The Water Brothers

The Ganges is worshipped as a goddess, and many Hindus believe that this holy river cannot be polluted, yet it is one of the most dangerously contaminated rivers in the world. The Brothers meet the people who live with the extraordinary paradox of the Pure and the Poisoned – and they take their own holy dip in the Ganges with over 30 million people at the legendary Maha Kumbh Mela, the largest gathering of humans on earth.

The Brothers embark on a sailing adventure to the middle of the Pacific Ocean to the remote “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”, a massive collection of plastic waste congregated together by swirling ocean currents known as gyres. What does the patch look like? How does it affect wildlife and the seafood we eat? Where in the world did this inconceivably massive amount of plastic come from and from what human activities, and more importantly, what can be done about it? The Water Brothers bring us some answers to this strange and disturbing phenomenon.

It sounds futuristic, but “Dead Zones” exist in our water environments and are rapidly increasing in size and number. Why? A Dead Zone is a body of water with greatly reduced oxygen, often causing marine life to die. Habitats that were once teeming with life are reduced to biological deserts. Run-off of nutrients from farming is a major culprit. The Brothers travel to the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Erie to examine two of the world’s largest and most notorious Dead Zones.

Hundreds of millions of people live without access to clean water and billions live without a toilet, causing countless lives to be lost each day. It is women and girls that are usually given the difficult task of hauling water, taking many hours each day often in the hot sun and sacrificing much for their families and communities. The Brothers travel to Africa to the most water scarce regions of Tanzania and Kenya, to see first hand how simple water projects can make huge changes towards economic advancement – and how it is women who hold the key to improving clean water and sanitation access in their local communities.

Canadians are big water users and are also advanced in water treatment and distribution technologies. Yet, in one of the most water rich countries in the world, approximately one out of every five First Nations communities in Canada lacks access to clean, safe and sustainable drinking water. Why do some First Nations communities have these problems and others do not and are thriving? How can there be economic independence and advancement for these communities without this basic human right? The Brothers travel to First Nations communities in search of the answers.

No one saw it coming – the extensive flooding and damage in the NY City area in 2012 from Hurricane Sandy. But all the signs were there, half way across the planet in Bangladesh. The Brothers witness first hand the impact of rising sea levels and the increasing frequency and ferocity of violent storms, and some of the amazing adaptations the people of Bangladesh are undertaking. Will these solutions and others hold the key to Bangladesh’s floating future, or is this country on the verge of a massive environmental refugee crisis? Watch out, because Here Comes the Flood!

People love to eat salmon, but chances are that salmon is not wild. Globally, over 70% of the salmon we eat is raised on fish farms in the open ocean. Does it matter? And is it true that salmon farms, which are supposed to take the pressure off wild salmon stocks, might be wiping them out? To find out, the Brothers immerse themselves in the worlds of both wild and farmed salmon in one of the most beautiful places on earth.