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Anthony here for dnews and this never stops being funny.
大家好，我是安东尼，欢迎大家收看今天的DNews视频，吹氦气球从来都是很好玩儿的。
Well, not until we run out of helium, which is happening.
但是，等我们的氦气用完了，这事儿已经发生了，就不好玩了。
And it's a much scarier proposition than you might think.
而且，氦气被用完是一件远比你想象的可怕的命题。
See, most people think of balloons when they think of helium.
事实上，大多数人一想到氦气首先想到的就是气球。
And balloons are fun.
气球确实很好玩儿。
So, that's good.
那这不挺好的嘛。
Let's think about fun things.
我们就想好玩儿的事儿啊。
But helium actually has much more important uses.
问题是，氦气其实还有更重要的用途。
It's the only thing capable of cooling some electromagnets,
它是唯一能冷却某些电磁铁，
like the ones in MRI machines, and the Large Hadron Collider.
比如核磁共振机和大型强子对撞机的物质。
It also takes huge amounts of helium to launch liquid fuel rockets.
发射液体燃料火箭也需要大量的氦气。
It's used in the manufacture of computer chipsets and fiber optic cabling.
制造计算机芯片和光纤电缆也要用到氦气。
The universe is nowhere near running out of helium.
宇宙中的氦气还远没有到被用尽的那天。
It's actually the second most common element there is.
事实上，氦还是世界上第二常见的元素。
It's just really really rare here on earth.
只不过，地球上的氦气储量不多。
See, we mined for it in the ground like natural gas, mostly in the US.
氦气是需要我们像开采天然气一样在地下开采的，而氦气的主要储藏地是美国。
And we started stockpiling it in the United States in 1925 in a place called the Federal Helium Reserve.
早在1925年，我们就已经开始在一个叫作“联邦氦储备库”的地方储存氦气了。
Basically because back then everyone thought we'd be using dirigibles as transportation.
主要是因为当时大家都以为飞船会成为日后主要的交通工具。
After holding on to the hope that a Zeppelin powered future was coming for 70 years,
接下来的70年，美国人一直都抱着未来将由齐柏林飞艇开创的希望，
the U.S. unloaded all that helium onto the open market in the 90s.
这一希望一直持续到了90时代，之后，美国便开始将美国所有的氦储备都放到了公开市场销售。
Where most of the population used it for remote-controlled shark balloons and doing chipmunk impressions.
那时，大多数人都用氦气给遥控鲨鱼气球充气或吸氦气模仿花栗鼠说话。
Which was a bad decision, because we're depleting our helium supplies really quickly.
这个决定是很糟糕的，因为我们正在迅速耗尽我们的氦气供应。
And there's currently no way to manufacture it.
而且，我们目前是没有办法人工制造氦气的。
And no good substitute for it.
也没有好的替代品能替代这种资源。
Some scientists are saying that we could be as little as a hundred years away from running out of it.
有科学家称，现在可能已经只剩一百年的用量了。
And that if you compared its level of scarcity to that of other precious materials,
如果将氦气的稀缺度和其他珍贵资源相比的话，
we should be charging as much as a hundred and twenty-five dollars for a single party balloon.
一个派对用的氦气球都应该征收高达125美元的费用。
Crazy, right?
难以置信，对吧？
I wonder if this situation is actually as dire as they're making it out to be.
我很好奇当前的形势是否真的有他们说的那么严重。
And if it is, why aren't we hearing more about it?
如果有，那我们为什么没有听到更多有关这方面的消息呢？
How many other resources are we just burning through without realizing how important or scarce they are?
还有多少资源是我们没有意识到它们的重要性或稀缺性就已经大肆挥霍了的？
Kind of feel really bad for doing the chipmunk thing in the beginning of this video now.
说到这儿，我都对我在视频开头吸氦气学花栗鼠的做法感到后悔了。
So what do you think?
那么问题来了，你怎么看？
Are you gonna swear off helium?
你会发誓戒掉氦气吗？
Let me know down below, and subscribe for more dnews.
快来评论中告诉我们吧，还有，记得订阅我们的频道。
Might as well not, let it go to waste, got it here.
要不还是别订阅了，就让它被白白浪费掉吧，有这个就够了。
Bye, everybody, I love you very much.
再见了，各位，爱你们。
