Caribbean Deadly on a Mission: Pole to Pole

My name's Steve Backshall.

And I'm on a mission, searching for...

deadly places,

deadly adventures

and deadly animals.

And you're coming with me, every step of the way!

Arghhhh!

Our planet-spanning expedition from the Arctic to Antarctica

is now halfway through.

Our next deadly destination is 4,500 miles south

from our start point in the Arctic Circle.

We've reached the Tropics,

and are here to explore a group of 700 islands - the Bahamas.

Surrounded by the Caribbean Sea

these warm waters are filled with a phenomenal diversity of life.

And we're about to meet some of their most formidable residents...

This is absolute chaos!

..avoiding the attentions of tiger-striped sharks..

Whoa! Whoa! Slow, slow, slow!

-RADIO:

-Everyone all right down there?

..and tangling with a toothy reptilian terror.

It sends a chill up your spine. Where's it gone?

At the moment, all I'm doing is shaking with fear.

And I face my worst nightmares.

No way!

There's one group of animals that we come back to

over and again on Deadly... the sharks, for obvious reasons.

But this time we're aiming to take our understanding of sharks

to a whole new level.

The experiment I have in mind can only work

if we can get enough sharks to take part. And this is just the place.

The sharks here are used to being fed,

and the second the boat's turned up, we are surrounded.

I'm going to be getting in the water

and feeding them by hand.

Wearing chainmail should protect me from any accidental nip.

Our aim is to film a shark's bite as never before,

using a specialist rig called a time-slice.

It has 20 small cameras, all aligned around this semicircle of metal and

they'll all fire off simultaneously, allowing us to freeze in time

the exact moment of a shark's bite.

It'll mean that we can see it in three dimensions,

understand it in super-slow speed, and it should give us

a better understanding of the anatomy of a shark bite.

'Using the time-slice on land would be tricky, but underwater and

'surrounded by a shiver of sharks, it'll be a serious challenge.

'To get a shark to bite on cue, we have a boxful of fish bait.'

OK, so this is the plan.

I'm going to try and bring a shark in and get it

to bite right dead in the centre.

It might sound easy, but trust me, it's not going to be.

There are sharks everywhere!

I'm getting absolutely beaten up here.

'I need a clean, clear bite, right in the epicentre of the cameras...

'..while taking care not to get bitten

'by an overenthusiastic shark.'

Oh, ow.

'Despite being super keen to feed, there's no mindless frenzy here.

'Finally, we start to get the hang of it.

'Our plan is coming together.' Yes!

Perfect!

'But with this many excited sharks,

'you need eyes in the back of your head.'

Oh...!

Argh!

Well, I got pretty hammered there.

Got a hold of my hand and dragged me off.

I don't think it meant to bite me.

I just didn't get my hand out of the way in time.

'I'm a little shaken, but no more than a few scratches.

'It's a good job I was wearing the chainmail.

'And it seems the sharks have worked out where the food is.'

Um...!

I think we've got a bit too many sharks for this.

Argh!

'It's a good time to get out and see what the time-slice has captured.'

OK, so...

you can see the lemon shark coming in here.

Oh, wow!

That is incredible!

Fantastic.

'The time-slice has captured the exact moment of the strike.

'It allows us to analyse the bite from every angle.'

Now, because the mouth is on the underside of the head,

it needs to lift the nose up quite considerably to be able to

stand any chance of getting a bite.

But the jaws are very, very different

to the jaws that you'd see in a mammal.

We have our upper jaw fused to our skull

and only our lower jaw can move free.

In a shark, it's completely different.

And you can see that at this moment of the strike.

There.

Both the shark's upper and lower jaws thrust forward.

Rows of thin, pointed teeth can snag larger prey.

Smaller prey is just hoovered up.

Its huge gaping mouth creates a massive cavern

and water is sucked in like a vacuum.

'The lemon shark's skewer teeth,

'suction strike and jutting jaws

'are unquestionably deadly.'

Agh!

'Our next target is another shark,

'but not one for the time-slice,

'and the chainmail will have little effect on its mighty jaws.

'It's the Bahamas' largest and most feared predator.'

So, this is Tiger Beach, except there's no beach

and no tigers either.

Well, not the obvious kind, anyhow.

