“End of the World” is episode three of season one of The Time Tunnel.
At the end of the previous episode, “One Way to the Moon”, Doug and Tony arrived in a mine during some sort of disaster. Men were running out of the mine and one, when asked about the rest of the crew, said all 200 of them were trapped.
This episode opens inside the mine and Tony stumbles across a miner who says there are 200 men trapped. More rumbles or explosions follow and the miner tells Tony to get out. Then part of the roof collapses. Tony and Doug are separated by the collapse, and Doug says he is going for help.
Doug gets out of the mine and heads to the mine office. There is a single man, Henderson, there. When Doug asks where the rescue crew is, he is told there isn’t one. To Doug saying the men in the mine will die, Henderson asks what difference that will make. They are no better than the rest of us. They are all going to die, because of that thing out there. Doug heads outside and sees a glowing ball of fire in the sky.
At Tik-Toc, they see a crowd in St Peter’s Square in Rome, at the turn of the 20th century. That image is lost, then somewhere tropical is seen. Various other places are seen, all showing crowds. They’ve located Doug and Tony in time, but not in space. They then get a look at the glowing ball of fire and identify it as Halley’s Comet. Now, neither Halley’s Comet, nor any other comet, looks like a ball of fire in the sky. General Kirk wants research on the comet. They manage to focus on Doug who is telling Henderson that somebody needs to help the men or they will all die. Henderson states nobody can save them; they can’t save themselves. Doug will do it alone then.
Doug manages to dig Tony free, who tells him the other miners are trapped in the next shaft. There’s a cave-n and they need men. Tony wants to know why there aren’t any men there.
They return to Henderson who, being Mr Gloomy, says there’s no help for the miners nor anyone else. The world is coming to an end. Doug identifies the comet, from the calendar, as being Halley’s Comet. He states that it isn’t going to hit the Earth; it’s going to pass by. Henderson doesn’t believe him; this time tomorrow they will all be gone. Given that Doug and Tony are from the future, if there had been massive worldwide panic about the approach of Halley’s Comet, they would have known about it, or Tik-Toc would at the very least. Whilst it’s true there was some minor panic over cyanide in the comet’s tail in 1910, it wasn’t a worldwide panic and certainly there wasn’t a widespread belief that the comet was going to collide with the Earth.
Henderson says that Blaine is in charge in the mine; he’s the one who saved Tony’s life. Henderson feels sorry for him, but there’s no help for a dead man. At which point the phone rings from within the mine. Blaine and the others are still alive, but they need rescuing. Henderson thinks they are better off where they are, rather than coming out and facing the comet. They didn’t know about it when they went below. Then another cave-in severs the phone line.
At Tik-Toc, research showed the comet came close before veering off. It never veered anywhere. Research didn’t, it seems, turn up a worldwide panic. Kirk is concerned that the comet might affect the base. Ray and Anne don’t really know; the time tunnel is not perfected.
Henderson is telling Doug and Tony that Professor Ainsley at the observatory is the one who said the comet was going to hit. Yes, if he retracts his statement, people will believe him. But he wouldn’t say something unless he believed it. Doug plans to convince him otherwise. He wishes they had modern instruments. Tony is going to head into town. The sheriff, however, isn’t going to help; he doesn’t have the men. The townsfolk have all found religion.
Professor Ainsley tells Doug that every major observatory they could contact confirmed their calculations. He would be delighted to go over them with Doug. The finest minds have checked and rechecked them. Yes, Doug is a scientist, and he will work through them as well. Tony is having no luck with the townsfolk. Tik-Toc tries, and fails, to send modern instruments back to Tony and Doug.
Again, not a terribly accurate episode. Getting historical data wrong is a different thing to dodgy science.