Space's Deepest Secrets

Above the Atlantic Ocean...

And my first thought was, "What was that?"

...there is a region of space...

- I'd do this, and there'd be blood on my finger. - ...that is dangerous

for reasons we don't yet understand.

It's not clear why, but the last time there was communication

with the satellite, was actually in this area.

This area of the South Atlantic

was giving us errors all the time, every day,

every time we passed through it.

You can see there are some irregularities.

You see six or seven of these peaks each day.

Some scientists now think the long-term effects of this danger zone,

may be far wider reaching than anyone ever expected.

On Earth, that can lead to a breakdown of the ozone layer.

Our whole species has developed

under that kind of protective envelope.

It's called the South Atlantic Anomaly.

And it may even have implications for the future of humanity

in space, and on Earth.

Deep within NASA's mission control center,

as small team of scientists works 24-7,

to protect NASA's astronauts from the dangers of space.

- You ready to write the alert? - Yeah, I'll get it set,

- so when we hit it, we can just send it out. - Okay, sounds good.

Three-five. We are ready to start.

Two... one... booster ignition

and lift off of Shuttle Endeavor,

with NASA's final space station crew compartment

that brings a bay window view for our celestial backyard.

For former fighter pilot, Terry Virts,

this was his first mission into space.

One of the most special experiences of my life

was seeing Earth for the first time.

As I launched at night time

I had a chance, very briefly, for a few seconds,

to see the whole east coast of America.

It kinda took my breath away. I wasn't prepared for that emotional impact.

Terry was one of six astronauts on a 14-day mission

to finish constructing the International Space Station.

By our fifth day in space, we were docked with the space station.

We were about 400 kilometers in altitude above the Earth.

It was a normal day.

It may have been a normal day for someone

trained to work miles above Earth's surface.

But what happened next, changed Terry's life forever.

I was exhausted, like I was every night, getting ready for bed.

I got in my sleeping bag, pulled it over my head,

closed my eyes. And just a few minutes after that,

I saw this giant, white flash,

and I opened my eyes.

And my first thought was, "What was that?"

Computers were fine.

There was no problem on board.

None of my other crew mates woke up and said, "Hey, did you see that?"

It was just me.

And then it wasn't long after that,

a few days after that that I started noticing my face was bleeding.

I'd do this, and there would be blood on my finger.

There's a lot of mystery in space.

There's a lot of things that we don't know.

Terry had just crossed into a region scientists call

the South Atlantic Anomaly,

the so-called Bermuda Triangle of space.

It's an area of heightened radiation

which experts have been aware of since the dawn of the space age.

But it's true danger only really became appreciated in the early 1980s.

In Surrey, England, a small team of university students

dreamt of joining the space race.

Back in 1983, it all began.

And we did photographically record the building of the space craft.

This is state-of-the-art technology, 1980s style.

Absolutely nothing by modern standards, but remarkable at the time.

These engineers wanted to build a communication satellite

using a low-budget, off-the-shelf technology,

the type of devices that had never before been sent into space.

In the mid '80s, everyone thought we were crazy to do this.

The, sort of, mainstream industry say, "Why are you doing this?

This is kind of like a toy space craft."

Because most space craft use special electronics to work in space.

Craig's mission was a big risk at the time.

It carried some very early experiments in digital communications

and digital imaging. In fact, it was a pioneer of these techniques.

We were flying state-of-the-art technology

similar to the emerging personal computer technology of the time,

devices that essentially have an unknown heritage in space.

So part of the activity was to see exactly how do these things respond.

The experiment so intrigued NASA,

that they agreed to launch the satellite.

We have ignition, and we have lift-off.

When we launched the satellite, we got data back.

It's always exciting, the first time you hear your space craft.

The jury-rigged satellite had one unique and crucial feature,

designed to address any technological malfunctions.

We had what we call error detection and correction coding systems.

So if there were any errors in the computer caused by radiation damage,

these would be detected and automatically corrected.

What we realized then, is we had a unique resource.

