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Jan. 21, 2002 - Art Bell
03:05:24
Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell - Mel Waters - Bottomless Hole - Replay Compilation (2-21-97, 2-24-97, 4-24-00)
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art bell
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mel waters
01:37:01
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Tonight on Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell, it's an encore presentation featuring the best of Art Bell and his guests, Mel Waters and the story of Mel's Hole, the bottomless pit in Washington State.
Art will be back live tomorrow night with his guest, best-selling author Dean Coots.
And now, this hour from February of 1997, enjoy the best of Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell.
Thank you.
Art Bell is taking calls on the wildcard line at 702-727-1295.
That's 702-727-1295.
First-time callers can reach Art Bell at 702-727-1222.
702-727-1222.
Now, here again, Art Bell.
art bell
Well, all right.
I have got Mel on the line.
No thanks to all the Mel imitators on the special Mel line.
I finally picked up the phone during the newscast and called Mel's number, and he was just coming in.
So I've got Mel on the line.
Mel's the guy with the never-ending hole, and we're going to ask him about it here in a moment.
I have read that fax now twice on the air.
And I've got a lot of follow-up faxes.
Here's one entitled Yet Another Mystery Hole in Eastern Washington.
Art, you'll love this.
It was sent to me a couple days ago by email.
And it's all about another one on the Indian Reservation in Colville, where there is another mystery hole.
Anyway, we'll get to that.
unidentified
Thank you.
*thud* Thank you.
art bell
Well, all right.
Now to Eastern Washington.
I guess this is Eastern Washington.
Mel, are you there?
mel waters
Yes, I am.
art bell
First of all, Mel, thank you for answering.
What are you doing up at this time of the morning?
mel waters
Well, after I sent the facts, I'm living in town here now because we had a couple of our buildings out there cave in after the big snows that we had out here last month.
Oh, yes.
And so thereby goes some of the construction debris into the hole.
art bell
All right.
When did you discover this hole?
mel waters
Well, the hole has always been there.
We've been out there for a couple of years now.
And, you know, the hole has been there since we've been there.
It's been there since the previous owner was there.
And the previous owner there was quite elderly.
And I'd say he was there for a good 30, 40 years before we moved in.
Wow.
art bell
And so there's been a thing of throwing stuff down this hole for a long time.
mel waters
Oh, yeah.
It's been going on, you know, for as long as the hole has been there, I assume.
art bell
When nobody knows that, I guess.
All right.
How do you pronounce the name of your town?
Menastache?
mel waters
Oh, Monastash.
art bell
Monastash.
That's right.
Thank you.
mel waters
And actually, I'm in right now I'm in a little town called Ellensburg.
art bell
Oh, I know Ellensburg.
mel waters
Ah, you must know about it.
art bell
A rodeo here then.
Oh, sure.
mel waters
Okay.
Well, so, yeah, we've been there for several years.
You know, we just take all, you know, we take all of our trash, rubbish, anything we have that we have to get rid of.
We take it, throw it in the hole.
Everyone's throwing their stuff in the hole.
The people from around there throw all the stuff in the hole.
I mean, it's just been going on for a long time.
Well, you know, I got this thinking one day, how come this hole is not filling up?
It must be an awfully deep hole.
art bell
That's a good thing to consider, sure, as you throw stuff in it for decades, literally.
mel waters
And so, you know, I used to be a, well, I would say pretty close to a professional shark fisherman.
A couple of huge fishing reels went out there and started letting the line down, I figure, after one...
Oh, yeah.
In fact, the original line is still down there.
I've just been adding to the line and keeping track of how much line I have used.
So I've not reeled it in.
art bell
How much weight is on it?
mel waters
There is a one-pound weight at the bottom of it.
art bell
One-pound weight, okay?
mel waters
One-pound weight.
It's a triangular one-pound weight.
And so that's at the bottom of it.
unidentified
At first.
art bell
So in other words, it would go down kind of like a plumb bob.
mel waters
Exactly, exactly.
In fact, I have it rigged across the center of it there, and it goes straight down from the center there.
And occasionally I try to move the line there, but when you're moving that much line, you really can't do a whole lot with it.
But it seems to, you know, there seems to be it's not resting against anything at this point here, and it continues to go down freely.
And so when I was out there earlier, I let out a little bit more line.
art bell
So you actually went out there tonight after I read that.
mel waters
Yeah, exactly.
art bell
Oh, man.
mel waters
Well, you know, it's not too bad out here right now.
It's only about 25 degrees, so it's not too cold.
art bell
Have you ever heard anything coming from any sounds or anything?
mel waters
Well, you know, I mean, the normal thing to do is kind of like yell into it there to see an echo.
And I've never heard an echo come out of that thing at all.
You know, that's one of the first things I noticed about it.
As usual, I brought the dogs with me.
They wouldn't go anywhere near the damn thing, and I went back to the suburban and hung out over there.
So it was kind of, you know, if I try to bring them there on a leash, they'll just dig their feet, and they do not want to go anywhere near the hole.
And so that's, I don't know.
Well, you've got miles and miles of yeah, I think well, I'm measuring it by feet.
You know, I convert feet to yards, so I don't know how many miles that is.
I assume that's it's a fair number of miles, though.
art bell
Well, 5,280 feet is a mile, so you really think you've got 80,000?
mel waters
Yes, yeah.
I get line in 5,000-yard spools.
And so I've gone through that many.
art bell
Well, you have got a hole then that goes well, you know, you can't say to the center of the earth, but you've got a hole that goes miles and miles and miles into the earth.
I would think a university would be out there boom just like that.
mel waters
Well, my wife does work for a local university here, and you know, we've been talking to them about it, and one of the things is they find it quite incredible that I've let that much line into the ground, but that's what I've been doing.
art bell
Have you ever thought of winding it all back up again?
mel waters
Well, when I let out the first 1,500 yards of line, I reeled all of that back in.
And I wanted to know if I hit water down there, because I thought, that's a lot of feet.
You bet.
You know, that's 4,500 feet of line.
Did I hit water?
So what I did is I sent down a roll of lifesavers.
art bell
Life savers?
mel waters
Yeah, so when it hits the water, the lifesavers will dissolve.
art bell
That's true.
Oh, I see.
Very smart.
mel waters
So there's an old shark fisherman's trick there.
We used to send our bait out on a balloon attached to a roll of lifesavers, and the bait would go out into the ocean on the tide.
art bell
Yeah.
mel waters
And then eventually the lifesavers would melt, and the bait would fall to the bottom.
You couldn't cast a big old mackerel out there that far.
Amazing.
art bell
So, what do you...
mel waters
I don't.
I have no idea.
I thought it could have been a mine shaft, but the thing about it is the surface part of it's been very well cared for.
I mean, someone built a very lovely wall around it.
art bell
All right.
Tell me about the nature of the side of the walls.
In other words, you must be able to look down far enough at least to examine the side of the wall.
unidentified
Sure.
mel waters
It is stone for about 15 feet down.
And then after that, it's soil, dirt, and then further down rock.
But I can only see to the extent of a really powerful flashlight.
I've brought halogen lights out there to try to get a better look down there, but the visibility really isn't there.
You cannot see much after a while.
But it's a retaining wall.
I'd say it's about a 3.5 foot retaining wall, and it goes down about 15 feet.
art bell
Well, I'll tell you this much.
No matter how powerful a light, and I was even thinking about a laser, when you're talking about 80,000 feet, forget it.
mel waters
No, they should have some technology that can give me an idea of how deep this thing is.
I mean, obviously, the old fishing line method is only going to go so far.
unidentified
What we need here is a volunteer.
art bell
Real, I'm serious.
Somebody who would be willing to be lowered into this hole.
mel waters
Well, to be honest with you, I don't even know if there's any air down that far.
art bell
Well, I wouldn't know about that either.
mel waters
Or what kind of pressures we're dealing with.
These are things that are totally beyond my grasp in terms of knowledge about these things.
art bell
Do you own this property?
mel waters
It's our property, yeah.
art bell
How long have you been working on this?
mel waters
Well, we've been out there for a couple of years, I guess, about four years now.
But this project here with Letting Down the Line, that's only been since last summer here.
And it was just, you know, I said, well, how come this thing isn't filling up?
art bell
Well, sure.
mel waters
And, you know, I made, you know, I talked to the neighbors around there, you know, which are, you know, when you're out there in the country, your neighbors are pretty far away, but they all know the hole out there.
art bell
They all know about it.
mel waters
So they all bring their trash out.
art bell
So the local legend of the hole.
mel waters
Yeah, this could be an apocryphal story, but one guy claims that he threw his departed canine down into the hole.
art bell
Oh, really?
mel waters
And he swears, well, the story is the guy that did it swears the dog actually came back to him.
And he was a hunt.
art bell
Oh, really?
mel waters
He was a hunt.
The story is that he was a hunter, and he was out there hunting, and he saw the same dog.
He had the same collar.
He had the same little metal thing on his collar there.
And he said it was the same dog.
And he says he knew he threw the dog into the hole.
But that's not my dog.
That's not my.
art bell
It's not your story, but it's a story of a resurrected dog.
mel waters
This is, you know, as you can well imagine, this is all Native American land around here.
And so one of the lines of inquiries I'd like to make is, you know, is there anything about this hole in regards to the Native Americans?
You know, that's something I haven't really pursued right now.
art bell
If you had a fatal disease, Mel, would you jump in the hole?
mel waters
I would.
art bell
You would?
mel waters
Actually, it is in my will.
art bell
Watch.
mel waters
Should I meet my demise, disposed of into the well.
art bell
I'm not sure the health department would allow that.
mel waters
Well, you know, one of the things that we, you know, I thought about later on is what if this is like contaminating our water, you know?
And, you know, we've had, you know, I'm sure you do this out there in Prump too.
Well, you have your water checked all the time.
art bell
Well, yeah, no personal offense to you, Mel, but if there was a possible contamination problem, I'm sure you're a clean guy.
But, you know, as you deteriorated, you would possibly produce E. coli or something horrible in the local water supply.
mel waters
Well, again, so far it hasn't been.
I mean, the water around that area is absolutely pure water.
art bell
And so nothing thrown down, all the old junk and trash, and nothing has polluted the water?
mel waters
No.
I mean, you know, I can't speak for everything that's been thrown down there, but none of that has been showing up in the water that people draw from their wells.
I mean, the water is as clean as it's ever been out there.
I think we get water that comes off the cascades or something.
It's just really great.
It's really wonderful water.
art bell
Mel, you wouldn't be pulling my leg.
mel waters
No, I'm not.
And I'm one of the reasons that I went out to the property tonight, other than it just, you know, it's something that weighs heavily on my mind.
I was afraid that after I sent the facts out that there would be people around there because it's Well, there may be, but we have not identified specifically where it is.
Well, there aren't, as far as I could tell, too many big holes like that around.
And so at least the people in my neck of the woods are familiar with it.
And I kind of almost expected to see a small party of people looking at it.
art bell
Well, there may be.
Now, I mean, you know, come daylight there may be.
But remember, folks, this is private property.
This is Mel's.
mel waters
It is posted, too.
art bell
Oh, it is.
All right.
mel waters
Yeah, they are.
art bell
So without knowing exactly where it is, I wouldn't look for that to occur.
But there is going to be substantial curiosity about it now, Mel.
mel waters
Well, you know, I think I've, you know, let you know as much as I know about it.
I certainly want to find out more.
I was mostly curious about the depth of it.
I mean, how deep is the deepest hole anyone has ever found?
art bell
Well, I've never heard of anything deeper than this.
mel waters
You know, I thought maybe this would be like Guinness World Book of Records type hole here.
And as far as things I thought it would be like, could have been like an old mine.
art bell
Well, now here's a couple things to think about.
I've heard as you go down into the earth meld that it gets hotter.
Right?
So you would think that your fishing line with a weight on it at some point would melt or something.
But there's still weight on it, huh?
mel waters
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
The line is not moving freely.
I mean, you know, it still falls under its own weight.
art bell
Oh, that's amazing.
Let's let some of the audience ask you questions.
mel waters
Okay, I think I can do that.
art bell
All right, because I just might be missing something.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel, who's got the hole in Washington.
mel waters
Hello.
art bell
Hello.
Do you have any questions for Mel?
Hello?
