Mystery at Blind Frog Ranch (2021) s01e05 Episode Script

We have 9,600 feet
of flooded cave,
but we still don't have
a good entry point.
If we can
get into that cavern,
Eric thinks we will find
precious metal.
You see that?
That's natural gold.
But we're looking
for buried treasure.
Says right here,
"Pure gold."
This is where
it gets dicey.
That's as far
as I can go.
The ranch is part of
the most famous treasure
hunt that's never been solved.
[Charlie] Is there
any mining clients
on Blind Frog Ranch?
[woman] There are.
"Rhodes"?
You guys are
not gonna believe this.
What is it, Charlie?
[Charlie] There are some
places on earth that
just don't seem right.
The land feels different,
it acts different.
And this here
is one of those places.
Some say the land
is trying to hold on
to something.
Don't go in the [bleep] cave.
-Aztec treasure?
-Holy [bleep].
- Caverns of gold?
-Look at this!
Morning
It'll be a million dollars.
Some even say
there's a buried spaceship.
Hell yeah.
Me? I never cared much
about those stories.
I just care about finding
whatever the hell's
in the ground.
-Get outta there.
-[yells]
So, Charlie boy,
you're telling me
that there was a Rhodes
claim down here on
this end of the property?
-Two. Two.
-Two?
But now the name "Rhodes",
you know, it's the
same as the legend
of the lost Rhodes mines.
That can't be a coincidence
if he comes to this spot
and lost Rhodes, I mean,
it has to be the same Rhodes.
These are all
Mormon gold pieces
from the lost Rhodes mine.
Your ranch is likely
one of
the sacred story caverns.
Your ranch is part of the most
famous treasure hunt
that's never been solved.
It's significant because
usually legends are founded
on some truth.
This is good stuff.
I mean, very interesting.
The story being
that in 1519
the Aztec king
sent 10,000 men north
with gold
to start the new colony.
They came all the way to Utah
and met with their cousin
tribe, the Utes.
The Utes say they had
the gold in caves
to protect it.
And then, hundreds of years
ago, the Mormons came
to this part of Utah
and be-friended the Utes,
who had no use
for this gold.
But the Mormons did.
Supposedly, they entrusted
one man with the location
of the Aztec gold,
Thomas Rhodes.
Suddenly, the poor farmers
had more gold than
anyone in the world.
And it came from somewhere
in these mountains.
Now we know that someone
by the name of Rhodes
was on the property
filing mining claims.
-Last name is same.
-It's spelled the same, right?
Yeah, absolutely.
Probably the same family.
You don't file a claim
if there's nothing there.
Yeah, you better believe it.
It's just intriguing
and you can't get
enough of it.
It's good.
This very well could be
the place where this
treasure is buried.
You know, I'm not used to
chasing treasures,
you know,
it's not my deal.
Normally, I just
I go out and I find
natural minerals.
However,
there's so many clues
leading to this treasure
that I just can't
ignore that.
So, I'm committed to doing
whatever's necessary
to help Duane
find this treasure.
It's all kinda coming
together on this deal.
Yeah.
Let's try this way here.
Let's see.
So we know that
the Rhodes family
actually had a mining claim
here on the property.
That's the same Rhodes
that was pulling bags and bags
of gold out of the cavern.
We've got a giant
box of something
in the flooded parts
of the caverns.
So that could be the source
of the lost Rhodes gold.
Now we just need to find
an entrance to it.
We were right in this
wide area here.
You see there's
a lack of education
and that's the white rocks
that we're standing
on right here.
Satellite images often
don't tell the whole story.
Because there are subtleties
in rock formation
that you just can't see
from space.
If satellites
could see everything
I'd be out of a job.
If you can read the rocks,
and know where
they're going,
then you can often times
interpret them to make,
maybe a big find.
It's what I love to do.
That strike in dip
is vastly different.
I see that we have some
faulting going on right here.
But I don't see it
on the map here.
