Why is this Antarctic Glacier “Bleeding?” | Antarctic Extremes

Did you know that Antarctica has a glacier that bleeds red? (At least, that’s what it looks like.)
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Five stories high and emerging from the Taylor Glacier in the Dry Valleys of Antarctica, Blood Falls seeps into an ice-covered body of water called Lake Bonney. It’s one of the continent’s most enigmatic natural features and has fascinated scientists for decades. What makes it red? Does it always flow? And can anything actually survive near it? To find out—and see just how bizarre Blood Falls is with their own eyes—Caitlin and Arlo travel to the Dry Valleys, about 60 miles from McMurdo Station. There, they meet with microbiologist Jill Mikucki and hydrogeologist Peter Doran to investigate why this glacier looks the way it does, what lives there (spoiler: CHARISMATIC MICROBES!), and what clues it holds for finding and understanding life on other planets and moons in our solar system, like Mars, Jupiter’s Europa, and Saturn’s Enceladus. Answering these questions, it turns out, requires lots of probes, cameras, and even a massive sensor hanging from a helicopter.

Life Under the Ice photography Courtesy of Ariel Waldman. Produced with support of the National Science Foundation and the National Geographic Society. For more images check out https://lifeundertheice.org/

Hosted by Caitlin Saks and Arlo Pérez
Digital Producer/Editor: Emily Zendt
Producer: Caitlin Saks
Digital Associate Producer: Arlo Pérez
Field Director/Cinematographer: Zachary Fink
Executive Producer: Julia Cort
Coordinating Producer: Elizabeth Benjes
Project Director: Pamela Rosenstein
Production Assistance: Matthew Buckley, Emily Pattison, Sean Cuddihy
Director of Audience Development: Dante Graves
Senior Digital Producer: Ari Daniel
Audience Engagement Editor: Sukee Bennett
Outreach Manager: Gina Varamo
Special thanks to Michael Amundson

Special thanks to the United States Antarctic Program

Additional Footage: Ariel Waldman, Bill Dunford, Brad Herried, Brian Wilcox, Byron Adams, Brigham Young University, G. Neukum (Freie Universitaet, Berlin), Denys Grombacher, ESA, JPL-Caltech, Lars Jensen, NASA, Peter Doran, Polar Geospatial Center, Ricardo Garza-Giron, Robert Simmons, Space Science Institute, University of Arizona, USGS
Music: APM

National corporate funding for NOVA is provided by Draper. Major funding for NOVA is provided by the David H. Koch Fund for Science, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, and PBS viewers. Additional funding is provided by the NOVA Science Trust.

Major funding for this project is provided by the National Science Foundation. Additional funding is provided by the Heising-Simons Foundation, The Kendeda Fund, the George D. Smith Fund, and the Richard Saltonstall Charitable Foundation.

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. 1713552. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.

© WGBH Educational Foundation 2020

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