Okay, well, I guess that guy gave up.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
unidentified
Hello.
mel waters
Oh, you've got a guess now?
art bell
Well, I mean, sort of.
unidentified
Oh, well, I was calling about something else.
art bell
All right, well, thank you.
First-time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
Mel?
art bell
Yes, Mel.
unidentified
Oh, oh, Mel, Mel, Mel.
I wanted to talk to Art.
art bell
I'm on the wrong line.
Yeah, you are.
mel waters
I'm sorry.
That's the 222 line?
art bell
1222 is first-time caller line.
unidentified
That's what I thought I was calling.
art bell
Well, that's what you got.
But, I mean, we're talking with Mel right now.
unidentified
Okay.
Okay.
I just have something for Art.
All right.
art bell
Well, call me back when we're into open lines.
Wildcard line, you're on the air with Mel.
Hello.
unidentified
Hi, Art.
This is Dave in Milwaukee.
art bell
Hi, Dave.
unidentified
Yeah, I was listening to this.
Very interesting.
art bell
Yeah, it is.
unidentified
I just wanted to let you know, I looked up in the encyclopedia, and the Marianas Trench, which is the deepest hole we know about.
art bell
That's in the ocean, right?
unidentified
Right, is 36,000 feet deep.
art bell
So this is certainly over double that already.
unidentified
Right.
And it also says, undermining, that with current technology, we can only go down about 1,600 feet.
Wow, wow.
mel waters
That's great.
unidentified
That is great.
art bell
So you've got something here that already qualifies for Guinness.
mel waters
That is wonderful.
Oh, gosh, I like that.
That's great.
Do you said 1,600 feet?
unidentified
That's what they said, yeah.
1,640 feet, it says, with current technology is about as high.
Wow.
art bell
All right, all right.
Thank you very much for that information.
So already, we now learn that you may have a Guinness qualifying hole there, no question about it.
But I want to know, inquiring minds, want to know, I would think even if we just had somebody lowered past the 1,600 foot mark to see what's down there.
mel waters
That would be cool, but it wouldn't be me.
art bell
You wouldn't do it.
mel waters
I wouldn't go down and know.
art bell
At least not while you're still alive.
mel waters
No, yeah, then I will.
For the time being, no.
art bell
I understand.
All right, East of the Rockies, you're on the air with me.
unidentified
What if the rope broke?
Yeah.
art bell
Well, that's true.
unidentified
Mel?
art bell
Mel and I. Where are you calling from, sir?
unidentified
I'm in Austin, Texas.
art bell
Austin, Texas.
unidentified
Sorry.
Yeah, you mentioned earlier that you would like somebody to be lowered down into the hole.
art bell
That's right.
unidentified
I would be willing to do that.
art bell
See, there you go, sir, a volunteer.
unidentified
We would have.
I mean, obviously, under certain conditions.
mel waters
Like what?
unidentified
Just a cage, for one.
art bell
A cage?
unidentified
Yeah, just in the event that there's some kind of weird subterranean thing eating all of this garbage down there.
Obviously, I would want to be in some kind of a cage.
art bell
Well, what makes you think, though, that anything that could gobble up, say, a refrigerator wouldn't hit the cage?
unidentified
Well, I would have, obviously, a very powerful light, and I'd be able to see it at some point before it's too late.
art bell
So we'd have radio contact with you, and we could hear you scream, at least.
unidentified
Yeah, yeah.
mel waters
Not too much.
unidentified
Or an instant up button.
art bell
An up button?
unidentified
An instant up button.
On back up.
You know, at like a high speed.
art bell
And you could take a camera with you.
unidentified
Yeah.
art bell
With a light and show us everything as it is.
unidentified
Yeah, I've got a pretty adventurous nature to me anyway.
So this plus I have a very appealing draw to the supernatural for some reason, anyway, just naturally in my personality.
art bell
Well, nobody's saying there's anything supernatural about this, but.
unidentified
Well, the dog story would indicate something supernatural.
art bell
Well, that's true.
mel waters
Well, everyone's dogs are scared of the hole.
unidentified
Yeah.
mel waters
Not just my dogs.
art bell
No, that's a very good point.
In other words, other dogs won't go anywhere near the hole, huh?
mel waters
Yeah, my dogs will follow me everywhere.
I mean, you know, no matter where I go, they're except to the well.
unidentified
Now, you know, is this possibly at a grid point on the planet?
mel waters
I wouldn't know about grid points other than I know they.
unidentified
I don't know anything about the grid points.
art bell
Well, I know.
Yes, thank you, sir, from Austin.
I've heard about grid points, but I would have no way of knowing where they are and whether this is one of them.
I wouldn't know.
Now, this is just a hole.
And he's right.
There is something a little paranormal about it when you consider the dog story.
I tell you.
Mel, hold on, all right?
Stand by.
We'll be right back to you.
unidentified
I can't hear your concerns about my happiness.
All that thought you're giving me is...
...
...
art bell
Well, here's somebody from Las Vegas, Mike, suggest that we throw a cat down the hole.
Listen to the cat scream as it goes down.
It's a horrible idea.
I don't know about people who do that, throw down a cat.
Oh, man.
And you'd hear the echoes sort of going down.
I'm not for that at all.
All right, Mel, here come some more people.
First time caller line, you're on the air with Mel with the hole.
unidentified
Art, why don't you have somebody...
Radar would be the way to go and find out the depth.
art bell
Well, would radar go down a hole without hitting the side?
unidentified
I need a fancy radar to do it.
art bell
You mean like a...
unidentified
No, sonar you couldn't use because you don't have anything for the medium to go through, like underwater for sonar.
Yeah.
But radar would definitely work.
I'm just curious if you'd call a government agency to come out.
art bell
But wouldn't radar return a hit from the sides of the hole and bounce around down?
unidentified
No, no, no.
Early directional radar.
What do you use when you're driving down the highway?
art bell
Well, you use radar.
unidentified
Exactly.
art bell
That's out in the open.
I don't know enough about radar to know if that would work, but it's a good idea.
unidentified
Well, I've used it for years, but that's a way to try it.
art bell
All right.
How about a cop's radar?
unidentified
I'm not sure if they'll return an echo off of that.
Possible.
art bell
All right, all right.
mel waters
It would tell you how fast the hole was going, wouldn't it?
art bell
Yeah.
mel waters
Tell you how fast.
art bell
Cute, Mel.
Wildcard Line, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
This is pretty funny.
Good evening, Mel.
Hi.
My name is Barry.
I'm just hopskipping a jump away from you down here in Yakima.
mel waters
All right.
unidentified
I'm awful surprised I haven't heard of this before now.
art bell
Well, now, Mel hasn't made this public as far as I know.
Have you, Mel?
mel waters
No, it's just on my land.
Some papers know about it.
art bell
Well, I mean, wait, wait.
This is the first public announcement of the whole?
mel waters
As far as I know, there's no newspaper accounts of it, you know, not in the Daily Record or in the Herald.
art bell
There will be now.
unidentified
Well, as usual, you've heard here first, folks, on our bill.
Before I get serious, I just wanted to kind of lighten things up here and ask if you'd considered making a contract with the refuse collection department from Yakima County.
You could probably make a ceiling on that.
mel waters
You know, I read an article in the paper how they wanted to close down our local dump out here, and I almost seriously suggested.
art bell
Listen, here's another possibility for you.
Do you know that I live near an area where there's supposed to be a high-level nuclear dump?
Now, if this is really, in effect, a bottomless pit, you may have something that the U.S. government wants.
mel waters
So I could, like, rent this thing out.
art bell
You're damn right.
mel waters
And move away as quickly as possible.
unidentified
Anyways, I wanted to mention here, we've got many, many mediums of technology, and the gentleman who suggested radar, I think, was onto something.
You know, say, for instance, that Guinness came out and was going to, you know, they're pretty thorough with their investigation before they're going to print you.
But anyways, maybe the way to go is to have someone lower in a sensor's package, you know, which something that measures for noxious gases, temperature, and I'm sure they could focus a radar, you know, probably pencil thin, you know, and just hook it up to an endless supply of a cable and lower it down.
Yeah, that'd be awful interesting.
art bell
Look, I'd be interested, even if we don't get a hold of the guy from Austin, to lower a camera and a light down.
mel waters
You know, when I was out there this evening, it's kind of a full moon out there.
And one of the things that occurred to me is maybe this has some sort of astronomical type thing.
art bell
What do you mean, Mel?
mel waters
Well, you know, it's like, you know, how the various pyramids and things in Egypt, you know, are supposed to be lined up on various star systems or whatever.
art bell
Well, was it a thing like where the moonlight was shining into the hole?
mel waters
Well, no, but I, you know, I just happened to notice, you know, the full moon and all of a sudden to sort of put two and two together there.
art bell
You've never felt drawn to the hole personally, have you?
I mean, in terms of, you know.
mel waters
You mean in terms of some sort of spiritual involvement?
art bell
No, suicide, no.
mel waters
Oh, no, no.
I mean, I keep the lid on it there because it's an attractive nuisance.
You wouldn't want local kids there climbing on the wall and falling in.
art bell
There's actually no way of knowing whether people have gone in.
Because they'd be gone.
mel waters
Not in my...
Again, if I can find out something from the local Native Americans on, you know, maybe with some sort of burial thing or, you know, I mean And you can drop a big rock and you can hear it going down, probably bouncing off the walls or something, but you never hear a splash.
You never hear a splash.
I I've even taken like uh old television tubes, you know, the picture tubes.
art bell
You dropped picture tubes down there?
mel waters
Yeah?
I've dropped, I hate to say this here, but I've dropped more than one of them down there, and I've never heard it implode or anything.
Nothing.
art bell
EPA.
You probably shouldn't say that on the air.
They'll come and get you for that.
I mean, TV tubes.
mel waters
Well, it is mine.
art bell
It's your own property, I know, but these days, Mel, doesn't make any difference.
I mean, tomorrow morning, you'll have to wake up and there'll be tanks in Bootras Golly over here.
mel waters
That's true.
All right.
art bell
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
All right.
WKY, Sarasota.
art bell
Sarasota, Florida.
unidentified
Let me say, let's throw Mike from Las Vegas down the hole.
art bell
Really?
unidentified
Yeah.
Okay, you know, he's the cat.
Okay.
I do have a question for Mel.
You're a fisherman, right?
Yeah.
Okay.
Have you ever felt a tug on the line?
And if you did, what would you do?
mel waters
I don't have a hook on it.
There's just a large, there's a one-pound weight.
art bell
Yeah, but she's saying if something obviously was pulling on the line.
mel waters
What would I do?
art bell
Yeah.
unidentified
What would you do?
art bell
I'd run.
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
I'd seal that damn thing up and I'd never get near it again.
mel waters
Yeah, I'd put the lid down on it at that point there and say, that's it.
The dump is closed.
unidentified
And at any point, did you ever pull up the weight and look at it?
art bell
Yeah, I asked that too.
mel waters
Yeah, the first series of letting down line, when I got about 4,500 feet down there, I had a roll of lifesavers down on the bottom to determine if there was any water down there.
And, of course, if there was water, the lifesavers would melt.
And I didn't do that.
But since that time, I've let the line continuously go down.
I've just spliced on to the end of the line and continued.
art bell
Yeah, I'm just trying to find out where the bottom is.
mel waters
Yeah, that was my main question.
It's like, how deep is this thing?
Where does it go?
Well, it goes into the earth, but how far does it go before it'll stop?
art bell
All right, thank you, ma'am.
I think that a light and a video camera, I mean, Mel, you could have a special as you got down past what did they say was the deepest hole, 1,600 feet?
mel waters
1,600 feet.
art bell
As you got down past 1,600 feet, you'd have a network special on your hands, Mel.
mel waters
That would be good.
I'm thinking about putting up a web page on it there if I get one of those.
art bell
What's his name?
Rivera would come.
mel waters
And they'd lower him into the hole.
art bell
Only if we were all lucky.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
unidentified
Yeah, this is Terry from Bremerton.
art bell
Hello, Terry.
Oh, you're up in Washington again, yeah.
unidentified
You're right.
Well, I was wondering about how much does 15 miles of fishing line weigh?
mel waters
I have no idea.
I'm just letting that sucker go down.
