Tonight on The Curse of Oak Island...
MARTY: We're back, Oak Island,
old friend.
Hold it! Whoa, look at that!
(beeping)
- Something in there. - Oh, there's something in there.
- Yeah, it's a big chunk of metal right there. - CRAIG: Wow.
IAN: I'll give it a shot here.
Wow, those are some strange elements.
- GARY: AU. - RICK: Really?
That would be gold.
These came back with one time period.
Really and truthfully?
Medieval, baby!
NARRATOR: 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 a stone slab
with strange symbols carved into it,
man-made workings that date to Medieval times,
and a lead cross whose origin may be connected
to the Knights Templar.
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.
♪ ♪
TERRY: And the day begins. Here we go.
NARRATOR: It is the start of a new day of exploration on Oak Island.
- This is gonna be it, man. - And for brothers Rick and Marty Lagina and their team,
their level of excitement and anticipation
of a major discovery has never been higher.
TERRY: Okay, it's showtime!
CHARLES: Here we go.
Now we're cooking with gas.
- STEVE G.: We're on D-2, right? - Yep.
This is a good hole, because we have about a 15-foot rectangle
with good data, but unknown data.
So we're going west to see how far this extends.
We're gonna continue to chase this wood
till we no longer find it.
And then we know it lives in this area.
Yeah.
NARRATOR: Today they have begun drilling
a new borehole known as D-2,
which is located less than eight feet from the C-1 Shaft
in the Money Pit.
The team has dubbed the area the "C-1 Cluster,"
not only because they have recently discovered evidence
of a man-made tunnel system some 90 feet deep,
but also, evidence of the treasure
people have been looking for since 1795.
So, what have you got to tell us?
NARRATOR: One week ago,
geoscientists Dr. Ian Spooner and Dr. Peir Pufahl
presented their astonishing report of water samples
taken in previously drilled boreholes
in the area of the C-1 Cluster.
Here's the bottom line: it's got gold in it.
It's got gold in the water,
and if it's got gold in the water,
the gold is coming from somewhere.
RICK: I told you Bravo-Tango
was coming at some point.
Continue on here with the, uh,
- soil sampling to get the background and gold content. - Yep.
Right.
Dr. Spooner basically looked at all kinds of different samples,
and his overall conclusion was that he could not find
a natural source for the gold and the silver
we're seeing in the water.
(laughs): There she is! Beautiful!
MARTY: That is really good news.
Does it absolutely mean it's coming from a treasure? No.
But does it get us closer by process of elimination?
Yes, definitely.
NARRATOR: Now the Oak Island team
is in the process of drilling
up to 20 new boreholes across a strategic grid,
taking core samples at ten-foot intervals
down to depths of as much as 200 feet
in an attempt to pinpoint the location
of the possible treasure.
Once completed, they intend to dig
a number of ten-foot-wide steel-cased shafts
later this year, and hopefully solve
the Oak Island mystery once and for all.
RICK: The hope, certainly, amongst the team
is that they can reverse-engineer
where these deposits
might be and put an "X" on the ground
and investigate it with a drilling program
or a large can.
We're in a good spot.
So this is gonna tell us a lot.
This is the year that everything seems to be coming together.
TERRY: Agreed.
NARRATOR: While the core-drilling operation
in borehole D-2 continues...
RICK: How far over do you want to go?
- I mean, we got to do this whole area anyway, so... - To that? Okay.
in the southeast corner of the swamp,
Rick Lagina, along with archaeologists Laird Niven
and Miriam Amirault,
as well as heavy equipment operator Billy Gerhardt,
continue investigating near the massive stone road,
or possible ship's wharf,
a ship's wharf that researcher Terry Deveau believes
could be as much as 500 years old.
This is a type of road
that was built in Europe in the 1500s.
CHARLES: Wow.
TERRY D.: What comes to my mind
is the Portuguese.
BILLY: We don't know how deep it is.
We may have enough room there.
If we get anything from there, that's significant.
BILLY: Yeah.
We did find a ship's piece
- in that lower layer. - Yeah.
NARRATOR: One week ago,
just after Terry's incredible presentation...
RICK: I would bet anything that's from a ship.
the team discovered a curious wood artifact
that may have come from a large sailing vessel.
