This is a transcript for episode 9, Roads to Nowhere.
What would happen if every human being on Earth disappeared? This isn't the story of how we might vanish. It is the story of what happens to the world we leave behind. In this episode of "Life After People", mankind was car crazy. But now, all roads lead to nowhere. The Motor City breaks down. The world faces a new kind of oil boom. Bizarre creatures stake their claim on the highways of Texas, where there's no one to remember the Alamo, but plenty of things to destroy. And this once great American metropolis is already on a collision course with disaster. Welcome to Earth, population zero.
1 hour after people, oil refineries and chemical plants all over the world are still pumping out the lifeblood once used to power cars and keep airplanes aloft. Thick plumes of steam billow out from the dense cluster of refineries situated along the Houston Shipping Channel. In the time of humans, one fifth of America's oil production passed through here, helping to feed an insatiable demand for fuel. Every day, the United States consume 20 million barrels of oil. That volume is equivalent to the water held by over 40,000 residential swimming pools. Everything seems to be running smoothly. But suddenly, alarm bells ring. Without people, the oil refineries are in trouble. There's a problem in the reactor, a tall column that helps break oil down to petroleum. Each refinery depends on storage tanks, some holding as many as 20 million gallons of oil, to feed the reactor continually. Just an hour after people, one of the feeder tanks has run dry.
"When the tank goes empty, the conditions inside that reactor just go chaotic, because it expects to have continuous flow. In order for these reactors to work, you have to heat the oil to hundreds of degrees or maybe a thousand degrees."
-William Leffler
But without a fresh supply of incoming oil, the reactor turns the whole refinery into a ticking time bomb.
"In a life after people, there's nobody to react to that. And so the temperatures could escalate up to thousands, tens of thousands of degrees."
- William Leffler
But the reactor isn't entirely empty. Deadly gasoline vapors designed to burn only inside a car engine linger. Runaway temperatures rupture the reactor and create sparks, the fumes explode. Fire rushes through pipes connecting to a holding tank filled with already refined gasoline. It ignites. More sparks and heat ignite another tank, and then another. Within seconds, the whole refinery is on fire. In 2005, 15 workers died and another 170 were injured at an oil refinery explosion in Texas City when unmonitored gasoline fumes found an igniting spark. In a life after people, there's nothing to prevent these refinery explosions.
"You're going to have a fire in one refinery, and another one half a mile away, and then those could lead to other fires in those refineries. So they happen one at a time, but once they start happening, it just increases exponentially."
- William Leffler
The fuel that once propelled mankind around the world now fuels a seemingly endless inferno.
Three days after people, a former house pet in central Texas is in trouble. This god is a breed known as a Lacy. It's not any ordinary pet. Part sight hound, part shepherd, and part wolf, a lacy is a born problem solver. Gifted with a sharp nose, she's able to sniff any people food that has been left behind. Outfitted with a slim athletic body, a Lacy has no trouble leaping onto the kitchen worktop. She's finding the last scraps of food in the house. With her options dwindling and stomach growling, her basic instinct starts to kick in.
"The first thing on the menu is going to be house cats, because they're going to be plentiful. And they're not real smart. You know, so they're going to hang around. And I've never owned a good Lacy dog that wouldn't kill a house cat. So it's going to be pretty easy pickings."
- Jimmy Brooks
While neighborhood cats provide meat, the lacy scrounges for water wherever she can find it. An outdoor dripping tap throws a lifeline to man's best friend. But once the tap stops dripping in central Texas, the Lacy faces a decision.
"Lacy dog were bred to work in high heat, but they do have to have water. I think their first objective would be to find a good water source."
- Jimmy Brooks
Without food or water, her former owner's house is useless to the lacy.
"The Lacy dog is a hard drive working dog. And they're not content being a house dog. They were bred to round up ranged hogs, wild cattle."
- Jimmy Brooks
Her boundless energy serves her well in central Texas, a place that collects 35 inches of annual rainfall. Water won't be a problem. For food, the Lacy has work to do.