I have not really.
unidentified
What if you've already hit the bottom and you got a pound of fishing line on it?
You've got flutting it down.
mel waters
Yeah, I should have.
unidentified
I should already hit the bottom.
mel waters
I should weigh one of those spools because I'm getting them in 5,000-yard spools.
unidentified
Yeah.
mel waters
And so I should weigh a spool and sort of deduct the cost of the spool itself and see what that would add up to in terms of how much that weighs.
art bell
So in other words, it could have hit bottom some time ago and simply the pure weight of the line.
unidentified
Right.
mel waters
It doesn't feel like it is reached bottom there.
There's no slack in the line.
art bell
But even so, well, there might not be with that much weight.
But you know, even if that's true, Caller, think about it, he's still got the deepest hole ever heard of in the world.
unidentified
Yeah, he does.
But the weight of the line would keep pulling the line down.
art bell
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
But there would be so much line down there by then.
unidentified
What pound test line is it?
mel waters
I'm using 20 pounds, I guess.
unidentified
20 pounds.
20 pounds of line on it already.
mel waters
Pardon me.
unidentified
Do you think you have 20 pounds of line in the line?
Oh, I ready?
mel waters
I'm sure there's more line than that.
unidentified
would break by then.
mel waters
You know, we're talking, how many...
Have about 20 spools of line.
unidentified
There are a lot of tension on that.
mel waters
20 spools of line on there.
unidentified
Wow.
mel waters
And it's still hanging on there.
That weight continues to go down.
I don't know if there's a way of weighing that thing as it is.
unidentified
Yeah, I was just interested in how much the line would weigh itself.
mel waters
I could probably do that.
Get one of those hanging scales and spring operating stuff and just sort of knot it off up there.
art bell
Yeah, why not?
It's worth a try.
And the other thing that's worth a try, I suppose, although you'd be cranking for a long time, would be to crank it back up again.
mel waters
Well, no, I could just weigh like one spool of line and multiply it.
I think I'm up to about like 18 spools of line right now.
So, you know, it wouldn't be too hard to get a weight on it.
art bell
All right.
You'll report back to us on that?
mel waters
Yeah, I can, sure, definitely.
art bell
All right.
unidentified
Definitely.
art bell
First time caller line.
You're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
Yes.
art bell
Hi, where are you?
unidentified
I'm Bellingham, Washington.
Yes.
art bell
Oh, Washington again.
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
Yes.
unidentified
I was wondering what was the Mel said that he had a triangular one-pound weight on the end of the line.
mel waters
You're right.
Yeah, I was wondering what elements was that weight, or is that weight composed of standard lead fishing weight.
unidentified
You know, you were talking earlier, Al was talking earlier about the heat when you get deep into the heat.
art bell
Well, I was speculating.
You know, I saw the movie with Papoon about the journey to center the earth.
It's supposed to get hot and you go down, right?
unidentified
Yeah, and also, what about the magnetism?
You know, that's a factor you consider also.
art bell
The magnetism?
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
You're Off into a territory that I can't answer.
Mel, are you going to contact your wife?
unidentified
Works for a university, a local university.
art bell
Have they, I mean, did she tell them about this?
And if so, what did they say?
mel waters
Well, the people she talked to, because I nagged her about it occasionally, say, they're telling her, you don't have a whole day that deep.
art bell
So, in other words, they don't believe her?
unidentified
No.
mel waters
No.
And what I'm trying to do is kind of entice them out there and just bring something out there to measure how deep it is.
art bell
Well, Mel, would you be willing to talk to newspaper people or television people?
They're crazy.
They'd send someone down there.
mel waters
Well, I know I'm talking to a lot of people on the phone right now and on the radio, but I am not sure if I'd want to have a TV crew.
art bell
So you're not sure you want that kind of publicity?
mel waters
No.
I mean, I'd be happy to, like I say, I could put together a website on it and keep people informed about what's going on because I'm sort of making this my.
art bell
People would accuse you of going to the well one time too many.
unidentified
That's probably true.
art bell
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
Hello there.
That is absolutely amazing.
All right.
This is Ten from Scottsdale.
art bell
Yes, sir.
unidentified
And one thing I wanted to mention about that you mentioned about a car that had fallen, apparently fallen from the sky.
art bell
De Chevrolet, yeah.
unidentified
Right.
I recall reading about many, many incidents in England and throughout Europe of nuts raining nuts of different kinds.
I mean, Brazil nuts and hazel nuts.
art bell
Sometimes it rains nuts on my program.
Listen, we're not talking about things falling from the sky right now.
We're talking about a hole.
unidentified
Right, I know.
Well, it was open lines a minute ago, and now you switched it.
art bell
Well, I've switched it because I have Mel.
unidentified
Oh, well, anyway, as far as the hole goes, isn't it possible there could be like an aquifer or something and water or something?
art bell
Mel has not found any water.
Any water at all.
He lowered lifesavers in, and the lifesavers came back, and that was how far, Mel?
mel waters
4,500 feet.
art bell
4,500 feet.
And the lifesavers came back intact, right?
unidentified
Oh, yeah.
mel waters
They were absolutely dry.
They weren't dissolved.
They were just perfect.
art bell
That's pretty definitive.
First time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hi.
Mel?
art bell
Hi.
unidentified
Hi, this is Conrad in Grass Valley, and I've got some thoughts about this whole well problem.
mel waters
Sure.
unidentified
First of all, if he's putting line down the well, let's say...
art bell
We've got to stop this because people are going to call it a well.
There has never been any water found in this hole.
unidentified
Okay, a hole.
art bell
Yeah, thank you.
unidentified
All right.
If he started out with a one-pound weight and he starts adding fish line to it, then the amount of weight down the hole increases.
All right, now, if he knows the weight of the line on a per-foot basis, as he puts more weight down the hole, if he could measure the total strain on the top of the, or load on the top of the line, he would know if any of that line was draped on anything.
See, the thing is, once he gets a fair amount of line down, the one pound weight on the end is insignificant.
And he wouldn't even, it could be hung up on something or laying on the bottom or something, and he would never know it.
art bell
Yeah, but he put lifesavers down 4,500 feet.
So even if what you're saying is true, this is still, by a long shot, the deepest hole ever.
unidentified
Well, that assumes it's even that deep.
The one thought that you had that I thought was very valid was the temperature as you go farther down into the ground.
art bell
Well, that's what they I think that's right, isn't it?
unidentified
Oh, yes, of course.
By the time it's down 4,000 feet in the ground, or the temperature would probably be well over 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
art bell
If the 100, well, the monofilament and the lead would certainly survive 100 degrees just fine.
You're probably right.
That is interesting.
Mel, I say that we've got to put a person down there, a volunteer.
mel waters
Not a cat.
unidentified
No, not a cat.
mel waters
A cat.
art bell
No cats.
But a person, maybe like a media person, one of these anchors from maybe one of the Seattle Como stations or something.
Lower them down.
mel waters
Oh, boy.
Again, I'm intrigued.
Again, I've been running line down there for quite a while, and I don't think I've hit bottom.
The weight seems to be hanging plumb over there.
And like I say, we've been throwing things down there for a long, long, long, long time.
And, you know, this hole has not filled up.
I don't know.
Maybe it's getting incinerated down there.
I don't know.
art bell
All right.
And you would swear on all that is sacred to you that what you have told us is the absolute unadulterated truth.
mel waters
This is my hole, and this is the truth about it.
art bell
God, it's an amazing story, Mel.
Who else, besides your wife, the people you've tried to talk to at the university and yourself, I guess your neighbors know about the hole?
mel waters
Oh, yeah.
There's probably a good not families, but individuals, probably a good 20 people that use the hole regularly.
art bell
To throw junk into.
unidentified
Yeah, yeah.
mel waters
It's always been done.
art bell
Well, I remember when I was a kid, I used to like to throw stuff off bridges and stuff like that and into holes just to hear it hit bottom.
mel waters
Never heard anything hit.
I mean, if you hit the side, of course, but if you just drop it straight down, yeah, 9.5 feet.
art bell
Nine and a half feet is certainly large enough so that if you got in the center and dropped it straight down, it would go straight down, right?
mel waters
Yeah, you can just lean right over there and get it going straight down.
And as far as anything I could see visually, with the halogens and flashlights.
art bell
The light just what?
Fades away into blackness.
mel waters
You've got nothing after a while.
I mean, you can see as far as the beam will go, and that's it.
art bell
Does anybody have any theories about you said a dog was thrown into the hole dead and then came back alive again, right?
mel waters
The story is the guy was out hunting and he saw his dog and he knew it was his dog because it was the same dog, it had the same collar, it had the same tag on it, and the whole thing.
art bell
Oh, man.
Does anybody have any theories about what properties would be in the hole to resurrect a canine?
mel waters
God, I'd like to think that this is something like really benign.
I mean, cows have gone down there.
I mean, I haven't heard any cows coming back, or at least that you would know, but I don't...
art bell
Well, it's not the creator.
Well, look, we're out of time.
Mel, you get the honors from Near the Hole in Washington State.
mel waters
From the hole.
It is good night to everyone from coast to coast and beyond.
art bell
Thank you, Mel.
unidentified
Stay tuned for more of the best of Art Bell with Mel Waters.
Coming up after these messages.
art bell
We talked about it Friday night, Saturday morning, last hour.
Now, a lot of you might not have heard that last hour, so I've got Mel, and there's an update.
It may be the deepest hole anywhere in the ground.
It may go on forever, for all we know.
I'll catch you up here in a moment.
I received the following facts last week.
Dear Art, I'm writing to you to see if I can get some help from you or your vast listening audience.
I live in rural Eastern Washington near the Monastosh Ridge.
I think I'm pronouncing that correctly now.
unidentified
On our property, there is a hole.
art bell
Like the previous owners and the owners before them, we've been throwing our trash into the hole.
Apparently, the hole has been there as long as anyone can remember.
At first, I thought it was an ancient well.
Anyway, the hole is nine feet, nine inches in diameter.
There is a stone retaining wall around it, and we've put a steel door on top to keep anyone from falling into it.
As I said earlier, people have been throwing their trash into the well, that's in quotes here, for decades.
Furniture, household trash, dead cows, building debris, you name it.
The thing is, I noticed the hole never filled up.
So I got curious, actually obsessed, began trying to measure the depth of the hole.
I emptied three fishing reels of about 1,500 yards of monofilament trying to determine the depth.
Soon I was buying fishing line in bulk.
So far, I've sunk about 80,000 feet of line into the hole without reaching bottom.
My wife works at a local university with a geology department.
We hope to get some professional scholarly help in determining the depth of the hole as far as I can tell.
There's nothing else particularly strange about it except for two other things.
Dogs refuse to get within 100 feet of the hole.
Birds won't sit on the retaining wall or metal door.
Another strange thing is there's no echo when you yell into the hole.
Indeed, I've never heard anything hit bottom when tossed in.
We once tossed in an old refrigerator, and we never heard it hit bottom, no crash, splash, or crunch.
I hope your listeners can help with possible explanations.
I'm wondering if this, based on my measurements thus far, might be the deepest hole on earth.
Signed, Mel Waters.
Well, you know me.
I get a fact like this, and I jump right on it.
So I called Mel in the middle of the night.
We put him on the air.
Last hour of the show, last week, and we got the story of Mel's hole.
But now, Mel's Hole Part 2, I get the following facts.
Earlier today, Art, you're receiving this fact simultaneously with the facts I attempted to send you earlier today.
Much has developed since the first facts.
I'll try to explain as rationally as possible what has transpired since my earlier facts.
Around 1 p.m., I drove to Yakima to shop at the Costco there.
On my way back, I decided to stop at the property.
When I got there, my access road was blocked by military personnel that were armed.
I noticed that several pieces of yellow gear had entered and exited my property based on the direction of their thread.
I asked one of the guards, what's going on?
He said, there was a plane crash on the property.
I said, well, that's strange.
I told him there's no smoke.
I don't see any in the distance.
He asked who I was, and I let him know I own the property.
I then asked to talk to the officer in charge.
A non-uniformed man came up to my suburban and let me know that I won't have access to my property until the crash has been completely investigated.
I mentioned the yellow gear and the lack of smoke, and that they were on my property.
I was told by this man that it's not necessarily my property, and that it would be very easy to find a drug lab on my property.
