The Curse of Oak Island (2014) s04e07 Episode Script

1
Tonight on
The Curse of Oak Island
Here we go.
As soon as that drops in you're
fifteen feet away from the void.
There's a shiny gold thing
down there.
- David!
- What?
Drain the swamp!
Way to go!
We can finally start
excavating in the swamp.
Look at that!
This is a piece
of the Spanish Galleon.
Six people have lost
their lives trying to do
what you may be able to do
this afternoon.
It's definitely inside
the cavity.
Here you go. The door's open.
There is an island
in the north Atlantic
where people have been
looking for an incredible
treasure for more
than 200 years.
So far, they have found
bits of gold chain
a stone slab with strange
symbols carved into it
even a 17th century
Spanish coin.
To date, six men have died
trying to solve the mystery.
And, according to legend,
one more will have to die,
before the treasure
can be found.
Well, how you feeling,
Rick? V-3 is done.
I'm disappointed,
I will say that.
Yeah. I agree.
For brothers Rick
and Marty Lagina,
their life-long dream to
solve the Oak Island mystery
has proved to be more
elusive than they hoped.
Definitely got wood.
Two years ago,
while searching for the location
of the so-called Money Pit
Concrete and then wood.
That's the description.
They found what they believed
to be evidence of
a long-lost treasure vault,
first discovered by treasure
hunters Frederick Blair
and William Chappell in 1897.
You think you're on the vault?
But last week, after
commissioning a massive dig
at the same location,
known as Valley Three
Got wood.
Their hopes of finding
the vault were crushed
when it was discovered
that the wooden structure
they located was in fact,
a section of
a searcher tunnel built
by William Chappell's son
in the 1930s.
Well, Rick, things here
on Oak Island
seem to be changing by
the minute.
What do you think of that?
That would be a circular
saw cutting.
If that really is
a circular saw,
then it's truly not 1600.
Correct.
There's the island.
Let's get back to digging.
Nothing ventured,
nothing gained.
Right.
Coming off of V-3,
I mean it is such
a roller coaster ride from
thinking we were
scraping at the top of
a sacred vault of some sort to,
to breaking through and finding
out it was a searcher tunnel.
I mean, it was just an
emotional roller coaster.
Now we go onto C-1 and
as a team,
we all think it's worth
digging and we're gonna dig it,
and be prepared to be surprised.
The Oak Island team
has now moved
20 feet northwest
from their
first borehole to their
second target in the Money Pit,
known as C-1.
It was at this location
where last year,
Rick Lagina and Oak Island
historian Charles Barkhouse
discovered what they believed
to be a large cavern
approximately 171 feet
underground.
- Still dropping?
- Huge cavern!
Here we go.
But even more incredible was
what they found after they put
a pipe inspection
camera down the hole.
What the hell is that?
It's your gold color, David.
A shiny, golden object?
Embedded in rock more than
170 feet underground?
Could it be a piece of the
fabled Oak Island treasure?
The one that people have
been searching for,
and dying for,
for more than two centuries?
I think what happened
in the Money Pit
is still in the Money Pit,
above the bedrock.
There's so question about it.
Well, then it's still there.
Nobody recovered that
because they couldn't have.
- Exactly.
- Hole one is done.
Hole two begins anew.
Oak Island is doing its thing.
It's doing what it's done to
people for 221 years.
But we're still hopeful.
Oak Island's a giant puzzle.
Mom used to tell us all the time
when we would be making puzzles,
she'd say,
"Find the four corners.
Find the four corners,
and then you can build it."
Maybe, we might have one,
maybe two.
But without the four corners,
it's a tough puzzle to
put together.
And I think that's where
we're at.
- Gentlemen.
- Here we are again.
How you doing?
Ed.
What are those rocks over there?
What's those rocks? You tell me.
The rocks are gettin' bigger.
Really? No wood?
Very little bit, very
little bits of wood.
Well, let's go look at
the big rocks.
Go look at the rock, yeah.
A lot of the areas
we've dug, it's been
merely on hope,
speculation and theory.
Here we have an object,
a hard object
to go locate and retrieve.
