There is a lake close to the outskirts of Los Angeles that is covered by nearly one hundred million of black balls. This is the world’s largest ball pit and the interesting thing about it is that no one in Los Angeles actually knows what’s going on there. Fortunately, a man by the name of Derek Muller who runs the “Veritasium” YouTube channel decided to figure out this mystery and learn everything there is to know about the strange black balls that are floating on the lake.
As we can see in this picture, the Los Angeles lake is actually covered in floating black balls which are called shadow balls. The reason why they are called shadow balls is because they help keep the lake cool, but this is not their real purpose there.
You can say that this lake is unique, because let’s face it, where have you seen a huge lake filled with millions of balls? They’re not there for people to splash around and have fun.
As we said, they’re used to save water, and actually they do more than that. David was very curious to learn all about these shadow balls, so he went straight to the source!
According to the Los Angeles officials, there are more than 96 million shadow balls floating on top of the lake. Can you believe that?
It’s rare to see 96 million of anything. And that’s where Derek was heading, looking at them up close!
In August 2015, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti was present as the 96 million plastic balls which only measure 4 inches, have been dumped into the lake which holds around 3.3 billion gallons.
Their purpose was later unveiled by none other than Derek!
Derek Muller loves science and to use his knowledge in order to solve some of the world’s most interesting mysteries.
This is why it shouldn’t come as a surprise that the lake covered in shadow balls came to his attention.
After talking with the locals in Los Angeles, Derek found out that no one knows anything about the shadow balls.
The interesting thing about this is that no one actually was curious to find out why 96 million of them are floating on the lake.
“It looks absurd. It’s like we’re in the world’s biggest ball pit,” said Muller in the video as he got closer to the lake.
He was intrigued and had to learn more about these shadow balls that had a lot more use than just keep the water from evaporating.
Derek asked the Los Angeles health department for help in figuring out this mystery and they were more than happy to explain everything.
What they did this is quite innovative and they wanted to let the entire world know about it.
The first thing that you need to know is that this not a regular lake, it’s a reservation one.
This means that the water needs to be clean and healthy to drink at all times since it goes directly to people’s homes.
When Derek asked the Los Angeles officials why they put 96 million shadow balls on top of the lake, they said that the answer to that question is rather complicated so instead, they decided to take Derek out on the lake and show him everything.
You can count yourself lucky if you get in the middle of this lake, and Derek was right there, on a boat.
He cannot believe his luck when he finds himself in a boat with the man that cares for the lake. There, it all felt like the boat was floating on those shadow balls and not on the water!
Derek was introduced to James Tilch who is in charge of making sure the lake doesn’t get contaminated and they both got on a boat, but not before Derek put on a life jacket because driving a boat in this lake is super difficult.
The first question that Derek had for James was why don’t the balls just fly off when the wind blows?
The man said that these are special shadow balls and that they have been filled with a little bit of water so that they don’t fly away at the first breeze.
The first time these spheres were used was in airports to stop birds from perching in the water.
It was then revealed that these bird balls, as they were initially called, were also great at keeping out sunlight, so that meant it helped save water. But they had one more essential role for this lake…
While James Tilch was the one who took Derek out on the lake, Marty Adams who is the Chief Operating Officer of the LADWP is the one who was actually able to give Derek the scientific answers that he needed.
While the balls were now considered to be used to save water, this wasn’t the reason why they were added in the first place.
They helped keeping the water cool and provided enough shade to minimize algae growth. This way, the treatment facility uses less chlorine to treat the water for consumption. But the shade balls help with one more essential thing, the most important of them all…
