Nova - Season 31 (2004)

A scientist scuba dives a flooded ice cave searching for a hidden lake under the Mount Blanc glacier. Such a lake burst its ice dam in 1892 causing a flash flood that killed hundreds.

Can the lessons of one air disaster help prevent another? What caused Swissair Flight 111 to plunge into waters off the coast of Nova Scotia on September 2, 1998, killing all 229 people aboard? After four years and almost $40 million, investigators revealed that the accident was caused by factors that, alarmingly, still exist on many planes today. NOVA was given unprecedented access to this intricate investigation, involving a seemingly hopeless search for evidence among two million pieces of debris scattered across the ocean floor. The recovery of the flight data ...

Nova examines the practice of wartime medicine by taking an inside look into the medical care offered to injured US troops during the Iraq War.

Tornado-chasing scientists with an eye to better forecasting risk their lives to plumb the secrets of nature's most terrifying killer.

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Following the formation of the Earth, life didn't waste any time getting started. Scientists explore the evidence and conduct experiments to determine how life could form on the inhospitable early Earth then change to cover the entire Earth.

This program reviews the Drake equation to provide an updated estimate of the likelihood that there is another civilization close enough to Earth for us to talk with. And it ponders the question; with so many strange life forms on earth how would we know an alien if we met one?

Scientists discover and explore the the cosmic microwave background and with it, the big bang and understanding of the first stars and the formation of the elements.

Documents the emerging science of public health and the social, ethical, and legal dilemmas it posed at the turn of the 20th century concerning Mary Mallon, AKA: Typhoid Mary, who was identified as a healthy carrier of typhoid fever,

More than 2,000 years ago, the thriving city of Petra rose up in the bone-dry desert of what is now Jordan. An oasis of culture and abundance, the city was built by wealthy merchants who carved spectacular temple-tombs into its cliffs, raised a monumental Great Temple and devised an ingenious system that channeled water to vineyards, bathhouses, fountains and pools. But following a catastrophic earthquake and a slump in its desert trade routes, Petra's unique culture faded and was lost to most of the world for nearly 1,000 years. Now, in a daring experiment, an ...

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Nova follows an archaeological expedition into the Cave of Letters and examines the Jewish Bar Kokhba revolt against the Roman Empire.