Well, I got the drift.
I asked if I could leave.
He said, sure, don't come back until we contact you.
I asked if he wanted a way to contact me.
He said, they know how to contact me.
I said, I suppose you don't want me to talk to anybody about this.
He said, nobody would believe it anyway.
That's about it for now.
Oh, I talked to one of my neighbors earlier today, and he told me something very interesting.
He said that some time ago, he was driving up to the hole at night and thought he saw the most bizarre thing.
He said he saw a beam of solid black Coming out of the then uncovered hole.
I said, What do you mean?
He said he saw something blacker than black coming out of the hole, like a searchlight reaching into the sky as far as he could see.
So there you have it.
There actually is more.
Here is from the state of Washington.
Here's Mel.
Mel.
mel waters
Hello, Art, Bell, and listeners.
art bell
Hi.
When I got this second facts from you, I called you up, and you were totally, totally freaked out.
mel waters
Oh, my God, I was.
I tell you, I was a lot better now, let me tell you.
art bell
Yeah, you were just a pile of nerves when I talked to you.
Now, explain again.
You went up to your property.
You were going to examine the hole because we were talking about it.
I'm sure you have interest.
And they stopped you there, huh?
mel waters
Yeah, well, originally, after the show on Friday night, I went out there and in the evening and noticed there were some helicopter activity around the property.
There was further helicopter activity the next day.
And so I figured that clearly somebody out there listens to your program.
Oh, yes.
And I think.
art bell
I'm really sorry I brought this on for you.
It certainly wasn't intentional.
mel waters
Well, you know, when we talked yesterday, you felt that probably the best thing to do is to be public in this matter.
art bell
Your best protection is to be public now.
mel waters
Well, anyway, so there was a lot of activity around there.
And, you know, I've had some thoughts about this.
And if they knew where the hole was, I would imagine that they could take some readings of the depth of the hole from satellites.
art bell
I don't know about that.
I'm sure they have a way to measure it from ground.
I'm not sure about satellites.
mel waters
Well, we did have a lot of hovering up there in the air, I'll tell you that.
So we did have that situation.
art bell
And they stopped you, right?
In other words, there was a barrier there?
mel waters
Well, there was on, I'll tell you, I'm getting a little confused about days.
I guess this is now Tuesday morning.
art bell
Yeah, that's right.
mel waters
But since what they had originally there was a barrier, not a barrier, but just armed soldiers, basically.
art bell
Armed soldiers.
mel waters
Armed soldiers.
Since then, they have erected some further down the road.
I mean, basically, there's the road, there's the access road, and then finally you kind of meander into the property.
They now have jersey barriers at the road.
What are those?
Jersey barriers.
Those are kind of like big chunks of concrete.
art bell
Oh, like the bomb barriers they have at the White House.
mel waters
More or less.
So you could squeeze maybe one vehicle through there, but it's definitely being controlled over there.
art bell
Now, this is your property, right?
You've got the deed to this property.
mel waters
This is, well, mine and the bank's.
art bell
Well, you're in the bank.
We're all in the same situation.
So they won't let you own your own property, and they're claiming there was a plane that crashed.
mel waters
Yeah, that was the thing.
And I said, well, where's the smoke?
I've seen plane crashes before.
There's got to be smoke.
And, you know, again, I asked to talk to the officer in charge there, and I figured, you know, one of these military types would come up, and I don't know, maybe he was just dressed in civilian clothes because, you know, the nature of what happened there.
But, you know, he told me that I won't be able to go out there until the accident's been investigated.
And I was insistent about my property rights.
And he seemed to indicate that this might not necessarily be my property in regards to the drug lab.
But the problem is I do have a sort of a lab on the property.
art bell
Oh, no, no, wait a minute.
You have a sort of lab?
What kind of lab?
mel waters
Well, I work or working in the alternative health field here on the property.
And that's one of the reasons, and this can all come out now.
I imported some plant life from northern Nevada.
They were Native American plants that the Indians used there for treatment of various illnesses, mostly cold and flu.
Anyway, so we, because of the nature of the climate and is very similar to northern Nevada, we thought we would cultivate these plants and then use it as a cure.
It's a very effective cure.
art bell
It's not a narcotic, is it?
mel waters
No, it's not narcotic.
art bell
Well, then what the hell are they talking about drug lab?
mel waters
Well, there is a lab there, though.
art bell
I mean, and there's no, you're not cranking out crank or methamphetamine or anything.
mel waters
Yeah, but if they had, for instance, that they found like it was a drug lab, they could seize my property.
art bell
So it was their way of telling you, listen, brother, stay away, let us do what we're doing, or, you know, we might find a drug lab here, then it wouldn't be your property anymore, and you might even be in jail?
unidentified
Mm-hmm.
Mm-hmm.
mel waters
Yeah.
So they were clearly letting me know, and my feeling was that they were in control.
unidentified
So what have we got?
art bell
We got some kind of national security hole now, or is it what?
mel waters
Well, I assume by now they've made a lot of determinations about it, and it sounds like it's something they want.
Today on my answering machine, I had a message from my real estate agent.
art bell
Oh?
mel waters
And he says that he had someone who is very interested rather in purchasing my property and would make me a very generous offer.
Now, I haven't gotten back to him, but I think we can put two and two together here.
Somebody wants to get their hands on my property.
art bell
So what are you going to do, Mel?
Are you going to accept the, quote, generous offer and get out of this with your skin intact in a few bucks?
Or are you going to fight?
mel waters
Well, that's a good question.
That's one of the reasons why I didn't get back to my agent today, You know, is that I wanted to sit down and think about it before I did anything.
I don't know what their so-called very generous offer is, but on one side you have a possible drug lab, and on the other side, you have a very generous offer.
And so I would kind of be curious to know what their generous offer was.
art bell
Well, that's a carrot-stick approach, no question about it.
mel waters
Yeah, they're working the both ends here, I think.
And I'm, you know, like I say, I feel a lot calmer about this now than I did before.
art bell
No, you were almost panicked, weren't you?
mel waters
Yeah, yeah.
It was just a little bit too much.
art bell
All right, you did some measurements.
People were asking about the weight of the line that you were putting into the hole.
And so what have you determined?
mel waters
Yeah, I did some real, real quick and dirty work here with this here.
First of all, when I was out there on the weekend, I was able to actually measure or weigh the line that's in the hole.
And basically, I tied it onto one of these little fishermen's scales, okay?
And it's a little spring-operated thing there.
But I had a weight on that, including the one-pound sinker on there.
It looks like it weighs about 17, 18 pounds.
art bell
What does?
mel waters
The line that's in the hole.
art bell
In totality?
mel waters
Yeah, the entire weight of the line.
The line weighs 10 ounces for every thousand yards.
art bell
Okay, so 17 or 18 pounds.
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
It's a 20-pound test line, right?
And you have got one pound down at the end of it tied on the end of it, right?
mel waters
That's right.
So one of the things is it's, and this has become a moot point at this point, but if I drop much more line down there, and based on what your caller said, this line will break probably at the top of the line because that's where all of the pressure will be.
art bell
But you believe you're down 80,000 feet?
unidentified
Yeah.
mel waters
Yeah, without a doubt.
art bell
80,000 feet.
mel waters
With, what is that, four zeros on there?
art bell
Well, it's a mile, 5,280 feet.
mel waters
I believe, I haven't done the math on there.
I always forget how long a mile is.
art bell
How long have you owned this property with a hole?
mel waters
We've had the property for about four years now.
And, you know, the guy that had it there had been there for a long time.
I believe he's been there for over 40 years.
It's very rustic.
I think I might have indicated to you, we do not have electricity there.
We do not have phone service.
art bell
No, it's just raw property, right?
mel waters
Well, we have some buildings and the housing structures.
All of those were basically damaged with the heavy snowfall.
art bell
All right, that's right.
Recent snowfall.
Mel, hold on.
We'll be back after the bottom of the hour, all right?
Stay right there.
I'm Mark Bellin.
This is CBC.
unidentified
CBC.
The devil went down to Georgia.
He was looking for a soul to steal.
He was in a bag, but he was way behind.
He was willing to make a deal.
So he came across this young man sowing on the fiddle and playing it hot.
And the devil jumped up on a hip for himself and said, boys, I tell you what, I get you getting somewhere behind.
I'm a fiddle player, too.
And if you care to take a care, I'll make a bet with you.
Now, you play pretty good fiddle, boy, but give the devil his view.
I've got a fiddle of gold against your soul to think I'll bet it's true.
Boy, my name's Johnny, and it might be a sin, but I'll take your bet, you're going to regret because I'm the best that's ever been.
Johnny, you're on up your bowl and play your fiddle hard.
The Devil's News.
art bell
Now back to Mel.
And Mel.
A lot of this audience would not have heard, but there was another little bit of a legend of the hole.
Apparently, at some point, somebody threw a dead dog into the hole, right?
mel waters
Oh, yeah, I was telling you about that before the other night.
And, yeah, people throw everything in there.
There's dead cows going down the hole.
There's, you know, sheep, whatever.
You name it, it's gone down there.
One guy threw his old hunting dog down into the hole, I guess, as a form of burial.
And the story that I heard was that the guy, the hunter, was out there hunting one day, and he saw his old departed dog.
It looked exactly the same.
In fact, it was wearing the same collar and the same tags on it.
So he was absolute, the story is, they were like, absolutely believe the dog came back somehow.
art bell
And you believed it to the degree that you changed your will so that when you die, they were going to throw your body into the hole, right?
mel waters
When I'm gone, I'm going to the hole.
art bell
Oh, well, but maybe not now, huh?
mel waters
Well, that's a matter for conjecture.
I, today, I didn't have a chance to mention this.
After finding out the story about the black beam, the other day I thought I'd go out there and do some more research amongst my neighbors who may have.
art bell
That makes sense.
You can't go on the property, Muslims talk to the neighbors.
mel waters
So you go out and buy him a cup of coffee and find out a few things here.
Anyway, I talked to one gentleman who's really quite elderly and has lived in the area for a long time, but he said that originally, and this is going way back, so this must go back about 40, 50, maybe longer, that there was a series of, around the hole, there was a series of stone columns.
art bell
I said stone columns and stone columns?
mel waters
And so I asked him, you know, could he like, you know, you know, I sketched out a little, how the property looks there and see if he could place the stone columns on it.
unidentified
Yeah.
mel waters
So, you know, he drew it on the napkin there, and I said, that's very interesting.
Well, I had my Power Book with me, and I pulled up a picture of Stonehenge.
And he says, that's exactly what the thing looked like.
art bell
You're kidding.
mel waters
He said that they had these pillars lined up, you know, just like that.
He said, it wasn't, you know, it didn't have that thing on the top.
They had some things on top of the pillars at Stonehenge.
art bell
Oh, that's really odd.
Listen, you can't get photographs, Mel.
I'm sorry to interrupt, but I asked you about photographs.
They won't let you close enough to take any photographs.
mel waters
I was afraid to take pictures of the guards, to be honest with you.
art bell
No, I understand.
How about a drawing, Mel?
Can you get us a drawing?
mel waters
Yeah, I could do that.
I had a question for you.
The night that I talked to you, you said you've got another fax about another anomalous hole in the Colville area.
art bell
That's right.
That's exactly right.
I've got that fax.
And I'll try and get to it for you.
mel waters
Okay.
On Sunday, I listened to your show a bit, and you had Linda on talking about HAARP.
art bell
That's right.
Project HAARP.
Now, HAARP is supposed to look for underground tunnels and such.
mel waters
That's right.
art bell
Now, maybe it's looking at your hole.
unidentified
Who knows?
art bell
Here's a fact for you.
The following is a theory regarding Mel's property.
One, imagine two naturally occurring iron vanes just happening to reach toward the Earth's surface around Manastash?
mel waters
Manastash.
art bell
Washington.
There is a tremendous amount of naturally generated high-voltage electricity deep in the Earth.
What if the bottom of the hole on Mel's property is a naturally occurring focal point, a lot like the device that Mr. Markham built?
The Earth could have its own, in effect, time machine.
Over the centuries, through various quakes and so forth, all of the soil above the portal would have fallen into the bottom and been launched into some other time.
This explains the lack of echoes in the apparent depth of the hole.
