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Short Stuff: Lake Peigneur · Stuff You Should Know

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to the short stuff. I'm Josh,
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: and there's Chuck, and there's Jerry enof talking. Let's get started.
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: Let's uh, let's travel, my friend, to not only Louisiana,
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  Speaker 1: Louisiana and nineteen eighty. Can you imagine, which I believe
• 0:22
  Speaker 1: the drinking age back then was still probably eighteen I
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: think so too. I wasn't they held out the longest,
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: and they think they did. And the FEDS were like,
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: well kiss kiss decent roads, goodbye until you've been to
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: our will states rights. Oh goodness, who knew that was
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: going to come up? Me? So in in uh Louisiana,
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: in Iberia Parish, around the town of New Iberia, there
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: is a Lake Chuck. And it's still there today, which
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: is not that surprising. It will become surprising that it's
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: still there shortly. It's called Lake Panier p E I
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: G N E U are Lake Pennier, Okay. And in
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  Speaker 1: November of nineteen eighty, which is where we are right now,
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  Speaker 1: there was like some Texico contractors who were doing some
• 1:14
  Speaker 1: exploratory drilling in Lake Panier. And Lake Pennier was really
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: really big, um how many acres acres? I mean at
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  Speaker 1: least like five or six acre rcres of land, but
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  Speaker 1: only eleven ft deep. Yeah, that was like, I think
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  Speaker 1: one of the deepest points. I think the average was
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: just a handful of feet, so really really wide, but
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: really really shallow. And the other right, the other um
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  Speaker 1: point about that is that Lake Pannier set on top
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: of what's called the salt dome. It's an accumulation of
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  Speaker 1: salt that builds up underneath the ground. And there was
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  Speaker 1: a company called the Diamond Crystal Salt Company and they
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: like to mind for salt around Lake Pin. Your and
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: all this is going on at the same day, at
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: the same time, on the same day in November that
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: the Texico Exploratory crew was drilling down through Lake Pin.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: You're looking for gas deposits, that's right, And I think
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: you see where this might be headed. But the details
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: of this story are so bonkers. It's so nuts, it's
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: just crazy. So Texicos is drilling and they're probing the
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: floor and their drill all of a sudden just seizes
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  Speaker 1: up and stops about twelve hundred or so feet below
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  Speaker 1: the surface. So if you remember, this lake is only
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: eleven ft deep, so they are far far far, far
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  Speaker 1: far below this lake, and they said, that's that's interesting.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: This doesn't usually happen. Yeah, so what what happens when
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: your drill gets stuck in something? You try and work
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: it loose a little bit um, which if it shallow,
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: it's no big deal. When it's that deep, it's a
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  Speaker 1: little bit different because you can't see what's going on.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: And all of a sudden, these workers heard, you know,
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  Speaker 1: pop boy awing, and this big rig all of a
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: sudden starts tilting toward the water, and they're like, mmmmm,
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: this is not good, guys. No, rigs are not supposed
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  Speaker 1: to tilt. No, no, no, And this thing, uh, it's
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  Speaker 1: a five million dollar drill, and it starts to sink,
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  Speaker 1: and it starts to buck and it starts to move,
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  Speaker 1: and all these dudes are like, all right, this is
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  Speaker 1: not good at all. So we're gonna release ourself, uh,
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  Speaker 1: release these barges that are attached. We're gonna get out
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  Speaker 1: of here, and we're gonna get on shore, which they did, right,
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  Speaker 1: So they got out of there. They made it safely.
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  Speaker 1: But as they're on shore, like trying to figure out
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  Speaker 1: what was going on, this is really weird. They're leaning
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  Speaker 1: rig starts to kind of tip further and further into
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  Speaker 1: the water, and surely at some point, if it's just
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: a few feet of water, should stop and stay above
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: the water. But these guys were really surprised when they
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: saw that the rig kept going underwater and underwater, and
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  Speaker 1: then it just this ap peered from sight. Could you imagine? No,
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: I can't. But as they're sitting there scratching their heads
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  Speaker 1: over this one um, they noticed that a there was
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  Speaker 1: a whirlpool that was starting to form, just a little
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  Speaker 1: bit at first around the point where the oil the
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  Speaker 1: drill rig had just disappeared. And then it started to
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  Speaker 1: come into view I guess in their mind's eye what
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: had just happened. And they realized pretty quickly that they
• 4:30
  Speaker 1: had accidentally drilled all the way down into one of
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  Speaker 1: the main shafts of the salt mines, twelve feet below
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  Speaker 1: Lake Penner. And now there was a hole connecting the
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  Speaker 1: air above the lake and the hole underneath the lake,
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  Speaker 1: with a lot of water in between just waiting to
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  Speaker 1: get in. YEA, so this whirlpool is growing and growing.