CRAIG: This is one right here, too.
GARY: I think we've found a barrel here.
along with pieces
of potentially ancient cargo barrels.
We anticipated the southeast corner of the swamp
would be productive, and it's not disappointing.
Finding barrel staves, things that could be from ships,
um, it's looking good.
- Hey, Laird. - Hey, Craig.
- I'm here to help. - Okay.
Billy will bring the bucket up for you
- and just shake it out. - Okay.
- All right? Okay. - Sounds great.
♪ ♪
(scraping)
CRAIG: Got something here.
- LAIRD: Whoa, Bill. - Yeah.
CRAIG: There's a structure there, a wooden structure.
Rick, come look at this structure we found.
NARRATOR: A wooden structure?
Buried in the southeast corner of the swamp?
Could it be connected to the believed stone wharf?
Or might it be another, completely separate construct?
If so, who built it? When?
And for what purpose?
CRAIG: All of a sudden, the, uh, muck
fell away from the side.
You can see the boards-- There was, like,
three boards on top of each other.
Looks like cribbing
- of some sort. - Is that, uh...
- dimensional lumber? - LAIRD: Looks to be.
- Well, I don't actually know. - CRAIG: I'll jump in there
if you want me to, Laird.
Sure, if you want.
LAIRD: Going in.
Uh, this appears to be the bottom here.
- That's all one board to there. - LAIRD: Wow.
- 12-to 16-inch board. - That's a huge board.
LAIRD: It's big, isn't it?
I wonder, did the Restalls supposedly...
think they probed something and then dug a shaft
down to it, maybe?
Maybe.
They probed looking for the...
Jack Adams box.
NARRATOR: According to Jack Adams,
who served as a caretaker on Oak Island during the 1930s,
while probing in the southeast corner of the swamp,
he made contact with a large wooden box
that was buried beneath the brackish water, muck and mud.
Although the box was never verified or recovered,
years later, Mr. Adams shared his believed find
with the Restall family, who spent five years
living on Oak Island between 1959 and 1965.
Thank you.
In 2013,
Lee Lamb shared the journals of her late brother, Bobby Restall,
who documented much of the family's legendary efforts.
There's September 22, 1960.
This is exactly what we were talking about.
Included was an entry detailing how Bobby constructed
a wooden platform in the southeast corner of the swamp
to search for what Jack Adams believed to be hidden there.
I have pictures of this, Rick.
There's pictures of them working in the swamp,
like, leaning over the water
and probing with this big, long pole.
CRAIG: It comes all the way up to here.
One solid board.
NARRATOR: Is it possible that this wooden structure
is part of the platform Bobby Restall built,
attempting to locate the so-called "mystery box"?
If so, could that mean that it is still hidden
somewhere in this area?
BILLY: I guess no matter which way you look at it,
Restalls or not, you know, they were here,
and somebody knows something about this corner of the swamp.
CRAIG: Oh, yeah.
We're chasing the same thing.
RICK: Okay, well, if everyone's in agreement,
- well, let's keep going. - All right.
NARRATOR: While Rick Lagina continues to oversee
the investigation in the swamp...
CHARLES: A core coming out.
TERRY: Looks like, yep.
NARRATOR: back in the Money Pit area,
the team has just reached their zone of interest,
around 90 feet deep in borehole D-2.
- What's the good word, Adam? - 88.5.
That's good.
Ready, Terry?
- TERRY: This is more like it. - STEVE G.: Oh, it's full of wood!
- TERRY: Yeah. - CHARLES: We've got some major wood there.
TERRY: Wood piled on top of wood.
Some kind of planking or material on the floor.
STEVE G.: That's a lot of wood.
Yeah.
NARRATOR: Planked wood?
Nearly 90 feet deep in borehole D-2?
One week ago, the team made a nearly identical discovery
in borehole CD-6 some 15 feet away.
Is it possible they've encountered the same structure?
And if so, could it be connected to the silver and gold
they recently detected in this area?
- Gentlemen. - STEVE G: Hey, Craig. - TERRY: Hi, Craig.
- How you doing? - Take a look at this.
It's dark and looks woody.
This is very dark and woody.
