Oh, wow, the excavation
is really coming along.
Yeah.
NARRATOR: Doug Crowell
and Charles Barkhouse
head to Smith's Cove to drain
the newly excavated area
surrounding U-shaped
shaped structure
which has filled in overnight.
To me, since there is no
other structure around it,
I think this was an attempt to
try to block off the drains.
Well, if this
is the coffer dam
to close in those
five finger drains,
that's almost dead center.
I know.
I'm going to have
to get that pump lower
once it goes down a little bit.
Well, I've got boots on here.
I can get in.
Charles, you see that?
Look between those two rocks.
There's an opening there.
There is some water
coming out of there.
Well, that's what that 1863
"Yarmouth Herald" article said.
It said it was two flat rocks
laid together like that,
like almost like a triangle.
That's curious.
That is curious.
NARRATOR: A
triangle-shaped opening,
the same shape used to describe
the stone box drains in 1863?
That looks like the apex of
an opening right there to me.
It does.
When we get this down a little
bit more, maybe we get in here
and take a look at that.
Hey, Rick.
Hey.
Hey.
Over in this wall here there's
two stones, two flat rocks
laid together like a triangle.
Hard to imagine mother nature
laid those stones like that.
Have you seen water
come out of there?
Yeah, there's been a
steady trickle of water
down through that whole area.
You see it right here over
on this side coming right down
the other side of that rock.
To me, it looks
like it's a box drain.
Yeah.
It's hard not to get excited.
Absolutely.
If that's a flood
drain, what we might find
is signs that the rocks were
worked to make them fit.
Yeah.
I think what we need to
do then is maybe slowly,
gently wash that, at
least preliminarily.
All right.
If this is a feature that was
once constructed to allow water
to pass from Smith's Cove to
the depths in the money pit,
it would be more than huge.
It would be the aha moment.
Hey, what's this?
Doug, is this coconut fiber?
I just pulled it
out of right here.
There's a whole bunch
of it, right in here.
Like, a level of it.
NARRATOR: Coconut fiber?
When the box drains were
first discovered in 1850,
treasure hunters from
the Truro Company
reported finding the stone
structure covered by layers
of coconut fiber which
served as a filter
to prevent debris and
sediment from clogging
the flood tunnels.
Because coconut fiber was also
found in the various layers
of the original money pit and
considering that the nearest
coconut tree is more than
1,500 miles from Nova Scotia,
researchers have speculated
that it was originally brought
to Oak Island as
packing material
in the cargo of the
numerous ships that
made their way into Mahone Bay.
That 1863 account,
it said that the rocks
that formed the drain were
packed in coconut fiber.
So if you're finding
coconut fiber at that level,
that's really curious too.
It is curious.
Lots of water.
Yeah, definitely coming out.
Look at the water
coming out of that.
Does that alignment look
natural to you, Laird?
No, it actually
does look strange.
Yeah.
And this certainly
is not a glacial rock.
You could ask Terry, but--
In your opinion, all
the work you've done,
all m the digging you've
done in the general locale,
does this look normal to you?
It's a substantial
conglomeration
of boulders with very
little matrix between them.
Right.
If somebody was
trying to build a drain,
this is the type of
construction you might see.
But you know, the proof will
be, you know, as we move back.
As we follow it back,
it'll turn into something.
You know, we should see a
pattern then of that type
of a thing going up.
Right.
It seems to be going this way.
Let's follow it.
Not only do you have this
description in the newspaper,
which we now see in front of
us, but we have this gate which
aligns with the
U-shaped structure
which aligns with this
construct, this stone
formation.
That can't be a coincidence.
We have to proceed
very cautiously,
very slowly, very disciplined.
Because the last
thing we need to do
is to be highly
disruptive in an area
that we now find so
compelling and intriguing.