Each error message clearly recorded

the exact position of the satellite when the failure occurred.

The chips we were flying turned out to be

quite sensitive to this radiation,

so we were getting a large number of errors.

One thing I did was started to map out where these errors were occurring.

And that gave me a view of the errors from the perspective of a map.

That really then, in a very concrete way,

showed you exactly what was going on.

And to my surprise, really, we got an awful lot of errors,

just off the coast of Brazil, in a region of the South Atlantic.

This area of the South Atlantic

was giving us errors all the time,

every day, every time we passed through it.

Although unintentionally, Craig had helped create

the most accurate map of the South Atlantic Anomaly to date.

This was priceless information.

It confirmed the radiation hot spot could damage modern electronics.

From then on, anything that passed through this radiation hot spot

had to be capable of surviving it.

Dr. Jurgen Matzka is a world expert,

who studies the South Atlantic Anomaly

After discovering just how damaging the Anomaly can be

to modern electronics, big space agencies around the globe,

began to notice the same phenomenon.

We have the space telescope, Hubble,

that has very delicate instruments on board.

And actually when this Hubble space telescope is flying

through the region, in the South Atlantic,

NASA could see that there were problems with these instruments.

Today, Hubble's most vulnerable electronics are preemptively shut down,

while the telescope passes through the Anomaly.

Liftoff!

Very recently, there was the Hitomi.

The Hitomi was a satellite that got lost.

It's not clear why, but the last time there was communication

with the satellite was actually in this area.

Also, all space agencies have taken notice of this.

And, for example, the International Space Station,

when it is traveling in this region,

it's taking certain precautious steps.

Space walks must be carefully planned,

whenever the International Space Station

enters the South Atlantic Anomaly,

So again, we have here obviously a problem in this area.

So all these events, and research over the years,

shows that there is something special about this region.

This cannot be a coincidence, so there must be a good reason for this happening.

So what is causing the South Atlantic Anomaly,

and is there anything anyone can do about it?

As society becomes more technologically-advanced

and humans strive to reach beyond our planet,

it's more important than ever to understand the dangers that lurk in space.

Here in Boulder, Colorado, a highly-specialized team

works to ensure the safety of both humans and hardware,

beyond Earth's surface.

The whole business of understanding the space environment,

and anticipating what's going to happen

is really a crucial one for our advanced technological society.

The radiation above the Earth is driven

by the changing activity of our Sun.

Dan and his team look for solar flares,

super-energized radiation particles,

that are released from the sun, and stream towards Earth.

Energetic particles from the sun

can probably be thought of, somewhat accurately,

as tiny, but very powerful bullets

that are being generated by the energy in the sun.

Those powerful bullets, if they were to strike a spacecraft,

they could cause damage within the spacecraft,

or within the electronics of a spacecraft.

But in fact, the Earth is incredibly well-protected

from these solar bullets by its remarkable magnetic field.

We have this wonderful, protective umbrella above us.

The Earth's magnetic field prevents much of the powerful energy from the sun.

This magnetic forcefield shields the Earth in two ways.

It deflects some of the dangerous particles back into outer space,

but it also traps some radiation,

holding it in a layer that is just miles above the Earth's surface.

So we have both the fact that the Earth's magnetic field,

in a sense, prevents radiation

from getting very close to the Earth,

but it also provides a trap for particles to be embedded

within the magnetic field for long periods of time.

Beneath this dangerous blanket of trapped radiation,

the International Space Station,

and many of our key satellites,

fly in what is called the low-Earth orbit.

But this safe zone

doesn't always provide the protection that scientists expect.

That means any astronauts passing through this zone

need to be monitored, and that's the job of Kerry Lee and his team.

We're in the multi-purpose support room,

which is a back room in mission control at the Johnson Space Center.

And our goal here

is to keep the astronauts protected from space radiation.

On board the space station,

live radiation data is beamed back to Kerry,

and reveals what happens when the International Space Station

flies over the South Atlantic.

You can see there are some irregularities that happen

at various places within the lower orbit.