Tell Mel to lower a clock down there.
mel waters
Let me tell you, I was over at the university library today, and I wanted to find out a little bit more about Earth geology.
And one of the things I found out is the crust, on average, on the Earth, is about 20 miles deep.
Now, underneath the crust, and this is something that a lot of people don't know about, there's something known as the Moho discontinuity.
art bell
The what?
mel waters
The Moho.
M-O-H-O discontinuity.
art bell
What is that?
mel waters
It's named for a guy named Mohorovic.
He was a Croatian seismologist.
But I don't know much about seismology, but I'll tell you what I know about this discontinuity.
P waves, and I guess those are seismic waves, through this discontinuity move faster than they do through the rest of the Earth.
They like speed up.
Normally they go like 7 kilometers per second.
These are going like 8 kilometers per second when they go through there.
And it's believed that it has to do with a chemical difference in the type in that area of the Earth.
So you've got the crust, you have the Moho discontinuity, then you have the mantle.
And so that region is very little known, as you can well imagine, because you really can't get to it, at least not yet.
And the scientists really don't understand that.
But we have this thing that goes on underneath the crust that is very, very peculiar.
And I just thought I might mention that, Blair.
All right.
art bell
Well, I don't know anything about that.
That's very interesting.
All I know is we had all kinds of cool plans.
I mean, we were going to, I had, Mel, I'm telling you, I've got volunteers who are willing to go down in your hole.
But now that's obviously not going to occur because they have your hole.
I mean, this is outrageous.
This is your property.
mel waters
Yeah, it is my property.
That's the incredible thing.
I could not step one inch onto my property.
My deepest incursion only got me onto the access road.
I was kept way away from that thing there.
art bell
How far is it from the access road where you were stopped to the hole?
mel waters
Oh, gosh.
You'd have to travel.
Oh, gosh.
I would say it's from the access road kind of is very hilly ground over there, so you kind of have to go around all the low spots there.
You might go about a mile and a half or more.
You can't even see the little, like, valley that I'm in.
art bell
Before you began dropping this monofilament line into the hole with a weight, you threw an entire refrigerator down this hole and then listened and listened and listened and never heard a thing?
mel waters
Nothing.
Nothing.
I mean, again, the refrigerator, I didn't hear anything.
I mean, I expected something that massive, you know, and that, you know, I expected something.
But, you know, I've thrown things there that I knew would make interesting sounds, like television tubes, picture tubes.
art bell
Yeah, they explode.
mel waters
Yeah, those are my favorite.
And no, I couldn't get an implosion, explosion, or anything out of them.
So I have not heard anything actually touch bottom in that thing.
art bell
I mean, it's almost impossible, it seems.
mel waters
I mean, if the hole right now, I don't know, is 15, 16, 17 miles, you know, how long would it take for the sound to travel back?
You know, if it is hitting bottom, let's say it's hitting bottom at, say, 15 miles.
You know, how long would it take?
Or would I hear it at all?
You know, those are things, you know, I don't know.
art bell
I don't think so.
I mean, you don't hear things that occur.
Well, on the other hand, though, it's a channeled...
I don't know the physics involved in such a deep hole.
unidentified
Have you ever heard of any other holes?
mel waters
No.
You know, that's why I was curious about the Colville hole.
I did find out that actually the deepest mine is like 2.3 miles into the earth.
art bell
So this is way, way beyond anything that anybody's ever heard about.
mel waters
But that's a mine.
That's a mine structure.
Another thing I was curious about was that channel that they built underneath the English Channel in West France.
Not how deep it is, but how long is it?
Is it several miles?
art bell
I almost rode on it.
It's funny you should mention.
I almost rode on it last time I was in London, but I didn't.
So I don't exactly know.
I saw the entrance to it.
I rode right by the entrance to it.
mel waters
I would be leery of going into that thing.
art bell
Well, then you certainly wouldn't want to go in.
Would you go in this hole?
unidentified
Your hole?
art bell
If you could?
mel waters
I anticipate what will be going down into the hole in the future will be federal prisoners, I imagine.
We will be going down there on a non-voluntary basis, I assume, because I mean, if we're talking to the government here, which it is obviously the government that's interested in this, they have every piece of technology they could ever want.
They could send down cameras, they could send down whatever they wanted.
So, you know, I assume at some point if they determined that it was safe for a human being to go down, they'll send a person down.
You know, and they take air readings if it's got good air, bad air, you know, find out what's going on.
Yeah, I'd say that, you know, they would do that.
You know, again, I'm just like a poor ordinary little guy here who doesn't have a lot of technology as bad.
art bell
Well, how would you like to get a whole bunch of citizens together, Mel, and go marching on that property and challenge their authority to take your property like that?
mel waters
Well, we talked about that over coffee with the guy that told me about the stones out there, you know, saying, you know, I mean, you know, we're pretty, what's we're big on property rights here.
art bell
Yeah, this is your hole, not theirs.
mel waters
And, you know, we're, I mean, you know, very, very militant about that.
And they say, you know, how can they do that here?
You know, the truth is, you know, if they say a plane crashed onto property, and I have any evidence of that.
But I mean, I expect to see some smoke.
But, you know, if they're telling people this is an accident scene, we've got to do an investigation, you know, FAA and all that business there.
art bell
Did they tell you what kind of airplanes, civilian military, or what?
unidentified
No.
mel waters
No.
art bell
All right.
Are there any reports?
I mean, after all, you can check on plane crashes.
mel waters
Well, first of all, over here, if a kid throws a snowball at your car, in winter time, they makes newspaper.
I mean, so.
art bell
So there should have been big news if the plane went down.
mel waters
Oh, you bet.
I mean, we've had planes go down here before.
I mean, we've had planes go down, you know, on the other side of the mountains and makes newspaper here.
I mean, you know, that's a big deal here.
art bell
All right, well, look, look, then instead of a crowd of civilians, maybe that was a bad idea, how about a crowd of media?
I mean, I could get Seattle media by your side and go marching right up to that group.
Right up to the barrier.
mel waters
And then I end up being a convicted drug cooker.
Those were the exact, those were almost verbatim the exact words they said.
You know, you know, you know, we could find a drug blab on this property if you get my drift.
You know, just very easily.
art bell
All right.
Mel, let's take a few calls, see if anybody has any ideas.
This one has me stumped.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
unidentified
Hello there.
Yes.
This is Robert in Milwaukee.
art bell
Hi, Robert.
unidentified
All right.
I just had a thought connecting Stephen Greer at CCETI with what he said concerning interplanetary travel and drew a connection to the cloning.
I find it very interesting that the scientists say they're not going to consider cloning humans.
art bell
Oh, baloney.
That's a bunch of crap.
You know, don't listen to that.
Excuse me for a second, Mel, on the subject of cloning.
You know, all day I've been listening to this drivel from the scientists about the cloning thing, that we're not going to do it.
Oh, well, yes, this technology will allow clone, but we're not going to do it.
That is utter garbage.
And when we get around to talking about cloning, which we will, we're going to talk about it in an entirely different vein because unless you are naïve beyond belief, spending your time talking about whether we should or shouldn't, will or won't is baloney because we will.
I guess you can say, should we?
But we will, I guarantee we're going to clone.
Anyway, that is not tonight's subject or the moment's subject.
Mel's hole is first time caller line, you're on the air.
unidentified
Hey, Mel?
art bell
Yeah, hi there.
unidentified
Hi there.
art bell
Where are you, sir?
unidentified
I'm in Oregon.
My name's Pete.
art bell
All right, Pete.
unidentified
Okay.
mel waters
Where in Oregon are you?
unidentified
In Corvallis?
mel waters
Corvallis.
Okay, I know where that is, sure.
unidentified
Okay, yeah.
I was listening to the show, and I guess it's a delayed broadcast out here.
I was listening to earlier stuff.
art bell
No, no, this is about Mel's hole.
Go ahead, sir.
unidentified
And, yeah, I would just say to Mel that you need to get in contact with just about every media person that you can think of and get them out there.
art bell
He's done that with me, and I agree with you.
I just said to Mel that he should take, you know, like an army of cameras out there.
But he's afraid that he's going to end up in jail.
Now, he's got a point.
Suppose the army of cameras with Mel and Toe arrive, and there's feds there saying, sorry, this is a crime scene.
Or is this Mel Waters?
Well, you're under arrest, Mel.
mel waters
Well, I have to tell you that as far as what I believe is now that the surface of the hole, there's a lot of snow on the property.
It's been covered up with snow.
I think that's what the yellow gear was there for, is to groom it all so you can't see it from the air.
unidentified
Well, I think there's a lot of questions that need to be answered.
And if the military is out there, if there was a plane crash, I think the media would want to know what kind of plane it was, who was flying it.
art bell
I will.
mel waters
Well, you see, the thing is, I'm the one that's saying that there was a plane crash.
art bell
Yeah, Mel, I'll tell you something.
And for what it's worth, if it was a civilian airplane that crashed, that would be in the news.
If it was a regular military airplane that crashed, that would be in the news.
But there are some type of aircraft that crash, Mel, that it, believe me, it does not make the news.
We have them out here.
They crash, and you see the military cordon off miles of area, and there's no news about it at all.
You know, there's secret aircraft that fly and crash.
But I don't think that's what happened there, and neither do you.
mel waters
No, I don't believe that anything crashed there because I didn't have the smell of the smoke.
I didn't see any smoke.
It was a beautiful, beautiful, clear day.
I mean, if there was any, and it wasn't Particularly windy if there was a crash, there'd be evidence of it.
There'd be smoke pops.
art bell
Well, I'll tell you one thing: I would be very cautious, Mel, about accepting a generous offer for the property with a hole because you know what?
No matter what else, Mel, your hole is worth millions of dollars if it's what you say it is.
If it's as deep as you say it is, man, you could fence a property and sell tickets.
mel waters
Well, I think I also mentioned that they actually moved onto the property several mobile, those like temporary buildings to move that onto the property.
Oh, really?
Yeah, one of the neighbors says he saw almost like a parade of these things going out there, like three, four of them, plus some generator equipment there, too.
Good, all that stuff.
art bell
How long after the broadcast did this parade begin?
mel waters
Well, it was Saturday night I was out there pretty late.
art bell
And we did the broadcast between, I think, 3 and 4 o'clock Pacific time Saturday morning.
mel waters
Yeah, so I got some sleep, you know, and went out there in the evening and did my weighing of the line in the hole.
And that's when I saw the first helicopter out there.
And that was a very strange experience.
You know, I actually looked up at this thing here for about 20 minutes.
There were more helicopters out there Saturday morning, early, several of them coming in and out.
That was Sunday morning.
And then by today, the chronology is getting real confusing for me.
art bell
Now, yesterday, I guess, really.
mel waters
Yeah, yeah, I lost a day in here, Mark.
But yeah, what they saw is actually some mobile buildings being moved onto the property.
Apparently some generators there.
Again, I have no power or phone on the property.
We use cell phone if we need to make a call, and we used to use solar out there to Well, I feel in a way guilty, Mel, but your original facts got me going.
art bell
And there was no way not to follow up on that, and I guess once we aired that, it was too late.
It was a done deal.
mel waters
You know, when I originally approached this thing here, you know, what I wanted to do was to get some good ideas about the nature of this thing here.
I guess I was pretty naive about it.
art bell
All right, Mel, one thing I've got to ask you.
Don't think me rude, but I've got to ask, Mel, that's not a drug lab you've got out there, is it?
mel waters
No, no, no.
We are working with Native American plants.
They're plants that Native Americans used in making what they would.
This was a northern Nevada doctor back in World War I time who found a cure for the flu.
He gave this stuff to his, he was a military doctor, gave it to the people under his command.
art bell
All right, Mel, hold on.
We're going to do a break here at the top of the arrow.
We'll be back to you.
Mel Waters, the guy with the endless hole, is my guest.
We will start taking some calls.
Anybody have any advice for Mel or thoughts on all of this?
Yikes!
CBC in action.
unidentified
CBC in action.
art bell
All right.
Back now to Mel and the dilemma of the endless hole.
Mel, are you there?
mel waters
I am here, Art.
art bell
All right.
There are some people with questions.
