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Naked & Marooned Shortlisted for Broadcast Award

The shortlist for the Broadcast Awards 2014 has been announced and Tigress Productions have received a nomination for ‘Naked and Marooned with Ed Stafford’ in the Best Popular Factual category.

The awards ceremony will take place on 5th February at the Grosvenor House Hotel and the winning productions will be revealed then.

Former British Army Captain, Ed Stafford was the first person ever to walk the length of the Amazon, but surviving completely alone on a desert island is his biggest adventure yet. Can he last 60 days on an uninhabited Fijian island with absolutely nothing?  No survival tools, no rations, no clothes, no film crew. It’s a daunting challenge and nobody’s ever done it before.  In fierce tropical heat he has only hours to find water before dehydration ends his attempt before it’s started.  He must master the island – and his fears – to find food and water, light fire, build a proper shelter and progress from mere survival to the point where he could live there forever.  Filmed entirely by Ed himself, there has never been a more authentic survival series on TV.

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Monty Halls and The Kaiser’s Lost Gold

Monty Halls investigates the world’s greatest underwater mysteries from what’s killed more than 100 divers in Egypt’s notorious Blue Hole to what sank a perfectly preserved ghost ship discovered at the bottom of Lake Huron with the lifeboat still attached and no sign of her crew? In Namibia, he and his expert team of deep divers explore a desert sinkhole in search of a safe said to hold £60million worth of gold dumped by the retreating German Army in the First World War. And in Japan he braves dangerous currents to investigate claims of a civilisation lost beneath the waves.

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Africa 2013 – Countdown to the Rains

Kate Humble and Simon King report from Zambia, following the lives of the animals living along the Luangwa River at a critical time in the seasons.

It hasn’t rained for 7 months and every animal, large and small, is locked in a struggle to survive – the elephant and her new born baby, the tiny lion cubs threatened by a power struggle in the pride and the hundreds of hippos and crocodiles squashed uncomfortably close as the river bed dries up.

75 cameras capture every moment as it happens through the last days of the longest dry season in memory to the arrival of the rains that will change everything.

BBC Two – Episode 1 – 8.00 pm – Sunday 3rd November 2013

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Coming soon : Edward VIII: The Lion King

Never before seen home movies shot by the controversial Edward VIII reveal the untold story of his extravagant safaris with the real life cast of “Out of Africa”, complete with adultery, champagne and specially built airstrips. At the height of the Great White Hunter era, Edward turned his back on big game hunting and championed conservation instead. Inspired by his safari guide, Denys Finch-Hatton – played by Robert Redford in the Oscar winning film – he put down his rifle and picked up a movie camera, pioneering the photographic safaris we all know today.

Tuesday 28th May

9pm on Channel 4

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Nature Shock : The Pig Bang Theory

A series of explosive fires are ravaging pig barns across North America, causing millions of dollars of damage and burning thousands of hogs alive.

 

A colossal fire in 2005 destroyed a family hog farm over night. The barn was razed to the ground and every pig inside killed.  There was no evidence of arson. An investigation was immediately launched and after exploration a suspect came to light – methane gas. Formed in a years worth of pig manure collected beneath the barn, this lethal gas could easily catch light on the heater systems used within. It seemed like an obvious cause, but didn’t fit all of the evidence.

 

A twist at the scene of another fire had a disturbing edge – a perfect circle of dead pigs. The cause, another deadly gas emitted from manure; hydrogen sulphide. It kills through respiratory paralysis, but more worryingly still, it is highly corrosive and eats away at the electrics. As the wiring degrades, the electric unit overheat and creates hundreds of potential ignition sources.

 

As the devastation continued victim farmers reported a strange gloopy foam that appeared in the manure pit prior to the fire. The foam was 60% methane making it highly flammable. With the right trigger, it released flammable gas, if the gas hits an ignition source it is capable of creating an unstoppable fire, killing thousands of hogs. 

 

So what creates the foam? Scientists are going to extraordinary lengths to find the explanation as Farmers are left living in fear that the fires could break out again, destroying their livelihood.

 

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Nature Shock : Killer Elephants

In the South Indian state of Kerala during 2009/10 a series of dead elephants are discovered by forest guards – each has died in suspicious circumstances. Finding so many corpses in the popular Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary is a huge shock for those who protect these endangered animals, and for Scientists worldwide.

There are around 900 Asian elephants in this Sanctuary and it’s extremely rare to find them dead. Normally around 3 or 4 die each year, mostly from old age.

Kannan, a tribesman with 30 year’s experience, is one of those tasked to guard the 350 square mile Sanctuary. On March 16th 2009 he’s distressed to discover two elephant corpses on the same day. No one in the Sanctuary has experienced anything like this before. Yet the tally of deaths keeps rising. And just five weeks later the body count stands at seven. All bar one are female and none are old.

Why are so many elephants dying in their prime, and why are nearly all female?

