Toxic Revenge is the second episode of season two of Life After People: The Series. It originally aired on January 12, 2010.
Synopsis[]
After people, dangerous substances once harnessed and dominates the world that were left behind leaks into the environment without human intervention. The nuclear fuel rods at nuclear power plants around the world spontaneously burst into flames and going nuclear, the common chemical chlorine spills out of tanks and turns the environment into a cloud of death, and raw sewage creates methane across New York City to the ultimate destination, the Grand Central Terminal, where it eventually ignites an explosion to the adjacent MetLife Building. Stenches of food allows raccoons uses homes as a temporary paradise and Niagara Falls oversaw the flooding of the Maid of the Mist docks, the fall of the International Railway Bridge, lake freighters tumbles on the edge of the fall, and the eventual process of erosion. The episode explores Picher, Oklahoma, where the mining town has been slowly abandoned by toxic lead since the 1970s.
Plot[]
Prologue[]
Man may be gone, but the world will face an assault from toxic chemicals and deadly substances left behind.
1 Day After People[]
Nuclear reactors around the world begin shutting down into safe mode. Jim Riccio stated that when power was lost from outside the reactor, the safety systems are designed to try to shut down the core. A mechanical system automatically engages to halt the nuclear reactions. The uranium used for fuel in the plants is naturally radioactive meaning it releases energetic particles as it decays, and there's more uranium at a nuclear plant than just in the reactors. Every 18 months, uranium in the core stops producing enough energy to sustain the nuclear reaction, and as to be replaced, the fuel is dangerously hot. Jim Riccio stated that once they pull the fuel from the reactor core it will becomes radioactive waste where it's thousands of times hotter when it put into the core, thermally and radioactively, where one take the fuel and put it in the fuel pools to keep it cool. Freshly removed fuel rods can reach a scalding 2,000 degrees and it takes 40 feet of water to maintained below 120 degrees to keep them from overheating. Jim Riccio stated that the amount of waste in the pool depends on how long the reactor is operated and the reactors in the U.S. alone have been operating between 30 to 40 years at its point. He continues that it have 5 to 10 times the amount of radiation in the spent fuel pool that it actually have in the core of the reactor. The cooling pool may look harmless, but danger is simmering beneath the surface.
Another threat looms at railyards, where train cars wait for engines that will never arrive. 31 million cars carried 2 million tons of cargo in the time of humans, and 40,000 of it carry a common chemical that can be lethal if accidentally unleashed. After people, it's waiting silently for the time to strike.
5 Days After People[]
One of mans toxic leftovers is already ravaging the planet, raw sewage, where millions of gallons are flowing into the rivers around Manhattan. As electricity shuts off, 93 pump stations around the city are failing one by one, causing sewage to back up and flood 6,000 miles of piping beneath New York. It already happened before during the Northeast blackout of 2003. Steven S. Ross stated that when power went out, the sewage system could not pump all of the water through the sewage treatment plant and as a result, water went right out in to the Hudson. 500 million gallons of raw sewage overwhelmed pipes and spilled out into New York's waterways and being left unchecked, sewage produces methane gas, a product of decaying organic matter where it's finding its way into the city rail and subway tunnels. Steven S. Ross stated that all of the tunnels are interconnected with each other including the sewer lines of the city. Methane is lighter than air and can naturally seeks the highest tunnels as it creeps below street level.
The ultimate destination for much of the methane gas is the area around Grand Central Terminal, sits on one of the highest natural points in Manhattan. Steven S. Ross stated that since Grand Central Terminal is such a highpoint, one of the dangers is the collection of gas especially during the spring where there's a lot of water and bacterial growth. He continues it'll get small amounts of gas collecting naturally in the platform area and the terminal itself. Ventilation intakes inside the terminal would normally clear the area of dangerous fumes, but without power, it isn't working anymore and wherever flammable methane flows unchecked, the risk of an explosion follows. Steven S. Ross stated that one should think of the city as a machine since it is not a pile of static structures and the machine is in mortal danger once people leave.