Do you have anything else you want to say?
mel waters
Just that, you know, just after beginning to explore this thing here, you know, with the help of your audience and, you know, further questioning on, you know, people, you know, that live around in my area here, asking them, you know, really, do you remember anything strange about the hole in particular?
art bell
Well, I would say a resurrected dog would be pretty good.
mel waters
It just becomes more and more mysterious.
I have no way of understanding.
art bell
I would say a darker than dark beam that seems to go straight up into the sky would be pretty strange.
mel waters
That to me was utterly fascinating.
The hole itself is dark, but for it to send out darkness into the sky to me was just a matter of time.
I mean, it was, you know, the way he described it, it was just.
art bell
All right, all right.
Let's bring some people on.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
Hello, where are you?
unidentified
This is Philip in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
art bell
Hello, Philip.
How are you doing?
unidentified
Great.
Love your show.
art bell
Thank you.
unidentified
Mel, what type of work do you do for a living?
mel waters
Well, I'm a retired person.
unidentified
No criminal record of any kind?
art bell
Pardon me?
unidentified
No criminal record or anything?
mel waters
No, no criminal record.
unidentified
I'd find a lawyer.
We get a local group of citizens and press and militia.
And that's a good reason why we need the militias in this country is to prevent this type of situation from happening.
The government coming in, taking over your property, threatening your life.
You know, I would call their bluff.
I don't see how they can.
art bell
Well, that's easy to say, you know, from a distance.
I'm not sure I'd call their bluff.
I've got to be honest.
Look, if you had a property, sir, and you're trying to get on it and they had it all roped off and they said, go away, I would come back with a gun.
unidentified
And they haul in a bunch of people.
art bell
Then you know what you'd be?
You'd be a dead martyr.
You take a gun up to a military.
unidentified
I'd have to press with me, and I mean, I would not go at this alone.
art bell
Oh, I see.
unidentified
You know, but they're not going to drag in a bunch of military trailers to examine a drug lab.
art bell
Well, I see.
unidentified
No, that's just not logical.
art bell
I agree with you.
I agree with you.
So they're obviously after the secret of the hole.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
Hello.
unidentified
Hi, this is Dan from San Diego.
art bell
Hi, Stan.
unidentified
I just got a question there for Mel.
Is there any way that you could charter a plane so you can do a flyover of your property?
mel waters
I suppose I Could do that.
I mean, there is a small airport here in Ellensburg, and I'm sure that that can be arranged for.
Well, what I'd be interested to know is if actually planes can fly over that area, and I suppose I could try to find that out.
art bell
To get some photographs.
mel waters
Yeah, but again, I do believe that the hole itself has been covered over with the surrounding snow.
They probably did a really nice job with what they brought in there of keeping it invisible from the air.
That was my speculation of why they brought the yellow gear up as to kind of dress it up a little bit there so that anyone casually going over there wouldn't notice anything.
That's just my opinion.
unidentified
Okay, and another thing is I got a little assumption of why none of the animals want to go by there.
art bell
Why?
unidentified
Maybe they see the oppression of the dead dogs, and it's warning them not to go there.
Maybe.
Maybe.
art bell
I mean, that's pure conjecture.
Who knows?
But no animals will go near it?
mel waters
You know, the observations I made was my dogs and other people's dogs that come visit.
They won't go there.
If I put them on a leash and try to drag them there, they'll dig their feet in there, and it just will not budge.
art bell
You know what, Mel?
I once was on a trip with my family going to Florida.
We used to go to Florida to drive to Florida in the winter.
And we once got near a slaughterhouse on one of our stops.
And, man, I had a golden retriever, and that golden wouldn't get anywhere.
He did the same thing.
He dug his feet in, and I don't care how you'd pull, he could smell the death.
mel waters
Well, when I was in college, I had a, brought from school a human skull, and I brought it home, put on the coffee table.
My cat walked into the room, and he saw that thing, and the cat literally jumped backwards about eight feet.
art bell
I bet.
mel waters
When he saw that.
Now, how did a cat know?
unidentified
Sense.
art bell
They sense these things.
There's something about it.
First time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
Hello.
unidentified
Hey, Art.
This is Scott from Kirkland, Washington.
art bell
Yes, sir.
mel waters
Oh, Scott.
art bell
Washington.
unidentified
Not only from Kirkland.
I've only been over on my side of the mountain for a little while, but born and bred in Yakima and a graduate of Central Washington University.
Spent a lot of time in Ellsberg.
In fact, I sat around with one of my old professors who is one of these guys who has been living in the area for, oh, God, forever.
And he actually had told me rumors one morning over coffee, sitting down in one of the little restaurants about a great big hole that nobody knew the bottom of.
Wow.
We'd actually heard of this.
This was back, oh, 1990, 1989.
Sometime about in there, and we even heard that.
And the one thing that really surprises me, this guy that was saying, well, I took a gun in the media up there.
What a lot of people don't realize, Art, and I think that most people don't realize, is he lives about, oh, depending on where the hole is, between five and ten miles away from one of the largest military reservations in the Pacific Northwest, possibly the western United States.
The Acoma Firing Center is where they did all of the training for Desert Storm.
They have a bunch of satellite dishes up there that theoretically don't exist, that they use for talking to satellites that aren't there.
And all sorts of things, very interesting things go on up there.
And so something like this, a hole appearing within spitting distance of this military reservation, it doesn't really surprise me a whole lot that they have trucks and stuff out there in a lighting bulb.
art bell
Hey, Mel, do we know how long that hole has actually been there?
mel waters
I mean, I can probably trace this hole back, you know, from actual recollections, you know, to for a solid 40 years before I got there and the previous owner said it was there, the next owner back.
Before that, I don't know if anyone owned the property.
I suppose I could check on that to see from the records there if there's been any ownership of it or whatever.
But I can trace it back for a good solid 40 years, at least from the verbatim accounts from the previous owner.
Again, I don't really know.
I would venture to say that given the nature of it, that it's been there for a very, very long time, I'm talking, not just decades, but out there.
I mean, how can this thing just be there?
It has to be ancient.
unidentified
Well, I wish you the best in figuring out what it is.
All of us local here.
We're going to keep tuned in to see if there's anything worth driving back across the mountains to hang out and see.
mel waters
Well, I've just been out here for just a couple of years.
I decided to retire out here and pursue my interest in alternative health.
unidentified
And this is what I get.
art bell
All right.
Well, it's turned into a nightmare.
An absolute nightmare.
unidentified
You see the Rockies?
art bell
You're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello?
Yeah, about that hole.
art bell
Yes, sir.
unidentified
There was a Rod Sterling thing I saw in TNT, I think, about four years ago.
He was hosting it.
It was like, it must have been early 80s, late 70s.
And there were reenactments of these true occurrences.
And there was a hole story about a boy.
It looked like it took place when they still rode horses or something.
And a boy woke up with his dog missing or something.
And he went looking for his dog and fell into a hole, except he didn't fall in.
He hung onto the edge and crawled out and went and told his dad.
And his dad went out there and they heard noises coming out of it.
art bell
Oh, God.
unidentified
And so they didn't think it was the dog making the noises because it sounded real spooky and stuff.
So he went to town and got a bunch of guys to go out there with him.
And I guess a bunch of guys went out there and they thought, well, let's lower a rope in and somebody's going to have to go down on it.
Sure.
And so the dad said, well, I'll do it since you're looking for your dog and stuff.
And they lowered him down and He made this scream, deadly scream, and so they brought him up.
And I guess after that, after they brought him up, he went clinically insane for the rest of his life.
art bell
All right.
Well, I hope you're not in any danger of going clinically insane, Mel.
mel waters
I hope not.
art bell
But you sounded close to being discombobulated when I spoke with you.
When was that?
mel waters
Sunday afternoon, I think.
art bell
Was that Sunday afternoon?
mel waters
Sunday evening?
Something like that.
Yeah, I was.
art bell
I mean, you called me up and you were just a wreck.
mel waters
Yeah, I was any negative, fearful emotion, I had it there.
I mean, I was shaking.
I was sweating.
My body was doing things that I couldn't explain.
I was a wreck.
art bell
What do you think about the idea of your not even going out, but sending the media out?
mel waters
I could do that in terms of saying, I think there's something interesting going on over there, and send them out there.
And what I assume that will happen is if they did go, if they thought it was a valid story, they'll say, look, we're conducting military exercises on this land here, and there's nothing for you to see.
And I think that'll be it.
Again, this guy was real clear to me.
He said, look, I asked him, I said, look, I suppose you don't want me to talk to anybody about this.
And he said, hey, no one's going to believe you anyway.
You could tell them anything you want.
Why are they going to believe you?
art bell
All right.
Well, first time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
Hello there.
mel waters
Hi.
unidentified
Maxine in Southern California.
art bell
Hi, Maxine.
unidentified
I am very interested in the conversation that's been going on with Mel.
I heard the program the other night, and, you know, he's really in a big dilemma.
art bell
Well, he is now.
And I feel somewhat responsible being.
unidentified
Yeah, I understand that.
You know, the first thing he needs to do is get a good lawyer, somebody that's prominent, like that, I can't recall his name, Spence from Wyoming.
art bell
Jerry Spence.
unidentified
Jerry Spence, somebody like that.
And maybe your listeners could do a writing to Janet Reno, the president or the vice president, on his behalf.
Keep him in the background because with the power they've got, you know, they can just wrap him up and we might never hear from him again.
art bell
Yeah, that's right.
I guess I'm going to stay in touch with you, Mel, to be sure that you don't meet some.
mel waters
Well, you know, they're working me from both sides here, as far as I can tell.
art bell
What it sounds like, yeah.
mel waters
Yeah, I mean, it looks like it's like the Godfather.
They want to make me an offer I can't refuse.
art bell
You know, if there's a lot of armchair soldiers out there, Mel, and they're going to say, What's the matter with you?
You've got to get in there and fight.
Tell them to go to hell.
But the fact of the matter is, if I were in your situation, I might be very disinclined to fight.
I might be much more inclined to take a, quote, generous offer and get out from under while I can.
mel waters
If I actually get to talk to somebody in a position of authority who wants to sit down and talk turkey, and I'm not talking about my real estate agent, honestly, I'm going to ask for a relocation to another country is what I'm going to do.
art bell
You want to be sent out of the country?
mel waters
Yeah, I'd like to be sent to Australia, for instance, like where Standeo is, you know.
art bell
Be an expatriate.
mel waters
Some place that's geologically sound.
unidentified
Yeah, okay.
art bell
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel, who's still an American at this moment.
unidentified
Hi, my name's Brad.
I'm calling from Lexington, Kentucky.
art bell
Hi, Brad.
unidentified
Hi.
When I heard about this hole, it kind of reminded me of the story with the hole they dug.
I think it was in Europe or Scandinavia.
art bell
Scandinavia.
Scandinavia.
unidentified
They lowered a microphone.
art bell
Yeah, I'll tell you what.
That was an Associated Press story, and they lowered a microphone in, and they heard the screaming, agonized sounds of thousands of people in agony, they said.
That was an actual AP story.
Now, it may have turned out to have been not true, but AP ran that story.
unidentified
So, I don't know.
I mean, maybe it's the entrance to hell.
I don't know.
mel waters
There isn't even an echo that comes out of this.
unidentified
I mean, you don't even hear anything.
And as far as the animals not wanting to go near it, you know.
art bell
But he says there's not a sound.
I mean, it's totally dead, right, Mel?
mel waters
Yeah, I mean, unless you hit the side of the thing there, when you drop something in and it's like close to the surface, you know, you hear it there.
But after a certain point, you wouldn't hear anything anyway.
art bell
Now, when you dropped a refrigerator in, I'm curious how you can drop a refrigerator.
Now, 9 feet, 9 inches is a pretty good size diameter.
But how do you get the fridge in the middle to drop it so that you don't slam it into the sides?
mel waters
Well, you get like one of your buddies over there, and you get it over there on its, you know, so it's like leaning over on its back, and you slide it over on the stone wall, and just kind of give it a shove, and it just sort of goes straight down.
art bell
Yeah, that makes sense.
mel waters
Yeah, it's not too difficult.
I mean, we've been throwing stuff in that hole of all sorts of descriptions here, and believe me, you know, we've done it.
I mean, you know, it's, you know, a cow is a pretty big thing, but people have gotten cows down in there.
