When someone dies, the body will immediately start to decompose,
starting with the internal organs
and depending on the conditions, an untreated dead body
will become unrecognisable, within ten days.
This is a natural process and is as nature intended.
However there are cases, where people have died in extremely cold places,
meaning their bodies have been frozen
and perfectly preserved for many years.
Here we look at five such instances,
where peoples bodies have been frozen in time.
As a warning, this video will contain
some graphic imagery.
Captain Scott. In June 1910
renowned arctic explorer, Captain Robert Falcon Scott and his team
left Cardiff, Wales, on the Whaling ship
Terra Nova
in preparation to become the first British explorers
to reach the south pole.
However when they reached Antarctica, it became apparent,
that the group were ill-equipped to deal with the harsh conditions
and the ponies and sledges they were using, were unable to cope
and were abandoned.
The expedition carried on with just dogs but eventually,
the dog teams also turned back
and by January 1912
only five of the original group remained
Scott, Wilson, Oates, Bowers and Evans.
The five pushed on through appalling conditions
and finally reached the pole, only to find
a Norwegian flag flying and the realisation
that a party lead by Roald Amundsen
had beaten them to it.
Deflated and exhausted, they started
the 1500 kilometre journey back
but by mid February, Evans was dead
and just a month later,
Oates, who was suffering from severe frostbite
and knowing he was holding his companions back,
walked out of his tent into a blizzard and was never seen again.
The remaining three, also eventually succumbed to the freezing conditions
and died of starvation and exposure
at the end of March 1912.
Their frozen bodies were found in their tent eight months later
and Scott's diary revealed the extent
of their torment.
Heartbreakingly, they were located
just 20 kilometres from a pre-arranged supply point.
It was decided that their bodies should be left as they were found
and a mound of snow was built around and over the tent
in a makeshift icy burial site.
A cross made of skis was placed on top,
and a member of the search party left a note
in a metal cylinder at the site
in which he wrote their obituaries.
The three were then left in their snow covered ice tomb
where they remain to this day.
However in the years since and with the changing climate
the tomb has been slowly moving.
This is because it was erected
on top of a 360ft section of ice
so as the surface accumulates more ice
and the bottom of the shelf melts and refreezes, it slowly moves.
With the passage of time, it's now estimated
the three bodies have travelled, around 39 miles
and are encased in over 55ft of snow.
In fact, no-one seems to know exactly where they are now
but glaciologists believe
the moving bodies are still preserved intact
and within the next 250 years
the remains of Scott, Bowers and Wilson
will reach the age of the Ross Ice Shelf
where it meets McMurdo Sound in the Ross Sea.
By then, it's estimated that they'll be encased
in more than 325ft of ice
and by the time they reach the sea,
they will emerge inside a huge iceberg, bobbing around in the ocean.
Marceline and Francine Dumoulin
On August the 15th 1942
Marceline and Francine Dumoulin
ventured out to feed their cattle
on mountain pasture in the Swiss Alps.
they never returned and were never seen again, leaving behind seven children.
That is until July 2017
when an employee of a local cable car company
was doing routine maintenance in the Swiss Alps
when he saw a foot protruding from the ice.
Upon closer inspection, he saw two other boots and some personal artefacts
as well as the blackened remains of a man and a woman.
Security and the police were notified
and after recovering the bodies still encased in a block of ice,
it was confirmed by DNA that they were the remains
of Marceline and Francine Dumoulin.
It's thought the couple fell into a crevasse 75 years earlier
and as the glaciers started to melt, their well preserved bodies were revealed.
Only two of their children were still alive and their youngest daughter
who was just four years old when her parents disappeared
said she and her siblings had spent their whole lives looking for them.
The couple were finally laid to rest in south west Switzerland
and their funeral was attended by their two surviving children,
their grandchildren
and great grandchildren that they had never met.
The pair had finally been released from their icy grave.
The mummified bodies of World War One soldiers.
Global warming has revealed some unexpected and gruesome discoveries
as glaciers in the Italian alps are slowly melting
to reveal the mummified frozen corpses
of soldiers killed during World War One.
Since 2004 whenever their is a hot summer
more and more bodies are being exposed in the location
where countless men were shot, starved or froze to death
during the great war.
The last two soldiers to be found
were lying side by side on the Presena glacier.
It's thought they were just teenagers who were buried in a frozen crevasse
by fellow fighters after being shot in the head
in 1918.
One of the young soldiers, still had a spoon tucked in his uniform
for eating his rations.
These two young men, thought to be between sixteen and eighteen
went to fight for their country and were not seen again
for nearly 100 years.
The fight between the Italian forces
and those of the Austro Hungarian empire was long
and much of it was in the mountainous Italian Alps
where a blizzard could send temperatures
dropping to minus 30 degrees Celsius.
However it's not just bodies that are being unearthed from the battleground.
Clothes, shoes and intact letters from soldiers
are also being discovered.
Sadly, sometimes bodies are found that have been completely looted
with all remnants of them being soldiers removed
to be sold online to unsuspecting collectors.
In fact, some people are going up to the mountain
with the sole intent of finding such things
to sell on the internet.
Alex Lowe and David Bridges.
On the 27th of April 2016
the bodies of acclaimed mountain climber
Alex Lowe and cameraman David Bridges were discovered
16 years after their disappearance in the Himalayan mountains.
The pair were buried alive in an avalanche
in Tibets Shishapangma
on the 5th of October 1999
along with their companion Conrad Anchor.
All three were part of the nine member
American Shishapangma ski expedition
Anchor, who was only partially buried
sustained broken ribs and a head gash but was able to walk to safety.
However despite almost two days searching,
Lowe and Bridges were not found.
The two bodies were finally found encased in blue ice
and their identity was confirmed by Anchor from the description of their clothing and backpacks.
The bodies were not touched out of respect
and left on the mountain.
The finds brought closure to the families
who planned to make a pilgrimage to the area to recover the bodies.
George Mallory
In 1924, George Mallory
and his partner Andrew Irvine
attempted what at the time seemed impossible.
To be the first humans ever, to reach the summit of Mount Everest
the tallest mountain in the world.
Whether they made it or not is open to debate
as they didn't survive to tell the tale.
Their last confirmed sighting was 800ft from the summit
after that, their fate remained unknown for 75 years.
At the time, their disappearances made world headlines
and the only evidence found was an empty oxygen bottle
and an ice axe belonging to Irvine.
But in 1999, a Nova BBC sponsored expedition
set out to try and find the pair
and within a matter of hours
they discovered a frozen body lying face down, dressed in wool and fur.
At first they believed it was the remains of Andrew Irvine
but the nametags on the body's clothing
indicated it was the body of George Mallory.
The corpse was perfectly preserved
and although no photos of his face were taken,
it was reported, it was undamaged with a solemn expression.
It also show how George died
when a broken climbing rope was tied around his waist
suggesting that Irvine and Mallory were tied together
when one of them fell.
An ice axe was also found close to his body
leading researchers to believe that George had stopped his own fall
but a puncture wound found on his forehead
indicated that he was killed in the process, possibly by his ice axe hitting him
sadly, Irvines body was never located.
So that's five, remarkable cases
where human bodies have been found frozen in time.
Thanks for watching and I'll see you in the next video.