1 Week After People[]
The stench from garbage left behind by people is a sign of a delicious meal for a nocturnal rodent. Stan Gehrt stated that raccoons are attracted to things that smell bad and something that would repel people is an attractant for it. The average raccoon weighs about 15 pounds and those with easy access to human scraps can balloon to over 60 pounds. Stan Gehrt stated that the raccoon is an omnivore meaning they'll eat anything. Without people, raccoons continue to exploit the structures that resemble their natural habitat the most. Stan Gehrt stated that the chimneys function like hollow trees and is one of the favorite refuges for record. He continues that raccoons can easily climb up the outside of a chimney and come down through the bottom. Raccoons seek interiors because it offer protection from weather and predators but nothing beats the allure of free food. Stan Gehrt stated that the sense of smell will draw them into the kitchen and any other place where they garbage in the house. For a raccoon, it is heaven on Earth where a very highly developed sense of touch means their long fingers and toes are a raccoons point of first contact. Stain Gehrt stated that their brain is connected to their feet and forage with their feet or hands instead of their noise and eyesight like a lot of other carnivores allowing them to open up cabinets, refrigerators, and devastate the kitchen. For the masked little bandits, the shoplifting has never been easier. Stan Gehrt stated that they'll simply walk from their den site to the refuge site and eat, drink, and simply walk right back to sleep which make them couch potatoes very quickly.
10 Days After People[]
Discarded fuel rods are primed for a toxic reawakening at nuclear power plants. Spent fuel rods were kept below water for up to 10 years before they were cool enough to be removed safely in the time of humans. With the power lost to the cooling pools, heat from the rods cause the water to boil away. Once the water level dips below the tops of the rod and their temperature hits 700 degrees, the entire pool becomes a bonfire. Jim Riccio stated that it would help propel all the radiation with 10 to 20 cores worth that are sitting in the spent fuel pools out into the environment by whichever way the wind blew, making the areas to be contaminated. An invisible killer has been unleashed and nothing is safe for miles in each direction.
1 Month After People[]
Niagara Falls, the 170+ foot drops on the American and Canadian side on the Niagara river continue to put on their spectacular show. Although once a destination for honeymooners and family outings, the 1.5 million gallons of water that continues to gush over Niagara Falls each second is hiding a very unnatural past of toxic. Ginger Strand stated that one of the surprising things about the Niagara region is that it always very industrialized and one of the signs is a large number of landfills. Perhaps the most lethal is at Love Canal, where 20,000 tons of toxic waste lie buried. Ginger Strand stated that the hazardous waste landfill is lined usually with plastic or cement. She continues that the fluid that leak out are constantly monitored and the leaks are adjusted, corrected, and repaired, and in a life after people, none of it will be happen. But it's not the small leaks of toxins that will cause the most damage, it's the massive surges of water that wreak havoc on Niagara Falls. The region attracted heavy industry because of access to inexpensive high hydroelectric power in the time of humans. After people, a pair of plants 7 miles from the falls are still generating electricity. Ginger Strand stated that hydroelectric plants don't require humans to load the fuel into the plant and unlike coal plant requiring humans to load the coal in, the water would continue to flow into the plant and continue to spin the turbines even without people. Enormous intake tunnels continue to draw water into the turbines and divert it away from the falls, but it's about to change. Ginger Strand stated that after people, no one will used and need for electricity and the substations that accept the electricity coming from the Niagara power plants will then speak back to the power plant by not sending anymore power, which it begins to automatically shut down. As the plants turn off, the intake tunnels close. Ginger Strand stated that the tunnels will o longer be pulling water out of the river and it will be an interesting moment. The river then rises 13 feet almost instantly and doubles the flow of water over the falls. Downstream at the Maid of the Mist docks, the launch point for up-close views of the falls for over 150 years, gets blasted away.
2 Months After People[]
The free ride for urban raccoons is coming to the end. Trash cans are providing the bounty they grown used to but access to water is keeping some raccoons close to abandoned homes while domestic gardens also provide a lifeline. Stan Gehrt stated that raccoons take advantage of fruits a bit and would continue for some period in time but probably not enough to sustain them over the long haul. Raccoons moved into cities in the early 1900's as they discovered the good life near people and in peak conditions, one square mile of urban space can support over 200 raccoons. Without the bounty supplied by people, fewer than 1 in 10 urban raccoons will survive even a year. Stan Gehrt stated that they'll have to start looking and actually working for food which means chasing their prey by eating clams and crayfish and would go back to eating the things they're supposed to be eating. It's no longer a picnic but after a massive die-off, the species will survive.
1 Year After People[]
At nuclear plants where overheated fuel rods burst into flames, miles wide dead zones leave a scar. A radiated ring of death already happened once in the time of humans caused by a malfunctioning nuclear reactor at Chernobyl in the former Soviet Union. Radiation have decimated pine forests within a 2 mile radius and it is a damage wrought by the failure of just one power plant. After people, hundreds of sites where spent fuel rods unleash their deadly radiation. Jim Riccio stated that there are 400 commercial reactor including the military sites would become irradiated dead zones.
