Case Zero

In 2014, Lars Mittank, a young German man, was captured on security cameras at an airport in Bulgaria. The footage shows him visibly agitated, scanning the room as though he believed he was being watched. Without warning, he abandoned his belongings, ran out of the building, and disappeared. He has never been seen again. Despite the footage being widely circulated and investigations launched, his...

In 1948, the body of a man was found on a beach in Australia. He carried no identification. Every label had been removed from his clothing. In one of his pockets, investigators found a small scrap of paper bearing a phrase in Persian: "Tamám Shud" — meaning "finished." The investigation uncovered encrypted clues, a mysterious book, and connections that were never fully explained. More...

 In 1997, underwater sensors operated by NOAA detected an extraordinarily powerful sound in the Pacific Ocean. It was picked up thousands of miles away. Its origin was never definitively identified. Some scientists proposed a natural explanation. Others considered possibilities that remained inconclusive. The recording, known as "The Bloop," remains one of the strangest sounds ever captured b...

  In 2006, Rey Rivera disappeared in Baltimore. Days later, his body was found inside a hotel — in an abandoned conference room he appeared to have fallen through from a considerable height. The room was locked. There were no witnesses. The trajectory of the fall did not quite fit the scene. Police classified the death as unexplained. Years later, the case continues to raise questions a...

On March 8, 2014, Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 vanished from radar with 239 people on board. There was no distress call. There was no immediate explanation. In the days that followed, the search expanded across thousands of miles, while contradictory data emerged about the aircraft's trajectory. Despite one of the largest search operations in history, the plane was never fully recovered. What ha...

In 1587, more than a hundred English settlers established a colony on Roanoke Island, in what is now the United States. Three years later, when a supply expedition returned, there was no one left. No bodies. No signs of struggle. Only a single word carved into a wooden post: "CROATOAN." The fate of the Lost Colony of Roanoke has remained one of the oldest and most puzzling mysteries in American hi...

  In 2008, Brandon Swanson called his parents in the middle of the night after his car went off the road in a rural area of Minnesota. He was walking and talking to them by phone, trying to get his bearings. Then, without warning, he said a single word: "oh, shit." The call went dead. He was never heard from again. Despite extensive search efforts, his whereabouts remain unknown. See omnystud...

In 1959, nine hikers died under inexplicable circumstances in the Ural Mountains of the Soviet Union. Their tent was found cut open from the inside. Some had fled into extreme cold without adequate clothing. Others displayed injuries that were difficult to explain. The official investigation closed the case without a conclusive answer. Decades later, it remains one of the most analyzed mysteries o...

In November 1970, the body of a woman was found in Isdalen Valley, in Norway. She was partially burned, and no documents were found to identify her. Her belongings shared a peculiar trait: labels had been removed, objects had been altered, and traces had been erased. The investigation revealed that she had traveled across Europe using multiple identities and routes that were deliberately difficult...

On January 19, 2013, Elisa Lam entered the elevator of the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles. She was never seen alive again. Weeks later, police released the security camera footage. The world watched. The world had no explanation. Case Zero reconstructs, episode by episode, the real cases that remain unanswered. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.