.
12:30The 10,000 panes of glass are attached with a silicone adhesive.
12:38The flexibility of the silicone was intended to help the glass resist up to 100 mile per hour winds.
12:46And survive an 8.0 earthquake.
12:48But there's another LA hazard attacking the windows.
12:54In a time of people, air pollution has really affected the glass quite a bit.
13:01The acid air contaminants like oxides of nitrogen, smog, eat away at the glass's protective, reflective coating.
13:11Every year, a scheduled inspection and cleaning was intended to prevent decay and failure.
13:20The difficult work required two weeks and 100,000 gallons of ammonia and water to complete.
13:27But the only cleaning the windows will now be getting
13:29is the infrequent Southern California rainstorm.
13:39Like a biblical apocalypse, the natural world is winning the battle with man's achievements.
13:46And only one faithful servant can prevent the coming slaughter.
13:52It's one year into a life after people.
14:05Like grim prophecies ripped from the pages of revelations,
14:09the world's greatest structures crack and crumble,
14:13helpless in the wake of man's absence.
14:16The 2,000-year-old Roman Colosseum is one of the most famous structures ever built by man.
14:25Inside these ancient walls, some say a half million Christians met violent deaths just to entertain the citizens of Rome.
14:35In 1349, a massive earthquake brought down the entire southern wall.
14:45Looters hauled off pieces of the facade for use in other buildings, including St. Peter's Basilica.
14:52But even without humans to clean and care for it, the ancient arena could outlast the best modern buildings.
15:00The Colosseum is an incredible structure because it's built by a culture that invented concrete.
15:07There are no reinforcing rods.
15:10And no reinforcing rods means there's no steel to rust.
15:15No steel rusting means no expansion and extra cracks.
15:20It was built to last.
15:23It was built for the ages.
15:24In one colosseum, Christians were sent to die.
15:31Across the globe, in the City of Angels, another colosseum once drew them to worship.
15:39Built in 1923, the Los Angeles Memorial Colosseum once attracted a record audience of more than 134,000 worshipers to an appearance by Billy Graham.
15:51But in the first year after people, no amount of prayer can cast out the seeds of destruction.
16:01The Los Angeles Colosseum is totally open as a structure.
16:06Animals and plant life can move right into the arcades under the stands.
16:12So this is a building that's going to get attacked both from inside and outside very, very quickly.
16:18Two colosseums.
16:22Constructed some 1900 years apart.
16:26Which structure will claim ultimate victory?
16:37Five years after people, a biblical symbol of evil is on the rise.
16:42In the book of Genesis, the evil presence in the Garden of Eden, a serpent, turns man against the will of God.
16:55The symbol of evil was the serpent.
16:59And this symbolism transcends all the way down into modern culture.
17:10Venomous serpents, like the rattlesnake, were a literal menace to mankind.
17:16A menace man tried to eradicate.
17:18What I have here is Cortalis atrox, the Western diamondback rattlesnake.
17:24Now, people and snakes, they intersect in everyday lives.
17:28In the time of humans, rattlesnakes were contained with annual roundups held in the American South and Midwest.
17:38The snakes were hunted to protect cattle and entertain the curious at popular festivals.
17:46On average, some 16,000 snakes were captured and killed every year.
17:51But now, it's the snakes who are staging a roundup of a different sort.
17:59Five years after people, you're looking at the beginning of an arms race between the rodent empire and the snake empire.
18:08Remove people from the equation.
18:11Immediately, you have tons and tons of human waste.
18:15All these rodents would move in.
18:17The snakes would follow the food.
18:18And since they're opportunistic eaters, they'll be going after city mice, rats, even small cats, baby kittens.
18:28Anything that follows the food and takes over an urban sprawl once people leave is just rife for pickings by snakes.
18:39Five years without their human predators, and the Bible's symbol of pure evil is looking to make a comeback.
18:49But there are other predators on the prowl.
18:52These wolves are in search of an easy meal.
18:57They won't find it here.
18:59The Anatolian dogs still guard their sheep, willing to fight to the death to protect them.
19:05That unswerving dedication begins at the moment of a sheep's birth.
19:13The dogs will guard the ewes while they're having their lambs.
19:18They'll help the ew deliver the placenta, and then the placenta will be taken away and be eaten by the dog so it doesn't draw the wolves or the coyotes out of the hills.
19:27Even in times of sickness, the dog goes to extreme lengths for the good of the flock.
19:38The dog will guard the sick animal until it either gets better or it dies.