4 days after people. Even the Motor City is silent. In the birthplace of mas produced automobiles, none travel down the road, and no trucks shuttle cargo over the Ambassador Bridge to Canada. The Renaissance Center, the tallest building in the state stands empty. 4 miles east of downtown, on the banks of the Detroit River, at the city's waterworks plant, some machines are still humming, even though power plants begin to fail worldwide.
"Once you have main power failure, we would switch over to generator power."
- John McGrail
The diesel fuel powering the generators will last for 2 more days. And so it's business as usual at the waterworks, even without people. The electronic boards at the system control room continue to keep track of the half a billion gallons of water filling the city's pipes. But in a life after people, catastrophe looms. There's no one around to turn on a faucet.
"We're pumping water into a system that's not being used, so eventually, you're going to max out the capacity of the pipes."
- Cheryl Porter
Underneath downtown Detroit, 4 foot diameter pipes dating back to the 19th century are the weakest links in the system. In the time of humans, they sent water to Detroit's citizens, through the birth of the Model T, the rise of the Big Three, and the collapse of manufacturing. But these pipes are finished with their tour of history.
"Things are going to be completely full and start to burst."
- Cheryl Porter
Compounding the disaster, much of downtown Detroit stands on clay soil.
"The clay is impervious to the flow of water, so to the extent that there is water saturating the clay, the tendency is for the water to go up.
- John McGrail
"The pressure continues building, pushing up sidewalk and street until the sidewalk and street buckle."
- George Ellenwood
10 foot high fountains turn Detroit's streets into thoroughfares of water.
One week into a life after people . As the oil refineries continue to burn in Texas, the 100,000 longhorn steer living throughout the state on open ranches or hemmed in barns face a crisis. The 1,800 pound beasts rely on weekly hay rations. Without people to give them food, and with barbed wire fencing keeping them in, it looks to be the end of the road for these creatures. But these lumbering beasts aren't feeling anxious.
"If they wanted to, this guy's big enough to knock down anything here. But he's so well trained and so docile that he doesn't have any need. Plus, he's already given everything he needs to survive, and he knows it. He's content."
- Larry Smith
Longhorns descend from Spanish cattle, a tough breed brought to the New World aboard Columbus's ships. It's in their blood to eat whatever is available.
"All cattle are herbivores, so they eat grass. Longhorn cattle, more than other breeds of cattle, will also eat brush, and browse, and leaves. They'll eat anything they need to survive."
- Larry Smith
They also have a pair of not so secret weapons.
"That's what they have these horns for, to protect themselves against the hounds and the wolves and the bears. There's not many animals that will want to go up and tangle with a set of horns like this."
- Larry Smith
Although individual longhorns managed to survive these first few days without humans, their survival as a species is still in doubt. The changes are beginning in earnest throughout Texas in a life after people. As oil fires continue their march of destruction, San Antonio faces imminent death, while local wildlife thrives in unexpected places.
Two months after people, man stores of oil and gas haven't run out yet. An apocalyptic firestorm still burns along Houston's Shipping Channel. In the time of humans, this area processed most of the over 1 million barrels of crude oil produced in Texas every day, more than any other state in the country. 200 miles west, down Interstate 10, sits the city of San Antonio, with it's iconic landmark, the Alamo. Nearby, the San Antonio River streams peacefully through the abandoned River Walk. In the time of humans, this was the most popular gathering spot in the city. Now, once packed office towers and hotels look down over empty barges waiting for travelers who will never show.
"San Antonio River is essentially what created the city of San Antonio."
- Steven Schauer
The river has attracted manking for centuries. Native Americans who lived here named their settlement Refreshing Waters. But in a life after people, this tide is about to turn.
"Right now, it's highly engineered. Man has influenced it. We have straightened it. We have put in flood control structures."
- Steven Schauer
But now, all that stands between the river and the destruction of the city is a steady rain, something that's all too common in this part of the country.
"The Midwest United States has Tornado Alley. We in Texas have Flash Flood Alley, running up I-35 from San Antonio all the way to Dallas."
