The Curse Of Oak Island: Season 11 Episode 8's 'Breakthrough Discovery' Explained
Season 11, Episode 8 of History's "The Curse of Oak Island," which is appropriately titled "A Void At All Costs," opens with a debilitating setback for the treasure-hunting brothers Rick and Marty Lagina alongside their team of experts and archaeologists.
The setback in question is localized to the Money Pit area, wherein a heavy influx of rain from a major storm caused significant flooding in the Garden Shaft. The source of the constant water, which rises at a speed of a foot an hour, is unknown, though there is speculation that it could be connected to one of Oak Island's infamous flood tunnels. The flood tunnels are a type of security measure on Oak Island (via Oak Island Mystery) and have been thwarting the efforts of treasure hunters for almost two hundred years. When a hole has been dug too deep or improperly, an air-lock supposedly triggers which allows a steady stream of water in.
Due to the flooding, the team must halt any further digging on the Garden Shaft, which is at a current depth of 87 feet, to reach a depth of 100 feet. Per a voiceover in the episode, it is at the 100-foot depth mark that the Oak Island crew plans to breach a seven-foot-tall underground tunnel. This tunnel is believed to lead toward the Baby Blob, an area of the Money Pit with high trace amounts of gold and other precious metals located somewhere between 80 and 120 feet underground.
Speaking on camera, Marty Lagina notes that in the previous year, no water had breached the Garden Shaft. Now, in Season 11, Episode 8, nearly 700 gallons of water are flooding in, rising at about a foot an hour, causing huge setbacks.
What is Oak Island's supposed breakthrough discovery?
How does major flooding in the Garden Shaft lead to a potential breakthrough discovery for History's "The Curse of Oak Island?" With the help of Dumas Contract Ltd., the "Oak Island" crew attempts to fix the flooding in the Garden Shaft. These efforts lead to more evidence of potential manmade structures.
In the episode, Dumas Contract Ltd. continues to drill into the Garden Shaft to find the source of the water. It was Roger Fortin of Dumas Contract Ltd. who, while in the shaft, discovered a small cavern behind the structure full of wooden timber, as well as what appeared to be signs of man-made structures. According to the episode's narrator, the cavern is located at a depth of 65 feet.
"Seeing the void, or the cavity, your first thought of course is, you know, is this possible connected to an offset chamber or a previously unknown void, cavity, tunnel, and might it lead somewhere?" Rick Lagina said in a confessional interview during the episode. "But you gotta get down there, you gotta put your eyes on it and, if it happens to turn out to be true, wow. That would be amazing."
Before the "Oak Island" team can determine what they may have found, they will first need to stop the flooding, which does not happen in "A Void At All Costs." Like many other discoveries on "Oak Island," it is not necessarily a breakthrough, but it has the potential to be, and only time will tell if it will lead to anything worth filming.