I mean, that's
what we're here for,
find something deep underground.
Wow.
We're lucky to get that one out.
Well, that one is just barely
be able to grab.
That guy's a granite boulder
there.
Yeah.
Not too sure what he is,
but he's a big rock.
- How deep are we?
- 85 feet right now
with casing and excavation.
The rock was down about 73.
Did you have to mess with it
for a while, or did
No. I think he just lowered
down and gripped onto it.
He might have played around with
it a little bit,
but came in and out in one.
If we're in undisturbed ground,
undisturbed by searchers,
hell, we could break into
anything at any time.
You're still on track though,
right? I mean
Yeah.
Maybe a little bit
ahead of the curve?
We're gaining ground on this one
right now.
We'll see what happens when we
hit the bedrock.
But we're gaining ground.
Where do we expect that bedrock
to be on this one, Charles?
- 150.
- 150.
All right.
Although the team from Irving
is currently drilling
through softer topsoil,
once they reach the anhydrite
bedrock at 150 feet,
they will need to take
a more cautious approach
in their attempt to enter
the approximately
21 foot deep void.
Because the sections
of steel caissons
weigh in access of 60 tons,
they will need to be anchored
in bedrock at a depth
of 160 feet,
so that they don't collapse
through the chamber.
From there, a 39-inch wide
drill bit will be used
to cut a hole in the top
of the cavity.
C-1 is going swimmingly
well. It's going great.
We'll be in that cavity
in a day or two.
Look, I can't argue with
any of that.
It is going well.
As progress at borehole C-1
continues at the Money Pit,
Rick, Marty, and their partners,
shift their attention to
another project this season:
The Oak Island swamp.
So you should straighten it out
a little bit.
Why do we got all these hoses?
Okay, so I think Marty's set up,
he's gotta get that culvert,
so we can get across the
road right away.
And then you guys are just gonna
have to follow the beach here.
Then you can run up next to
those birch trees on the other
side and then just keep heading
towards the Cave-In Pit
- and that's it.
- Got it.
All right, we'll make it happen.
Because environmental
regulations prohibit dumping
swamp water into the ocean,
the team will use a 63
horsepower pump and more than
1200 feet of hose to transfer
thousands of gallons
of brackish water to an area
near Smith's Cove
known as "The Cave-in Pit,"
so named because it was formed
after an old searcher tunnel
collapsed deep underground.
You got enough hose from here,
Alex?
- Yeah.
- I'll back it out?
Yep.
A few weeks ago,
after a metal detector
indicated the presence
of a large metal object
at the southeastern edge
of the swamp,
Rick, Marty and the team invited
area diver, Tony Sampson,
to try and find it.
There's where the anomaly
is, Tony. Right over there.
Two meters
to the left of that stake.
It should be quite large.
Fantastic.
But although Tony was unable
to locate the metal object,
he did make an
incredible discovery.
- What is that?
- Wow. It's huge.
Looks like a piece of wood.
It's a large board.
Convinced that the swamp may be
hiding important clues,
Rick and Marty are more
determined than ever
to drain it down to the botto,
something now possible
because of an agreement
the team reached with landowner
Fred Nolan,
shortly before
his death earlier this year.
But with all of the activity
now underway at The Money Pit,
running hundreds of feet of hose
across the island landscape is
not without its challenges.
These hoses can't interfere
with the big
project at the Money Pit.
There's gonna be trucks in and
out of there all the time,
we can't just lay that hose up
to the swamp.
So we decided we needed
to take an old pipe
and ditch the road
and stick this old pipe in
and pull the hose through it.
Okay that's good.
It looks good.
- Yep.
- Okay, guys, hey!
Let's pull this thing through.
Let's see if it works.
- All right.
- Enough of this.
All right!
- Yeah, man!
- Yay!
So everything goes
relatively smoothly,
certainly by Oak Island
standards.
Pipe's in.
We pull the hose through.
By God, it fits.
We hook it up to the pump and
everything looks really good.
We now have what's called
a dry prime pump.
This thing can run "dry",
if you will, for hours
and hours and not harm the pump.