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  Speaker 1: It eventually grows in front of their eyeballs to a
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  Speaker 1: quarter of a mile in diameter. That is so enormous.
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: It's so enormous. Uh. In the meantime, down in the
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  Speaker 1: salt mine, Uh, there's an electrician named Juniors Gattison. He
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  Speaker 1: heard bang pop boying and it's like, that doesn't sound good.
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  Speaker 1: And all of a sudden, muddy water starts rushing in
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  Speaker 1: and it's bringing fuel drums along the mine shaft and
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  Speaker 1: he was like, this is not good. He calls in
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  Speaker 1: an alarm, which is three blinks of the light. He
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  Speaker 1: heads out. All the workers are like, all right, we
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  Speaker 1: know what three blinks of a light means. That means
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  Speaker 1: we need to drop everything and get out of here.
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  Speaker 1: And these fifty or so dudes are fifteen feet underground.
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  Speaker 1: I'm sorry, fifteen hundred feet underground. Fifteen ft would be
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  Speaker 1: no big deal. And they start getting up to higher
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  Speaker 1: levels and higher levels where they can get to these
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  Speaker 1: elevators to get them out. They get to the third
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  Speaker 1: level and it's blocked by these rising waters on the surface.
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  Speaker 1: It's like, uh, something out of the Bible or an
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  Speaker 1: X Files episode or something. What was originally a fourteen
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: inch hole in the ground in this mine starts to
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  Speaker 1: fill up with water and all of a sudden water
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  Speaker 1: hits salt, and that starts dissolving and dissolving. All these
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  Speaker 1: columns of salt supporting these caves and tunnels start dissolving,
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  Speaker 1: and this whole mine starts collapsing in front of everyone's
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  Speaker 1: face and chuck all that water that's flowing through, dissolving
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  Speaker 1: away the salt. That was like three and a half
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  Speaker 1: billion gallons of water. So it's a substantial amount of
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: water starting to fill up that salt mine underneath. And
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: as the water is sinking down from the lake, it's
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: starting to flood upward towards the bottom of the lake,
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  Speaker 1: which doesn't happen very often in Louisiana anywhere else really.
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  Speaker 1: All Right, I think we should take a break. We'll
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: come back and finish this amazing story right after this.
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: This is an amazing story. I love this story. It's
• 7:11
  Speaker 1: one of my all time favorites. All Right. So below
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: the surface, um, they're these miners trying to get out.
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  Speaker 1: They finally get up to level three where they can
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  Speaker 1: access these elevators, but there's a ton of high water
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  Speaker 1: blocking their route. They're using mine carts and and vehicles
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  Speaker 1: powered by diesel to try and push their way through
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  Speaker 1: and eventually all those fifty miners, uh, eight dudes at
• 7:35
  Speaker 1: a time are able to get into these elevators that
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: carry them to the surface. Uh. And it's not like
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: the speedy elevator. Imagine the waiting as this water is
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  Speaker 1: rising for the elevator to come back was some seriously
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: scary stuff. Yeah, I mean eight at a time, there's
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  Speaker 1: fifty of them down there, and the elevator slow as Christmas.
• 7:53
  Speaker 1: I can't imagine how stressful that must have been. And like,
• 7:57
  Speaker 1: how did you decide who went? You know, I mean
• 7:59
  Speaker 1: that's scary stuff. So as the miners are like starting
• 8:03
  Speaker 1: to like slowly come up like eight by eight um
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  Speaker 1: above ground back up on the surface of the lake,
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  Speaker 1: there's like this this this huge hole has opened up
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: where the whirlpool was, and the section from the whirlpool
• 8:17
  Speaker 1: has sucked the Gulf of Mexico in now. So like
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: there was three and a half billion gallons of Lake
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Panier to begin with, but that whirlpool that created sucked
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: the water from Del Cambrie Canal that connects the Gulf
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: of Mexico and Lake Panire suck the Gulf of Mexico
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  Speaker 1: into the lake and eleven barges that happened to be
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  Speaker 1: in this miles long canal. Um got sucked into Lake Panier,
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  Speaker 1: and that just sucked into Lake Panir, sucked down the
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: whirlpool into the salt mines underground. Yeah, so uh, eleven
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  Speaker 1: barges gulp, Um, Jefferson Island seventy acres, big gulp, another
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  Speaker 1: drilling platform, gulp. This little tugboats out there. God blessed
• 9:01
  Speaker 1: this little tug boat just doing everything it can to
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  Speaker 1: get out of there and fight that current full power
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  Speaker 1: to get basically sucked down what looks like a toilet.