19:42Two, three, five generations down the road, you're not going to see much change in the trait of these dogs.
19:51But as wild dogs spread out, crossbreeding with Anatolians could rearrange the guardian's DNA and leave sheep wide open to predators.
20:0525 years after people, the glorious walls of the Crystal Cathedral once again become a unique kind of sanctuary.
20:23The megachurch was designed with glass panels that automatically open and close.
20:28With the power out, some open panels have allowed a steady stream of windblown seeds inside.
20:41Very soon after people, plants would become king of this holy kingdom.
20:51The former church is now a greenhouse, as the glass allows in solar heat.
20:56And even supports an automatic sprinkler system.
21:01As the moisture comes up in cool evenings, it would coat the undersides of the glass and drip back down.
21:10And you would have a cycle, almost a natural rain cycle inside, even if you didn't have it outside.
21:17The Crystal Cathedral is well on its way to becoming a new Garden of Eden.
21:22But the 10,000 glass panes were not designed for such a role in a life after people.
21:31The rubber and the gaskets will degrade over time.
21:36If they aren't giving close attention, those pieces of glass will start falling out.
21:41In Rome, amid the dark, deteriorating structures, a strange white-walled building juts up from the undergrowth.
21:57This is the Jubilee Church.
21:59Completed in 2003, its immense concrete walls were intended to represent the longevity of the Roman Catholic Church.
22:10Now, they are doing just that.
22:13The walls are somehow still gleaming white and resisting the destructive rampage of plant life.
22:19Could the city of Rome, center of the Roman Catholic faith, be experiencing a genuine miracle in a life after people?
22:3250 years after people, standing 2,400 feet on the peak of Brazil's Corcovado Mountain, the 1,145-ton Christ the Redeemer is struggling to maintain his pose.
22:52As you get closer, you'll realize that some of the outside veneer, the fine detail of soapstone will have pulled away.
23:03A renovation in the year 2000 revealed weak spots.
23:09The first things to fail are likely to be where the statue has been patched in the past, especially the wrists, some sections of the arms, the neck.
23:19That's where the greatest stresses have occurred on the structure.
23:25It's the beginning of the end for Christ the Redeemer's reign on Earth.
23:30In 50 years without people, unstoppable forces play hell with man's legacy.
23:49In one remote desert of the world, a devil with this methodically drowning homes and dismantling a town brick by brick.
24:01Here, a biblical plague has already arrived.
24:0550 years after people, desert towns around the world are being sandblasted into oblivion.
24:27How do we know this?
24:31There's one forsaken place in the middle of an ancient desert where it's already happened.
24:41This is Kolmanskop, Namibia.
24:47It may seem like a hellish mirage, rising from southern Africa's Namib desert.
24:54But this is no illusion.
24:57It is one of the most remarkable sights on the planet.
25:01A town whose fate could have been ripped right from the pages of the Old Testament.
25:06Hundreds of miles south of Windhoek, the Namibian capital city, Kolmanskop is hanging on in a godforsaken corner of the desert.
25:20Dozens of homes and public buildings scar the desert hillside like half-buried corpses.
25:27In 1903, it was a boom town.
25:32Hundreds of German workers lived and worked here under the harshest possible conditions.
25:38It's a very harsh environment, lots of wind.
25:42That wind can carry a lot of sand.
25:44It can be extremely irritating and annoying place to live.
25:49Why would anyone choose to live in the middle of this desert?
25:53One word, diamonds.
25:58Millions of years earlier, the diamonds erupted from the earth and were slowly scattered and blown north into the Namibian desert.
26:08In Kolmanskop, the workers literally plucked them from the surface, often using the light of the moon.
26:15Today, their once comfortable social halls and living rooms are now visited by an unwelcome guest.
26:29The very desert itself.
26:31This house acts as a natural wind block so that the sand that comes in through the windows and doors accumulates here and piles up on the walls and grows higher and higher, sort of like water on a sinking ship.
26:54Doors are frozen in place.
26:59Stairways lead to nowhere.
27:04And bathtubs that once held precious water are drowning in a sea of sand.
27:12Everywhere, the fine grains invade the weakened structures, forming perfect dunes, disturbed only by the footprints of rodents.
27:30In pursuit of the rodents come the modern day residents of Kolmanskop.
27:37A variety of serpents, including the deadly coral snake, now call these hallways their home.
27:44As the dunes slowly fill each room, sand pummels the building's exteriors.