Now that should be,
that should be all right.
Well, thanks.
We flip the switch.
We start the pump.
It's a full go.
- David!
- What?
Drain the swamp!
At borehole C-1,
the massive Coming
stack of 40-inch wide
steel caissons
are only a few feet
away from reaching their
target depth of 171 feet.
Meanwhile, Rick, Marty and the
team are ready to begin their
excavation of the swamp,
where just a few weeks ago,
they discovered a mysterious
18-foot long wooden plank,
making the team wonder
if theories
of a possible shipwreck buried
there could be true.
With water successfully
diverted to the Cave-in Pit,
the area is nearly 90% dry,
and, for the first time
in decades,
excavation is finally possibl.
Okay, I'm gonna start digging.
Where's the exact dig point?
Or is there not one?
It's the stake.
This is going to sound crazy,
'cause I hate the swamp.
I don't like working in it.
But I'm very excited
to dig in the swamp.
I'm sitting up high and dry
in an excavator and I can't
wait to stick that scoop down
in there and
pull back some of the material
and see what this is all about.
That actually worked
pretty good.
It's actually not as wet
as I thought it would be.
No, it's dried off a bit.
Per the permit we have to
isolate the organic material
from the inorganic material,
i.e. the, the liquid mud
and the peat has to be
completely
isolated and separated
from the hard clays,
bits of rock material,
because they have to go back
in the same order they came out.
Gosh! This smells rancid.
You cannot mix the two materials
so basically we've created two
cattle pens for the material.
We can finally start
excavating in the swamp.
I think there's something
in the swamp.
Is it at this point?
I don't know but this is a
hard target and we need to,
we need to get to the bottom
of it.
It's better.
It's pretty solid.
- Anything?
- Nothing.
We should have picked it
up by now.
I'm not seeing anything.
How far does that thing read?
About a foot down.
- I'm not getting anything.
- All right,
I'll tell you what would
be best:
You need to pick up that
piece of plywood,
I'll reach back further.
- Okay.
- Okay.
Put it on top of this,
Jack, just
- Need to get back over there.
- Yeah.
Is that your foot?
- Yeah, what's going on there?
- No.
It's kinda saying
there's something a foot down.
Okay.
It doesn't ever actually hit and
say this is the point, though.
I understand. Just stay with it.
Okay.
Nothing.
If there's something here,
it shouldn't just be
a ghost hit.
It can do that sometimes
if something's deeper.
That's what I'm wondering.
Like it's just picking up the
trail of it's magnetic field.
All right. I'm going to dig
that out a little bit.
A metal target,
buried deep within the thick,
rich mud of
the Oak Island swamp?
Could it be connected in
some way
to the team's earlier
discovery of a wooden plank,
perhaps more evidence
that a sailing ship
could have been buried
on the island,
centuries ago?
As Rick, Marty and the rest
of the team
continue to dig at the swamp,
Oak Island historian,
Charles Barkhouse,
travels to the port town
of Lunenburg
20 miles southwest
of the island.
I've arranged for us
to go down to the.
South Shore Genealogical
Society.
With him is author and
investigative journalist,
Randall Sullivan,
who is gathering research for
a new book he is writing on
the Oak Island mystery.
They have records of a lot of
people that were on Oak Island;
Maybe we can find
something that can
add a little bit to the mystery,
or take it away from the
mystery, I should say.
I mean, even though we'll be
looking at dusty old records,
it could be pretty thrilling
to find certain names in there,
don't you think?
You know what, I never mind
looking at dusty old records.
Well, I share the same
pleasure. So, good.
If Randall can bring us
back a few puzzle pieces,
that would be fantastic.
X marks the spot would be
I guess that would be bringing
all the puzzle pieces.
Exactly.
He can bring all 400 in a box,
that'd be good, too.
Exactly. Let's see where his
investigative nose takes him.
Hello! How do you do today?
I'm Randall Sullivan.
- Nice to meet you, Mr. Sullivan.
- Hi, Charles Barkhouse.
Hello. Stephen Ernst.