- Steven Schauer
In this region of the country, warm, moist air drifting inland from the Gulf Coast collides with cooler, dry air sweeping in from the north. These weather patterns set up central Texas with frequent rainstorms. As a result, half of the top 12 world records for rainfall in 48 hours originate in Flash Flood Alley.
"The first rain event that would occur following life after people - basically, the downtown area of the River Walk here that we know and love today, that would be the first casualty."
- Steven Schauer
The buildings at the River Walk stand level with the San Antonio River, some 15 feet below the surrounding downtown streets. Where the San Antonio River bends into downtown, at the entrance to the River Walk, a three ton floodgate stands guard.
"Basically, what we're looking at here - you can see the lines in the wall there. That's actually the groove that will actually hold the gate door as it comes down. The gate door is actually above us right now, in the open position. In life after people, basically, there would be no one to lower this gate during a rain event."
- Steven Schauer
In 1921, a burst of rain inundated downtown with up to 10 feet of water, killing 50 people.
"Behind me, the river is only about five to six inches at its lowest point below the sidewalk. So it wouldn't take that much rain to actually raise the water level in this area and begin flooding out all the restaurants, all of the hotel space, all of the business space."
- Steven Schauer
Meanwhile above the River Walk, at street level, the Alamo, the oldest building in the city, silently awaits the assault.
Three months after people, Houston's oil refinery fires have finally exhausted their fuel. And since the world's oil refineries are now reduced to ruins, the 1.2 trillion barrels of crude oil that still lays untapped beneath the Earth's surface will never rise to propel any man-made machine again. But in the scrub lands of central Texas, the Lacy dog that staked out on her own is having no trouble moving without people around. And she's not alone. These enterprising canines have discovered food to be plentiful in central Texas.
"The Lacy would most likely adapt to catching hogs faster than anything else."
- Jimmy Brooks
In the time of humans, 2 million feral hogs scoured the Texas countryside. Without hunters to keep their numbers in check, the wild pigs are rampant.
"Feral hog - it takes three months, three weeks, three days to have a litter of pigs. They will double their population every four months. They can have up to 13 pigs in a litter. That's a lot of pork on the ground."
- Jimmy Brooks
Their pig herding instincts have awakened a primal hunting urge.
"Let's take a lab, for instance. This lab has been raised for 10 generations as a house pet. They have no prey drive. They have no idea how to get out there and catch anything. You take a Lacy dog? They've got they prey drive. They'll get out there and get it done. They know what it takes to bring an animal down."
- Jimmy Brooks
Lacies are not large enough to take down hogs that weight over 200 pounds on their own, but in packs, they thrive. With a seemingly never ending supply of food, the Lacy dog seems destined for success.
Six months after people, another Texas resident is enjoying the new world order: The nine banded armadillo. Its armor of bony plates and leathery skin is designed to protect it from predators, except for one. In the time of humans, their number one enemy was traffic. Countless cars and trucks roared down streets and roads. When it came getting out of the way, their instincts failed them.
"With the armadillos, actually, they have a tendency to vertically jump."
- Michael Perez
Their tendency to jump, sometimes as high as 3 or 4 feet, serves them well against most predators by scaring them away. But when the attacker is a speeding car, the encounter is nearly always fatal. And no state in the country had more of these death traps for armadillos than Texas, with it's 80,000 miles of roads. That's enough to circle the globe five times. Now, with no cars on the move, armadillos own the roads.
"When we come to a point where there's no humans around, we're going to see an increased habitat for the armadillos."
- Michael Perez
Man's abandoned cities offer new places for armadillos to explore. And they won't be confined to Texas. Even in time of humans, they spread deep into Florida, as far west as Nebraska, and as far north as Southern Illinois. Only cold weather holds them back.
"They thrive here in Texas because of the climate. We have very mild winters. They don't have a lot of hair to actually insulate them, to keep them warm. So it's important for them to be in temperatures where it's above freezing."
