afety and welfare of its crew. But they stated they will "vigorously oppose" any attempts to "censor material that is clearly in the public interest and public domain." The ice continent of Antarctica, they point out, belongs to no nation. The U.S. has no jurisdiction there. "That video is the property... (read more)of @lantisTV," said a company spokeswoman. "We shot it. It's ours. And as soon as it's rightfully returned to us, we're going to air it. End of story."

Two Navy officers who saw the tape described its contents to civilian National Science Foundation (NSF) researchers upon their return to Amundson-Scott Station at the South Pole, according to sources at McMurdo Station, the main American base in Antarctica. "They said it showed spectacular ruins and other things they couldn't go into," an NSF scientist reported. "We chalked it up to some sort of subzero- induced delusion until a chopper full Navy SEALS landed and picked them up and took off. Now we're scratching our heads" Officials of the U.S. Naval Support Task Force, Antarctica, deny the story or possession of any video shot by the missing @lantisTV crew.

News of the video, which Navy rescuers said they found in an abandoned supply dump one hundred miles west of Vostok Station, comes on the heels of U.S. attempts to strike passages from RAISING ATLANTIS, the upcoming novel by Thomas Greanias that is the basis for @lantisTV's popular online Atlantis Mapping Project channel. Federal officials agreed to allow an uncensored version of RAISING ATLANTIS to go on sale in April at Amazon.com as an e-book. But they won court approval to "block certain portions that might compromise national security" from the hardcover edition due in bookstores by year's end.

"The government feels fairly confident that few people are going to read a 400-page novel on their computers," said a U.S. attorney familiar with the negotiations. "And @lantisTV has agreed to remove the uncensored e-book when the hardcover comes out." The problem for the feds, he said, is going to come when people buy the e-book and keep it to compare it with the hardcover. "At that point the disputed passages might as well be lit up in neon."

The novel focuses on a secret U.S. military expedition that discovers ancient ruins two miles beneath the ice in Antarctica. Recent events in Antarctica have raised questions about whether the story is fiction or a novelization of actual events. But sources say the current federal review is focusing on the novel's depiction of "Federal Emergency Plan D," which officially doesn't exist, although parts of the plan have become public in the wake of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on America. Specifically, Stage One of "Plan D" went into effect on Sept. 11 and calls for the activation of a "shadow government" to operate in secret bunkers outside the nation's capital to ensure the survival of the United States of America and the continuity of its government in the event of a natural global catastrophe or nuclear Armageddon.

It's the specifics of Stage Two and Three, detailed in RAISING ATLANTIS, that concern federal officials. "Hell, I didn't even know about Stage One and the shadow government until 9-11, let alone Stage Two or Stage Three," said one CIA source on condition of anonymity.

Last week President Bush, in a veiled reference to Stage One of "Plan D," said his administration has "all options on the table" as the Pentagon reworks its nuclear weapons policy to deter any attack on America - including from non-nuclear states such as Iraq and Iran.

The U.S. nuclear arsenal is "a way to say to people who would harm America: 'Don't do it,'" Bush said. "We've got all options on the table because we want to make it very clear to nations that you will not threaten the United States or use weapons of mass destruction against us or our allies or friends."

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