**ICE**

[Limitool]

Armchair detective mentioned flood tunnels with his first post of this thread.
I was just asking...weren't they supposed to flood the shaft with water from Smith's cove? If so, we're not talking about freezing freshwater.

Brain fart is all.... I'm sure he meant ground water or cavern water not flood tunnels. But he'll correct me if I'm wrong if he meant man-made flood tunnels.

 

[Johnnybravo300]

I live in Gunnison CO, one of the coldest places in the lower 48.
My well is 240 ft deep with water 20 ft down and it doesn't freeze.

We have to dig 6 ft minimum to bury water lines for houses if that helps.

 

[chalkoutline]

View attachment 2210989

Still lower than freshwater.

 

[GravelTeeth]

Sort of related trivia: even the ground under glaciers is sometimes (often? always?) unfrozen.

But back to OI. The idea of freezing the water encroachment in the Money Pit was proposed by S.A. Williams in 1912, using the Poetsch method which had a track record of some utility in mine work in Europe. Basically they'd sink pipes filled with coolant in a circle around the target area. Williams' Oak Island Salvage Company failed to raise enough funds to bring the plan to fruition and never set foot on the island. [The Curse of Oak Island by Randall Sullivan, ch. 8]

--GT

 

[GravelTeeth]

What flood tunnels...? We're way past man made flood tunnels.

If you mean the case for their existence or non- is settled, I beg to differ. While there has never been a successful tracing of the route (as in running a line from one end to the other), and probably never could be now thanks to dynamiting at several points and the active erosion at depth via the so-called solution channel undermining its course, the 1897 interception of a small rectangular tunnel lined with beach stones from which seawater poured forth at pressure, at approximately 111 feet deep in the Money Pit, is kinda tough to ignore. The classic skeptic argument against is that this was either a searcher tunnel (though its 2.5 foot width and beach stones would tend to work against this theory) or a natural channel (its squared off ceiling would say otherwise ... nature's not that fond of right angles).

Another argument raised is that even if the bed was lined, the sides were not, and natural erosion would have done a number on them over time. This seems likely in a scenario where the water is constantly flowing at force, but once it has flooded a given shaft, the water is calmer and only moving with the tides, so the "waterproof" hard-packed clay till forming the sides of a channel might have resisted erosion for an extended period.

If there were no man-made flood tunnels then the question of what the finger drains were for becomes necessary to answer. The salt-works theory, though well-argued, is still only a theory.

So like everything else on OI, still an open question to those with open minds!

--GT

 

[Limitool]

So like everything else on OI, still an open question to those with open minds!

--GT

No open mind here because no "logical" reason to dig 100+ hole AND engineer flood tunnels has ever be presented. You'd think after 200+ years and all the work done on the small island something to justify all the interest would have been found. Money from advertising is all that exists and been presented.

 

[chalkoutline]

No open mind here because no "logical" reason to dig 100+ hole AND engineer flood tunnels has ever be presented. You'd think after 200+ years and all the work done on the small island something to justify all the interest would have been found. Money from advertising is all that exists and been presented.

My theory is ...it was a mine and the flood tunnel were air vents.

 

[GravelTeeth]

You'd think after 200+ years and all the work done on the small island something to justify all the interest would have been found.

Yes you would think so. The spectacular failures are part of the allure, like trying to climb a mountain littered with the corpses of those who tried before. I do think the current crew are probably past their acme of effort and are starting to come down the other side ... so maybe even if there were Something it might not be found in my lifetime either. Hoping for it is a bit like hoping for world peace -- totally unrealistic but still worthy.

--GT

 

[Armchair detective]

I live in Gunnison CO, one of the coldest places in the lower 48.
My well is 240 ft deep with water 20 ft down and it doesn't freeze.

We have to dig 6 ft minimum to bury water lines for houses if that helps.

This could actually be helpful.

Some questions:
Is the well covered?
What is the well water temp in January?
How wide is your well?
. When you pump water, is it from 240 ft?
And please excuse the obvious, how do you know the surface of the water never freezes?

I see your outside average air temp in January is about.12°F - yikes.

Bury the pipes at OI at 4 1/2 ft.

 

[Limitool]

This could actually be helpful.

Some questions:
Is the well covered?
What is the well water temp in January?
How wide is your well?
. When you pump water, is it from 240 ft?
And please excuse the obvious, how do you know the surface of the water never freezes?

