Wonders of the Earth
The planet's most extraordinary places, from the deepest lake to the hottest desert, and the forces that made them.
- geography
- nature
- earth
Some of the stories included
- The Formation of the Grand CanyonHow the Grand Canyon formed: nearly two billion years of rock, a rising plateau and the Colorado River cutting down through it.
The Danakil DepressionIn Ethiopia's Danakil Depression, a continent is splitting apart, creating some of the harshest conditions on Earth.
The San Andreas Fault: California's Sleeping GiantThe San Andreas Fault, the boundary where two tectonic plates grind past each other beneath California, and why scientists expect another big earthquake.
El Niño: The Phenomenon That Changes World WeatherHow a periodic warming of the Pacific, first noted by Peruvian fishermen in the 19th century, can trigger global extreme weather events.
Lituya Bay: The 524-Metre WaveA fisherman and his 7-year-old son rode a wave in Lituya Bay that climbed 524 meters up a mountain, and both lived.
The Ring of FireThe Pacific Ring of Fire is a 40,000km belt where 90% of earthquakes occur, its mechanism revealed by two giant 1960s quakes.
Plate TectonicsThe unifying theory of geology explaining how Earth's outer shell is broken into pieces that move at the same rate human fingernails grow.
Son Doong: The Cave a Farmer LostHo Khanh found a cave in 1990, lost the way back, and in 2008 found it again: Son Doong, the largest known cave on Earth.
The Amazon RainforestThe world's largest rainforest makes its own rain, releasing 20 billion metric tons of water vapor into the atmosphere every single day.
The Darién Gap: The Break in the Pan-American HighwayThe Darién Gap, the roadless stretch of jungle between Panama and Colombia that is the only break in the Pan-American Highway, and why it has never been built through.
Mapping the Deep: The Quest to Understand the OceanFrom an ancient Greek's weighted rope to modern robots, this is the story of the quest to map the ocean floor, revealing a hidden world.
The Missoula Floods and the Scablands HereticGeologist J Harlen Bretz was called a heretic for his theory of a megaflood that carved Washington's Scablands, a theory rejected for decades.
The Ginkgo Tree: A Living FossilThe ginkgo, the last survivor of an ancient group of trees, which has stayed almost unchanged since the age of the dinosaurs.
Why the Dead Sea Is ShrinkingWhy the Dead Sea is falling by over a metre a year: the water taken from the Jordan River, the mineral industry, and what scientists expect to happen next.
The Mariana TrenchThe deepest place on Earth, a scar formed by 50 million years of one tectonic plate diving under another.
Lake BaikalLake Baikal in Siberia, the world's oldest and deepest lake: its active rift, its unique wildlife, Buryat legend, the 1904 railway laid across its ice, and the neutrino telescope in its depths.
The Coelacanth: A Living FossilThe story of the shocking 1938 discovery of a fish thought to have gone extinct with the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.
Lake Vostok and Subglacial ExplorationBeneath 4km of Antarctic ice lies Lake Vostok, a freshwater lake isolated for millions of years, finally breached by a Russian drilling team in 2012.
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