Welcome to the South Shore
Genealogical Society.
What can I help you with today?
Well, we're actually here to
do a little research
on the early families on
Oak Island.
Okay, certainly. Yeah, if you'd
like to come this way.
Our card catalog's here,
we have information
on most of the families
of Lunenberg County.
So if you want to take a look
through some of these,
it should give you some
information on
- Okay.
- Do you have any early maps
of Oak Island, or that area?
- Absolutely.
- Really?
Yeah.
One moment.
This is what is
known as the Church map.
A.F. Church and Company was a
firm out of Bedford that was
authorized to do a series
of maps of Nova Scotia,
starting in 1864.
And if you'd like to come right
over here.
The beauty of this map is
not only does it tell you
what everything is,
but it also names the heads of
the eholds in each area.
So when was this dating from?
This one is about 1883.
- A very curious map.
- Yeah, it's wonderful.
- Here. Look.
- Yeah.
Wow, this says
"Kidd's Treasure."
Here, look.
NARRATOR-Yeah. ng up
That says "Kidd's Treasure."
At the South Shore
Genealogy Center
in the nearby town of Lunenburg,
Charles Barkhouse and
investigative journalist,
Randall Sullivan,
may have just found an
important clue connecting
the Oak Island mystery
to the 17th century pirate,
Captain William Kidd.
One of the things that was
kind of curious on the map
is they list Kidd's Treasure.
It was written in pen,
right there.
Even back then,
they believed that.
Captain Kidd's treasure
was buried on Oak Island.
It was obviously recognized as
a treasure site
by the mapmaker, even.
During the late 17th century,
Captain William Kidd became
notorious for attacking and
looting merchant ships,
from the Caribbean Sea
to the Indian Ocean.
In 1699, he was finally arrested
and sent to England where
he stood trial for piracy,
and was sentenced to death.
Despite a desperate
plea for clemency,
by offering to trade
his life in exchange
for a mysterious treasure whih
he claimed was buried
somewhere east of Boston,
Kidd was hanged
on May 23rd, 1701.
Is it possible that Captain
William Kidd was really the man
behind the Oak Island mystery?
Are the countless legends
connecting Oak Island
to pirates and pirate gold
really true after all?
Very interesting how they put,
put the property owners on here.
Got a Boutilier,
two McGinnis' and a Graves.
So the McGinnis' stayed
on the island until
Should we take a look
at the card file?
Yeah. Absolutely.
Let's take a look.
You know, we were looking
in the McGinnis file
for Daniel McGinnis because,
you know, he's supposedly one of
the original finders
of the Money Pit.
Now there's various
spellings of McGinnis.
Here's the McGinnis.
- Here's the McGinnis.
- You got a McGinnis?
Yeah.
It's a book:
Western Shore, Gold River,
Martins Point Communities.
Let's ask him if we can take
a look at that.
Yeah, I'll go up and ask him.
Genealogists tend to be
people that only put in what
they can find written,
written down somewhere.
There's a listing
of a book here.
Wonderful. Yes, right over here.
Okay.
They don't make something up.
It's at least something solid
to start with.
Well thank you, giving me
the book.
Is there a, index
or how is it listed?
Pages numbers, or
Here we are.
There's a story of a, this
ancient sailor,
he's on his deathbed.
And he's relating this story
of him being a member
of Captain Kidd's crew.
It's published on
December 20th, 1863,
and subsequently by a member
of the Oak Island association,
who said that, more than
a century before,
an old man died in what was then
known as the British
My god, I didn't realize
as the British
Colony of New England,
who on his death bed confessed
to having been one of the crew
of the famous Captain Kidd, and
assured those who attended him
in his last moments that he
had many years previously
assisted that noted pirate
and his followers in burying
over two millions in money
beneath the soil of a secluded
island east of Boston.
Two million?
In buried treasure?
In 1804, while digging
in the Money Pit,
searchers from the Onslow
company found a large,
smooth stone slab at
a depth of 90 feet.
On it were strange
carvings which,
when later translated, read:
"Forty Feet Below,
Two Million Pounds Are Buried."
