Doomsday 2012

Some believe the end of the world will happen on December 21, 2012. INSIDE EDITION reports on what all the panic is about.

Is this what your neighborhood is going to look like next Friday?

The photo is from a scene of the hit apocalypse movie 2012, based on the ancient prophecy that the world will end on December 21st.

But for many, this doomsday date is the real deal, and they are bracing for the end of time.

In one YouTube video shot last month by a guy who calls himself  "Daniel the Prophet," he warns his audience, "There's little more than a month left until the end of time as we know it December 21, 2012."

Business is booming at Jeff Edelstein’s emergency-preparedness store, S.O.S Survival Products, in Los Angeles.

Edelstein told INSIDE EDITION, “Usually December is a slower month, but right now with people thinking December 2st might be the end of the world, sales have skyrocketed.”

Many believers even think a mountain in France is where aliens will appear to whisk them to safety that day. The peak has been considered a mystical place for hundreds of years.

So why is December 21, 2012, inspiring such fear?

It all comes down to the fact that the calendar of the Mayans, an ancient central-American civilization, supposedly ends that day.

The History Channel did a whole one-hour special on the subject.
 
And what's going to cause the end of the world? Let's consider the options. Some think it'll be a cosmic collision. Others say global plague, or maybe solar flares.

Even the prestigious space agency NASA felt the need to address the December 21 phenomenon. They released a video detailing what the world will look like the day after doomsday, just the same as every other day.

The narrarator of the NASA video said, "If you're watching this video, it means one thing. The world didn't end yesterday."

NASA also has a website section debunking December 21st fears.

But, not everyone's too worried about apocalypse next week.

Michael Shermer, the publisher of Skeptic magazine, said, “This will pass. Christmas will happen. People have been predicting the end of the world for thousands of years and not one of them has come true. What are the chances that this is the right one and all those thousands of other predictions are wrong? Zero."

Even so, the doomsday believers are convinced that scene from 2012 is what we can look forward to next Friday.