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Witness History

An Antarctic mystery

Witness History

BBC

History, Personal Journals, Society & Culture

4.41.6K Ratings

🗓️ 24 February 2020

⏱️ 11 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In 1985, human remains were found by chance on a remote island in Antarctica by Chilean biologist Dr Daniel Torres. But whose were they? It would take years to determine their remarkable origin. We speak to Dr Torres about his discovery and how it revealed an unknown chapter of indigenous South American history.

Photo: Skull discovered on LIvingstone Island, Antarctica in 1985 (D.Torres/INACH)

Transcript

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0:00.0

Choosing what to watch night after night the flicking through the endless

0:06.8

searching is a nightmare we want to help you on our brand new podcast off the

0:11.8

telly we share what we've been watching

0:14.0

Cladie Aide.

0:16.0

Load to games, loads of fun, loads of screaming.

0:19.0

Lovely. Off the telly with me Joanna Paige.

0:21.0

And me, Natalie Cassidy, so your evenings can be a little less

0:24.9

searching and a lot more auction listen on BBC sounds just before this

0:30.3

BBC podcast gets underway here's something you may not know.

0:34.4

My name's Linda Davies and I commission podcast for BBC Sounds.

0:38.3

As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely

0:46.0

engaging voices. What you may not know is that the BBC makes podcasts about all kinds of things like pop stars,

0:54.2

poltergeist, cricket, and conspiracy theories.

0:57.6

And that's just a few examples.

0:59.4

If you'd like to discover something a little bit unexpected, find your next podcast over at BBC Sounds.

1:10.0

Hello and welcome to the Witness History Podcast from the BBC World Service with me Alex Last.

1:16.0

And in today's episode we have a story about a 200 year old mystery which began in the 1980s with a discovery on a remote island in the Antarctic.

1:27.0

On the afternoon of the 7th of January 1985 I was doing a census of mammals and also

1:45.0

collecting marine refuse on Cape Sheref, Livingston Island. On the beach I saw a big plastic container and also an enormous plastic orangey boy.

1:52.0

Dr Daniel Torres is a chilian biologist who spent his life working in the

1:57.3

Antarctic. That day he was on Livingston Island, one of a chain of islands

2:01.9

just off the Antarctic mainland, some 1,000 kilometers

...

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