That is very interesting.
Now we can just park it
right up in here.
-Right here?
-Yeah.
That's good.
The reason I really
like this spot
is can you see
that outcrop right there?
I think that's
an unmapped fault.
And so, that happens
to go right across to
your tunnel site, too.
-Oh, really?
-Yeah.
It looks like there'd be
space under that,
as much as it's pushed up.
It makes total sense.
We'll go in, if we can get
maybe 50 feet vertical?
-Okay.
-Can you guys do that?
-Oh, yeah.
-Yeah, we'll get the drills.
-And meet you here.
-Let's make it happen.
-You're gonna drive it down?
-Yeah, yeah.
Geologically,
caverns are known to exist
along fault lines,
which represent
weak portions of the crust.
And for some reason,
the features we're
seeing at the surface
aren't showing up
on my topographic map.
This could lead us to
the entrance of the lost
ruins of
[Chad] So, the boring machine
comes in two parts.
First you get the big drill
with the nozzle on it,
then it has
high pressure water
pushing back out.
And that gets fed
by the second part.
-[honking]
-Here we go.
We're sliding.
an 800-gallon water tank
in the back of my dad's truck.
Don't lose the brakes here.
We got problems if we do.
[chuckles]
[beeping]
Having Eric here,
somebody with his
technical background
to add to this project
is, well, it's priceless.
'Cause we could
overlook this.
[motor stuttering]
That's the water.
Eric's right. And there is
a dry entrance
to the cave system.
That could lead us back
to the main dig site
where I found the box.
But that means we're
gonna have to drill through
a pretty serious amount
of bedrock, which is hard.
So you can tell
on the boring machine when
you break through bedrock.
There's no resistance
and it'll just keep
spinning faster and faster.
-It's hard?
-It's rock.
[grinding]
Keep going, Chad.
It's going.
Everything's working the way
it's supposed to work.
It's just that we're hitting
some pretty tough luck.
We just have to
give it a little.
-Chad, bro.
-Keep going.
Right, here we go.
Look at that.
Watch how fast that is.
No resistance.
He must've busted
through that rock.
Whoo-hoo!
It's gotta be a void.
Hold [bleep] man.
There we go.
This is awesome.
Look at this.
I don't even have to spin
and it goes in.
That's an open hole.
See how far it goes
till we get resistance.
[chuckles and whoops]
That's a big [bleep] cave!
Hell yeah.
[chuckling]
It's gotta be a void.
Holy [bleep] man.
There we go.
This is awesome.
Look at this.
I don't even have to spin it
and it goes in.
That's an open hole.
See how far it goes
until we get resistance.
[whoops]
It's a big [bleep] cave!
[alarm beeping]
Turn it off.
Turn the pressure off.
Looks like some of
that casting broke
on that pressure pump.
It's pretty typical
about equipment
failure here.
Sometimes, when you're
looking for gold,
it fights you
at every turn.
When it fights this hard
it usually means there's
a fortune down there.
Well, Duane and Chad
was working on the rig
and I decided to do
some metal detecting.
As I got about,
I don't know, 40 foot
from the dual rig
I started getting
a big hit.
[detector beeping]
Hey, guys.
Charlie's got a pretty big
hit going here
on the detector.
Really?
Listen to the signal.
[detector beeping]
If it is, it's all
It's all right in here.
Right in here?
From here to here.
Lit bit deeper.
There's something there.
-[bleep]
-Bedrock.
That ain't rock.
That's a [bleep] drill stick.
Yeah, it is.
It seemed like we'd drilled
through the bedrock walls
and poked into the cavern.
Instead of digging
into bedrock,
it kicked the bed up.
We were just pushing it
into the soft dirt.
You know your
metal detector works.
[bleep]
We keep poking all these holes
and not finding anything.
It's frustrating.
I mean, 'cause we've been
at this for a while now.
We have so much
at stake here.
The risk is super high
and we're not seeing
any reward yet.