In actual fact, it's a shallow sandbank, surrounded by miles

and miles of open sea.

'And Tiger Beach is home to tiger sharks,

'stripy underwater undertakers

'that can be at least double the size of the lemon sharks.'

Got something coming back. I don't know if it's a tiger now.

Big dark spot coming in right now.

'The silhouette is distinctly different to the lemons,

'so we kit up and drop in.

'Tiger sharks are opportunistic

'and one of the most omnivorous of all creatures.

'They course up and down the water column taking a bite out of...

'well, just about anything.'

So far, all I can see are lemon sharks.

Oh, my goodness!

Well, THIS is why we came here to Tiger Beach!

It's a true monster of a tiger shark.

It's easy to tell them apart from the lemons.

The tiger shark is noticeably broader and stouter.

The eyes are black...

..and it has these stripes and dappling colouration

running down the sides...

..that give it its tiger name.

It's a much more menacing shark.

'The teeth are also totally different to the lemons -

'stout, wide, curved and with a serrated edge,

'they can carve through seabirds, turtle shells,

'even other sharks.'

So, now we have two tiger sharks in the mix

and that's completely changed the situation. Three?!

Yes, another one.

Right, from here on in, we're going to have to be much more careful.

If a tiger shark got a hold of you, even wearing a chainmail...

it's going to be very bad indeed.

I'm...I'm really nervous about this tiger here, it's a bit...

a bit too...

..aggressive for my liking, actually.

That one there, it's got attitude.

The other ones I'm fine with, but that one, that needs to be watched.

I'm not comfortable with you at all.

Whoa!

Do you know what?

This shark is not good.

'It's obvious that every shark has a different personality.

'This one is bold, confident and inquisitive,

'and as sharks don't have hands to feel with,

'they use their mouths and their teeth.'

I've got my eye on you.

This is absolute chaos!

There - on your fin, Si. No, draw in your foot.

Draw in your foot, seriously.

Whoa, whoa, whoa! Si, Si, Si!

RADIO: Everyone OK down there?

That shark very, very nearly took a bite of Simon's leg...

..and that's a tiger, that's not good news.

'Best not to overstay our welcome. This is the tiger sharks' domain.

'Weighing up to half a tonne, these awe-inspiring beasts

'are the true lords of the Caribbean seas.

'I'm continuing my search for the Bahamas' most deadly

'by heading inland.'

What lies ahead is one of the most challenging, certainly for me,

THE most frightening thing that we've ever done on Deadly.

'This time, it's not a predatory animal, it's a deadly place.'

Over the years, I've done

expeditions in every kind of environment -

mountains, desert, arctic.

But there's one that scares me more than any other. It's caves.

And if there's one thing that's more frightening than a cave,

it's a flooded cave that has absolutely no air in it.

'These pools mark the entrance ways to flooded passages and caves,

'stretching for hundreds of miles underground.

'Caves are some of the most beautiful

'and unexplored places on Earth,

'but have the potential to be lethal.

'So, back in the UK, I've been training hard to prepare.

'The only things that keep you alive are planning, specialist kit

'and a bit of nerve.

'Here in the Bahamas I've teamed up with some elite cave divers.'

Flooded caves are one of the most unexplored environments

on the planet, but they're also one of the most dangerous and

one of the reasons for that is, there's no air inside them.

If you're diving out in the sea and something goes wrong, you can

come to the surface. You can't in a cave.

So, we've got enormous amounts of compressed air.

The other complete nightmare with cave diving would be

if everything went dark, because then you'd get lost

and if you get lost, you're probably not going to come out alive.

So, I've got an awful lot of light.

'Whenever I get into a cave, I start feeling claustrophobic

'and I can feel my heart rate going up and it does really frighten me.'

Can't put it off any longer.

Over all the years that Johnny the cameraman and I have been

working together, we've done all sorts of dives -

sharks, whales, crocodiles.

This is the first time that he's not allowed to come with me.

'All these precautions are for good reason.'

At the moment, all I'm doing is shaking with fear.

'The other cave divers will be watching my back

'and also filming what we find.

'It's time to leave my crew behind.'

Three...two...one.

'Not far from the last light,

'our first find.'

Amazing!

There's not much life living in these caves,

but there are a few...

creatures that make their home here.

