Articles
Six Degrees offered an extraordinary opportunity to take a journey into our planet’s future --one possible future-- witnessing a rise from one through six degrees over the next hundred years. We filmed on five continents, spending time with some of the world’s top climate researchers …and with everyday people tuned into the signs of a changing climate. From Greenland’s rapidly-melting ice sheet to bleaching coral reefs along Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, from fast-eroding Himalayan glaciers that feed the Ganges River to drought-afflicted Amazon rain forests, we saw first-hand the varied nature of global warming.
One behind-the-scenes incident really brought the subject home: last May, my crew and I were transported by helicopter into the interior of Greenland’s Ice Sheet. Summer is now a time of extraordinary melting here, transforming this place into a very dangerous one to explore. Our helicopter pilot discovered just how dangerous. As he stepped from the chopper, he fell 20 meters down through a hidden, melting crevasse, breaking both legs and fracturing his skull. Luckily, he was rescued. All we had to endure was being stuck for 36 hours. Places like Greenland are unfortunately providing a way to get a sense of ”how bad things could get.”
By combining high-definition location photography with super-realistic computer graphics, a science-based hypothetical portrait emerged of what a century of continuing climate change could eventually look and feel like. Our journey of Six Degrees concludes with an examination of solutions, both great and small, that we might use to help avoid a future on a hotter planet.
Don’t miss” Six Degrees could change the world”, airing on Sky National Geographic Channel 526 on 24th February at 7pm.