You can just about throw anything down there.
art bell
It's actually almost disgusting.
mel waters
Yes.
art bell
In fact, the bottom of the hole, if there is a bottom to the damn thing, must be truly disgusting, a mixture of horrible things of earth that should not have been thrown in there.
Mel, can you hold on?
mel waters
Oh, yeah, I'll be.
art bell
All right, well, we'll do one more half hour, and we'll be right back.
It is a strange and wonderful world out there, is it not?
Stay right there.
unidentified
Trees of green Red roses, ginger Ah!
I see them blue.
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
I see skies so blue and bright so white the brightness tonight on Coast to Coast a.m. with Art Bell.
It's an encore presentation featuring the best of Art Bell and his guest, Mel Waters, with the story of Mel's Hole, a bottomless pit in Washington State.
Art will be back live tomorrow night with his guest's best-selling author, Dean Koontz.
art bell
It absolutely is.
Good morning, everybody.
Mel is my guest.
She's got a hole.
unidentified
Mel's hole, we call it.
art bell
And now let's go back and give him a little challenge, all right?
Mel, are you there?
I'm here.
All right.
I've got a couple of faxes here that are not kind, Mel.
They say this man is lying.
His voice is shaking so much.
He's stuttering.
He's searching for words.
He's in a bind because you're paying attention to his fable, you know, made-up story they're saying.
And you have to come up with something that would keep you from finding out about his lie.
So here's another one.
It says, Mel's hoax.
Aren't you falling for another one?
Well, I am a little naive, and I like stories like yours, Mel, and so I do tend to go for them.
Is it, I mean, do you swear that this is absolutely the truth?
mel waters
Mel, look, I would have rather not have talked or called or faxed or anything in regards to this subject at all.
art bell
Yeah, the people need to understand.
You faxed me, but I'm the one who called you.
mel waters
I would have preferred, to be honest with you, to be there tomorrow morning letting a little more line down into the hole and just going along my merry way.
art bell
And then getting you on the air stopped all that and plus put the idiots there that are there taking hold of your...
mel waters
You know, a couple of days ago, we had this guy shoot a bunch of people on the Empire State Building.
That's right.
The Empire State Building's been there for like 60 years or whatever.
And today I heard that they put metal detectors in the Empire State Building.
Now, for 60 years, people believed that the Empire State Building was a safe place to be.
That was belief.
And in one day, people no longer believed.
So beliefs change.
And that's how I view beliefs.
Should they have had a metal detector on it for 60 years?
art bell
All right, look, let me ask you this.
You have neighbors.
They know about the hole.
mel waters
They've been there.
They put their trash in it.
art bell
They put their trash in it.
Would any of your neighbors talk, or do you think they're scared now, too?
mel waters
I'd be happy to talk to them and see if they want to talk to you.
art bell
All right.
mel waters
And, you know, if they want to talk, I'll tax you a phone number.
art bell
That's great, Mel.
Work on that one.
That's at least one other angle to approach this with.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
Where are you, please?
unidentified
I'm in Cameron, Texas.
All right.
Gentlemen, how wide is that hole?
It's nine and three-quarters feet.
Nine and three-quarters feet.
art bell
Nine feet in diameter.
Nine feet nine inches in diameter, he said.
unidentified
Okay, Mel, to the library, why don't you go tomorrow and they can network books all over the United States.
And there's one called The Phantom of the Poles by William Reed.
And there's one called The Hollow Earth by Dr. Raymond Bernard.
And I'll guarantee you that'll open your eyes because the earth is hollow.
They've never proved the earth is solid.
And at the pole, It's totally a hole, and it's about 1,400 miles wide.
And people can't see across it, and they don't realize they're going into the earth.
But Admiral Byrd flew 1,700 miles inside the earth, and they shut it up.
So the government's up to stump it here.
All right, as a matter of fact, here's the facts, Mel saying.
art bell
Regarding the hole, it sounds to me like the government's going to take the hole and give Mel the shaft.
mel waters
That is what it sounds like.
art bell
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
unidentified
Hi, how are you doing?
Well?
Another fantastic story, Art.
art bell
Yeah, I know.
unidentified
I appreciate you taking my call.
Sure.
I have a friend of mine who also believes in the Hollow Earth story.
And I've read two scriptures in the Bible, which I won't quote, because I know you don't like to talk about that.
art bell
That's right.
unidentified
But there's one that talks about making graven images of things.
And that would be even things that are under the earth.
And then there's a.
art bell
Well, what are you driving at, though?
unidentified
Well, there are scriptures in the Bible that also allude to a hollow earth.
art bell
Oh, oh, oh.
unidentified
And so there's one in Revelation that talks about they were looking all around to try and find somebody who was worthy to open the scrolls or the seals or something.
And even under the earth, no one was found.
mel waters
All right.
art bell
Mel, are you a religious person?
mel waters
I wouldn't categorize myself as a religious person.
art bell
So then you don't necessarily feel there's any religious significance to the whole?
mel waters
I'm starting to believe that there's some supernatural significance to the whole.
art bell
Well, yeah, the dog part and the other thing about the beam of the blackness, that certainly would lead in that direction.
But on the other hand, things that we don't understand may seem as magic.
mel waters
Yeah, yeah, they do.
And that's so, you know, those are things that I cannot understand.
And so I have to say, I don't understand it.
art bell
All right, look here.
Do you want any help from your representative?
In other words, it may be that your state senator or your local representative, congressional representative, would help you out.
And we could help you out with that, too.
In other words, fight power with power.
That's an idea from John in Reading, California, and it's not a bad one necessarily.
mel waters
Well, my local congressperson is Doc Hastings out here.
And he is one of those guys that believes in property rights and so forth.
And so that would be an avenue.
Again, this is an opportunity for me to gain as much information as I'm also disseminating.
And I'm going to have to make a decision.
When I go in one direction or go in another direction, that will be it.
There's not going to be a point where I could take it back.
All right.
art bell
Well, here's another one for you to consider.
I've got connections at Strange Universe, Hard Copy, all those kinds of shows.
I could have those people in contact with you in two seconds flat, Mel.
Once you decide which way you want to go, believe me, I can have either media power or a government power, representation to help you out here.
mel waters
Yeah, again, I'm going to have to, the main thing I have to do is decide, is this tantalizing enough for me to move forward and say, well, I want to claim this as my own.
I want to deal with it on my own basis.
Do I want to get out of it?
Do I want to get into trouble?
I mean, these are the considerations that I have here.
art bell
All right, here's somebody saying, what about your local sheriff?
Now, that is an idea.
They're usually pretty friendly guys.
Do you have a good local sheriff?
mel waters
We have a local police department here, and we have a sheriff's department.
And they're all great.
They're all wonderful people.
Every last one of them is a great guy.
but I don't even know how I would approach this here.
My property is being illegally used.
unidentified
There's no question about it.
art bell
And you have the deed, right?
You can prove this?
mel waters
Oh, I can prove it's my property.
What I don't know is how can the government use your property?
At what point do they develop an authority to use your property?
Let's say a plane crashed there, which is what I was told.
Well, then they'd have a right to salvage the plane, do whatever they're going to do.
You could establish a right to it.
All right.
art bell
Here's Darrell in Rancho Mirage who says, kidding aside, Mel's hole, if in fact he is sitting on top of an access point to an extraordinary depth, he's also right on top of a whole bunch of trouble.
The potential military scientific significance can go as deep as one's imagination allows.
One thing is for sure.
The government doesn't have this kind of response to retrieve an old refrigerator.
I think Mel better get an attorney, Presto, if he doesn't have one already.
Remember, if they accuse him of a drug-related violation, they can reco that property in a flash.
mel waters
That is exactly what I believe.
And again, I have something on the property.
I have an old prowler trailer out there that's been gutted.
And it's where I do a lot of the work I do with the plants they have.
And, you know, I have solvents there.
I have alcohol there.
I have drying equipment out there.
And, you know, it would take them 30 seconds to make it look like a methamphetamine lab or whatever it is.
I mean, it just, you know, it's already my lab.
I mean, that's where I do my work.
art bell
I hear you.
All right.
First time caller line.
You're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
art bell
Where are you?
unidentified
Hello.
I'm calling Perino.
No, no, that is.
art bell
Perino.
Okay, speak up good and loud for us.
unidentified
Oh, okay.
I'm sorry, but I just feel like you've got somebody there that's got quite an imagination.
art bell
Well, you're talking to them.
So, I mean, I've just said the same thing to them.
Some of the faxes that I've been receiving are saying that, obviously, people don't believe.
unidentified
I just hope that you don't get all wound up in this.
art bell
Well, look, I get wound up in all kinds of things, dear.
I'm not going to stop.
That's what I do.
Don't worry about me.
unidentified
Oh, okay.
Well, I was just...
art bell
He's here.
unidentified
Mel, I think that you're looking for some kind of notoriety for some reason, and I think that you think everybody is pretty gullible that is listening to Art Bell's program, and that you're taking unfair advantage of him.
All right, you've got to remember, dear, I called him.
But didn't he originally call me?
art bell
Faxed me?
Yes, he did.
Well, he faxed me with information.
As a matter of fact, I read the facts at the beginning of the program with Mel tonight, and I read it over there.
So he didn't anticipate that I would call him, didn't ask me to call him, and I had to look up at the top of the fax to get the fax ID to call him.
So that's the truth of the matter.
I have no way of knowing, of course, whether Mel's weaving us a story or not, except his word.
And I can't imagine why he'd lie.
mel waters
To be honest with you, and since you're from Reno, and if I wanted to be on the air talking about something, I'd much rather talk about my work with Indian herbal remedies.
That would be the thing that I would prefer to be talking about.
It just so happens that the materials I'm working from are from northern Nevada, from your local Indians out there, and they're the ones that have provided me with the line of research that I'm doing.
I have, you know, this whole thing is secondary, you know, but if I had a topic I really wanted to speak about, that would be it.
art bell
All right, I understand.
All right.
East of the Rockies, you are on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
unidentified
Will, WTDY, Madison, Wisconsin.
Hello, fellas.
art bell
Hi.
unidentified
Allegedly Zionists, allegedly anti-religion Zionists with billions of U.S. dollars profits makers and currency future derivatives, Marcus.
All right.
art bell
Well, I don't know where he's.
He's always going all over the place where it has nothing to do with our topic.
First time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
Hi, this is Philo from Vancouver B.C. Yeah, hi there.
I just think your last caller, the female caller, must have a wild imagination herself.
But I have two questions here.
Number one, is he called a psychic by any chance?
art bell
You know, that is a thought.
I mean, it's.
mel waters
Look, after, you know, if I decide, you know, to basically take the money and run, I still want to know what's down there.
I want some mechanism to know.
I mean, my original line of inquiry really was, is this the deepest hole around?
I mean, that was my original question I put forward.
And, you know, I think I got an answer to that.
But now I'd like to know, what the heck is this thing?
So that's where I'm coming from now.
And one way or another, I mean, I think I'm at the point where I'm opening up.
My beliefs are such that if we had a psychic look at it, a remote viewer, I don't, whatever, that I would be willing to accept what they have to say about this.
If they looked into it and saw what was at the bottom or what was going on over there, I think at this point I can accept that.
Boy, I'll tell you what I've had, except in the last couple of days here, I can accept anything at this point.
All right.
unidentified
Thank you.
I know a really good psychic and I know I'm going to be asking her tomorrow.
All right.
art bell
Thanks, Dean.
unidentified
Can I ask a second question?
art bell
Yeah, go ahead.
unidentified
Okay.
Um what did you think the odds are of someone going ahead and finding out who he is and calling the media and we've had his full name on the air for one thing?
Yeah, I noticed.
art bell
All right.
So, Mel, what do you think the odds are that somebody will...
I mean, obviously, as a result of the first broadcast, look what's happened.
So the media may descend on you, Mel.
mel waters
They very well could.
And as the guy said, at the uh at the road here, it says we already know where you're at.
art bell
So Well, what are you going to do if the media I mean suppose tomorrow KOMO or one of the big Seattle broadcasters comes to you and says, look, we've got a camera crew.
Tell us where the property is.
We want to go out and investigate.
mel waters
I suppose if they wanted to go there, I would lead them to the access road there and say, here, I'm out of here.
You take a look.
You talk to these guys here.