- Michael Perez
As long as the weather stays warm, and there's no traffic, armadillos will do very well in a life after people.
A quarter of a century after people, the extreme Detroit climate is taking it's toll on the city skyline.
"It's tough being a building in Detroit because of the extremes of weather here - very, very hot summers, very cold winters. There's freezing, there's thawing, there's wind. There's rain, there's ice. You're right by the river, and as a result, you've got quite a bit of moisture in the air as well. And it's very open space, so you do get very, very high winds."
- Steven S. Ross
In the time of humans, the Renaissance Center stood as a monument to the industry that delivered Detroit into a golden age. In the city where Henry Ford's modern assembly line made the family car affordable, his grandson instigated the construction of the Renaissance Center as head of Ford Motor Company. Two decades later, the entire complex, including the 73 story central tower, the tallest building in Michigan, was purchased by General Motors, the one time largest car manufacturer in the world.
"The Renaissance Center is a classic example of late 1960s, 1970s design. It's basically steel framed and the outer skin is almost entirely glass. The frames that hold the windows in, the steel frame that holds the building up, and the glass all expand and contract and vibrate in different ways. And the result is is where they meet, gets worn a little bit."
- Steven S. Ross
25 years without people has turned the Renaissance Center's atrium into a forest. Although the decorative palms have died, native trees like Shagbark hickories and giant oaks have moved in.
"As long as the structure provides some shelter, you're going to get plant and animal life inside there. So you'd have feral dogs, wolves, wolverines would start coming in. And you have this ecosystem there."
- Steven S. Ross
25 years of neglect have wrecked some parts of Detroit. What will Detroit look like 40 after people? We already know, because of these haunting sights, it's already happened.
40 years after people, Detroit is a wreck. It's a future that has already happened in some parts of the city, where a population exodus has decimated once proud factories and crowded city blocks. From 1900 to 1930, the burgeoning motor industry powered a growth spurt. The city's population skyrocketed more than fivefold to more than a million and a half inhabitants. Abandoned for 40 years, Detroit's Packard Plant, 5 stories and 47 buildings, is a sad reminder of a once thriving car industry that pumped life into the city. The Packard Name was once synonymous with luxury, churning out everything from convertibles to limousines. But the public stopped buying it's designs. Burdened with a crushing debt, Packard closed it's doors. This is what nature achieves in 40 years without people.
"In that 40 years since the people have left, plants and animals have colonized the area."
- Steven S. Ross
Even the plant's roof is slowly turning into a forest.
"Notice the trees right along the wall. Well, how did they get there? Basically, windblown seeds wedge themselves into the crack that almost inevitably exists where pavement meets a wall. These are goldenrod, and goldenrod is a pioneer plant. It's very old, from very, very ancient times, and it will grow in almost anything, as many gardeners know."
- Steven S. Ross
Without windows, the inside is beginning to look like the outside.
"We're up on the fifth floor now of this old building. What you're seeing here is the original hardwood floor. And you notice that it's bowed upward. The wood has been soaking all through the winter. And as a result, the wood has expanded. Underneath the wood, there's actually quite a bit of what you would call dirt. You can see it here. You can see it here. You see it here. Basically, what's happening is dirt is blowing in from outside. In another 30 or 40 years, most of this wood will be gone. What you're going to see is basically a giant flower bed."
- Steven S. Ross
Where workers once assembled Packard engines, saplings now take root. Moss has begun to colonize the floorboards. Meanwhile, the harsh climate is eating away at the plant's foundations.
"The entryway wall itself, over time, mainly due to freezing and thawing, has warped away and come out this way a little bit. As it did that, it actually cracked this guard. This guard is actually a bell of very thick cast iron. Now, on the other side of the entrance, we see the logical conclusion of that, and you get some idea of the thickness. Can you imagine, that a little bit of water, a little bit of ice getting in here can actually pull this apart and cause these kinds of tracks? What's happened here is the bell is pretty much totally worn away because it's cracked out."