5 Years After People[]
An abandoned freighter still plies the waters of the Great Lakes. vessels of all types shuttled 160 million tons of cargo through the region each year in the time of humans. Ginger Strand stated that there are a lot of ships on the Great Lakes including very large tankers where they're up to 1,000 feet long. All vessels still floating on the Great Lakes are heading in the same direction, Niagara Falls. Ginger Strand stated that the falls are almost like a bathtub drain by pulling all of the water out of the Great Lakes, through and into Lake Ontario, and ultimately out to sea making it a reason that everything in the Great Lakes is moving towards Niagara Falls. However, the International Railway Bridge near the entrance to the Niagara River bars the way where no ship taller than 22 feet can pass underneath. The bridge built in 1873 is holding it for now, but more ships are on the way.
10 Years After People[]
Grand Central Terminal, once visited daily by half a million people, is just a gathering place for owls. Methane gas has been building up in rail tunnels below but it's not Grand Central that's in the most danger, because the tracks don't actually run under the building. Steven S. Ross stated that the tracks are under the MetLife Building beside Grand Central Terminal and pointed out that people don't realize the original railroad terminology stating that a terminal is where tracks end. In the tunnels below the MetLife Building next door, other toxic fumes are mixing with methane. Steven S. Ross stated that there are a lot of volatile materials like fair amount of oil and residue on the tracks below in the areas that are very well maintained. He continues that after people, there'll be a fair amount of kerosene fumes, gasoline fumes, alcohol fumes and all the cleaning materials that are used to keep the tunnel dust free and grease free, and all of it are in metal cans where it is subject to corrosion. Sitting over the tunnels, the MetLife Building is absorbing a dangerous cocktail of gases. Steven S. Ross stated that the volatile material itself in the presence of oxygen begins to oxidize, heat up, and at some point explodes into fire. The process of event cause a ball of flames erupts from below and shatters the silence of the abandoned city.
20 Years After People[]
At the International Railway Bridge, there's a log jam made up of giant ships, but it's not only the boats bearing down. James R. Chiles stated that in most winters, Lake Erie freezes and typically 2% of the ice works its way towards the upper Niagara. He continues that the 200 square miles of ice wanting to go down the river and find its way to Lake Ontario. In the time of humans, a boom is lade out on the lake every December which blocked ice from colliding with the bridge, and so far, it lasted 20 years without help from people. James R. Chiles questions can it stand forever before answering no and the reason is ice coming off of Lake Erie because there's no boom anymore to stop or deflect it. In 1938, the Honeymoon Bridge over the Niagara River collapsed after a 100 foot high ice jam plowed into it. After people, the International Railway Bridge collapses under the pressure, massive ghost ships then begin a new voyage, and the way to Niagara Falls just 20 miles downstream is wide open.
40 Years After People[]
A toxic wind blows through the abandoned streets of middle America, and it's a future that's already happened in Picher, Oklahoma, the most toxic town in America.
Picher, Oklahoma[]
Visiting Picher, Oklahoma, it is the future where the town is afflicted not by one, but 3 forms of toxic revenge, all caused by the very thing that built the town, mining. Bob Nairn and Earl Hatley visits and tour the town and the progress of toxicity. Picher, Oklahoma was once at the center of the largest lead and zinc deposit in the world, but all that remains is the poison that can't be removed and a land that can't be fixed. It's different in the first half of the 20th century as the world plunged into 2 world wars, tanks, guns, and ammunition created a huge appetite for lead but when the wars ended and in the 1950s and 60s, the mine shut down one by one till the last closed in 1970. Bob Nairn stated that it was a commodity town and like other industrial towns, once it goes away, the population decrease. As many as 30,000 citizens filled Picher at it's height, but only a few dozens souls remain and it's almost entirely abandoned. Bob Nairn stated that Picher was a lot like a lot of small towns in the middle part of America with hardworking folks, mining history, the salt of the Earth, raised their families, and made do.