Could the markings on the
so-called 90 Foot Stone be
evidence that the old sailor's
deathbed confession was true?
Is Captain William Kidd's
treasure really buried at
the bottom of the Oak
Island Money Pit?
One of the problems
with Oak Island
from a writer,
researcher's point of view,
is that the historical
record is scant.
There are bits and pieces
that you can hold on to,
but it's a process of putting
pieces together and try to
find out whatever I can
that'll be worth all this work.
Well, I mean it's fascinating.
It's, you know, and I'm glad
we made the trip,
but it's like added one
more layer of what if, maybe.
It's fascinating and
exasperating at the same time.
- Yeah, It is.
- You know, so.
I guess you got your work cut
out for you.
I don't have to solve it.
I just have to tell the story.
We need to see if we get
a big hit
that's coming from
below that bedrock.
- Yeah.
- Well let me just clean it out
but you're going to need to
jump right in
there 'cause it's coming
- I'm already dirty.
- Yeah, I didn't think
- you'd mind.
- No.
While metal detecting in the mud
of the recently drained swamp,
Jack Begley may have
located a target,
where, just a few weeks ago,
he and other members of
the Oak Island team found
a long wooden board,
thought to be the planking
of an ancient shipwreck.
All right, I got this now.
So we pulled a few scoops,
got Jack to metal detect that,
he was getting all kinds
of hits,
and it's like, well there's
something there.
What is it? Any one of
those could be it,
could be the find that
sets us on fire.
Well now, I'm not seeing
anything.
So we're done digging.
Curiously, the metal
detector is no longer
picking up the signals.
Could it be that the target
is simply much deeper than
the team's equipment can reac?
You know, if somebody buried
something in this swamp,
they picked a damn good
hiding place.
We might need to rethink
this whole thing.
- Why?
- We haven't found anything.
That's why it's a treasure hunt.
Of all the places on Oak Island,
the swamp has proven to be
the most difficult to explore.
Drilling through water and mud
is virtually impossible,
and draining the swamp dry
has proven to be
both logistically challenging
and hugely expensive.
Nevertheless, the strange,
triangle-shape of the swamp,
coupled with recent discoveries
like the 17th century
Spanish coin,
have made the area one
of Rick and Marty Lagina's
most intriguing, as well as
frustrating, target sites.
It's disappointing, you know,
we haven't found anything.
But the swamp still intrigues me
and I'm not done with it yet.
The truth is, we went
with that EM-61
because, for depth penetration.
Maybe we bring the more accurate
one back for a couple hours.
It may be worth it.
Okay, that's where I think
the decision is.
Either we, we have somebody come
out and look at this area again,
or we continue with the process.
I think, I think we should,
we should run
another piece of gear for
a couple hours.
- Yeah, get 'em out here.
- Fine. I'll call
Gary Drayton and see if he can't
come out tonight.
You should probably go out
in the ocean.
I'd love to get cleaned up.
I can feel stuff crawling
around on me.
- Okay. Let's go, let's do it.
- Awesome.
I'll I'll make the call.
As a new day begins
NAR on Oak Island
- Morning!
- Morning, Andrew.
The team assembles at the
Money Pit to get an update on
the excavation of borehole C-.
We're not making much headway,
are we?
Right now we're on something
very, very solid.
Chisels not advancing it.
The oscillators not advancing
it, nor is the hammer grab.
- So
- What do you think it is?
It's, it's, either a very,
very hard boulder,
like a granite boulder,
or it's solid rock.
The boulder's big enough,
if it is a boulder,
that it's not going
inside the can.
- Yeah.
- And we're not fortunate
enough to just go in and
pluck it out.
- So
- It's bigger than the can.
Yeah. I'm gonna go back
over here and we're gonna
start throwing drill rod in
and we'll sees you in a bit.
- Yeah, okay.
- Thanks for the update.
See you, guys.
This hole is a lot different
in terms of how we need to
structure it
than the first one because,
we know the chamber,
the ultimate objective here,
is in bedrock.
Hey, boss!
So we can't just
keep going because
when it gets into that chamber,
there's nothing to hold it.