27:58You can see that the sand grains at the base have cut through and physically eroded away the wall, leaving a huge gap.
28:07We can follow that along this wall, partly covered up by dune sand.
28:10And down here we have the ultimate, the next step result is that the gravitational forces have literally allowed this wall to drop into that gap.
28:20And if we follow it further down, we see the final product of the entire crumbled down wall and the collapsed roof on top.
28:32How quickly the buildings deteriorate depends on the quality of the brickwork.
28:38Here's an excellent example of a south-facing wall showing the different weathering.
28:48We've got the more resistant coarse-grain bricks above, which are sticking out in positive relief.
28:54The mortar in between the bricks is softer as weathered out.
28:57Below that, we have the opposite.
28:59We've got soft bricks that have weathered out preferentially and left behind the harder mortar in between.
29:05Even though Kolmanskop is surrounded by desert, it's surprisingly close to the Atlantic Ocean.
29:15When diamonds near Kolmanskop began drying up just a few years after its founding,
29:21the German miners built another prospecting outpost here, 12 miles south, at a place called Elizabeth Bay.
29:28Here, sea salt has proven to be an even more efficient destroyer of brick.
29:37Many of the bricks have completely disappeared, leaving behind the mortar that once held them in place.
29:44The extreme conditions often forced the settlers inside.
29:53Known as the casino, this once magnificent structure was a regular gathering place for concerts and even worship services.
30:02They built a theater, they had a lot of musical events, and there wasn't a lot else to do.
30:09And there was not a lot of interest in being outdoors in the harsh environment.
30:14By the early 1930s, the diamonds in Kolmanskop and Elizabeth Bay were drying up.
30:22The last family departed in 1956.
30:31Taken directly from the pages of the Bible, God's take on mankind's demise is now a fitting requiem for Kolmanskop.
30:42From dust you came, to dust you shall return.
30:55Seventy-five years after people.
30:59In the midst of Rome's decaying buildings, the Jubilee Church is still standing tall and bright.
31:06How can the concrete walls remain so clean and white, with no human hands to maintain them?
31:15The structure is a miracle of engineering.
31:19This church is actually coated with a titanium dioxide based cement.
31:26It's called photocatalytic cement.
31:28And what this material does, with sunlight, it will actually decompose CO2 and environmental pollutants and self-clean the church.
31:39The cement sheds dirt and water with ease, making it difficult for plants to colonize.
31:47This beautiful white exterior theoretically could last forever.
31:51Another modern temple, the Crystal Cathedral, is still the world's greatest glass megachurch.
32:04But the works of man are humbled by greater forces.
32:08Ultimately, we'd be left with a fairly light structural steel frame with very few panes of glass.
32:14And finally, the process of steel corrosion would bring the whole structure down.
32:21Beneath the rubble of civilization, the ancient symbol of evil incarnate is king.
32:44With no human predators, rattlesnakes are growing to enormous sizes.
32:51The larger an animal gets, the more it can breed.
32:55And genetically, the larger the offspring will be.
32:58It could be getting to the point where right now the western diamondback, the largest recorded individual, was approaching 7 feet long.
33:05If we were to leave that alone for 10, 15, 100 years, imagine the size of that snake as it could just grow unchecked.
33:13To the point where it could possibly become an apex predator like some South American species.
33:17I wouldn't be surprised to see an eight or nine foot rattlesnake in as little as 50 years.
33:2475 years after people and 65 million years after the dinosaurs, the age of the reptiles has returned.
33:34100 years after people, the roof atop the Turin cathedral in Turin, Italy, is the only barrier separating the heavens and the shroud of Turin below.
33:55Leaking cracks in the 15th century dome finally reach a point of utter collapse, exposing the shroud to sunlight.
34:05The growing concern over the years was that any kind of UV exposure perhaps would cause an aging or a darkening of the rest of the cloth.
34:16The daily doses of UV radiation are slowly fading the shroud's famous image.
34:27But another more destructive force is pressing the attack.
34:32The greatest risk to the shroud of Turin or any ancient linen isn't so much the ultraviolet from light as it is humidity or moisture.
34:46In just a few short years, as rainstorms saturate the failed seals, mold begins attacking the linen.
35:01The image many believed was Jesus Christ is destroyed by a lowly fungus.
35:07150 years after people, compared to the ancient concrete in the Roman Colosseum, the reinforced concrete of the Los Angeles Colosseum is in dire straits.