Chad's a chip
off the old block.
He runs a little
hot sometimes
just like hid old man.
He needs to get
his head right
because we have weather
coming in, and we don't
have much time
to get this accomplished.
-Hey, gents.
-Hey. How you doing?
Nathan Rasnick, GPR data.
-Duane Ollinger,
nice meeting you, sir.
-You too.
We used the boring machine
on the un-mapped fault
that Eric found
but we could not
bust through the bedrock.
So, we wanna get some more
sophisticated scans to figure
out where we need to drill.
Guy ready to do
some scans, I guess?
Absolutely.
Well, gentlemen,
let's get after it.
So, we have some people
coming in that have
ground penetrating radar.
These scans will show down
about 50 to 60 feet.
The GPR is a very good tool
that helps us
find voids or pipelines
in the oil fields.
We could work with this,
Tony.
-So that's the rig, huh?
-Yeah.
-Where y'all get one of those,
like Home Depot or something?
-[chuckles]
[Duane] Based on where
Eric thinks the un-mapped
fault it,
we picked up three
target zones to check out.
Three spots we like
the most and possibly
offer alternate entrances
to the cave system.
And the intel we get
from the GPR here
will help us narrow it
all the way down
to the most promising one.
-You all set?
Right, let's collect data.
-Yeah.
[Duane] What kind of data
is it collecting?
This antenna is shooting
radar waves down in pulses.
When those pulses
bounce off something,
let's say it's metallic,
it's gonna shoot those
radar waves back up
to the antenna.
For a void, it's gonna
bounce out and disperse.
Both of those are gonna be
a high or low amplitude
that I'm gonna
see in the data.
Essentially, I can then
take all of those data slices
and generate
a 3-D image.
Once I've got it in that
3-D image on my computer,
I can see clear
whatever we're looking
for underground.
It's kinda fun, isn't it?
-It's pretty slick, isn't it?
-Yeah, it is. Good deal.
-It's like calibrated.
-[device whining]
Drag it back
over here, Tony.
I don't see why the antenna
would react this strongly.
There's something highly
reflective right there.
Something blocking
the signal from the top.
-Something buried?
-Yeah, something buried.
But it's kinda coming
through the surface as well.
Something highly reflective
over in that corner.
I've never seen that before.
I've never seen data
that looks like that before.
It disappear?
What'd it do?
The data just
like really blew out.
There was something
unusual interrupting
the radar waves
that I would expect to see
maybe in a city,
where I was around some
sort of, like,
an electrical substation
or there was a lot
of interference going on,
but way out here
in the middle of nowhere,
I wouldn't expect to see
anything interfering.
Something highly reflective.
Not a sandstone bedrock
that you see right here.
I'd like to look at the data
and see what that looks like.
But right now,
I don't know why
it would do that.
Drag it back over here, Tony.
[detector beeping]
Something highly reflective
over in that corner.
Not a sandstone bedrock
that you see right here.
I'd like to look at the data
and see what that looks like.
I don't know
why it would do that.
Side of the pit.
-Yeah, yeah.
-Hey, Tony.
-Hey, guys.
-How you doing?
Got some data there?
Yeah.
This is the data here
and this are in particular,
it's really high
amplitude reflections.
It doesn't continue
across the whole pit
but it does continue on
about 10 or 12 feet there.
The reflection on that
doesn't look like a void to me
and it doesn't
look like moisture.
It looks like
there's a steel plate
getting in the way
of the signal there.
Whatever that is
goes on for four feet.
Interesting.
Very interesting.
I don't really have
a way to explain that
unless there is something
buried under there.
There's certainly something
that looked different.
To me, this is
very good information.
Very good.
As soon as he said
there's a metal plate about
four foot under the ground,
I thought, "Hell,
maybe it's gold."
We might be
right on top of it.
Maybe what's hidden here
is a big, wooden box
full of gold.
So I'm gonna bring
the track ho up here
and get it to the surface.