CHARLES: Yeah.
CRAIG: Did you run your, uh, metal detector over it?
CHARLES: I'm gonna do that now.
Charles, I'll get you some wood samples,
- if you want to grab the bags. - Yeah, I'll get it. Let me run
the pinpointer over it first.
Okay.
(beeping)
Oh, what do we got?
Let me pick the bag up.
- There's something in there. - Oh, there's something in there.
STEVE G.: It'd be nice to find an artifact.
NARRATOR: At a depth of some 90 feet in borehole D-2
in the Money Pit area,
the Oak Island team has just retrieved a core sample
that not only contains more evidence of a wooden structure,
but also something they hope will be
a much more valuable clue.
CHARLES: There's something in here.
CRAIG: Oh, there it is, a piece of flat metal.
CHARLES: Yeah, it looks like it.
There's metal right here.
- (beeping) - STEVE G.: That's a big chunk.
CHARLES: Yeah, it's a big chunk of metal right there.
- STEVE G.: That's good. - TERRY: Wow.
Hey, can you take a quick look at this?
Do you think that's mud caked on there? Clay?
Or do you think it might be cement of some sort?
Mm, actually, okay.
Yeah, on closer inspection,
yeah, that looks like it might be
a little more solid than mud.
That looks like is has the possibility of being cement.
NARRATOR: Possible cement?
Found 90 feet deep on a piece of metal
in borehole D-2?
But if so, is it simply evidence of previous searcher activities
in the Money Pit from the past two centuries?
Or from something that was done deep underground
on Oak Island much earlier?
What would they be using the cement for?
What would they be cementing in?
STEVE G.: What's the history on that, Charles?
In the vault that the Oak Island Treasure Company found in 1897,
they drilled through what they believed to be cement.
They actually sent a sample away to London,
and it came back with a high probability
that it was man-made cement.
NARRATOR: When treasure hunters Frederick Blair and William Chappell
reported drilling through a cement substance
that encased a seven-foot-tall wooden vault back in 1897,
they also discovered the scrap of parchment paper
bearing the letters V-I as well as shavings of gold
when they retracted their drill bit.
CHARLES: Don't break it.
NARRATOR: Since the team has already obtained evidence
of both silver and gold in this area,
could they be close to finally locating
the so-called "Chappell Vault"?
TERRY: Interesting.
CHARLES: You know, the fact that we're finding what could be cement
on this piece of metal,
that brings me back to the story
of the Oak Island Treasure Company
drilling into the vault.
And they actually went through cement and a very thin metal.
And that's maybe what we're actually picking up now.
Yeah, this appears just metal here.
TERRY: It's a little too thin for drill casing.
I think so, too, yeah.
RICK: These are the first metals that we have found
of unknown origin
in the Money Pit.
We've recovered metals,
but in association with drive shoes
and old shafts and nails.
This is a unique find
at a depth we're significantly interested in,
in a previously unexplored area.
It means you're close to a structure.
That's my interpretation.
It would be interesting to see if there is correlation
or relation between the two. I mean,
- as we know, multiple workings underground. - Absolutely.
Dr. Brousseau can look at the metal and see if it's cement.
Okay, let's bag 'er.
- CHARLES: Okay. - NARRATOR: While drilling in the Money Pit continues,
along with the search in the southeast corner
of the swamp...
- GARY: So we'll give it a go, mate? - RICK: Okay.
NARRATOR: Rick Lagina and metal detection expert Gary Drayton
arrive at the uplands on Lot 15.
It was in this area...
What is this?
where just one week ago,
Gary and Peter Fornetti discovered an unusual iron band
on nearby Lot 17,
which once belonged to the wheel of an old cart or wagon.
This find not only dated
to before the discovery of the Money Pit in 1795,
but also offered evidence of a potential pathway
between the swamp and the original treasure shaft.
To find this hidden road, it is Rick and Gary's hope
that uncovering a trail of pre-searcher artifacts
between Lot 15 and the Money Pit
could prove this theory to be true.
We put flags on any target
that sounds good to me.
- Mm-hmm. - And now we've got permission to dig them up.
So all we got to do is see what they are,
put them in a bag, mark them,
exact same as the flag, and Bob's your uncle.