I see your outside average air temp in January is about.12°F - yikes.

Bury the pipes at OI at 4 1/2 ft.

I realize this was not directed at me but I can answer from my experience. My well is 199 ft deep. Well water stays the same temp year around. My well is 6" wide and cased 100%. It's always covered. I pump from 193 feet. The surface of the water NEVER freezes here (how do I know?). I've changed pumps out in the middle of winter. Just drop a pebble and you can hear a HUGE splash when it hits surface of water.

But the average air temp here in January is NOWHERE near 12 degrees. Probably a balmy 30-40. But I highly suspect all wells that deep act the same no matter the surface temp. It would have no bearing on the ground water.

 

[Armchair detective]

Your information checks out - you've pretty much insulated your well.

Regarding the open shaft, it turns out that dirt is a pretty good insulator. After you remove the latent heat in the wall, the air column in the shaft, and the phase change from water to ice, the "cooling load" is fairly small, about what you need to cool a small house from 95°F outside to 70°F inside (but constant).

HOWEVER, the air volume required with an average winter temp at OI of 30°F....

My brain is rebelling.

 

[Armchair detective]

. I pump from 193 feet. Just drop a pebble and you can hear a HUGE splash when it hits surface of water.

One thousand and one
One thousand and two
One thousand and three
One thousand KERPLOOSH !!

 

[Armchair detective]

Yup - checks out.

 

[SSR]

If you mean the case for their existence or non- is settled, I beg to differ. While there has never been a successful tracing of the route (as in running a line from one end to the other), and probably never could be now thanks to dynamiting at several points and the active erosion at depth via the so-called solution channel undermining its course, the 1897 interception of a small rectangular tunnel lined with beach stones from which seawater poured forth at pressure, at approximately 111 feet deep in the Money Pit, is kinda tough to ignore. The classic skeptic argument against is that this was either a searcher tunnel (though its 2.5 foot width and beach stones would tend to work against this theory) or a natural channel (its squared off ceiling would say otherwise ... nature's not that fond of right angles).

Another argument raised is that even if the bed was lined, the sides were not, and natural erosion would have done a number on them over time. This seems likely in a scenario where the water is constantly flowing at force, but once it has flooded a given shaft, the water is calmer and only moving with the tides, so the "waterproof" hard-packed clay till forming the sides of a channel might have resisted erosion for an extended period.

If there were no man-made flood tunnels then the question of what the finger drains were for becomes necessary to answer. The salt-works theory, though well-argued, is still only a theory.

So like everything else on OI, still an open question to those with open minds!

--GT

There are no flood tunnels. Case firmly closed. There is only a draining feature a Smith's cove which had a shallow sump (the vertical shaft (full of large boulders) which led to the beach. It firmed up he ground there by collecting any sub surface shallow run-off from higher ground which made the ground terribly mushy. A fanned out draining outlet was to increased flow at low tide by effectively enlarging the area of seepage on the beach. We know this was the working end of the island from early days. The ground just above the beach was paved to allow a firmed up working area. A small pressure from within the vertical shaft started a daily syphoning off of it a low tide. Beach water never went inland via the drain system. It was at sea level and a few fee of water would no have flowed uphill against even a weak head pressure from above.

Reports of anything by searcher groups are examples of seeing ghosts. A flood tunnel to the depth of a 111 foot level would have required significantly more labor and digging than a hole of that depth would. There are no air shafts either. There is nothing of the sort. The way water snakes its way into areas is through dissolved fissures in a hard packed clay overburden. once breached a shaft is doomed to never ending flooding from water coming from below. This is how water wells eventually succumb to salt water infiltration.

 

[GravelTeeth]

There are no flood tunnels. Case firmly closed.

Case not closed just because you or any other internet pontificators say so. You've repeatedly referred to Smith's Cove as the "working end" of the island while being unable or unwilling to provide citations to support this notion. The finger drains are unsolved. The extent and nature of the small rectangular inlet tunnel at 111 feet is unsolved. These will almost certainly remain unsolved because they've been essentially destroyed by subsequent search efforts. Case most definitely open, to remain so unless and until historical documentation appears that we can evaluate on its merits.

What you meant to say, I'm sure, is "in my opinion ... ."