It could just keep going.
So the plan right now is to
stop in the bedrock and then
we'll drill out and get into
the chamber that way.
Because the stacked
caissons in C-1,
weigh in excess of 60 tons,
the team from Irving
Equipment Limited must now
cease drilling at a depth of
160 feet,
just shy of the 21-foot
deep void they
encountered last year.
Once firmly anchored in bedrock,
a 39-inch drill bit will be used
to grind through the remaining
10 to 20 feet to create a stable
entrance into the cavity below
and allow for safe,
human exploration.
Here we go.
Okay, get after it.
- Big dog two.
- Yeah.
That's big stuff. I gotta admit,
I'm impressed with that.
It is huge.
So Charles, as soon as that
drops in,
you're 15 feet away from
the void.
How do you feel?
I just hope there's something
there.
- Hey, Andrew.
- Gentlemen.
So we got 173 feet of string
in the casing right now.
We're going to lift the lead up,
hook it up.
And then you're ready to let
the big dog eat.
Yep. Yep.
The prospect of
excavating borehole C-1
to a diameter large enough
for human exploration, has
the team filled with both
excitement and anticipation.
It is now just a matter of hours
before they reach
the strange void
in the bedrock
some 170 feet deep
to confirm what the
gold-colored object
might really be.
Excavation has been removed so
we'd like you to go through
those spoils piles as well,
but here's the current
condition of the swamp.
While the drilling operation
at the Money Pit continues
Okay, let's get you out there.
Rick and the team have brought
metal detection expert,
Gary Drayton,
out to the swamp.
Wow, you weren't joking
when you said it was dry.
- It's dry. It's dry.
- That's fantastic.
They are hoping that someone
of Gary's extensive experience
will succeed in locating the
elusive metal object that.
Jack's equipment
was unable to reach.
I can't speak highly enough
about Gary as an individual,
and his skill set as
a metal detectorist.
He's back to try to
locate something in
the swamp and I know that if
there's something to be
found in there Gary can find it.
Rick, if we find
anything important
we'll give
you a call right away.
- Perfect.
- Well, you might hear
a scream too but
I don't care, scream or phone
call, you just make it happen.
And you'll see me dancing.
That's my gold dance.
I love it.
Where, where at?
I would put the boards
over there.
Because obviously I've got to
get in there.
Okay.
No signals yet.
Come on gold, where are you?
I just want to try up in here,
this
You're going everywhere where
we're not plying, Gary.
Yeah, I know. But I don't want
to walk away from here and leave
these little nooks and crannies.
No, be thorough about it.
This is one of the few chances
we'll get.
Exactly, that's what
I'm thinking.
Because draining the swamp
has always been difficult,
owing to the need to obtain
permissions from both
landowner Fred Nolan and
the Canadian government,
the fact that the swamp is now
almost completely
drained offers a rare,
but time sensitive, opportunity.
The Laginas and their partners
have only a few more weeks to
search the swamp for possible
artifacts or clues that could
help them solve the mystery.
It's always in the swamp.
Well, I'd like to agree,
but we need more evidence
if we want to continue here.
Suddenly
Oooh! Now that's a good signal.
And it's under
It's underneath the board.
- Here.
- Thanks.
That's what we're waiting for.
- Good signal.
- Really?
I'll just dig a bunch of dirt.
Yeah, just Yep, just dig it
up. It's not that deep.
It says it's 6-7 inches so we
should have it in one scoop.
Please be something good.
Okay, I'll give it a little
test.
- All right!
- It's somewhere around there.
So we got it out of there.
- Yeah.
- Look at that!
All right!
It's somewhere around there.
- Yeah.
- Look at that, that's nice!
While searching for
a mysterious metal object
in the Oak Island swamp,
veteran treasure hunter,
Gary Drayton has discovered
something unusual
buried in the mud.
That is old.
It's a handmade spike.
That's pretty good.
Yeah! That is cool!
This type of nail was
specifically made for,
for putting decks down,
thick decking, on the old boats.
You see the size of the head?
That was so the planks
couldn't come up.
