Every year, thousands of men and women wage America’s war on fire in our majestic wildlands. Armed with special training and the best technology, and with their hearts full of determination, they battle the blazes. To find out what’s wrong with America’s war on wildfires, travel to the fire line with the Arrowhead Hotshots, a top firefighting team. Fire Wars offers an up-close look at the war on wildfire—a war so intense, you can feel the heat.
Grade levels: Adult
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The Viking Deception – DVD
There are few more tantalizing or notorious historical documents than the Vinland map. A faded, yellowing scrap of parchment bearing a faint tracery of lines, the map apparently shows the eastern seaboard of North America-yet it was drawn at least half a century before Columbus reached the New World. It seems to present unshakeable proof that the Vikings were the real discoverers of the Americas. But for 40 years, a bitter debate over its authenticity has raged among cartographers, historians, and scientists. Despite chemical analysis and radiocarbon tests, the case remained unresolved. Now, in an exclusive investigation, NOVA presents fresh evidence confirming that the map was probably one of the cleverest forgeries of all time, and probes who might have wanted to carry out the deception. In this enthralling cartographic detective story, NOVA pursues a trail from Scandinavia to Austria, Switzerland, London, and the U.S.
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The Killer’s Trail
This is fact: Marilyn Sheppard was murdered in 1954. The rest of the crime is a haunting question mark. The Sheppard case led to the infamous trial–and re-trial–of her husband, Dr. Sam Sheppard, and launched the legal career of lawyer F. Lee Bailey. But who was the killer? Dr. Sheppard’s insistence that a mysterious stranger was the real murderer led to his eventual acquittal xx years after the murder and inspired the plot of The Fugitive. Now, nearly 50 years later, NOVA reopens America’s most intriguing unsolved murder case.
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Welcome to Mars – DVD
On January 3, 2004, a tiny rover named Spirit crash-landed on the dusty surface of Mars and sent its first message home. The elation of the assembled scientists, as well as the behind-the-scenes engineering story leading up to the landing were captured by NOVA in its hugely popular documentary MARS Dead or Alive. That elation is the starting point for the highly anticipated sequel, Welcome to Mars, which follows the adventures of Spirit and Opportunity on the red planet. Once again, NOVA’s producers enjoyed unprecedented access to the mission scientists at JPL as they wrestled with the technical crises that soon beset the rovers. Welcome to Mars presents a compelling inside story of triumph and technical ingenuity, full of scientfic and human drama, with stunning fresh images from an alien world.
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A Science Odyssey
Join host Charles Osgood in this extraordinary chronicle of 20th-century scientific adventures. Viewers journey through 100 years of discovery, combining historical footage, interviews and animation. “Matters of Life and Death” includes the key topics of fighting disease, penicillin, insulin, surgery and organ transplants. (9:20 hrs. on 5 discs)
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The Elegant Universe
It’s the holy grail of physics–the search for ultimate law and order in the universe. And in the last few years, excitement has grown among scientists as they’ve pursued a revolutionary new approach to unifying nature’s forces. It’s called string theory and, to the uninitiated, it’s totally mind-boggling. But physicist Brian Greene has a rare gift for conveying physics in vivid everyday images, a gift that has turned his recent book The Elegant Universe into a mighty bestseller, and now Greene brings his talent and vitality to this documentary. Special DVD features include: materials and activities for educators; a link to The Elegant Universe Web site; closed captions; and video descriptions. (3 hrs. on 2 discs)
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Everest: The Death Zone
Get ready for a (literally) breathtaking trek up Mt. Everest, from Base Camp at 17,600 feet; through the chilling, corpse-strewn Death Zone; to the very pinnacle of the the Earth, five and a half miles above sea level. For those brave souls who survive the harrowing climb to the top of the world, it is a transformative experience. But can the excruciating ascent–through frigid cold, blasting wind, blinding sun, and severe lack of oxygen–cause permanent, damaging changes to the human brain and body? Special DVD features include: Access to the Everest: The Death Zone Web site; chapter search; English audiotrack; subtitles.
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MARS Dead or Alive
Go inside NASA’s risky field trip to the red planet in this tense and dramatic behind-the-scenes chronicle of the $820 million Mars Exploration Rover (MER) project. Beginning a year before launch, NOVA’s cameras follow MER scientists and engineers through a gauntlet of potentially fatal problems. Then, seven months later, experience the final nail-biting minutes of the journey, as Spirit successfully lands on Mars and begins sending back its first spectacular images of the Martian landscape. Special DVD features include: materials and activities for educators; a link to the NOVA Web site; closed captions; and video descriptions.
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The Miracle of Life
Each minute, all over the world, a baby is born. An everyday occurrence, yet each birth is the culmination of one of nature’s most complex, mysterious, and seemingly miraculous processes. A dramatic breakthrough in science and cinematography, The Miracle of Life takes you on an incredible voyage through the human body as a new life begins. World-renowned Swedish photographer Lennart Nilsson presents a spectacular look at a microscopic world of beautiful colors and forms deep inside ourselves. Special DVD features include: Access to the award-winning NOVA Web site; chapter search; English audiotrack; subtitles.
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Odyssey of Life: The Photographer’s Secrets
The photographer who led us into the awe-inspiring world of the womb has agreed to take us behind the scenes of his own work. For the first time ever, Lennart Nilsson reveals the state-of-the-art techniques that gave us The Miracle of Life and so much more. For decades, this unparalleled photographer has astonished the world with images–from the creatures under the sea to the viruses inside our cells–that make visible the mysteries of life. Yet Lennart Nilsson has kept his own secrets to himself…until now. Special DVD features include: Access to the NOVA Web site featuring an interview with Lennart Nilsson, a time-lapse sequence of growing embryos, an online teacher’s guide, and more; chapter search; English audiotrack; and subtitles.