Documentaries
BBC-NHK

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At the end of February, Jean-Pierre Houdin travels to Cairo at the invitation of Japanese television channel NHK, as part of the documentary it is preparing. As with every trip, he meets several people on the spot.

 

Collaboration with Dassault Systèmes continues on the study of the "room" discovered behind the notch. The latest simulations to reconstitute the area have resulted in a significant modification to the appearance of the pyramid's edges, without changing the principle of the internal ramp. The rotation of the sleds on an open platform notched into the edges and the return of the pulling teams to their base via an external gangway are abandoned. Henri Houdin's "all-in" solution of 2004 is definitively adopted, and the ramp now has 2 levels: a lower one for pulling the blocks, and an upper one for the return of the unloaded teams. The priceless result is that all 84,000 M2 of smooth Turah limestone faces are completed as construction proceeds - a process that only theory allows, whereas all other theories postpone the smoothing of faces until the end of construction, meaning several years of work needlessly added to the building process.
After more than 2 years of waiting for a hypothetical authorization from the Egyptian authorities to carry out an official non-destructive research campaign on the pyramid, and in view of the obvious blockage at this level, Dassault Systèmes decides to entrust Mehdi Tayoubi with a new Khufu project: the production of Episode 2 to explain the funeral of Khufu and unveil part of the internal architecture kept secret by Jean-Pierre Houdin since 2003. 

In addition, infrared thermographic simulation studies on a digital model of the pyramid are completed. They confirm that the presence of an empty internal ramp has an irrefutable influence on the thermal signature of a large pyramid.

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On April 4, BBC 2 broadcasts "Pyramid: The Last Secret", a customized version of the National Geographic Channel documentary "Unlocking the Great Pyramid". Over 2.2 million viewers watch the program.
On July 5, NHK broadcasts its own documentary, which is watched by 11 million viewers.

Since the meeting of the Supreme Council of Antiquities on May 7, 2007, Jean-Pierre Houdin has had no official contact with this administration. On the other hand, following President Obama's visit to the pyramids, in response to a question about the construction of Khufu’s Pyramid, Dr. Hawass writes in Al-Ahram Weekly Weekly on July 23:
The only debate now is about the nature of the ramp used in building the Pyramid. Was it outside the Pyramid, or inside as a French scholar has suggested?" .

 

The next August 7, in an interview following a lecture-show in Indianapolis, Dr. Hawass answers to a question from American blogger Keith Payne for his "EmHotep" blog: "It's not a theory. It's the theory of a French guy, his name is Houdin, and his theory is completely wrong". A less surprising response from him! Following this episode, Jean-Pierre Houdin and Keith Payne began a solid collaboration for "EmHotep".

In September, Jean-Pierre Houdin and French journalist Marc Chartier begin collaborating on the journalist's "Pyramidales" blog. Example: Marc Chartier finds travellers' accounts of the room behind the notch, re-discovered by Dr Bob Brier in 2008, as far back as the 17th century and as late as the 19th, then nothing further. 

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At the end of October, Jean-Pierre Houdin attends the CAA 2009 archaeology and virtual reality conference in Williamsburg, Virginia, where he meets Bernie Frischer, director of the University of Virginia's IATH Virtual Reality Laboratory, which is developing the 3D reconstruction of "Ancient Rome".

 

On November 12, at the invitation of the CEA (Commissariat à l'Energie Atomique), the Khufu Team presents the 3D animation "Khufu Revealed" at the Marcoule Research Center - Institute of Separative Chemistry. Due to a record attendance - almost 600 people instead of the expected 300 - they hold 2 successive sessions; the audience leave enthusiastic.