Like these...tiny shrimp.

Look at all of the long antennae that it's tapping around

in the darkness with. It can't see...

so it needs to make best use of those long, sensory appendages.

'This cave shrimp is a rare find.

'They survive here by feeling their way with tactile antennae,

'sensing food and evading predators in the pitch black.

'A little deeper in the cave is a truly prehistoric find.'

It's called a brotula.

These fish are predatory,

so they'll swallow just about anything.

The extraordinary thing is, they're very, very primitive fish,

they've probably been around on the planet

maybe even hundreds of millions of years,

and remain pretty much unchanged.

And the only place they live is in caves like this.

'Further into the cave system, the water clears

'and a world of wonder emerges.'

No way!

I've never seen anything like it in my life.

That is incredible,

even more so because so few people will ever have seen it before.

'This cavern is adorned with stalagmites and stalactites

'that were formed thousands of years ago before the cave flooded.'

It's easy to be so overwhelmed

by the beauty and the majesty

of all the features in these caverns

that you totally forget where you are

and, all of a sudden, you remember

that you're underground and underwater

and a very, very long way from safety.

'We've now ventured so deep into the cave

'that there would be no chance of rescue.

'It's all too easy to get lost,

'it's a maze of tunnels and dead ends.

'And, as if to remind me,

'we find the bones of a long-dead deadly animal.'

It's the remains of a crocodile.

This has probably come from about 4,000 years ago.

You can still see the upper jawbone...

some of the teeth.

Actually, it's still in remarkably good condition.

'Our air's running low.

'Time to head for the light.'

There's no doubt that caves,

particularly flooded caves like this, are a deadly environment.

I mean, there's very little margin for error. You get things wrong

and you haven't really got a lot of chance of surviving.

But they've got to be one of the most

magical, mystical places on the planet...

and, uh...

I'm not going to forget that in a hurry.

'Our pole-to-pole journey rolls on south

'to the exotic Caribbean island of Cuba.'

It's the largest island in the Caribbean,

and a place that's legendary for its music, its culture,

its salsa dancing and its classic cars.

But we're here to show you a completely different side to Cuba.

The deadly side.

'Like the Bahamas, Cuba has a subterranean underworld which

'very few people ever see.

'The cave we are heading to is not, thank goodness,

'filled with water, but is filled with wonders of the wild kind.'

It doesn't look like much, yet.

But there's something very, very special inside this cave.

There's at least half a million bats roosting inside.

And many, many other predators have come here to take advantage of that.

'And one that can only be found here...

'..the Cuban boa.'

To show them to you, I have to take a journey into the underworld.

'These animals choose to live here in darkness for a reason.

'So as not to disturb them and cause a flying stampede,

'we're switching to infrared light.

'So, from now on, we'll be working almost in complete darkness.'

When you can't see very well, all of a sudden, you start to feel uneasy,

and particularly here in this cave where

there are kind of sounds of things moving around you.

Occasionally, you'll see something scuttling off into the darkness,

but you're not quite sure what it is.

It really, really gives you the fear.

BUMP

'The very floor seems to be moving, crawling with cockroaches.

'They're feasting on guano,

'the droppings of thousands of bats roosting on the ceiling above.'

But where are those bats?

'Our mission to find the cave boa has now taken over two hours

'and we've travelled half a mile into the cave.

'If we can find the main concentration of bats,

'the boas hunting them won't be too far away.'

Unbelievable.

Now, that is what I call a bat cave.

Caves like this are an absolute hell for human beings.

They're hot, they're humid, we're ankle deep in poo,

creepy-crawlies everywhere. But for bats, they're a kind of paradise.

The temperature in here is constant,

they're safe from the elements, from the weather.

This is a place where they can come

and they can roost during the day and be pretty much safe.

Safe, that is, apart from one rather terrifying predator.

'That's what we're here to find.' Got one! Got one! Got several!

There's loads of them.

No...way!

So...

this is why we've come to this cave.

Cuban boas.

There's one reason why this snake is here

and one reason alone,

and that's to feast on bats.

Just trying to keep my eyes on this snake

cos I can't really see it.

I wasn't really expecting to find anything this big, but I guess when

there's this much food around, you can grow to be a really good size.

'In the pitch dark, boas can't rely on eyesight to catch bats.