- Steven S. Ross
The seasons haven't been kinder to homes once cared for by people. As competition from foreign car manufacturers intensified, one million residents fled the urban center from 1950 to 1980. Left behind are blocks and blocks of abandoned neighborhoods. Of the 137 square miles that make up the city, 60 don't have people. What's left are just ugly reminders of former elegance.
"This building here has been abandoned for about 40 years. The harsh climate of Detroit accelerated the deterioration of this building. In this case, the freezing and thawing during the winter, and the fairly heavy rainfall during the year, were what finally destroyed this building."
- Steven S. Ross
The brick and mortar structure decays from the top down.
"Weather, especially water through the roof, has pretty much destroyed it. What we're looking at is actually a building with very solid walls."
- Steven S. Ross
Water seeps into the brick, expanding and contracting, as it freezes and thaws, prying it away from the facade. In another 75 years, the entire building will collapse into an unrecognizable heap, and nothing will remain a century after that. In this harsh climate it doesn't take long for a building to crumble.
"Brick and mortar is basically clay and limestone, very much like the surrounding soil. You would have to be an expert to know there was ever a house there."
- Steven S. Ross
It doesn't take long at all for a building to crumble in this harsh climate. This school has only been abandoned for two years. As the population continues to decline in Detroit, there are fewer students to teach, and schools keep closing.
"This is one summer and two winters in Detroit - have done this kind of damage. The paint is meant to be an interior paint. It's not meant to withstand a lot of water, and it's not meant to withstand a lot of temperature changes. Now, the ceiling is plaster. The reason it collapsed is, for the most part, water coming in in the classroom above. Now, over the next few years, the rest of the ceiling will collapse. And one thing that would happen is the plaster dust itself catches dirt, catches seeds. It's not nutrient itself that would nurture a plant life, but it could be the beginning."
- Steven S. Ross
In may start small, but green life grows into a powerful menace. Even a once mighty fort in Texas can't withstand this advancing army.
50 years after people. Detroit, the city once ruled by the big three automakers, crumbles. A place that once cranked out 15 million cars every year, now sees these same cars decaying on its streets. None of them have inflated tires anymore, but the rubber and synthetics will last hundreds of years. Within another 25 years, the tough Detroit climate will reduce this car into a skeleton. 1500 miles away, in San Antonio, repeated rains have spawned cycles of flooding along the River Walk. Waterlogged foundations leave the buildings tilting at odd angles, as silt and sand inundate the area.
"I call it death by inches. It happens slowly, it happens insidiously. The river itself, although not flowing very fast, would flood over and over again, bringing a lot of silt, a lot of sand, to basically cover part of the area. The buildings sink into it and settle, but they sink unevenly."
- Steven S. Ross
Eventually, the lean is too much for one of the buildings. It falls into the river it once overlooked. Meanwhile the Alamo facade stares back untouched on its elevated perch on the city's street level. But an enemy is attacking the compound from within. In the time of humans, live oaks already dominated the Alamo's courtyard.
"We have many oak trees. And those oak trees tend to grow very large. The limbs will extend outward, and the weight of the limbs causes them to reach down to the earth, where they support themselves."
- Bruce Winders
Without people to redirect the massive limbs, the trees will begin to demolish the Alamo's walls.
"The limb behind me is one of those that's been held up by an iron post to keep it off the ground. Without people to constantly cut the limbs back, a lot of them would continue to grow. And at some point, it would crush the wall. Those oak trees would drop acorns as well. And wildlife would come over here and they would bring seeds.
- Bruce Winders
Over 200 years after the Alamo fell to the invading Mexican army, an army of trees conquers it again. The Alamo doesn't stand a chance.
150 years after people. When it opened as a gateway to Ontario in 1929, Detroit's 1,850 foot long Ambassador Bridge stood as the longest suspension bridge in the world. In the time of humans this was the busiest border crossing between the US and Canada, carrying one quarter of the merchandise, including most of the auto parts traded between the 2 countries. But as the vertical suspension cables give way, nothing will ever cross this bridge again.