While the mines closing drove some of the residents away, it's what the mines left behind that killed the town for good. Mountains made from gravel known as chat piles are 1 form of toxic revenge. Bob Nairn stated that the chat pile are materials left over after the minerals were processed and it's a gravel-like substance, and once the material was taken, it became a waste and sat on the surface for the better part of a century. The chat piles contained toxic doses of lead, zinc, and other metals with gusty winds blowing over the plains of the midwestern United States as it scatter dust off the 75 million tons of noxious pile of gravel. One of the casualties is the Little League baseball field, still in use for years even when citizens fled from Picher. Bob Nairn stated that kids came out to the field to play, everyone using it as a playground with picnic tables as a hangout. After a dozen years, a tree claims the pitchers mound and native prairie grass displaced for decades is returning. Earl Hatley stated that the seeds for the old prairie are still in the dirt and while it didn't go away and once can burn it or till it, giving it in the right conditions would make them come back. The main street has been abandoned for more than 30 years and it wasn't closed by poison dust wafting from chat piles, it was another form of toxic revenge, the underground void created by the removal of all the rock. Earl Hatley stated that the main street was shut down because of a collapse over on the left side of the street. In the process of digging an estimated 300 miles of tunnels, miners had to removed so much of the rock and soil beneath main street that sinkholes started forming and swallowing parts of Picher. Bob Nairn stated that some of it were 100 feet from floor to ceiling while Earl Hatley stated that they mined too close to the surface in a lot of areas and some way up to the tree roots making the area could cave in at any time. Grass springs over the pavement where miners and their families once looked for supplies and where shopkeepers once welcomed patrons, saplings stand guard. Earl Hatley stated there was a Sears, a JC Penney's, a trading post, and hardware store in the area and pretty much all right at main street and one didn't have to go anywhere. All still on display like a pair of shoes, magazines, and supplies while the antiquated cash registers still standby, waiting for customers that will never show. It wasn't until 10 years after the last mines closed that the underground caverns opened up by mining delivered a third toxic shock to Pitcher, poisoned groundwater, cause by miners puncturing a natural groundwater reservoir to reach the underground deposits. Bob Nairn stated that during mining operations, they pumped about 55 million gallons a day out of the underground workings and once mining ceased, the pumps shut off and natural groundwater began to fill the mines while Earl Hatley stated it comes out of the mineshafts because of the aquifer that they were mining in. Some estimates stated that there's enough polluted water below ground to fill over a million residential swimming pools. Bob Nairn stated that it'd be hard pressed to find another human activity that causes quite as much damage as mining and humans open up the Earth, remove what one's want, leave it when it is finished, which happened in Pitcher. Mines built the town but toxic water, waste piles, and sinkholes destroyed it. Earl Hatley that the lead used to bomb Germany and Japan destroyed the place and it's destroyed today.
50 Years After People[]
Train cars loaded with cargo are deteriorating and some are carrying chlorine. It was used for disinfecting drinking water & swimming pools and manufacturing plastics, but chlorine can be deadly and the aging railcars aren't heavily armored. The outer steel shell is only 1/10 of an inch thick, the isolation is 4 inches of plastic. Rick Hind stated that half of it are already over 20 years old with life expectancy of 50 years and were constantly inspected, maintained, and cleaned. Weakened by corrosion, the undercarriage gives way. Rick Hind stated that most of it will empties in a matter of less than an hour and the cloud of chlorine is very dense and extremely deadly. Heavier than air, chlorine gas advances over ground like a killer fog. Rick Hind stated that immediately, one can't keep the eyes open and breathe any longer and the wildlife have no clue. If the chlorine gas touches water, on a tree, in a lake, or even on an animal, it immediately turns into acid. Rick Hind stated that it would continue to acidify the water and not only kill the fish, turtles, and other vegetation in the water but also result a long term death of system and the aquatic life in it. In 2005, a rail accident in Graniteville, South Carolina, released 90 tons of chlorine gas into the environment and about half the carrying cars capacity. 9 people died and another 250 had to be treated for chlorine exposure, with hazmat crews needed 2 weeks to decontaminate a 1 mile radius around the site. Rick Hind stated that the gas was partially released and it wasn't in a populated area but those who survived were horrified. Without people to maintain the rail cars, the deadly fogs continue to unleashed around the world.
60 Years After People[]
A freighter grounded in the Niagara River is leaking iron ore, releasing a red stain into the water. No commodity was carried over the Great Lakes more than iron ore in the time of humans, and the largest ships, known as lakers, can hold 75 thousand tons but also draw more than 30 feet of water when afloat. It's too deep for sections of the Niagara River near the falls, but another laker is working it's way toward the falls but it's not getting caught along the shallows. James R. Chiles stated that the ones most likely to make it towards the lip of the Niagara Falls are ships riding high like the one behind him, out of ballast and carrying no cargo meaning hardly drawing any water by 5 or 10 feet. It then approaches Niagara Falls, once a gathering spot for newlyweds, and the honeymoon is over for the ship. James R. Chiles stated that the lakers are not armored and not like a battleship because the shells are quite thin like an eggshell measuring 1/2 to couple of inches, depending on the size of the ship. As it reaches the edge, the front sheers off and tumbles, then the back soon follows. The 200 foot ship is actually longer than the falls is high.
