( intro music )
Voiceover: Nyiragongo is a real
dangerous volcano.
2 million people
living around there
could suffocate
of carbon dioxide,
but in the night you realize
there's more behind that curtain
of steam and organic smoke.
For me there were no doubts
I wanted to go down there
and it was a very special moment
to be so close to hell.
( applause )
Carsten: Thank you for
your interest this evening
and I would say we
just begin.
This is me in the
tender age of 15 years
and I was already
obsessed with volcanoes.
I bugged my parents
until they went with me
to Etna in Sicily.
When I looked in
the big fucina grande
I was kind of lost.
I changed my life
and I got the desire
to always climb down
into these craters.
And it took me until '99
for my ultimate volcano kick
when I directed
an expedition to Vanuatu
into a deep, live abyss
was probably
the most violent lava
lake in the world.
It's about 1500 feet deep
and it was a very special moment
to be so close to hell.
( laughter )
You felt like directly
on the magma chamber.
You felt the vibrations,
the shocks.
It was like a big
washing machine
and a heavy gear.
It was just amazing
and bombs were
flying around you,
so I got so addicted
I always wanted to see
the biggest lava
lake in the world.
And this is the travel
I want to take you on.
I would take you now
into the heart of Africa.
Into the Democratic
Republic of Congo
and worse, into the
war-driven Kivu Province.
Now I will do
an excursion to 2002.
There was a big
eruption of Nyiragongo.
8 mile fissure opened
and the lava lake drained
and flooded Goma City
and 4500 houses were destroyed,
14 villages, 170 people
lost their lives
and we had 400,000 refugees,
so that means Nyiragongo
is a real dangerous volcano
and it has very
little monitoring
because the Congolese,
they love to recycle the
instruments of the scientists.
There are solar
panels and batteries.
All things they can
use in a better way.
A few parts of the city
are life threatening.
Invisible gas springs
become like natural traps
for kids and animals
and this is strictly unmarked.
You have these gas traps
filled with carbon dioxide.
These are called mazukus .
Even worse are the dangers
of the Lake Kivu.
It's one of the world's
exploding lakes.
There are only 3 of them
and Lake Kivu is
by far the biggest.
In its steps there
are huge quantities
of gases of carbon
dioxide and methane.
Over half a billion
tons are stored there
and an earthquake
or a volcanic eruption
might destroy the equilibrium
and it could pop up
like a shaken bottle
of carbonated water.
So, it's very, very dangerous.
So you could fear
tsunamis or the people--
2 million people
living around there
could suffocate
of carbon dioxide.
A limnic catastrophe
of the lake
would be really unimaginable.
It happens every thousand years,
every millennium,
that all life
is extinct around that lake.
But the surrounding
of the volcano
is very fertile, so you find
almost everything
you can imagine;
wood, fruits, all
sorts of vegetables.
People already cut
the wood in the fields
and then this is
transported down
with very strange wooden bikes.
They are called tshukudus
and they are loaded
up to 1500 pounds.
And so they race down these
gentle slopes of these volcanoes
and provide the markets
with all you can imagine.
So, A tshukudu
can do quite a good living.
It's like a truck
driver in our society.
They carry down everything
like this charcoal.
It's a wanted commodity in Goma
because they cook with it,
but there are uncounted
illegal charcoal kiln
in the forest and it's
an immediate threat
to the trees down there.
Despite, there are these layers
of methane
in the depths of the lake
so if that would
be better organized,
you could directly save
the mountain gorillas living
around these volcanoes
because these
forests are the last wild
remaining areas where
these mountain gorillas survive.
Here you see the giant
flanks of this volcano.
It's a huge caldera
with a diameter
of 3 quarters of a mile.
These are the 1st
views for us down there
to the biggest lava lake
so we have to make our thoughts
how we get down there,
but 1st we have to get up there.
So, Nyiragongo is more
than 11,000 feet high
and we had to carry a lot.
We have to carry
everything up there;
water, food, scientific
gear, climbing gear.
So we needed 107
porters to do all that.
They were very happy.
For them it's
a great opportunity
and they were amazing.
They could do, in a day,
a months salary so these jobs
were really seeked
by the porters.
And we had, of course, guards
because this is kind
of a conflict area
and the mountain is always
taken again by rebels
and it happened
short after our expedition
that the mountain was taken
by the rebels again
and I think it's still
not freed.
I mean, the national park
doesn't have control over it
and more than 130 rangers
have been killed
in the last 15 years.
So, it's a big problem.
But our porters have
been in a very good mood
up to the top where
it was quite cold.
It's getting down to
freezing temperatures
because of the altitude
and then you see, in the first
moment, not very much.
I mean, everything is
filled up with gas
and we thought,
"Well, that's not
a nice surprise."
I expected to see something
glowing and whatever,
but in the night you realize,
"Well, there's more
behind that curtain
of steam and organic smoke."
And then it opens
and then you see
it's like a giant theater.
You see this
incredible lava lake
illuminating the steep walls
of that caldera
and we built up
our base camp on the summit.
This is our cooking tent.
Always was this
incredible view down there
and it's always
changing the surface
of that lava lake so it's
a really incredible spectacle.
This is Ken Sims
our volcanologist
and he was a former
mountain guide
and he was doing
all the rope work
to get down there.
We looked to the 1st terrace,
which is only a small relict.
The 2nd one was much bigger
and the 3rd one was a lava lake
situated in the midst.
And this is where we aim to.
We wanted to stay there
one week.