35:30In the time of humans, the 1994 Northridge earthquake caused nearly $100 million in damage to the structure.
35:42The damage was quite extensive, especially in the reinforced concrete columns and beams supporting the upper concourse.
35:51Now, another earthquake rumbles through Los Angeles.
35:54Roman-style arches made of modern concrete are shattered.
36:04The cheap seats provide a front row seat to the destruction.
36:24250 years after people.
36:37The Roman Colosseum is little changed.
36:42In the time of humans, the relentless clearing of plant life by workers kept the walls pristine.
36:48Now, extreme plant growth is choking the ancient concrete, but something is preserving it for the ages.
37:00The Romans used the same kind of limestone that we use, but as an aggregate, they used volcanic ash.
37:09It's a little bit finer, and the chemical balance, somewhat by accident, was just about perfect.
37:18The volcanic ash within is so dense, water cannot penetrate the concrete and expand during freeze-thaw cycles.
37:26Rome wasn't built in a day, and its Colosseum was built for the ages.
37:32Across the world, the corroded bones of Christ the Redeemer are now covered in a robe of green.
37:43The plant life would have colonized it.
37:48Wind would have scoured some of the surface.
37:51Ultimately, in a really high wind event, this statue could topple over.
37:57As the remaining monuments to God are cracking and crumbling,
38:21As the remaining monuments to God are cracking and crumbling,
38:27will the last shepherd on earth resist the urge to abandon his flock?
38:40500 years after people.
38:43The absence of mankind has turned most sacred places into hellish visions of biblical prophecy.
38:53Specifically in the book of Revelation, where we're painted this horrible picture of earth
39:01as a place of absolute and total destruction,
39:05where everything that existed on earth no longer exists.
39:14Five centuries after people, the mountains above Rio de Janeiro
39:18are no longer graced by the figure of Jesus Christ.
39:24Probably 400 or 500 years from now,
39:27on top of this mountain will be something that looks like a huge tree
39:31that's overgrown, and that was once the statue of Christ the Redeemer.
39:43At the Vatican, the dome of St. Peter's Basilica still rises high above the city,
39:51but the iron support chains
39:54are being pushed to the limit.
39:59Over time, in the absence of people,
40:02that dome structure would want to expand at the base.
40:06That's going to be the vulnerable area of the dome.
40:08As the base pushes outward, a second force is acting from above.
40:15After the dome's completion in 1590,
40:19a cross and a decorative lantern were placed on top,
40:23weighing more than three tons.
40:30At the base, rainwater has attacked St. Peter's flat roof.
40:35I think the first thing that's going to go on St. Peter's
40:39is the roofing material.
40:41Sheets of metal that probably over the next 200 or 300 years
40:45are going to start weathering through.
40:47The roof will eventually disappear.
40:51Ultimately, corrosion will take over.
40:55The chains will break.
40:56And the extra support to the dome will be gone.
41:021,000 years after people,
41:22without reinforcing rods to tear it apart,
41:25the Colosseum is still a testament to Roman concrete.
41:29But the thicket growing inside is winning this battle.
41:35Birds have carried seeds from all corners of the Roman Empire
41:38throughout its history and deposited them there.
41:42And in a life after people,
41:44that may be a large part of what will eventually
41:47bring the rest of those walls down.
41:52In its weakened condition,
41:54an earthquake gives the home of the gladiators a final push.
42:12Despite the passage of many centuries,
42:15incredibly, Anatolian sheepdogs remain on guard duty
42:19over their flocks.
42:20They have avoided interbreeding with other dogs,
42:24which would have dulled their sheep-herding instincts.
42:28In life after people,
42:31the dogs will not crossbreed
42:34because any dog that they see
42:37will be presumed to be a predator.
42:39So you could see 10, 20 generations down the road,
42:44these dogs doing what they've been bred to do
42:46for the past 6,000 years.
42:48The remnants of man,
42:55his sacred sites,
42:57his cathedrals,
42:58and the inspired images of God
43:01have returned to dust.
43:05But the spirit of mankind lives on here
43:08in the legacy of devotion
43:10he created between the sheepdog
43:13and his flock.
43:14In the next episode of Life After People,
43:21a common chemical becomes a toxic cloud of death.
43:25Power plants find a secret way to go nuclear.
43:29Niagara Falls gets a whole new meaning.
43:31And this town in America's heartland
43:34was killed by three forms of toxic revenge.
43:37겨 jamais
43:39By the end.
43:39And the
43:48way,
43:49like the