Season: 9 Episode: 1
Title: Going for the Gold
Original Air Date: November 2, 2021
Click either link to get a copy.
Amazon https://amzn.to/3CK8aDb
iTunes https://apple.co/3cLpJs0
Synopsis:
They all meet in the war room The team discusses the concentration of silver. Dr. Spooner has found a company that can analyze the water samples that can actually check for gold in the water samples. It’s new technology. He’s going to take water samples from 30 more bore holes to send to them. It will be checked for gold and silver. Rick has also reached out to Iriving for 10 foot diameter cannisters to dig in areas where there is data for gold or silver. Next they discuss the swamp. Laird informs them that the restrictions are much tighter now and will be under a closer watch. The island has been in two parts. One part needed no permits and now permits are required for everything. They now have to work as they would on a normal archaeological sight. Marty looks at it as now this search has been validated. Dr. Spooner, a chemist, Charles, and Steve are at the money pit. They begin working on the list of 30 bore holes they need to get water samples from. They bring up the first sample. Rick and Craig meet Billy in the swamp. Laird is there as well. They are planning out the swamp dig for the stone road. They do have permission to continue to dig in the swamp with Laird’s oversite. They don’t require permission for the money pit area because previous digs caused so much damage. They find several wooden keg barrel pieces by the stone road where they are digging. One piece is painted red. There are no iron loops. Gary metal detects and gets a hit. It’s a metal gear or cog. It could be part of a pocket watch. That afternoon a portion of the group go to the archeological trailer to analyze the gear. Laird puts it in an ultrasonic cleaning machine to remove dirt and such. Now the cleaned object is examined with a XRF machine. It is made of copper and zinc which makes it brass. The next day the money pit water test continues. An antiquities expert joins them in the war room to speak about the possible sources of the road. He has done an image search for the beach for historical pictures and underwater features. He looked for features and boulders on the sea floor. He found a pattern of boulders that lines up with the road in the swamp. There may be a stone dock on the other side of the road. The expert states this was a type of road made in Europe in the 1500s. He then speaks of the Portuguese. They were active in Nova Scotia during that time period. He then shows them a picture of the money pit from the 1930’s that shows a stone road or path. It also aligns with the stone road in the swamp. Gary and Peter go to Lot 13 to metal detect. This is also where the stone path shows up in that old picture. He hopes to find some metal and narrow down a stone path. Under the new rules, Gary has already scanned it this morning and marked targets. Laird has logged everything, and they can move forward to dig. The first hit is junk, a piece of aluminum soda can. The second hit is a weird piece of metal that has been twisted many times. It’s a spiral pattern. Both get bagged and tagged. That evening Dr. Spooner leads a video conference with the three leaders and another scientist. His lab analyzed 12 samples already. Several samples showed gold. The geoscientist tells them that it takes the correct instrumentations to detect it. In this case it is parts per billion. He states that finding any reading is good because normally you would not find any at all. Dr. Spooner lists out the bore holes that had results. One of the gold hits is F4 which they believe is just north of the Chappel Vault. Craig points out that if the treasure had been removed it would not be leeching into the water, so the treasure must still be there. Marty is thrilled that only a small number of holes show gold or silver. If every hole showed gold and silver, then something would be wrong. Three days later, Choice Sonic drilling is invited to the island. Craig and Rick are going to give them 24 bore hole locations to drill on. Based on these 24 samples they were determine where the 10-foot cannisters will go. The first is DE-7. The core samples will be from every ten feet. Terry takes a look at the first sample. It’s disturbed but nothing else there. Back in the swamp, Laird is watching as they dig. Gary spots blue and white pottery. This could support the possibility of a Portuguese origin. Rick finds a board as he digs through the soils pile. Then he finds a hand carved piece of wood. Rick wants it to be evaluated by an expert on ships from the time period 1500s- 1700s. That afternoon in the archeology trailer they meet with Kelly Bourassa who has already conserved the spiral shaped metal object. It’s iron, antimony and lead content is 90%. Rick wants all the lead materials to be XRFed and logged so that they can keep track of the trace elements in the lead alloys. Wonder Woman steps in and tells Lana that it would hurt her father more if she signed over the formula than anything else. The next day Gary and Peter head back to Lot 13. He finds a modern nail. He then finds a piece of scrap lead. Next, he finds an iron band. He plans to have Carmen Legge, the expert blacksmith, look at it. At the money pit they are at 139 feet on DE-7. At 145 feet is disturbed material. It is also somewhat blackened. Terry finds a piece of wood. They posit they could be close to the Chappel Vault. The next core sample comes up empty. They move on to the next hole. Doug and Peter drive to Carmen Legge’s shop. They have taken the iron band to him. He says it’s a wagon or cartwheel band. He dates is 1650-1790. Back at the money pit, CD-6 is now being drilled. This sample is natural clay that is a little looser than normal. This next sample is from 98 feet. They open it and find wood. Terry thinks it’s a floor to ceiling collapse from a structure. Craig requests a water sample from this depth too. Later in the war room, there is a meeting with Dr. Spooner and two other scientists. They’ve done a more detailed analysis of the water samples. It’s final report time. He puts up a location map. The ones with a gold color are where they found gold. Those holes are: C1, F4, E8, and K7. F4 has 0.044 parts per billion of gold, E8 has 0.024 ppb of gold, C1 has 0.017 ppb of gold, and K7 has 0.012 ppb of gold. All four have more gold than sea water has. It’s coming from the till, the bedrock, or something is buried. The four core holes are within 50 feet of each other. F4 has the highest trace elements as well. It is also the only hole with silver in it. They need to get till and soil samples from all around this bore hole.
Categories: The Curse of Oak Island
Leave a Reply