Well, the board that Tony found
in the south part of the swamp
looked like decking.
It probably is.
It was very long and didn't seem
even close to thick enough to be
a part of of the outside of the
ship, the hull.
If you guys have found some,
like, wooden decking,
this is exactly the type of
handmade nail that they would
have put into decking
to hold decking down.
Look at it, I mean it's
- Yeah.
- That's a beautiful thing.
So does this mean we actually
found something in the swamp?
Yeah, I think this is
an artifact, for sure.
I found exactly
the same objects as this on,
off Spanish galleons from the
late 1600s, early 1700s.
An artifact from
a Spanish Galleon?
Could it be connected
in some way to the 18 foot long
plank found a few weeks ago
It's a large board.
And which was thought to be
part of the deck from
an old sailing ship?
Veteran Oak Island researchers
and treasure hunters
like Fred Nolan have long
believed that
the mysterious triangle-shaped
swamp
could have been
deliberately created
centuries ago to hide an old
shipwreck.
If so, who would have hidden
it? Spanish Pirates?
Or might it be further evidence
that supports Randall Sullivan
and Charles Barkhouse's
research suggesting
that Captain William Kidd
really did
bury a valuable
treasure on Oak Island?
For me, this is one of
the coolest things
we've found out here.
It's a fantastic find.
- Yeah, it is.
- And there's probably
Hey, and you found it!
Gary's excitement, I mean,
this guy has done this a lot,
and one of the things
that he looks for
in Florida are
Spanish shipwrecks.
So, he has found a lot of
these pins,
and he was really excited
about this.
He seems to sincerely,
100% believe
that this is from an old ship.
We're the first people
to touch that
in probably 300 years.
- That's pretty cool.
- What?!
Well, let's see,
let's do a spiral pattern around
here and see if there's anymore.
- Okay.
- That's sweet.
At least we found something.
That's cool.
Bag it and tag it.
After a day full of
hopeful anticipation
at the Money Pit,
and a potentially important
breakthrough in the swamp
- Cheers, guys.
- Cheers.
Rick, Marty and other
members of the Oak Island team
have gathered at the nearby
Fo'c'sle Tavern.
A well deserved rest,
if I do say so myself.
Well, a little bit of business,
too.
Any results from Gary Drayton?
Yeah, I mean look, they, they've
made significant progress,
specifically in the Swamp;
I think Alex, you were there,
and Jack, you were there, so
I know a little bit about
the finds but you found one
curious thing for certain.
Yeah, we found some cool stuff.
Jack, you can kind of
talk about it.
The most interesting
was a spike.
It looked like a railroad
tie at first and my
first assumption was
looking back
A railroad tie, you mean
a railroad tie spike?
- Yeah, a railroad tie spike.
- Okay.
Then Gary pointed out, "Hey",
I've found hundreds
of these before.
This is from a Spanish Galleon
and it's used to pin
- Really?
- The top decking down
on their boats."
He said, you know
you can tell the
differences cause they're
not like a normal railroad
spike because they're a lot
shorter and also,
on the very end,
with a railroad spike,
it has another spike sticking
out from it.
Yeah, to get another, more grip.
And this didn't have that.
Where was that found?
It was towards the north end
of the Swamp.
It's bagged and tagged,
as you say.
- Yeah.
- So, we can show it to you.
Ask Gary.
He must have sourced someone who
could say definitively this is
from nailing the deck
boards on an old ship.
I'm sure there's a,
you know, spike expert.
Let's find this person.
Look it's a weird thing to
find there no matter what.
Yeah. C-1, everything's
going well?
So far. I hope we're going to
find that shiny gold thing
that David saw on the monitor.
Is it gold? I had, that I have
no idea but it was a shiny
gold thing about like that,
that tall.
The only, the real concern is
as we come through the cavity,
what happens to the ceiling,
the roof?
Surely there's going to be
some fall.
- So
- That's unavoidable.
The last bit's gonna, you know,
cave in.
- The bit is very heavy.
- So Andrew has agreed that,
generally speaking,
they never do this;
They never put the hammer grab
well beyond the hole.
