The Curse of Oak Island: Precious Metals May Lead to Treasure!

Okay Rick, all set, all set. I’ll hold the ladder for you coming down.

It is an extraordinary moment for Rick Leina, having been alerted that a large section of the possible Treasure Tunnel located just beneath the garden shaft at a depth of some 100 ft has been exposed.

“Look at that right there, wow!”
“Those are big beams, they—oh yeah, and no two are the same.”
“That’s impressive, yeah. To get down there and realize that there is hard evidence that the tunnel is not just an interpretation, it’s real—you get a little bit of chills. Now we need to understand its relevance to the mystery.”
“Oh, I’d love to get one of those.”
“Well, what we’re going to do is clean some of it off and then we’re going to try and get a whole length out. I think it would be nice to get that one, yeah, and then this one here we know is good and wide.”
“Yep, this one is definitely rounded here. This is much thinner here, and that could be an upright piece.”
“It’s cool. It’s very cool, especially given the C14 results. That’s why it’s imperative that we get samples.”

It is the whole idea of what happened in The Money Pit—you know that we have a timeline. Earlier this year, wood samples from this tunnel, which the team obtained during a core drilling operation, were carbon-dated to the 17th century.

“I know you want to get that piece out whole.”
“Yeah, absolutely.”

But now that much more of the structure has been revealed, the team will remove some of the massive beams for additional testing, in the hopes of confirming just when this tunnel was created.

“It’s a pivotal moment—there, this recovery of these timbers may be a pivotal moment if it represents original work. This is important.”
“What I’d like to see happen here is these three timbers right here, even the fourth one being the one on top, get one pulled out so we can see a whole length.”
“Absolutely, we can get that done for you.”
“Great. If this is original depositor, there’s a good chance that there may be treasure at the end of this tunnel.”
“Yep, yeah. But I also want to see CBU them down here and survey this.”
“Yeah, great.”
“I wonder, just, you know, have Gary come down, scan that real quick.”
“Yep, absolutely.”
“So anyway, we will let you get started. We’ll get up on your way. My thought was, you know, to have Gary come down. I mean, why not? It is a treasure hunt, after all, and we have exposed new areas for him to investigate.”
“Ready, Gary?”
“Yep. Ready, mate. And hope that we find an artifact or artifacts that can be associated with cultural context as it relates to the construct.”
“How freaking awesome is this?”
“That’s pretty great. We got everything we need, Gary.”
“Thanks, mate.”
“Time to unleash the beast. You guys ready to find some treasure?”
“Find some treasure! Let’s strike up the magic.”
“Alright, let’s see if there’s any metals in there. And unfortunately, I can’t get too close to this.”

[Music]
“Iron.”
“Alright, mate. Well, fortunately, we know it, but we ain’t finished yet, mate. If you can hang on to my detector, I’m going to try pinpointing.”
“Oh, oh, you’ve got it, see mate? Let’s see what we got.”
“What is it?”
“Tough to tell what it is. I’m not getting a rapid vibration off it, which would tell me it’s iron. So this is going to go back to the lab.”
“Yep. And hopefully, Emma’s got some great news about this.”
“All good find, Gary.”
“Yeah, right, let’s see what we got here, bingers.”

[Music]
“Cross here, you’ve got another hit?”
“Yep. What we got here?”
“We have got a piece of metal. Look, its shape—see that flat edge on it?”
“Mhm.”
“It’s an interesting shape for sure.”
“You seen anything like this from your operation?”
“This is nothing we would use, so it’s probably from the tunnel construction.”
“Yeah, even more curious now.”
“Yeah, it really is.”

Could Gary be correct that this metal artifact may have been used in the construction of the tunnel? Fantastic news if so. Could it be another critical clue that could help the team determine just when it was built?

“Alright, chaps, I’m going to put this in the front pocket there and zip it. Do you want me to help you do some measurements, mate?”
“I wouldn’t mind. For the first time, I can put survey control points on this tunnel, and this is going to help me draft and project this tunnel accurately now, because this is the first time we’ve stood on it.”
“Okay, man, I think it’s great we’re doing this, Steve, for good measure. Can’t understand what this represents.”
“Here it comes, right here.”
“I absolutely hope that this leads us five steps closer to solving the mystery.”
“Oh, not quite yet.”

“You can see in that piece of wood, a man down there cutting that timber, creating that tunnel to go somewhere, hopefully to hide treasure. Look at that—we get a rounded edge here and rounded on this side, yeah, and that’s good.”
“Yeah, that’s cool. A timber cut with an adze.”

[Music]
Dating back to the days of ancient Egypt, an adze was a type of cutting tool designed for the construction of ships and wooden structures until the 18th century, when they were replaced by mechanized tools.

“That’s a bit of Oak Island Money Pit history right here.”

So now the question is, just how long before the 18th century might this tunnel have been created?

“Your fingers, it’s a real aha moment, there’s no question about it. After all the struggles and all the setbacks and all the time and all the effort to see it there in front of you—this is real history, and I want to hold it in my hand. This has more going for it than anything else so far. I mean, this could lead right to the treasure, we don’t know yet.”
“Let me just test it, see if it’s sturdy enough for a gold dance.”
“Yeah, it will be. Good news is, we still do have the horizontal drilling still to come.”
“Still to come, yeah.”

Because the tunnel must be more fully exposed and inspected before the team can possibly access it, in the coming days, representatives from Dumis Contracting Limited will conduct a core drilling operation from the B of the garden shaft into the tunnel’s interior, to hopefully pinpoint the source of the precious metals that have been detected nearby in the baby blob.

“Kudos to everybody, especially the guys down hole, you know, ’cause they did the work.”
“Let’s stay the course, get as much information as we can.”
“Yeah, so it’s been a very good day.”