BBC's 'Blue Planet: The Deep' airs on GMA News TV

 

This Saturday on GMA News TV, BBC’s The Blue Planet takes the viewers on a journey from the surface of the ocean right down to the deepest abyss.   Of all the ocean habitats, the deep ocean remains the least known. Sixty percent of the earth’s surface is covered by seas more than a mile deep but only a handful of submarines are capable of diving that deep.   In the clearest seas, light penetrates as deep as a thousand meters. This is the twilight zone – a mid-water world where animals play a constant game of hide and seek. Most are transparent, hoping to pass unnoticed in the gloom. Predators in the twilight zone have responded by developing highly sensitive eyes to take advantage of the last glimmers of light.   Go below a thousand meters and you enter the dark zone - a world of the weird and wonderful. Predators here have massive teeth and enormous mouths. Food comes along so rarely that they have to be able to eat it, whatever its size. The only light is bioluminescence, produced by the animals that live there. Potential prey like shrimps and jellyfish use bioluminescence to confuse their predators, while predatory angler fish use bioluminescent lures to attract their prey.   Many of the mid-water animals from the dark zone do not rely solely on food that comes to them. Each night, millions and millions of creatures perform a vertical migration into shallower, richer waters. This is by far the largest migration of life on the planet.   “The Blue Planet” journeys deeper down the continental slope, and further down to the abyssal plain, the ocean’s greatest depths. Surprisingly, in this cold world of total darkness and immense pressure, life thrives and has become almost completely independent of sunlight.     BBC’s The Blue Planet featuring “The Deep” airs this Saturday, September 8 at 10PM on GMA News TV Channel 11. This Philippine free TV airing is narrated in Filipino by award-winning documentarist Kara David.