Well, he's agreed to do
that cause we think
the bottom's 21 feet.
- So, but he's willing
- So you just go down,
whatever you knocked to bottom
you go down and grab.
Exactly, because if
that object is in there
- and that collapse happens
- We want it.
- That's right! We definitely do.
- Yeah.
- We'll find it.
- Yep.
Okay, well here's to that.
That's exciting.
Let's drink
to the gold shiny thing.
Shiny gold thing.
Shiny gold thing.
I'll drink to that, you David?
Definitely.
As a new day dawns
on Oak Island,
Rick Lagina and
Charles Barkhouse are excited
to learn that the massive
steel drill is just
inches away from reaching
its target depth
at borehole C-1.
- Gentlemen, how are ya?
- Good.
- Good, how are you?
- Good, good.
This is the same place where,
just last summer,
the two spotted what appeared
to be a shiny golden object
embedded in the walls
of an underground cavern.
We're monitoring the weight
on the bit right now.
We've backed everything off,
so I expect that the bottom
twelve inches or maybe
a little more,
might just fall away abruptly.
Might go down about an inch
or two,
I don't anticipate that it'll
be any more than that.
That'll mean we've penetrated
through something soft,
very soft.
Whether you believe it or not,
Charles can attest,
it's historically significant,
right, Charles?
It is. You pull something out of
there, that's the,
that's the first thing that's
come out of that Money Pit.
I mean, you'd go down
in history.
That is a major turning point
in Oak Island.
Six people have lost their lives
on this island,
trying to do what you may
be able to do this afternoon.
What we may be able to do
this afternoon. That's great.
- Yeah, we. We.
- That's great.
All right.
I'll see you guys in a bit.
- Thanks, Andrew.
- Okay.
Today is a pretty exciting
day on Oak Island.
We're going to break through
the ceiling of C-1
and finally be able
to investigate it properly.
We can put a sonar down.
We can put a camera down.
We can airlift the void.
We can get a diver to go down.
We've gone from putting
a little tiny sewer camera down
to now possibly getting
a man down hole.
We know that it can be explored.
Key question is,
is there a tunnel?
Is there a connection to perhaps
the original Money Pit?
That's the answer I want.
Did it go through?
They're lowering it right now,
there they go.
There it goes.
Boy, she's rocking.
Jumping around now.
Jumping.
That big chunk of gold,
she's having a hard
time getting through, Charles.
I hope you're right.
- Whoa, there she is locking up.
- Whoa, whoa.
Really torque up on it.
Yeah, I think it dropped a few
inches right there.
Yeah, yeah, it did.
Yeah, it looked like it might
have just broke through.
She dropped, it's gotta be
through.
And smooth, so it's definitely
inside the cavity.
Here you go, the door's open!
I think we got a pretty
clear unobstructed hole,
the whole way through.
- Okay, we're home.
- Yeah.
After more than
a decade of searching,
and after spending millions
of hard-earned dollars,
Rick, Marty and their
partners may be close to
realizing yet another
incredible goal.
Charles, he just said,
the door's open.
- How do you feel?
- Excited.
- Anxious.
- Then here, here's the thing is,
whatever that object was,
it's now resting on the bottom.
I mean we're within a, you know,
192 feet of grabbing it.
The team has finally reached
the 21-foot deep void
located some 170 feet
deep below Oak Island.
But what will they find?
A golden treasure
buried by pirates?
Priceless artifacts,
hidden centuries ago
by the Knights Templar?
Or could it be a key
one that will unlock
the door to a mystery
that was intended
to remain closed
forever?
Next time on The Curse
of Oak Island
- Ho-ho!
- Is that a coin?
- That's a king jewel.
- That's amazing.
This is a treasure hunter's
dream.
That changes a lot.
They're not supposed to be here.
The people who did this
wanted it to be found.
- Take it slow.
- The world hasn't seen this.
Hey, what's that
gold shiny thing right there?
Holy smokes.
That's amazing looking.
Here we go.
My hope as I'm watching,
is just show me one
man made object.
- What's that?
- Wow!
That's amazing.