- Okay. - Find something good.
RICK: Metal detecting is different this year-- we have to create
transects, or grids, across the island.
Uh, we also have to get a permit
from Communities, Culture and Heritage
for that process to continue.
In that area there, mate.
NARRATOR: In 2010,
Rick, Marty, Craig and their partners
obtained permission from the government of Nova Scotia
to search for treasure on Oak Island.
It is the only location within the province
where such activities are legal.
At the time, other than the late 18th century homesteads
that once belonged to Samuel Ball-- on Lot 25--
And Daniel McGinnis-- On Lot 21--
They were subject to few restrictions
regarding metal detecting activities
across their property.
That all changed in the wake of the historic discoveries
the team made last year in the swamp,
such as the massive stone road
and the cobblestone pathway,
which may be leading in this direction on Lot 15,
and potentially even toward the original Money Pit.
I think the arising awareness in the public
of how important this might be
has caused regulators to sit up and pay attention,
in large part due to the success of us making this real.
NARRATOR: Now, other than a designated green zone,
which covers the Money Pit area
from Lot 18 to Smith's Cove on Lot 20,
Gary must first mark metal targets that he detects
with flags, and then obtain permission
from archaeologist Laird Niven
to go back and retrieve whatever they may be.
GARY: There, mate.
(beeping)
GARY: Oh!
- Our old friend, the pull tab. - Imagine that.
Bag it and tag it, even though it's trash.
Yeah, I think issues like this need to be addressed with CCH.
This just seems like a waste of time
- and assets. - Yeah.
We have to really dig through the trash
to get to the treasures.
RICK: My hope is that the positive will outweigh the negative,
but to be honest, it will slow down the work.
Yeah, it's like a scrapyard around here.
All right, next flag is just here.
(beeping)
Just here.
(beeping accelerates)
That sounds even better.
Whoa, look at that!
There you go.
It was there.
Yeah!
Ox shoe.
NARRATOR: On Lot 15, between the swamp and the Money Pit,
Rick Lagina and metal detection expert Gary Drayton
may have just discovered what could be an important clue.
That looks like an oldie.
Crazy, isn't it?
So, all that modern junk, and then we get
an older ox shoe in this area.
We're not too far off the Money Pit, as well.
And we found all those ox shoes
- down below the so-called pine tar kiln. - Yeah.
NARRATOR: An ox shoe?
Since the team has found a number of ox shoes
over the last year on the island,
might it be more evidence of, not just a path
between the swamp and the Money Pit,
but also an operation to haul heavy cargo
between the two locations, as well?
That's cool.
That's what we want to be finding, some old stuff.
And I knew there had to be some more old stuff in here.
It's just clearing all this out.
And unfortunately, somewhere like this,
we're gonna have to take all the surface junk out
to get to the good stuff.
GARY: Where you find ox shoes,
you're in an area which could potentially be a trail,
or an area where treasure was hauled, perhaps.
So...
this is exciting.
What is that? French? British?
To me, it looks British, because it's got that wider bottom...
- Mm-hmm. - And that thinner top.
NARRATOR: If Gary's assessment about this ox shoe's origin is correct,
could that mean it may be connected
to the British pine tar kiln
that the team found on Lot 15 last year?
The same one that archaeologist David McGinnis
believes to date back as far as the 16th century,
and which Laird Niven suspects may have been used
in the construction of the original Money Pit?
Maybe we should go back to the old aerials.
Plot this, these finds, against the old aerials
where it's cleared
- Yeah. - And see if they correspond.
Yeah.
Well, that's good.
We know someone was here
using an ox a long time ago.
That's better, mate. These are the type of finds
we want to be recovering.
I knew we could sniff out an old find.
- On to the next flag. - Okay.
NARRATOR: Later that afternoon...
after being informed of the mysterious piece of metal
that was found in borehole D-2 in the Money Pit area...
All right, chaps.
- How's it going? - Good.
Rick Lagina, Gary Drayton and Billy Gerhardt
join geoscientist Dr. Ian Spooner and Laird Niven
in the archaeology trailer.
In order to learn what the object is composed of,
they are preparing to scan it using an XRF,
or X-Ray Fluorescence device.