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  Speaker 1: Probably these dudes are like, I don't think we're gonna
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  Speaker 1: make it. So they managed to get this thing over
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  Speaker 1: close enough to the bank to jump off and then
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: by by tugboat gulp. Yeah, imagine that. Like just seeing
• 9:22
  Speaker 1: the tug boat, like, you're a tug boat is pretty
• 9:25
  Speaker 1: strong man, and the idea of it not being able
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  Speaker 1: to fight this current, that just tells you how strong
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  Speaker 1: that whirlpool was. So there goes the tugboat, There goes
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  Speaker 1: eleven barges, oil, Derek, a lot of um, Jefferson Island
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: and um. Finally, after oh one, there was one other thing.
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  Speaker 1: So this made the whole thing even more biblical, Chuck.
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  Speaker 1: There was a lot of air down there in these
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  Speaker 1: underground mine shafts, and as the water filled up the
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  Speaker 1: mine shafts and displaced the air, that air came shooting
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: pressurized up to the surface. And so every once in
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: a while, like a geyser would shoot off like four
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: hundred feet into the air right out of Lake Panier.
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  Speaker 1: All right, is that your fact of the show. That's
• 10:06
  Speaker 1: one of them. I think this whole thing is one
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  Speaker 1: big factor of the show, because here's mine. Okay, So
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  Speaker 1: what happens when you suck stuff down there and then
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  Speaker 1: eventually that thing's gonna fill up. It's not just gonna
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  Speaker 1: fill up the entire center of the earth with water.
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  Speaker 1: Eventually the salt mine's gonna fill up, and it's gonna
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  Speaker 1: sort of regulate and equalize. That eventually happens. Three point
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  Speaker 1: five billion collons of water drain in three hours, and
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: then over the next couple of days, that lake level
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  Speaker 1: eventually reaches that original waterline, and then over and over,
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  Speaker 1: nine of these barges come popping back up like a
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  Speaker 1: cork that you've been holding underwater. Just boom, boom, boom.
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  Speaker 1: All these things just keep popping back up. It must
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  Speaker 1: have been amazing to see that, to see a bar
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  Speaker 1: just come popping up out of the water. No tug
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: boat though, No, no tug boat. And I think two
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: of the bars is they're still trapped down there along
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: with the tug boat and those the collapsed salt mines somewhere. Yeah.
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: I guess they're just wedged in there. Huh. Yep. So,
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  Speaker 1: the the fact that the that Lake pin Your sucked
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  Speaker 1: the Gulf of Mexico into the Lake Um, the fact
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: that the salt mines collapsed Um. Lake pin Your was
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  Speaker 1: completely changed by this. Here's what Here's here's the actual
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: fact of the podcast. Not one person lost their life
• 11:26
  Speaker 1: or was seriously injured. That the fifty miners made it out,
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  Speaker 1: the guys from the tug boat, from the oil um
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: drill rig, everybody made it out. Nobody was on Jefferson
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Island that got sucked into the whirlpool. Not one person
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  Speaker 1: died from this most colossal disaster, which is astounding. But
• 11:44
  Speaker 1: the lake itself was changed too. It went from being
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: a freshwater lake to a saltwater lake, and one that
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: was you know, a handful of feet deep to about
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: two feet deep. Now, yeah, it was initially like really
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: really deep, but that of aventually spread out in Uh.
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: I guess they settled on two feet as a good
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: new depth, right. Um. They had to pay out. Texico
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: of course had to pay out, you know, many millions
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: of dollars to the Assault mine company and other various
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: companies that are around there that got destroyed all these houses.
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: Of course, you know, the lake really really grew, um,
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: not only in depth but in size. So today it's
• 12:25
  Speaker 1: you know, basically sort of like a brackish saline lake.
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: Um you can see like closer to the shoreline, like
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: chimneys of houses that still pop above the surface. Yeah,
• 12:35
  Speaker 1: it's really an amazing story. And all of this happened
• 12:38
  Speaker 1: because the Texico engineer mistook one kind of map coordinates
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: for another and miscalculated where the salt mine was when
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: they were drilling. I'm surprised to hear that an oil
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: company was responsible for an ecological disaster, right, nice one, Chuck, Well,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: that's the short stuff. Hat tipped to our pals Alan Bellows.
• 12:59
  Speaker 1: That damn interesting, and our frank Ken Jennings for uh
• 13:02
  Speaker 1: doing writing some good articles on this stuff. Uh and
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: uh I guess that's it, so short. Stuff Away. Stuff
• 13:12
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• 13:14
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