Ancient Aliens

Strange, sharp-toothed predators.

Their genes don't match up

with anything else that we have on Earth.

Multi-legged behemoths.

The kraken scared humans for centuries.

And ravenous reptiles that prey on humans.

Children are warned to stay away

from bodies of water because the kappa will actually

drag them in and drown them.

Throughout history,

there are accounts of bizarre

and frightening creatures inhabiting our waters.

Is it possible that they come not from our lakes and oceans,

but from somewhere far more remote?

Could it be possible

that some of that light that we've discovered

at the bottom of the ocean had its origin in outer space?

Since the dawn of civilization,

mankind has credited its origins to gods

and other visitors from the stars.

What if it were true?

Did extraterrestrial beings

really help to shape our history?

And if so...

might they have come in the form of creatures of the deep?

August 19, 2014.

During a routine cleaning,

Russian cosmonauts aboard the International Space Station

discover something incredibly unexpected

covering parts of the windows...

Living sea plankton.

According to some mainstream scientists,

the tiny organisms may have been carried to the station

on air currents from the earth's oceans,

or perhaps launched into space on a contaminated rocket.

But many say these are both highly improbable scenarios.

In the previous episode of cleaning,

which was only about a few weeks prior to that particular date,

there was nothing found.

And the space station was in orbit;

There was no connection with the ground.

So I-I really think that there's absolutely no chance

that these are microorganisms that were

somehow lifted from the Earth.

Astrobiologist Chandra Wickramasinghe

believes the plankton is of extraterrestrial origin,

and evidence of panspermia...

The idea that life exists throughout the universe

and is spread by comets and asteroids.

I think what happened

was that a small fragment of a comet

that carried microorganisms, uh,

including plankton, landed on the window

of the International Space Station.

It's not surprising if one accepts the idea

that life is continuing to arrive

at the Earth from space.

There's always been a-a problem about life on Earth.

Did it actually start here on Earth

or come here from somewhere else?

Uh, seeing as we don't know how life began,

it's up for grabs.

But whether life originated on Earth

or somewhere else in the universe,

one thing is now certain:

Sea plankton can survive in outer space.

Surviving space is very difficult, actually,

primarily because of the, um, the vacuum of space

and then the intense radiation.

And so those things, um, in general

will sort of rip apart tissues.

So the presence of-of plankton

on the space station, um, is remarkable.

The discovery of plankton

on the International Space Station

has led ancient astronaut theorists

to ask the question:

If sea life can thrive in the furthest reaches of space,

could the reverse be true as well?

Might there be undiscovered alien life-forms

dwelling in the deepest regions of our oceans?

Portsmouth, England.

December 21, 1872.

The HMS Challenger sets out

on a three-year scientific expedition

to survey the Earth's oceans and search for new marine life.

At the time of its departure,

the mainstream scientific viewpoint

is that life cannot exist more than 1,800 feet

beneath the surface of the ocean.

But in March of 1875,

after more than two years at sea,

the crew of the HMS Challenger makes a remarkable discovery.

Using a deep-sea dredge,

they uncover an abundance of life

at depths well beyond 1,800 feet.

Every time they dredged the waters of the ocean,

they kept bringing up weirder and weirder creatures

at deeper and deeper levels.

And it quickly became apparent

that the oceans are teeming with life.

Throughout time, we tend to sort of, um,

impose our own limitations and our own perspectives on,

sort of, our view of the universe, right?

And so our idea of the deep ocean was similar to that, too.

We thought that probably nothing else could live at great depths

because we certainly couldn't survive.

Um, our bodies couldn't take the pressure.

It's sort of biased, I think, our interpretation

of life in the deep oceans.

They found over 4,700 different types of new life.

It was a wealth of data so vast that it filled

50 volumes with 30,000 pages of information,

and was, essentially,

a scientific revolution for its time.

Uh, 220-plus, uh, crew.

Only five scientists...

In addition to finding new species of marine life,

the Challenger crew also made the first discovery

of what are called cosmic spherules...

Nickel-iron micrometeorites from outer space.

According to some scientists, these spherules could be capable

of carrying extraterrestrial life.

A lot of those rocks

would have carried a microbial cargo.

Cocooned inside of rocks, a microbe could be quite happy

in the harsh conditions of space.

In particular, it would be shielded from radiation by

the depth of rock.

It could probably stay in the dormant phase

out in space for certainly thousands

if not millions of years.

When scientists explored these nickel-iron spherules

in depth, they discovered that they contained iron

that was extraterrestrial in origin.

Is it possible that this extraterrestrial substances

were brought here by alien beings and deposited

in the oceans of Earth, along with other forms of life?

Is it possible that the Challenger

discovered the conveyance

of extraterrestrial life on the sea floor?

Might the deepest parts of the ocean be as alien to us

as the farthest reaches of outer space?

Ancient astronaut theorists believe the answer

is a resounding yes,

and point to other strange creatures

that have recently been found

in the seemingly inhospitable deep.

March, 2005.

Scientists off the coast of Easter Island

discover the yeti crab,

a furry crustacean that thrives on the sea floor

near hydrothermal vents...

Fissures that release geothermally-heated water.

Using the hair that covers its body,

the crab is able to filter out

the toxic minerals the vents excrete.

But as extraordinary as the yeti crab is,

it is just one of many forms of marine life

known to be able to exist in such extreme conditions.

Because of the unique conditions that exists

in the hydrothermal vents, um, some really interesting

and remarkable organisms can be found there.

Another newly-discovered organism

that puzzles scientists is the ctenophore, or comb jelly.

When neurobiologist Leonid Moroz sequenced the DNA

of this translucent creature

at the University of Florida in 2007, he discovered

they possessed a complex nervous system

completely different from the entire animal kingdom.

How comb jellies function

continues to baffle scientists,

and their unique properties have led Dr. Moroz to dub them,

quote, "aliens of the sea."

We're still finding incredible creatures in the ocean,

creatures that we never even knew existed.

Could be extraterrestrial life.

It's a big planet, and there are a lot of mysteries still here.

Could there really be alien life

thriving in Earth's oceans?

Might they have traveled here on meteors,

like the plankton found aboard the International Space Station?

Perhaps further clues can be found

by examining the legends of strange aquatic creatures

that were said to have come to Earth from the stars.

Miyazaki Prefecture, Japan.

May, 2014.

At the historic Miyakonojo Shimazu Residence,

the mummified remains of a sea animal

with webbed hands and feet are put on public display.

Discovered in 1818,

the bones are the first of their kind to be exhibited,

and are purported to be from the legendary kappa...

A species of amphibious humanoid creatures

believed to lurk in the waters of Japan.

These remains were from, allegedly,

a kappa that had been shot in 1818 near a local river.

The kappa, which translates as "water child,"

is a creature that is usually about five feet in height,

has scaly skin,