'Instead, lip scales packed with sensitive nerve endings

'allow it to sense heat.

'A thermal-imaging camera shows how the bats may appear to the snake.

'With a bat targeted, the boa lashes out with pin sharp teeth.

'Then it constricts, preventing blood, oxygen

'and nerve impulses travelling around the body.'

The Cuban boa, it may make its home in a nightmare of a place,

but, for me, this is a dream of a snake.

And undoubtedly deadly.

'To my great relief, we're done with caves

'and heading out to the Paradise Coast.

'But we're in paradise to find a crocodile that could be

'the biggest and baddest in the New World.

'The American crocodile.

'And we're hoping to film one underwater.'

These islands are dotted with loads of paradise beaches,

and it's the perfect place to start looking for crocodiles.

Are you all right there, mate?

THEY LAUGH

'The beach is covered with animal tracks.

'But none look like crocodile.

'So, what are they?'

-Look!

-There's lots of them.

-Look at that!

This is absolutely remarkable.

All of a sudden, all of the bushes have just erupted with life.

And one of them has to be

one of the most curious-looking critters I've ever seen.

Look at this!

This is a Cuban hutia.

And they only occur in Cuba.

It's like someone's taken the head of a beaver

and stuck it onto a wallaby.

Surely the hermit crabs aren't going to come

and take things out of my hand. That would be too bizarre for words.

Nope.

I was expecting Cuba's wildlife to be special...

..but not quite this special.

Unfortunately, though, we're on the hunt for deadly animals.

I'm not sure that any of this lot qualify.

'So, it's back to the water.

'Noel, our Cuban biologist, is taking us

'to a lagoon where crocs are often seen, and, apparently,

'there's a good chance they might even come and find us.'

HE CALLS

'The wild crocodiles are sometimes fed by the locals.'

HE CALLS

'When they hear these calls,

'they know there's opportunity for a free feed.'

And there's already a crocodile heading straight towards us.

'It's not fully grown but its senses are fully formed.'

You can see how much it's driven by vibrations.

If I just...

..thrash the water slightly with my hand...

'The sound mimics the splashing

'of an injured fish or animal in the water.

'They're detected by sensory bumps in the lip scales.'

It's going to come straight towards me

and I'm going to take my fingers out of the water

because, otherwise, I think I'd probably lose them.

'If you think I'm being overdramatic,

'a few years ago in Argentina...

'I accidentally stepped on another fairly small croc.'

HE SCREAMS

That was a Caiman.

And I've just been given a really nasty bite.

'A lucky escape, but I still needed ten stitches in my leg.

'So, youngster or not, he gets my full respect and attention.'

There aren't many rules for diving with crocodiles,

mostly because not many people have been dumb enough to do it.

'So I'm going to stick to the rules I use for swimming with sharks.

'Be confident and big in the water.

'Don't flail hands and feet around that could look like fishy food.'

OK, here goes nothing.

'And the last rule, keep your eyes on the animal

'so they can't take you by surprise.'

Where have they gone?

Your ten o'clock, about ten metres away, just gone under.

Be careful, fellas. Straight ahead of you now.

Yes, I see him.

It's such a chilling sight,

having a crocodile head straight towards you like this,

particularly when they're capable of just dropping out of sight

and becoming invisible.

Steve, there's another one here on the right. It's bigger.

'A larger and more menacing beast to share the water with.'

When you lose sight of it...

..it sends a chill up your spine.

Where's it gone?

His head is this far from my leg.

I don't want to move because any movement

might make me look like food.

'Hold your nerve, no sudden movements,

'and somehow keep an eye on two separate circling crocodiles.'

Such a magnificent creature.

'When hunting, they rely more on vibrations than their eyesight.

'Lying perfectly still under the water for 30 minutes or more,

'they wait for a fish, bird or mammal to alert their senses...

'..finally using their cone-shaped pointed teeth to finish the job.'

The American crocodile, one of the largest reptiles in the world.

There's no doubt they're deadly.

And I feel very lucky to have kept all my fingers.

'The caves and waves of the Caribbean

'have proved a hefty challenge.

'But next we'll head to the heart of darkness

'and the finest, most pristine jungle on the planet

'as we continue our expedition from pole to deadly pole.'