350 miles to the south, the MetLife Building is falling to pieces. When it opened in 1963, the building's 58 floors meant it stood as the 7th tallest in the United States, but it will soon give up it's place on Park Avenue. Steven S. Ross stated that it's built in a rather exposed area where its going to get more wind and rain that a typical New York City skyscraper. Already weakened by the methane explosion at its base, 6 decades of neglect have assaulted the building's steel and glass facade. Steven S. Ross stated that Death will come a piece at a time as sections of the framework peel away. It means that the neighboring Grand Central Terminal is in the line of fire. Steven S. Ross stated that the Grand Central Terminal has a mortal enemy right next door and he expect to see sections of the facade of the MetLife Building actually falling onto the roof.
150 Years After People[]
In New York City, the MetLife Building, after enduring a gas fire and shedding steel from its top floors for decades, finally breaks. A giant section falls southward, tumbling onto the roof of Grand Central Terminal, and despite the attack from the MetLife Building, Grand Central's 4 granite walls still stand. Steven S. Ross stated that the outside walls are very thick granite by hold themselves up and the granite itself is the structure of the building. He then shows the Grand Central Terminal, was more than 50 years old when the MetLife Building, originally the Pan Am Building, was built next to it and yet even with the head start on aging, Grand Central Terminal will still be recognizable as a building 250 years to maybe 500 years after people.
175 Years After People[]
At nuclear power plants around the world, fires in the spent fuel pools burned out long ago. Still looming over the sites are the iconic cooling towers that symbolized mankind mastery over the atom, where plant life clings to the rusting steel lattice frame that surrounds the concrete. Steven S. Ross stated that many nuclear plants are in agricultural areas and it will get a lot of blowing soil and seeds coming in very quickly. A steel lattice ring at the base supports the weight of the 500 foot high concrete structure, but it doesn't have any strength left. Steven S. Ross stated that as soon as the structure of its type begins to fail, it will fail spectacularly. He continues that the ring would tilt and the tower slide right off the ring and collapse in a heap, and while it would not come down vertically, it would slide, tip, and fail. Man's once mighty power plants of the future are reduced to rubble.
1,500 Years After People[]
The American side of Niagara Falls is undergoing a dramatic transformation. For centuries, the Niagara River split at Goat Island, creating cascades over 2 brinks called the American Falls, and the Horseshoe Falls on the Canadian side. Ginger Strand stated like all waterfalls, Niagara Falls is not a thing and it's an event where water flowing over a series of brinks that are moving backwards. As water cascades over a fall, it's eroding the rock beneath and moving it's brink upstream. Bert Murphy stated that about 900 years ago, there was a single waterfall that went across the river and because it is a double channel above, about 90% of the flow of the water came over the Canadian falls. The Horseshoe Falls eroded backwards about a foot a year in the time of humans, and because much more gushed over the Horseshoe Falls, the side eroded much faster than the American side. After people, the Horseshoe Falls are moving backwards faster, nearly 6 feet every year because there are no longer any power plants to divert water from the falls. Ginger Strand stated that once the Horseshoe Falls eroded upstream of Goat Island, there'll no longer any water at all going over the American Falls. For the American Falls, life after people have become life after water.
Epilogue[]
Earth moves on in timescales too large for man to have ever truly comprehended. Mankind toxic legacy lessens with every passing year. Buried in the silt, covered over by grass and trees, and carried away by the tide in a life after people.
Transcript[]
Life After People Wiki has a transcript for this episode. To see it, click here.
Errors[]
- If one compare the collapse size of the MetLife Building to the Grand Central Terminal, the side walls of the terminal would've been crushed by it.
- Despite the attack of the MetLife Building, some parts of the roof of the Grand Central Terminal, including plant life, still seen on the roof.
Trivia[]
- Most of the content in the episode were related to toxic, with the exception of the International Railway Bridge, being a blockage to Niagara Falls.
Gallery[]
TBA
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Franchise | Documentary | The Series | Behind The Scenes | Extinctions | Latinoamerica sin Humanos | Italian Commercial | |
The Series | Season 1 | The Bodies Left Behind | Outbreak | The Capital Threat | Heavy Metal | The Invaders | Bound and Buried | Sin City Meltdown | Armed & Defenseless | Roads to Nowhere | Waters of Death |
Season 2 | Wrath of God | Toxic Revenge | Crypt of Civilization | The Last Supper | Home Wrecked Home | Holiday Hell | Waves of Devastation | Sky's the Limit | Depths of Destruction | Take Me to Your Leader | |
Miscellaneous | Timeline | History ![]() |