The BBC has withdrawn Human Planet from distribution after admitting that the series faked scenes of an Indonesian hunter harpooning a whale.
The natural history programme is currently available on Netflix but will be withdrawn within 24 hours while the corporation conducts an “editorial review”.
It is the second Human Planet fakery story this month. It emerged that film-makers had staged scenes of a rainforest tribe supposedly living in a treehouse 140 feet from the ground.
The opening episode of the 2011 series visited the Indonesian island of Lembata and focused on a young man named Benjamin Blikololong. He was shown jumping into the sea during a sperm whale hunt, and viewers were told he had succeeded in harpooning it.
A voiceover from John Hurt said: “Benjamin’s moment has arrived.” After he leapt into the water brandishing the weapon, Hurt said: “He’s got it.” Viewers are then Blikololong received a larger share of the whale meat because he “struck the decisive blow”
But a journalist writing a book on the whale hunters, who live on the tiny island of Lembata, met Blikololong and heard that he had not harpooned the whale. He then contacted the BBC.
In a statement, the corporation said: “The BBC has been alerted to a further editorial breach in the Human Planet series from 2011.
“In Episode 1, Oceans, a Lamaleran whale hunter named Benjamin Blikololong is shown supposedly harpooning a whale. On review, the BBC does not consider that the portrayal of his role was accurate, although the sequence does reflect how they hunt whales.
“The BBC has decided to withdraw Human Planet from distribution for a full editorial review.” In all, there have been four fakery stories surrounding the series.
In 2015, the corporation admitted that it had used a semi-domesticated wolf in one episode because the crew were unable to find a wild one.
And shots of a tarantula, purporting to be taken in the Venezuelan jungle, were actually taken in a studio.
At the beginning of this month, it was revealed that a 140-foot high treehouse said to be a home to the Korowai people in Papua New Guinea was built for the benefit of the cameras.
Writer and adventurer Will Millard went to the village to film another BBC series, My Year With The Tribe, and learned the truth.
The BBC said standards had been raised since Human Planet was made. “Since this programme was broadcast in 2011, we have strengthened our training for the BBC’s Natural History Unit in editorial guidelines, standards and values.”
Read more at www.telegraph.co.uk
Saighdear
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A-hah! so can we believe the images about the whales and PLASTIC ? – or at least ALL that plastic ? After all, it has come to light that much of the ocean pollution is derived from the Large Rivers draining the Far East / and Asia.