You're down about five feet.
Coming right up
against the dead rock.
No plates or anything
that that ground penetrating
radar was kicking out.
Yeah, copy that.
I haven't seen anything,
any metal objects.
Haven't seen anything strange.
Hey, let Eric run
his detector over that.
Ten-four.
That's doing it,
that one spot.
Anything?
Just, you know,
very faint little background
noise, nothing
-Yeah.
-By now I've seen
some weird things out here.
But I really don't get
how we can see something
that shows up like
a chunk of metal
on the GPR
but when we dig,
there's nothing there.
I was hoping this thing
would just light up.
I just can't
wrap my head around that.
-I think we can backfill now
if you're satisfied.
-Copy that.
Charlie, is that our drone
up there by that tree
up there by the door?
Is that our
camera guy's drone?
Let me check with him quick.
I don't think they
have anything up
but let me find out.
If it's not theirs,
somebody's damn sure
watching us.
-Is that one of your
drones up there?
-They're watching.
I'll finish filling
this hole up.
They're saying negative
on theirs, they do not
have a drone.
Somebody thinks they need
to be watching this project
while we're trying to do it.
Anybody that is
that interested
that means we're
doing something right.
Oh, they're kind of
hiding out now, ain't it?
[Producer] He's bailing out.
Here, here, set it down.
I'm gonna launch it right now.
Just take your hands off it.
Hold on. There's something
wrong with the controller.
I'm losing it.
I'm losing it
I can't
The controller's all [bleep].
Duane! Somebody's
on your property!
Ridin' around
on a four-wheeler.
I don't know how far
those drones go,
or where the communication
to that drone is.
But we're used to people
nosing around out here
all the time.
It doesn't slow us down.
But it leads
to people trespassing.
And they do,
they most certainly do.
Is that gold
around your neck there?
Maybe you'll find
some of that Spanish gold.
Them gold mines up in here.
There's no mine.
-There's no mining shafts?
-No.
-What about over by that bus?
-No.
What is it I can do for you?
'Cause we're busy
working right now.
I have a grazing permit,
you know,
but there's no cross fence
for me to isolate them.
-Wide open?
-Wide open, the whole thing.
Four pair never come
outta here last year.
They fell down
a shaft or something.
Eight head of cattle
never come out.
Can I see what the cows
are coming up against?
I don't know where they are.
Here's the deal.
I can assure you
there's no shafts
to be talking about
like that.
Do you want me to talk
to the BLM ranger?
-I don't know what to do.
-Well, you're more than
welcome to talk to him
but this is private property.
You know, what's he
gonna do for you?
He said he lost
some cows in a hole.
The thing is, all these
ranches around here,
they're sneaking
on the property
to see what's going on.
[producer]
Do you think the cattle thing
might've just been an excuse?
In Texas, in you're
down wind and something
smells like a skunk,
and looks like one
it's a [bleep] skunk.
What's all these guys
doing here?
We gonna be on TV or what?
[Duane] I don't have a clue
about any of that.
[camera clicking]
You know you're on
private property.
Where's the line?
Right there? I can stand
right there? Okay.
-So, you need
to erase those pictures.
-Erase them?
But you haven't told me
what these guys are doing.
Please let us get along.
But erase them.
I'll get off your property.
Can you erase those pictures?
We don't play those games.
I don't play those games.
It's very important for us
to protect this project.
I mean, we don't want
anybody to get hurt,
we don't want equipment
to get messed up.
They wouldn't like it
if I drove into their house
and parked in their garage.
I put game cameras up
to try to catch
whatever predators
were killing those deer.
But now, we've got
trespassers on the property.
So I've gotta rethink
the positioning of the cameras
and possibly,
adding other cameras
in different locations.
It will be miles to come in
from the eastern side,
so the access point
is gonna be right here.
You might even call it
a choke point, I guess.
They're fascinated about
this property out here.
