NARRATOR: Bolivia,
South America.
Here, 45 miles west of
La Paz, isolated high
in the Andes Mountains, lie
the mysterious ancient ruins
of Puma Punku.
Spread across a desert plateau
at an altitude over 12,000
feet, the megalithic
stones found
here are among the
largest on the planet,
measuring up to 26
feet long and weighing
more than 100 tons each.
 These are the
mysterious ruins of Puma
Punku, nearly 13,000 feet
in the Altiplano of Bolivia.
What you have here
are massive blocks
of granite scattered like
some kid's toy blocks
around the site.
It's like some
giant cataclysm just
wiped out this entire area.
Archaeologists are baffled
by what Puma Punku was,
how it looked, and
what the purpose
of this enormous
structure would have been.
NARRATOR: Mainstream
scientists believed
the site was
originally constructed
about 2,000 years ago.
But in 1945, archaeologist
Arthur Poznansky
proposed that Puma Punku
was much, much older.
By examining the structures
and what he believed
were their original
alignment with the stars,
he dated the ruins to 15,000 BC.
HUGH NEWMAN: Arthur
Poznansky was a researcher.
He was part Bolivian.
And he worked at the
site for many decades.
And he concluded that the
site must have been built
about 17,000 years ago by
studying the archaeoastronomy
of that particular site.
PHILIP COPPENS: We don't
know how old Puma Punku is.
We have had some
circumstantial dating,
but we have been unable
to date the stones
of Puma Punku themselves.
They could be thousands, if
not hundreds of thousands
of years old.
We don't know.
GEORGE NOORY: I think
the fascinating thing
about Puma Punku is, how did
these structures get built?
We're talking about stone
that is 25 feet high,
stone that is hundreds of tons.
BRIEN FOERSTER: Puma Punku
is so unique in the way
that it was
constructed and shaped
and positioned that it
is the most intriguing
ancient site on the planet.
Of all the places
I've ever visited,
Puma Punku is the
one that I go back
to time and again because no
one can solve the mystery.
NARRATOR: Mainstream scholars
believe the andesite blocks
found at Puma Punku
were formed by hand
with primitive stone tools.
But some researchers point
to the intricate stonework
as evidence of the use of
advanced precision technology.
 One of the amazing
things here at Puma Punku
is the precision of the blocks.
You can see with
his block of granite
that it's really been cut at
very accurate right angles.
Not only do these granite
blocks have precision corners,
but they also have these
difficult drill holes that are
going right through the rock.
NARRATOR: But how could
such primitive people,
living perhaps tens of
thousands of years ago,
have produced such
flawless stonework?
Might the ancient
builders of Puma Punku
have fabricated the
megalithic stones
with advanced
technology, technology
of an otherworldly origin, as
ancient astronaut theorists
believe?
 If you look at
the stones carefully
and you get a magnifying
glass on some of them,
you can see some intricate
stonework, as though they
used machine tools with lasers.
It's absolutely incredible.
I've seen nothing like it
anywhere on the planet.
 When an architect or an
engineer looks at Puma Punku,
one thing jumps
out immediately--
that whoever built this
place had knowledge
of planning, of
logistics, and had
access to advanced technology.