And not to get drawn in too much on hydro-engineering, which is way out of my depth (!), but if I recall correctly the Money Pit was essentially at the highest point on the island at around 32 feet above sea level. 111 - 32 is still 79 feet below sea level, making the putative path of any flood tunnel from the box drains still a downhill affair over the length of ~500 feet, giving us a roughly 9° gradient. The gradient could be even steeper from distances of less than that to account for speculated collection shafts further inland, or shallower if such structures had their Money Pit-facing egress below sea level.

--GT

 

[TruthbeTold]

There are no flood tunnels. Case firmly closed. There is only a draining feature a Smith's cove which had a shallow sump (the vertical shaft (full of large boulders) which led to the beach. It firmed up he ground there by collecting any sub surface shallow run-off from higher ground which made the ground terribly mushy. A fanned out draining outlet was to increased flow at low tide by effectively enlarging the area of seepage on the beach. We know this was the working end of the island from early days. The ground just above the beach was paved to allow a firmed up working area. A small pressure from within the vertical shaft started a daily syphoning off of it a low tide. Beach water never went inland via the drain system. It was at sea level and a few fee of water would no have flowed uphill against even a weak head pressure from above.

Reports of anything by searcher groups are examples of seeing ghosts. A flood tunnel to the depth of a 111 foot level would have required significantly more labor and digging than a hole of that depth would. There are no air shafts either. There is nothing of the sort. The way water snakes its way into areas is through dissolved fissures in a hard packed clay overburden. once breached a shaft is doomed to never ending flooding from water coming from below. This is how water wells eventually succumb to salt water infiltration.

Agreed.

The flood tunnel fiction has been fully debunked many times.

 

[GravelTeeth]

The flood tunnel fiction has been fully debunked many times.

Show us these debunkings. I know you won't because I've yet to see a single reliable source provided by you.

Failure to corroborate is not a debunking. It should play into the odds, yes.

--GT

 

[Carl-NC]

Case not closed just because you or any other internet pontificators say so.

A lot of holes that have been dug on the island have flooded, which begs the question: Did someone dig an elaborate network of 100-foot-deep flood tunnels criss-crossing the island so that, no matter where you dig, the hole will flood? Or does the island have a naturally cavernous geology that causes the flooding? Apply Occam's razor to find out.

It is impossible to say that the man-made flood tunnel theory is absolutely false. Given enough manpower and enough time, yes, someone could have dug an elaborate network of flood tunnels on the island, despite there being no evidence this happened. OTOH, we know for a fact that the geology of the area would support natural caverns that could also explain the flooding. This is where you get to apply Occam's razor: which explanation is simpler and more likely? Which one requires suspending critical thinking and accepting outlandish theories that require monumental efforts that have zero evidence? It's not a difficult choice.

 

[GravelTeeth]

It is impossible to say that the man-made flood tunnel theory is absolutely false.

...

This is where you get to apply Occam's razor: which explanation is simpler and more likely?

Yes. Weighing the evidence and applying likeliness scores is all we can do, and once that's done it may "close" the case to the satisfaction of one individual in their own minds, but that does not become a blanket solution for the rest of us, smug statements of certitude notwithstanding.

Here's a thought exercise: what if the network of natural fissures you theorize started out as just one man-made channel and devolved from there? Just for the sake of argument let's say that a channel ran from Smith's Cove through hard-packed clay till to a depth of ~110 feet in the Money Pit, but it drained into a man-made space/room/cavern which was deep enough to enter the anhydrite bedrock? Once seawater had entered the system, either by design at the time of cache deposition or by searchers triggering a "trap", the hydraulic action of the tides starts an erosion going which then creates a solution channel that undermines not only the Money Pit but all searcher shafts in the Money Pit area. Searcher exploratory drilling could be a major contributory variable, as it creates further "drains" from till level to bedrock level.

The same dude who described very large surface openings for any sinkholes in this type of geology also downplayed the likelihood of water percolating through clay till unless it had been previously disturbed (and the "slumping" of a sinkhole may not count), so arguing for percolation at all these above-bedrock (~120-160 feet IIRC) strata may also be inadvertently arguing for a man-made Money Pit.

--GT

 

[Carl-NC]

Here's a thought exercise: what if...

This is where mental gymnastics are applied to counter gaping holes in a theory or a glaring lack of evidence. It makes the case weaker, not stronger. Apply Occam's razor again; the natural geological cause is still the overwhelming winner.