RICK: I believe the classroom is now full.
- (chuckles) - Excellent.
So, I want to show you
a piece of metal that came up.
I think it's D-2,
uh, near C-1 at 88 feet.
So, it's a very interesting zone,
and it's really odd, to me at least,
that metal's coming up.
- Did wood come up with it? - Yeah.
Wood came up.
So, I'm just gonna throw it on and see what we get.
- This should be interesting. - Yeah.
Let's just give it a shot here.
RICK: When I learned that they had found some metals,
at depth, I'm there in a heartbeat.
Wow. Those are some strange elements.
- Right. - Yeah.
This horizon,
to me, it's very interesting.
The tunnels that have been found previously,
whether they were inferred to be original work
or part of the searcher work,
was previously unknown.
And the addition of the XRF
has been a boon to understanding
the importance of some of these artifacts.
Osmium. Is that cobalt? Iridium.
Manganese.
- Zirconium? - IAN: Zirconium, that's correct.
Titanium.
GARY: AU!
RICK: Really?
IAN: Well, let's just let it figure out...
It's doing all its math right now.
That would be gold.
- I don't see that yet, Gary. - No, I did.
- I saw it flash. Yeah, I did. - BILLY: It flashed for a second.
- I saw that AU. - Let's move it around a bit,
'cause I saw that, too.
NARRATOR: Traces of gold?
Detected on the mysterious piece of metal
retrieved from D-2 in the Money Pit?
Could it mean that the team is close to pinpointing
the location of the fabled Oak Island treasure?
- GARY: There it is! AU! - RICK: There it is.
IAN: That's-that's pretty high.
Like, 6-8? Yeah, .068%.
Not parts per million, but percent.
Is that a large amount of gold?
Yeah, that's more gold than you think.
Like a dump truck full of gold?
(chuckles): No. That amount is...
No, a thimble. A thimble full of gold.
I think we were all shocked that there was a gold signature
when they ran the XRF on these metals.
Well, I love this machine now.
(laughs): Yeah. We've had this thing for a year,
and I've done a fair bit of metal on it
and I've never seen any gold.
RICK: I don't know what to make of it.
Follow the science.
Is it possibly an aha moment? Yes, it is.
IAN: So it's significant gold.
It's either on the surface of the metal,
or it's on...
the sediment on the metal,
'cause it hasn't been cleaned.
GARY: Does this, in your opinion, make it more likely
that there is treasure in the Money Pit?
Well, there's gold on the metal at 88 to 92 feet,
somewhere around there.
I mean, it's not what I expected.
I've got one piece of a big puzzle.
The water's another piece. And these data are coming in.
They're provocative in exactly the spot
that you'd expect provocative results to come from.
So, I'm getting surprised at a furious rate these days.
(laughter)
- Welcome to the island. - Yeah.
RICK: It's just more homework, more in-depth analysis,
and I think in combination with the water sampling,
the lab work,
as a team, we can move this thing forward at this point.
I think we're on a very good path to success.
- Yeah. - Anyway...
- We better go find some more. - Yes.
GARY: That was good news.
BILLY: Sure was.
NARRATOR: One day after unearthing a metal object
which contains high traces of gold from the Money Pit...
- 48.7 meters without casing. - Yeah, 48.7.
the drilling operation there continues
in search of more valuable clues.
STEVE G.: We've got a long ways to go.
Meanwhile...
- Morning. - Morning. - MIRIAM: Hi.
We found rocks.
- Yeah, you sure did. - Yeah, we're just...
we're just kind of cleaning it off.
Rick Lagina
and heavy equipment operator Billy Gerhardt
arrive at the southeastern corner of the swamp,
where archaeologists Miriam Amirault and Laird Niven
have just uncovered what they believe to be
more of the ancient stone ship's wharf.
So, what's the plan for the day, then?
Um, if you don't mind helping Miriam...
I will... I will do whatever you tell me.
- I'll work with Billy. - Yep.
- And we'll start. - Then we'll go in here. - All right.
RICK: It's an ongoing story,
and that's what the archaeologists
have really taught us.
You're not gonna find one or two or five or ten things
and go, "There's the story."
This is evolving, and I'm glad
that they're leading the charge.