"Those vertical suspension cables are exposed to the wind, exposed to the weather. And they vibrate quite a bit in the wind. So they're major wear area, and a major maintenance problem for any keeper of a suspension bridge.
- Steven S. Ross
But in a life after people, there is no one to repair the damage in the cables.
"The weak spots are basically down at the bottom of the cable, where the cables actually tie into the deck."
- Steven S. Ross
The vertical cables lay over one of two horizontal white lines known as catenary cables. 37 steel strands, each about a foot in diameter, interweave to form just one of the catenary cables.
"As multiple cables break, it actually changes the shape of the white catenary cable that holds the whole thing up, because it's no longer taking an even amount of weight at each interval."
- Steven S. Ross
Another vertical cable snaps, and a segment of the deck crashes into the river. A 150 foot gap now gashes through the road to Canada. Within seconds, the other sections fall. In the century to come, the wheels of progress continue to roll backwards, as the seat of an automotive monarchy disintegrates.
150 years after people. In Detroit, just upstream from the Ambassador Bridge, the central tower of the Renaissance Center still stands taller than any other building. Broken windows have left the structure unable to retain any heat from the sun.
"There's a lot of rubble on them. During the winter, a fair amount of ice loading would build up, because the sun would not directly warm the building, because most of the glass would be gone."
- Steven S. Ross
One of the upper floors finally loses its grip. And the rest of the central tower collapses, bringing down one of the adjoining buildings as it falls.
200 years after people. On the skeleton of the Ambassador Bridge, the white horizontal catenary cable that once held up the span, is now ironically helping to topple its remains.
"That big cable is anchored on either side, on either shore. And when the deck is no longer there, the tension will be uneven. The big vertical towers would bend toward the land side. The tops would spread apart. And that would put quite a bit of strain on those towers."
- Steven S. Ross
The towers finally yield, and the last remains of a great transportation link disappear.
In San Antonio, the river has swallowed the city.
"The whole downtown San Antonio area basically has little hills and little remnants of buildings."
- Steven S. Ross
The Alamo is still standing, but only barely. Like the great stone temples of Cambodia's Angkor Wat, years of uncontrolled tree growth have the structure in a death grip. There is one one to remember the Alamo, but more importantly, no one to take care of it. As the Alamo collapses, another Texas icon soldiers on. After breaking out into the wild, Longhorn cattle are finding that history is repeating itself. In the 1800s, they escaped from the confines of their Spanish missionary masters.
"These animals evolved into an animal that could survive on its own. They grew very long in leg, very strong hooves, so they could travel long distances for water and forage."
- Larry Smith
In this earlier life without people, longhorns acquired a genetic diversity that serves them very well now.
"We don't need veterinarians even today with our cattle. They're extremely disease resistant. That's what makes a Longhorn adaptable without humans."
- Larry Smith
Many dairy and beef cattle died out quickly in a life after people, because they struggle to give birth without human assistance. Longhorns don't have that problem.
"The calves would hit the ground and start running immediately. So as far as an animal that can survive without humans today, the Texas Longhorn definitely can, because they've already proven they can do it."
- Larry Smith
Now, two centuries in a life after people, they number in the tens of millions, just as they did in the 1800s.
1000 years after people. along the banks of the Detroit River, this is what has become of the Motor City - massive oak trees looking down on wetlands. In the place that gave birth to the history changing V8 engine, the SUV and pickup trucks, the sound of a roaring engine is long forgotten. But there is one place where an American made vehicle can be found. Over 200,000 miles away from Detroit, 3 moon buggies remain, left behind by 3 Apollo missions, They stand in near mint condition, because the moon's environment doesn't attack man's technology like Earth's does.
"It has no water, it has no air, it has no active geology. So anything that is on the moon's surface will still be there. So what is left from the Apollo missions, that will be perfect."
- Jay Zalasiewicz
All that's left of a civilization once swarmed by fleets of cars and trucks are these motionless relics. Life after people is quiet and still.