How These Snakes Caused Power Outages in Guam
Transcript
00:00 The United States was reestablishing its Pacific Navy base on Guam.
00:05 The native Chamorro people were happy to have them back,
00:09 after being occupied by the Japanese for the last three years.
00:12 The liberated Chamorrans were unaware that a miracle had happened around them.
00:17 A miracle that manicured their jungles into acres of black-topped airfields,
00:21 moved mountains of material, equipment, and supplies.
00:28 But the Americans had brought something they hadn't intended.
00:31 The brown tree snakes were in with the supplies,
00:34 and when they just simply loaded the supplies up,
00:36 carted them back to Guam, to the military base there.
00:40 These snakes hitched a ride.
00:42 At least one female.
00:44 And there you go.
00:46 The snakes loved Guam.
00:48 No predators, lots of birds that didn't know anything about snakes,
00:53 lots of eggs.
00:57 The military began to notice a lot of power outages.
01:01 And you have the radar and all the other electronics associated with military activity.
01:07 You want to keep your power up.
01:09 Yes, you do.
01:11 As the population of the snakes got up,
01:14 they were getting fried as they were shorting the line.
01:17 Today, some areas in Guam have as many as 13,000 brown tree snakes per square mile.
01:26 And the native birds?
01:28 Out of 18 species in 1950, seven are extinct.
01:33 Two exist only in captive breeding programs,
01:37 like the Smithsonian's Conservation Resource Center in Front Royal, Virginia.
01:41 Maybe someday, they can go home.
01:45 They may be the villains in this story,
01:49 but the brown tree snake is only doing what comes natural,
01:52 surviving.
01:55 Their partner in crime, so to speak, was the U.S. Navy,
01:58 who introduced them to Guam in the first place.
02:02 [silence]