Rick, will you just grab that... those couple sticks?
I don't know if they're important or not.
- That's interesting. - That's a different one.
Miriam?
- What's up? - Look.
Well, that's weird.
I've never seen anything like that.
No. It's broken here.
Almost like a bowl. Feel that.
It's concave.
Oh!
Oh, that's really weird.
Laird? Do you want to come here for a second?
LAIRD: What do you have?
- Hey. - I don't know. - Oh.
What is it?
- No idea, Laird? - No.
I don't. I really don't.
But given the items that we think are associated with boats
or building of boats, this might be a maritime object as well.
Makes sense.
Yep.
NARRATOR: It was the belief
of the late Oak Island treasure hunter Fred Nolan
that the swamp had been artificially created
in order to hide the wreck of a massive treasure galleon.
In 2019, Rick, Marty, Craig and the team identified
a mysterious 200-foot-long, galleon-shaped anomaly
deep in the middle of the brackish bog
using seismic scanning.
However, that was only the beginning.
- Oh, yeah. - Oh, look at that! That's nice!
That is old. It's a handmade spike.
They have also found 17th century ship spikes...
- MARTY: What is that? - Possible deck planking...
and a number of burned wood pieces
that blacksmith Carmen Legge believes to be parts of a ship.
It's almost like it's meant to rest on something
or go into something.
Now, after finding another wooden artifact
next to the ancient stone ship's wharf
in the swamp's southeastern corner,
could the team be close to proving
that Fred Nolan was right?
It's really cool.
I've never seen anything like that.
- RICK: Somebody will know. - LAIRD: Somebody will know.
Okay,
- I'll take care of it. - All righty.
LAIRD: All right.
NARRATOR: Later that afternoon...
while drilling continues in the Money Pit...
Oh, yeah, right to the bottom.
GARY: I was looking forward to coming back in this area.
Rick Lagina and Gary Drayton arrive on Lot 16
to continue searching for clues along the possible pathway
between the swamp and the Money Pit.
We've got to find something good.
Let's find something good.
I have my favorite shovel, if that helps.
GARY: Your favorite shovel and my lucky digger--
- What can go wrong? - (laughs)
It's probably in the top.
I expect some junk here, 'cause we're not too far off the lane.
Sure.
Let's see if I can pinpoint for...
(beeping)
-(rapid beeping) -There you go. Yeah, we're on it.
A square nail, by the look of it.
A big chunky one. Yeah, it's tough to say
how old it is, but, I mean, it's heavy.
- Mm-hmm. - I know it's an oldie.
That's maybe the head of the nail. I don't know.
Yeah, 'cause that tells the story of the nail, the head.
Well, mate, great start.
- I'll tag and bag it. - Okay.
RICK: The hope is that you can connect these artifacts
with other artifacts that have been found.
Because there's always someone who knows something
about the most esoteric subject, maybe there's someone
who can look at all the spikes and say: You know what, guys?
There's a cultural influence here.
Or maybe there's a specific forging technique.
They are not just static finds.
They should be able to tell us something.
One thing I've noticed when we flagged this area,
Peter and I, is that most of the targets
seem to be along the top here and along the bottom.
So the next group of targets are down near the water.
Okay.
GARY: Hold it!
- Do you see what I see? - RICK: Oh, yeah.
NARRATOR: On Lot 16,
between the swamp and the Money Pit,
Gary Drayton and Rick Lagina
have just made what could be an important discovery.
Look at the shape of that.
Whoa, look at that!
It's a round shot!
RICK: Wow.
Dang, that is a nice find.
NARRATOR: A piece of round shot?
Although dating as far back as the 12th century in China,
round shot is a spherical projectile
designed to be launched
from both cannons and handheld firearms.
While the early form of round shot
was made of stone, it was eventually replaced
by iron throughout Europe in the 17th century.
Steve, look at this.
Oh, wow.
Last year, while sifting through the spoils
excavated from the Money Pit area,
treasure hunter Michael John discovered
a very similar small, round stone.
- Have you seen this, Gary? - This...
is a dress stone, or a gun stone.
This is really, really old.
Before the days of cannonballs, iron cannonballs.