The scientists had a lot
of experiments lined up
and here we constructed Tyrolean
to get all the scientific
gear down there.
So, we made a campsite
on the 2nd terrace
which had its advantages
because it had ground heating.
It was quite warm
( audience laughing )
and very pleasant
compared to the summit
and, of course, we were
closer to the lava lake.
So it was absolutely
mesmerizing.
So I knew that would be my home
for the next week
and I was really happy
to finally be so close
to the volcanism
and we observed this
kind of miniature
plate tectonics in the lake,
so it was really amazing
just to observe what's going on.
The hottest lava in the world,
2400 degree Fahrenheit.
That's probably the reason why
this lava lake is so big.
And here the scientists
are measuring
the radon which comes
from really big taps
from the magma chamber
and has a decay
rate of 3.8 days.
So they can make very
valuable analysis
about the lava of this volcano,
but suddenly
the scientists realized,
"Wow! There could be overflows
off that lava lake
( audience laughing )
and it could flood
the 3rd terrace
and it could flood quite hefty
and you don't know
exactly how stable
these cinder cones of
that lava lake are."
And that kind of a relative way
that their will to go down
to the 3rd terrace.
( audience laughing )
So, for me, there were no doubts
I want to go down there
and that was my goal,
but the discussions came up
and the scientists decided to go
already after 1 day and
I couldn't believe that
so I have a little sequence
with the scientists.
Carsten on the radio:
Well, I still would like
go down to the 3rd terrace
and I just wonder
what you are up to
and what your plans are.
( beep )
Man: Probably won't be
going down
to the 3rd terrace.
( whispering ) Jesus,
he really wants me
to go down, doesn't he?
Man 2: I'm staying out of it.
Carsten: Well, you need a lot of
ingredients for a good
volcano picture.
You need good activity.
You need good visibility.
You have to have patience
and you have to have to
outsit the right situations.
Well, I had a big problem
and you see, I mean.
It was really not
a nice weather situation.
I admit the weather
was really poor the 1st day.
It was acid rain and you almost
couldn't breathe because that's
the so-called rock,
the volcanic smoke.
Usually you take gas masks,
but if you are
hard work like here
and you have to
carry up equipment
you can't breathe through
the gas mask all the time
because of the resistance.
But everyone left
after that 1 day
and even my friend
and assistant,
he became ill and had to go up,
so I had no other choice
than to stay down there.
( audience laughing )
Well, and I had
nothing better to do
than to photograph myself.
( audience laughing )
But then I looked up
and looked at this beautiful
kind of vague lit
clouds in the moonlight
and I thought, "Well,
this is wonderful
to have the whole
crater for myself."
But these were my only
buddies down there.
Two white necked ravens
and they immediately
stole my food
when they realized
my tent was open,
but I was glad for them
because otherwise it's
kind of a death zone.
Insects fly in the night
to the lava lake
attracted by the light
and then they burn somehow
their wings
and then they fall down.
Everything is covered
by dead animals.
( audience laughing )
So the next day I climbed up
to the 1st terrace
to discuss with Ken.
Voiceover: Unwilling to
take the risk himself,
Ken asks Carsten to
collect the 0H sample
from the 3rd terrace.
They will need
to set two lines.
One to get in,
( music )
the other one to get out
if the lava overflows.
( music )
Up on the summit,
Ken will spot
the levels of the lava
for the climbers
on the final terrace
who can't see the surface
of the lake themselves
because they are below it.
( radio chatter )
Ken: Do you see him?
The activity is over on
your side of the wall there.
He's going back down.
Whoa!
Good job. Good job.
Carsten on the radio:
It's incredible.
I love it. I love it. I love it.
Carsten: I have been very,
very lucky
as you saw in the film.
We climbed down to
the 3rd terrace.
That's the view if you are
down on the 3rd terrace.
Actually you can't
see into the lava lake
up there so it's
kind of mandatory
that you have to
climb that cinder cone.
( audience laughing )
And then you have
these surprises
because there's something like
and infra-sound and it
shakes your whole body,
but you can't listen to it.
It's very, very strange.
I have never
experienced that before.
I imagine the whole crater
is like a loud speaker
and the membrane
is the lava lake
and if there are
big bursts of gas
you get the kind of resonance
and it shakes your body.
So very, very strange
and you feel tiny, tiny, tiny.
I mean, you see here my friend
on the cinder cone
and the lava lake is
huge compared to that
and the energy going
away from that lava lake
is unbelievable and
hard to imagine.
So it's a huge energy source
and there are these gas bubbles
coming out of that
lake and ripping apart
this liquid stone.
Bubbles maybe 80 feet high
and one day later Ken
came really down
and brought us the thermal suit.
I was testing it first.
I have to say
these thermal suits
are quite uncomfortable
because they are insulating.
It's very warm even if
it's not warm outside,
and you have a very
restricted view,
so very limited.
So if there is lava flow
or if bombs are flying
it's quite dangerous,
but you won't
believe the next day,
although Ken came down
to the 3rd terrace,
actually that's him here
on the top of the cinder cone
and he probably
won't forget that
for his life.
( laughing )
I would have loved to
stay a much longer time.
Unfortunately, we
were restricted
and we had to go up again
and made it up to
the 2nd terrace
to all these kind of
very difficult parts
with the 2nd
terrace taking apart
and there's a lot of rock fall.
This is my last picture of this
nasty volcanic smoke walk
as beautiful as it can be.
I hope to
see you maybe again
in the future.
Thank you very much.
( applause )
( music )