We probably have a lot
of comparisons to the
Skinwalker Ranch over there
'cause we're so close
to them.
The type of people
that are gonna be
coming through here
especially at night,
are gonna be up to no good.
There's been too many decades
of strange occurrences,
things happening,
investigations on-going
constantly.
So there's a lot of
folklore to it.
It's gonna bring
some people out here.
You know,
the curious people.
But you just can't have
people just walking around.
Got a good digital image
at night.
I really like that.
[producer] Uh,
what do we do?
Just gotta be vigilant.
We are the prey out here
at night.
We're not the hunter,
we're the prey.
Look, I'm from Texas
and I'm no [bleep].
But this land right here
is like something
I've never seen.
Electronics go crazy.
-[detector beeping]
-I've never seen that before.
[Duane] Strange things
happen to equipment.
-Turn it off!
-We've had issues
with aerial drones.
I know that this sounds
crazier than the cat
got into the whiskey,
but this whole deal's true.
There's an energy here
that's just different.
And I can prove it.
Even though
you might not see it,
it's always here. Always.
It drains batteries,
it does all kinds of [bleep].
Yeah. Well, the biggest deal
is it made metal out of dirt.
This metal right here.
I noticed you looked like,
"He's a dumbass."
[all laughing]
Regardless, it made
metal out of dirt.
We've had scientists
come in with all these
dadgum detectors
and the whole
nine yards setup,
their million-dollar
worth of equipment.
And they'll test
the dirt there,
we'll heat it up
in that energy zone,
it makes metal.
They look at it,
they load all their
stuff up and leave.
Because it's against
the theory of how
it all works.
If I told Eric
everything that we know
about on this project
and what has happened here
right at the front,
I think he would've
packed his [bleep] up
and left.
But he's a big boy,
I think he can handle it.
I wanna see this.
-Can we do that tonight?
-Well, let's go.
-Two ounces or two grams?
-Two grams.
You can walk in there
and it'll give your
whole body a buzz.
Something's kicking out
a lot of energy.
It's hard to believe
or hard to explain
what goes on here,
and whoever has
not experienced it
just don't believe it.
We call it the energy zone.
A few years ago,
I had a crucible
and it was dirty inside,
so I just took it
and hit it on the truck.
And lo and behold,
a piece of metal fell out.
What we found out is
you can just
get regular dirt,
it doesn't matter
where it's from.
As long as it's in
that energy zone there,
you cook that dirt
and you'll pour out
the prettiest metal
you've ever seen.
Don't shoot the messenger.
I'm just saying
that's what's happened.
I watched the whole process
from collecting the sample
That should be good.
to sieving it
There you go.
to putting it
in the crucible
and heating it up.
I watched every step
along the way.
I would expect to see
maybe a glass bead come out
because the sample itself
is like a dioxide.
It's sand.
If there's a metal nugget
that comes out of that
I'm gonna have to
rethink everything.
All right, we're ready
to pour this bad boy.
That's one hot
son of a budge.
Makes a V just like this.
-That's how
the hillbillies do it.
-[chuckles]
I've read all kinds of
books about alchemy,
and that's what comes to mind
when this process occurs.
In the middle ages,
some people thought that
you could change matter
into something else.
They actually thought
that they're missing
an ingredient
and that's why
it never worked.
But what if they were
just missing the energy field?
That was
the missing ingredient.
There you go.
[chuckles]
Question is
I just don't know
I shouldn't say that.
I'm not
[chuckles] It's crazy.
You know, it just, um
-Very [bleep] weird.
-[all laughing]
I don't see
how that can happen.
So, what I'm seeing
is a bluish color.
I can't say
that they're flakes
but it's reflecting.
This morning,
we're looking at the sample
that was processed
in this "energy zone".
So the next step
I'd like to do is do
few tests on it.
This is a real sophisticated
piece of equipment.
Just put them in there
and then crush out more.
I'm thinking,
how can I either
disprove or prove
this energy field's
melting metal?