Conservationists are forced to become investigators. With no witnesses and scant evidence, the truth of what’s happening is hard to determine. They must urgently examine a range of threats facing their prized elephants.

One threat echoes fearfully around the Investigators’ minds: poaching. In the last 60 years India’s elephant population has halved, much of it due to poaching. Periyar Sanctuary has suffered from the worst of this, leaving it with a uniquely distorted nature.

As the mystery of the deaths deepens the State Government is forced to send in a team of scientists. They reach a shocking conclusion, proving, ‘without doubt’ they say, that a male elephant has warped from sexual aggressor into serial killer – a deduction that’s not only alarming, but also unprecedented.

However, Dr. Ajay Desai – a biologist with vast experience of elephant behaviour – thinks they may have underestimated this crisis. And when a tribal fisherman witnesses one astounding event Desai gets his proof, revealing both the truth of what is happening in the Sanctuary, and why. It offers a revelation arguably more shocking than the forest guards, the investigators, or the committee of scientists could ever have imagined.

About Dr Kate Evans :

In January 2002 Kate Evans started research on elephants in the Okavango Delta, with the help and support of Randall Moore of Elephant Back Safaris (EBS) and the Ministry of Environment, Wildlife and Tourism. The research is focused on adolescent male elephants and the transition from herd to bull life with an emphasis on research into the viability of releasing elephants into the wild from a captive environment. The charity Elephants For Africa was set up in December 2007 to support the research, a scholarship program for local students and an outreach education program. 

More here: http://www.elephantsforafrica.org/index.html

Channel 5 at 8pm on Monday 22nd April 2013

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Nature Shock : The Blacktip Shark Mystery

In spring 2006, dive boat operator Mark Addison witnessed the mysterious arrival of sixty Blacktip sharks on the Aliwal Shoal off the coast of South Africa.  Blacktips were not unknown on this reef but such numbers were unprecedented.   At first it was thought the sharks’ arrival coincided with the annual sardine run, when millions of fish pass up the coast.  But this theory was blown out of the water when something even stranger happened – the highly migratory Blacktips stayed put.

The shark gang took over the reef, chasing off the much larger tiger sharks that are the focus of Mark’s dive boat operation. His business under threat, he decided to turn detective.  He discovered the gang was 100% female and was actually almost two hundred strong.   Over time he came to believe that not only did the gang have a hierarchy and a pack leader but they were also communicating with each other from a distance.   His theories could rewrite science.

Meanwhile local fishermen were being mugged for their night-time catch. Salmon were being torn apart before they could be landed.  Many blamed the Blacktip bandits and their fears were confirmed when a few sharks began harassing spear-fishermen in broad daylight, stealing their catches too. Concern grew that such a cocky gang of sharks were operating just off the coast.

And it appeared they were learning .   Mark suspected that they were following boats in search of food.  With the sharks becoming more of a menace, he decided to launch an experiment to find out if he could solve the mystery.   Would his research confirm these smart sharks were getting smarter? And would it provide an answer as to why the Blacktips had remained at Aliwal?

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COMING SOON : Nature Shock

Nature Shock returns to 5, with extreme events that have left animal experts stunned: elephants stabbed to death in India; pigs burning to death in North America; a giraffe killing spree in Tanzania; and sharks forming gangs in South Africa.

The Blacktip Shark Mystery   15th April 2013

Killer Elephant                        22nd April 2013

The Pig Bang Theory              29th April 2013 

Giraffe Feast                          6th May 2013

Channel 5 at 8pm.  

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Naked and Marooned with Ed Stafford

Former British Army Captain, Ed Stafford was the first person ever to walk the length of the Amazon, but surviving completely alone on a desert island is his biggest adventure yet. Can he last 60 days on an uninhabited Fijian island with absolutely nothing?  No survival tools, no rations, no clothes, no film crew. It’s a daunting challenge and nobody’s ever done it before.  In fierce tropical heat he has only hours to find water before dehydration ends his attempt before it’s started.  He must master the island – and his fears – to find food and water, light fire, build a proper shelter and progress from mere survival to the point where he could live there forever.  Filmed entirely by Ed himself, there has never been a more authentic survival series on TV.

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Naked and Marooned With Ed stafford coming soon!

Naked and Marooned with Ed Stafford

Former British Army Captain, Ed Stafford was the first person ever to walk the length of the Amazon, but surviving completely alone on a desert island is his biggest adventure yet. Can he last 60 days on an uninhabited Fijian island with absolutely nothing?  No survival tools, no rations, no clothes, no film crew. It’s a daunting challenge and nobody’s ever done it before.  In fierce tropical heat he has only hours to find water before dehydration ends his attempt before it’s started.  He must master the island – and his fears – to find food and water, light fire, build a proper shelter and progress from mere survival to the point where he could live there forever.  Filmed entirely by Ed himself, there has never been a more authentic survival series on TV.

TX date: Episode One : 14th March 2013

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