Could this piece of stone shot,
found between the swamp and the Money Pit,
and the one found last year in the Money Pit area itself
be connected?
This being stone shot, mate, wonder where this came from.
You'd have to say it came from the water,
- Yeah. - Which is not too far away.
And about the right distance if you was firing a small cannon.
So how big a cannon does that come out of?
It would... more than likely, it would have been
like a small rail gun,
- Mm-hmm. - That would have been attached
to the side of the boat,
and this would have been an antipersonnel ammo.
It would have been like scattershot.
It would be interesting
just to bring, like, a rototiller up here
- and see if there's more of them. - Yeah, we really should.
I thought it was a bird's egg when I first saw it.
Well, that just goes to show, mate,
using your twin optical scanners.
RICK: Oh, yeah, it's an amazing surface find.
Rarely do we find those.
GARY: Oh, without a doubt.
NARRATOR: The following morning...
MARTY: We're back, Oak Island, old friend.
- Okay, well, how you feeling, Alex? - Good.
Rick Lagina has just picked up his brother Marty
and nephew Alex after their trip from Traverse City, Michigan,
to Halifax, Nova Scotia.
Yeah, I'm glad to be back.
Looking at this from afar, and, you know,
- Mm-hmm. Yep, yep. - Punching in and punching out.
What do you find the most exciting?
What is the things that you're dying to show us
and that, you know, I mean, we can sink our teeth into?
I might as well show it to you right now.
This is the most curious thing of all.
What is that?
RICK: That's one of the pieces
of metal we retrieved from D-2 up by C-1.
There's a gold signature on that.
Really?
Per the XRF?
- Yep. - This...
is probably the most exciting thing
- Yeah. - In terms of a treasure hunt.
- Yes. - Not the information hunt,
- but the treasure hunt. - Yes.
- Yeah. - RICK: The other curious thing about that
is that it's right in the horizon of one of the tunnels,
- Mm-hmm. - the 86 to 93 tunnels up around C-1.
This was found at 88 and a half.
And that's a much more plausible depth than 220.
MARTY: Exactly.
Well, that kind of brings us up to speed,
but our first task here, though, when we get there
is to get in the war room, right?
'Cause Craig's here, and Craig has some, to my understanding,
more C-14 data, is that right?
Yep, and I'm gathering that it's gonna be very interesting.
And it's in the D-2 borehole.
Well, that's the same one.
- The same one, yes. - As this stuff.
- With the gold. - Yes. Yes.
MARTY: All right.
We had silver in the water,
we had gold in the water, now we're seeing gold
on a piece of metal unearthed...
in the Money Pit at a depth
where an offset chamber might lie.
That is really encouraging.
It's the first direct evidence
that precious metals might be here.
I'd say we're closing in on the treasure.
MARTY: Gentlemen!
- We're back! - Welcome!
SCOTT: Welcome to Oak Island.
Good to see you all. Good to be back.
I hope you feel the same.
(laughter)
DOUG: Absolutely.
Anyway, we're here. Good to see you all.
What the hell you got here, Craig?
- Samples. - Do you got a bunch of new data for us?
Uh, just one new data, but I wanted to incorporate
some of the old finds we found in here, too.
MARTY: Okay.
This is, uh, the other one, this is from last year.
This is CD-2.5,
which is only a few feet away from... from this one.
And this is from 91 and a half feet,
so just, you know, a foot and a half deeper.
- Really? - 1488 to 1650.
Just one period.
It's certainly...
I mean, it's inarguable.
We need to put a caisson at this location.
- GARY: Yep. - CRAIG: And then,
everybody knows D-2, kind of an exciting well this year.
We brought up the pieces of metal,
brought up wood all around the 90-foot level.
Wait a second, you mean the piece of metal
- with gold on it, that one? - The piece of metal
- with gold on it, exactly. - Okay.
Just wanted to be able to say that.
(laughter)
CRAIG: And, uh, so, you know,
one thing we did was, we sent the wood out for testing,
and this is the sample from 90-foot,
and, uh, it came back from Beta Analytical
- with one time period. - That's good.
1488 to 1650.
- Really and truthfully? - CRAIG: Yeah. - GARY: Wow!
ALEX: Wow.
Exact same time period.