Oh, this is gonna be good.
I still doubt the process.
I have to because
I'm a scientist.
But there's a question mark
in my mind.
-I think that's a good
representative sample.
-Okay.
Based on the material
that we smelted,
what I was expecting to see
was basically glass.
But that wasn't the case.
-Ooh.
-[wind blowing]
Wind always
puts me on edge.
So what I'm seeing here
is like, individual
particles of metal.
That is weird.
I'd like to retain
this sample.
Because this is
pretty amazing.
Having a sample
that doesn't show
any metal
and yet you have to
resmelt it,
it's showing metal.
It's very strange.
This is all, you know,
all stuff that
I'm trying to process.
-Sure, sure.
-It's completely new for me.
-Let's get the gun
and shoot it.
-Okay.
The XRF that uses X-Ray.
Each element reflects
the X-Ray.
And then it reads out
what it is on there.
So, this XRF technology
will tell us exactly
what the metal
that seems to have
magically appeared
is actually made of.
[beeps]
Oh, that's weird.
That is very interesting.
Got some anomalies here.
I've gotta show this
to Duane.
That is very interesting.
I've gotta
show this to Duane.
When I first got here
the guys were interested
in looking for
naturally-occurring
precious metal.
Then we discovered
there might be
significant treasure
hidden on the property.
And then, they go to
making metals out of sand.
There's an anomaly here.
And this alchemy business
could be worth more
than the natural gold
in the ground.
It's weird.
Makes for an
interesting project,
that's for sure.
Duane, we got
some results back
from the smelting project.
It is very significant,
I'll just tell you that.
So, we took the sample
that we melted, right,
and for some reason,
after you melted it,
silver showed up.
And I can't explain that.
So I don't really
believe in alchemy
because I'm a scientist.
I'm not calling
this alchemy.
But who knows,
maybe there's
something here.
And so I came up
with a strategy
to validate those results.
It involves
12 different locations,
random sampling,
sending them to a lab,
analyzing them by mass
[voice fading out]
An ounce of gold
is 1,800 bucks.
Silver's $20.
It's not that I'm opposed
to making money be smelting
metal in the energy zone.
Those dollars could help us
to move forward
in the real search.
But silver,
$24 an ounce
just ain't worth the time
and the manpower
it takes to do it.
So, for now,
our main objective is to
get into the caverns.
Well, I'll stick to what I do,
and the more samples
we get,
we'll have more values
that we can plot on your map
-and we'll
-Sorry to interrupt.
I've been going through the
camp, looking up
some stuff.
You ain't gonna
believe this.
That's down by Mosby Creek.
-Right where Chad's camping?
-Right where Chad's camping.
Look at this.
[groans]
[man groaning]
He's going into a trance.
This is a Skinwalker.
[man groaning]
You're not gonna
believe this.
[man groaning]
That's by your camp.
I gotta call my wife.
My whole family's
out there.
[line disconnects]
-I gotta go.
-Yeah.
Where is he at?
-Hey!
-[loud whirring]
We've been throwing
everything we've got to try
to get into the cavern.
We're kind of down to
the last couple of things
in our tool kit.
Good?
Wow, that's significant.
We have to go with what
mother nature gives us.
Sometimes, you can
work through it
and sometimes
you just have to stop.
[groans]
Winter's coming in,
and we're running
out of time.
It won't be long before
it shuts us down.
So, we got one more drill,
one last shot.
We better do it now.
Bring it in!
We better do it fast.
Pressure's on.
It seems like every time
we make some progress
Whoa, whoa, whoa.
[bleep]
It's stuck.
something else steps up
and starts fighting us.
What is this?
I think we got
a meteorite.
This could be the element
that's causing everything
to go wrong.
It can be worth millions.
Tens of millions,
hundreds of millions.
What?
There you go.
It's gonna have to be
a high concentration
before we wanna get
into a mining operation.
Is it the final?
Holy