FMF - Friends of Minerals Forum, discussion and message board

[Tobi]

Hi all,

i discovered that the French/German TV channel ARTE will send an 85-minute report about the giant crystal cave of Naica/Mexico today. So everyone who can receive ARTE (i think the channel is receivable in the whole transmission area of the Astra satellite): The report will start quarter past eigth p.m. (Central European Time) this saturday evening. ARTE is receivable in French and German, but surely even the audience in not French- or German-speaking countries can enjoy this report. Naica only needs pictures, words are not necessary in the light of this natural wonder.

Cheers!

[Vinoterapia]

Thanks for the tip Tobias. I just checked on the TV channel web page and there it say that the emission start at 20:40 tonight. I try to cach it.

Jose Luis.

[Tobi]

Hm, strange. I also checked it on arte[dot]tv and they say that the report starts at 20.15 and ends at 21.40. But i also saw that they will rebroadcast it:

Sunday, March 7 at 14:55
Tuesday, March 16 at 00:55
Thursday, March 25 at 14:45

(All times are CET)

[Peter Megaw]

My guess is that this is the program originally filmed for National Geographic/Discovery Channel. If it is, enjoy the pictures and howl at the overblown dramatic narative...how the "razor sharp" gypsum crystals can cut you to the bone and how much danger the scientists are in from the heat if they can't get out of the cave in time. It is virtually impossible to be more than 5 mintues from the cave entrance at any time...it is just not that big! Have fun while watching the show looking for repetitions of the crystals...they strung separate shots of people moving past the same groups of crystals to make the cave seem larger than it is!

I have some serious problems with some of the science in this show, especially the rate of growth calculations which indicate very slow growth. The basis of their calculations is completly different from the realities in the mine...where crystals 20 cm long can grow in a matter of months not the eons they would suggest. Isolating their "seeds" from the rich growth medium/supply is not an accurate representation of the probable conditions of growth. But check it out for yourselves and judge.

I guess the giant crystals aren't dramatic enough in their own right, so they souped up the narrative. This of course follows the history of the first significant photographer of the cave who made up a story about a would-be crystal collector who was parboiled to death while trying to harvest spcimens in the cave. This fabrication cost the photographer his exclusive access to the cave!

None of this takes away from the sheer wonder of this cave. I've been in many times since within a few weeks of its discovery and it never fails to awe me...this is one instance where "awesome" really fits. Penoles deserves a lot of credit not only for preserving the cave but for making it accessible to scientists and the general public. Yes, it is possible to make arrangements to see the cave...

[Matt_Zukowski]

Hey Peter - isn't that a selenite specimen






(this question is really for John W)

[chris]

Hi Peter,

Eventually it wasn't Discovery's documentary but one produced by Arte itself, mostly focusing on the people involved in the discovery and scientific exploration of the cavities found at the mine.

There were explanations about the formation of the crystals as well. For those interested to have a look at it, use one of these links. Note the video stream is available for free for just one week.

French version : https://plus7.arte.tv/fr/1697660,CmC=3087808,scheduleId=3067064.html

German version : https://plus7.arte.tv/de/1697660,CmC=3087808,scheduleId=3067064.html
(links normalized by FMF)

Christophe

[Jean Sendero]

Unfortunately, it seems to be impossible to view the video from the US or Canada. The video shows the message: Pour des raisons de droits, il n'est pas possible de voir ce video dans votre pays.
A shame.
Cheers
Jean

[chris]

Hi Jean,

There might be something you can try to bypass the IP filter. if you use Firefox, in the "Edit" menu, select "Preferences".
1- In the dialog box click onto the "Advanced" tab
2- then click onto the "Network" tab
3- Click onto the "Settings" button on the right side of the dialog box
4- on the "connection settings" dialog box, click onto "Manual proxy configuration"; in the HTTP proxy field, type "anomyne(dot)uni(dot)cc"
5- then click onto "Ok" then "Close"

Your browser then will use the "anomyne(dot)uni(dot)cc" anonymous proxy server as a relay for your browsing. From France it allows you to view the video. Might worth having a try from Tucson (might suffer some laggs however). After viewing the video don't forget to turn the network settings to "No proxy" afterwards.

Christophe

[arturo shaw]

Thanks for the Info.

I've seen the program on TV yesterday and it is very interesting despite the music sometimes a bit too loud.

Greetings

Arturo Shaw

[Jordi Fabre]

To complete this post I add now a video about the "Cave of the Swords"



And another on recent NASA findings about the possibility of "dormant" but viable microorganisms in the interior of the Naica Gypsum as reported by National Geographic