- ALEX: Wow. - Pre-Columbian date.
I find that incredibly amazing.
GARY: That is incredible.
NARRATOR: In the Oak Island war room,
Craig Tester has just presented an astonishing scientific report
regarding wood that was obtained
just two days ago from borehole D-2 in the Money Pit.
That's crazy.
- Wow. - GARY: That is incredible.
NARRATOR: Matching a sample taken last year from borehole CD-2.5,
which sat just two feet away, the wood dates
to as early as the late 15th century,
more than 300 years before the discovery
of the original Money Pit.
So, whether these are both the same log...
Wait, I want to revel in this a little bit.
(laughter)
Seriously, this is very...
We don't have the oddball bracket here.
ALEX: Is that clearly warped wood?
I mean, is it obviously man-made and...
Uh, yeah, this is stacked upon each other, yeah.
- To me, that's huge, don't you think? - MARTY: Yeah,
and the only other thing, if it was a log and the...
glacial stuff, it should be 10,000 years old, right?
- Yeah. - RICK: Historical data indicates
to the north of C-1, or even in C-1, was...
unexplored, literally.
And so now, yes, this data,
- this... the metal pieces... - Absolutely. - Right.
These dates just support
my belief for a long time
that whatever work was done here was done quite early.
Exactly. Exactly.
NARRATOR: Because of more than two centuries
of prior searcher excavations and subsequent cave-ins
caused by the man-made flood tunnels,
the location of the original Money Pit
has been lost since the early 1900s.
Could the matching carbon dating of the wood
in borehole D-2 and CD-2.5
mean that the team has finally rediscovered
the original treasure shaft?
So, it has always seemed virtually impossible to me
that after all the holes we've put down
in the conventional Money Pit area,
that this treasure could still be hiding
in the conventional Money Pit area.
This has 95.4% confident.
But I think it's entirely more likely
that we've been looking in the wrong place
and that these new holes might be where the real treasure is.
To get those dates there, that's pre-searcher by a long shot.
The Templars could have been here first.
Medieval, baby!
- There it is! - I couldn't resist it.
I wasn't going to leave till I got one of those, Gary.
RICK: You know what?
What this does say, as definitive as these results are,
if you try to...
do a probability window, say,
about the various theories, they all fit.
They pretty much do.
RICK: There are various theories that seem to indicate
possible evolving of the Templars into Rosicrucians,
into Free Masonry,
and there's so much fractured history there
that it's very difficult to say with clarity,
"This-- aha!-- this is what happened in this time period."
But there is no denying that this story has persisted
because of the belief that there is treasure
buried on Oak Island.
I mean, think about it, right?
14 years in, down the road of discovery here,
we thought surely science will carry the day,
and now it certainly has paid dividends,
but we also thought that, one by one,
we could eliminate this theory
and that theory and this theory
and get down, narrow it down to one, two or three.
And yet, five or six still remain,
even with specific information like this.
MARTY: Well, I think we can eliminate
or just about eliminate one of the theories, Rick.
The, uh, "nothing happened" theory.
- That's pretty much dead. - I'd say that's a...
- It's pretty much dying fast. - It's dead and buried.
So, with that thought, let's all get back out there
- and do what we're doing. - Yep.
NARRATOR: With every search operation that they conduct,
and with every new technology that they apply,
Rick, Marty, Craig and their team
are collecting more pieces of the Oak Island puzzle.
But as the picture continues to take shape,
will they ultimately identify a masterful group
of conspirators who hid something of great value here?
Or several of them, who, connected by a secret agenda,
made numerous deposits over a number of generations?
What is almost certain is that treasure
still lies buried on Oak Island.
The question is,
can anything stop the Laginas and their team from finding it?
(wind whistling)
Next time on The Curse of Oak Island...
MARTY: If there really is gold found
on these pieces of metal, this is
very, very significant.
Wow, this is really interesting.
So, we have ancient Spanish gold.
- That's huge. - So, when you project
this path, it heads to the Money Pit.
Wow!
LAIRD: Department of Community, Culture and Heritage
asked that we stop down immediately.
It is very discouraging to me.
The more we cooperate, the more of our island we lose.
Fine, let's throw in the towel.
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