You find out what's going on.
And then I'll watch it on the news tonight.
But you won't find me anywhere near that.
art bell
I hear you.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Hello.
mel waters
Yes, sir.
unidentified
This is Skip in Sacramento, KSTE.
art bell
Yes.
unidentified
A couple things for you, sir.
The hole that he is talking about, his 80,000 feet, comes up to 15.15 miles deep.
mel waters
Sounds right.
unidentified
The Mohawkistic discontinuity is talking about came in the International Geophysical Year.
I believe that was back in the early 80s, maybe even the 50s.
I'm getting sold.
I don't remember now.
It's called IGI, the International Geophysical Year, where all the world populations took part, checking the depth of the shelf underneath the oceans and the molten mass down to the core and so on, how deep it was.
There was a discontinuity.
It wasn't even.
And that's why it's called a discontinuity.
It was named after this fellow, Moharobist.
mel waters
Exactly.
unidentified
Your glue stuff, you know, was developed forced surgery for smashed spleens and kidneys.
It made to glue skin better than anything else.
art bell
Yeah, well, trust me, it works real well, sir.
Thank you very much.
It even glues carts into rocks.
I don't want to talk about it.
First time caller line, you're on the air with Mel.
mel waters
Hello.
art bell
Oh, I think we just missed him.
Wildcard line, you're on the air with Mel.
Good morning.
unidentified
Hi, Art and Mel.
Hello, Aaron Colin from Reno.
art bell
Yes, sir.
unidentified
Good.
I have a couple of questions in a comment.
Mel, just, I don't know if anybody's asked you yet, but have you ever seen a UFO out around in that area on your property?
art bell
No, good question.
mel waters
You know, out here, you're liable to see all sorts of things, and I myself have not seen anything personally.
I mean, this is one of those areas that they can get pretty remote in a hurry.
You know, Ellensburg is like 30 miles away on either side from the nearest town.
art bell
Matter of fact, matter of fact, Mel, I've got a lot of confirmation of that.
Faxes and phone calls, people saying it is a very weird area.
And they've heard stories there about holes.
So, you know, this is not that far out.
A lot of people are saying, yes, there's a lot of weird stuff going on in that area.
West of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
Fred from Sitka.
art bell
Sitka.
unidentified
Alaska.
art bell
Alaska, all right?
unidentified
Yeah, and just like to say that, geez, I thought the days of you'll just disappear ended with the Reagan administration.
And Art, I'm very disappointed that you will not be coming to Sitka on your Alaska cruise.
Well, you're going to be missing out there.
art bell
We're hitting quite a few cities, sir, but Sitka is not one of them.
Sorry about that.
East of the Rockies, you're on the air with Mel.
unidentified
This is Paul in Kansas City, and I want to tell Mel that I believe him entirely.
And I think the Jerry Spence idea is a great idea, and it's probably a good story for Linda Moulton Howell to go check out.
art bell
I've already given it to Linda, as a matter of fact.
unidentified
Oh, that's great.
And I think if he's told over 10 million people on the air that he's been threatened, that they're going to falsely accuse him of having a drug farm out there or something, and he got a really good lawyer like Jerry Spence, they would never be able to follow through on that, especially if he had a bunch of media attention like Strange Universe and stuff out there.
art bell
Well, that was another idea.
There's a whole bunch of ideas here on the table.
unidentified
Yeah, I think that I really think he should go for it.
And I totally disagree with that lady who thinks he just wants attention.
art bell
All right.
Well, I appreciate the call.
Thank you.
I did call Mel, folks.
That's the truth.
Yeah, he faxed me.
But I'm the guy who dug out the number and called him.
He didn't really want to go on the air for the record.
Wildcard line, you're on the air.
mel waters
Finally, I got through.
art bell
Hello, Art.
mel waters
Hello, Mel.
How are you?
unidentified
Okay.
mel waters
Mel, now with this hole and these people who are on your land, you have to understand they are listening to this radio program right now.
I'm absolutely certain of it.
And you also have to understand these are military spooks.
They are doing whatever they're doing right now.
And anything that you do through the standard channels, like getting a lawyer or anything along those lines, is going to serve only as a delay tactic.
I would suggest to you that you do some research.
If it was a plane crash, there is radar coverage of that area, I'm certain.
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
There would be a record of it somewhere.
art bell
Well, unless.
mel waters
If it's an airplane crash, where's the NTSB?
art bell
Well, sir, wait a minute.
Hold on, hold on.
Look, I live out here in Nevada, and I can tell you because there's been some experimental planes that have crashed out here, and A, it does not get into the media, B, the military cordons off the entire area, and trust me, you don't get anywhere near it.
I know personally that's true.
mel waters
All you need to do is contact one of the air traffic controllers for the area and find out if there's any record of anything in that area at that time.
You can also find out, I mean, if it's an air crash, where's the NTSB?
If it has anything to do with drugs, where's the DEA or the drug task force for that area, whatever it might be called?
If there is anything to do with anything else as far as the geological properties of the area, you can find all this information out from USGS.
You can get satellite photos in infrared.
You can get anything You want.
art bell
Yeah, these are all good ideas.
Although, I think the plane crash story is an obvious falsehood.
It's a lie.
Mel, again, they told you, look, they could find a drug lab there.
So the plane crash story was obviously a cover, and the story about the lab was obviously a threat.
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
Plain and simple.
So, my friend, I don't know what you're going to do now.
And I guess you don't know.
mel waters
I'm going to think about it.
I'm going to think about it.
I'm going to call the realtor tomorrow for one and ask him I would prefer not to talk to him, but talk to someone, you know.
art bell
I would ask them, too, who is making the offer?
They have to tell you who's making the offer.
mel waters
Sure.
Well, you see, this property is not for sale.
I mean, I don't have a listing out there.
art bell
Well, yeah, but you can make an offer on anything, though.
mel waters
I suppose you could.
art bell
Yeah, you can get a realtor and make an offer, and they will come and give you that offer.
So, look, I don't know what else to say or do, Mel.
If there's any way I can help you, if there's any media contacts or political contacts I can supply you with that will help when you decide what you're going to do, come to me.
If there are any significant further developments that you want, or you get some neighbors who want to come on the air, I'll put them on.
If you get any drawings, I'll put them up on the website.
I'll do whatever I can do to help you.
And I feel a little guilty about having solicited you on the air in the first place and causing all this.
mel waters
Well, look, I'm pretty rattled about this, I have to say.
And I'm usually a bit more articulate than I have been.
And I apologize for that.
This is a really stressful situation.
art bell
No, I understand.
People are just nasty, Mel.
mel waters
No, that's fine.
And I generally find that usually the people that are the most well-spoken are generally the ones that you really have to watch out for.
I know.
I think that's always a good thing to bear in mind.
And so I've got some thinking to do about this art.
And I appreciate everything that everyone has said.
I think overall, I think I've moved forward in this in terms of actually being able to resolve this within my mind.
And I think for that, it was good.
Quite honestly, your involvement with this may not, you know, it may be happening now because of your involvement, but it could be happening a year from now without your involvement.
art bell
Yeah, and everybody out there ought to consider something like this could happen to anybody.
mel waters
10 million people or how many are out there?
They know about this.
art bell
Mel, we're out of time.
Stay in touch, my friend.
mel waters
I'll keep in touch.
art bell
All right, take care.
That's Mel and the story of Mel's Hole, and that's the latest.
When there's more, you'll hear about it right here.
This is CBC.
unidentified
CBC.
art bell
One of the greatest stories ever told was told on this program.
How long ago was it, God?
You know, I don't even remember now.
About a hole in the ground that had no end or no end that anybody could find.
It was the damnedest story you ever heard in your whole life.
Anybody remember Mel's hole?
Well, guess who I've got on the line, I think.
unidentified
Mel.
art bell
Mel, is it you?
mel waters
It is him.
I can't believe it, Mel.
art bell
Listen, brother, I just spent an hour red-faced, embarrassed, because I thought the Blair Witch Project was real.
And I really thought it was real, Mel.
You know, I really thought it was real.
I mean, I've still got the hook in my mouth here.
And so I guess the first question I ought to ask you is, how long ago, Mel, did we do the shows that we did?
mel waters
Oh, gosh, this must have been about, I'm going to say, 97.
art bell
97.
Well, it was one of the greatest stories, no doubt, ever told.
In fact, it spurred all kinds of things.
Television crews went up to Ellensburg, Washington.
mel waters
I know it.
I know it.
I heard many things.
art bell
So I must begin by asking you, before I go forward any further with you tonight at all, Mel, is this, is Mel's Hole, the story of Mel's Hole, another Blair Witch project?
mel waters
I will not drop any bombshells on you in regards to this being the Blair Witch Project.
This is not the Blair Witch Project.
art bell
Real as a home.
mel waters
My life.
This is my property.
I may end up telling you things that will maybe I haven't seen the Blair Witch Project.
So I don't know anything about that, but I will say that I can tell you some pretty scary things.
art bell
I know you can.
All right, so anyway, I just wanted to get that out of the way here at the beginning before my face goes.
mel waters
No, no, this is not that.
art bell
All right, well, back in 97, I forget, did I get like a fax from you?
mel waters
I sent you a fax way back then.
art bell
Is that how it began?
mel waters
Basically, I was just curious about this hole on my properties.
And I knew with your big audience that somebody might be able to return some information to me.
I tried to do a little research on the depth of various holes and so forth and mines and all of those sort of things.
Well, so it's basically picking your audience's brain is what I was doing at the time.
art bell
Well, we were picking yours.
It's the damn best story I ever heard.
Let's, radio, you have time.
Let's tell.
A lot of the audience would not have been around then and would not have ever heard this story.
And I've never heard one like it in my life.
So if you would.
mel waters
Oh, sure.
I'll recap for you.
art bell
Especially after all these years, it'll be good to see if your story now fits your story then.
mel waters
Okay, well, sure, sure.
Basically, this all started.
I sent artifacts, and you know, I had this property or had this property.
Well, we're going to get into that later on.
art bell
But you owned the property at the time, right?
mel waters
Yeah, it was actually my wife's property.
art bell
Okay, was it empty property, ostensibly?
mel waters
Oh, we had some outbuildings on there, a couple of trailers.
It was really unimproved land, but while I could, I was living there.
I left the property.
art bell
Okay, so you lived in a trailer on the property?
mel waters
Yeah.
unidentified
Okay.
art bell
And then there was another trailer or two on the property.
mel waters
Yeah, there were several outbuildings out there, and I basically was doing a lot of research in various Indian herbal medicine and so forth.
I grew various.
art bell
I remember that.
mel waters
And that was my thing.
And actually, I used to spend a lot of time going to Nevada dealing with the various bands of Indians down there because the herbs that they use are the ones that I've been researching.
And we might talk a little bit about that, too, at some point, because I think you might find that interesting as well.
art bell
All right, now the location, the location of this is near Ellensburg.
mel waters
It's on the Monastash Ridge, which is a little bit south of Ellensburg, but it's the prominent mountains surrounding the Ellensburg area there.
Ellensburg is a little town basically in the center of Washington State, right off of I-90.
And it's a very nice little place.
art bell
Yeah, I hear you.
How long had you been living there?
mel waters
Oh, we'd been there for several years.
art bell
Several years.
mel waters
I'd married this woman in Ellensburg, and we lived there for a while, and then we kind of got broken up.
art bell
Well, at the time that you faxed me, you simply said, I don't even remember the facts now, but you said there was a hole on your property into which I guess for years people had been dumping stuff.
mel waters
Oh, absolutely.
And one of the things I didn't tell you about, one of the things that regularly was dumped in the hole, was a little Mexican fellow who used to come around about once a week with like a big steak bed truck full of tires that he used to dump in there.
And the guy used to pick them up at the various used tire places.
And I guess, you know, it costs money to dispose of tires, right?
art bell
Well, yeah, it does, because they have these big yards where they have these tire fires by mistake, Ha.
mel waters
Well, I don't know.
He'd pick them up from, you know, wherever he had them, you know, if they were too bald to be used as retreads or whatever.
This guy, a little Mexican guy, would pick them up and bring them over.
And he must have dumped like thousands and thousands of tires in there.
art bell
Now, let's describe the hole.
Was the hole just a hole in the ground or was it a well?
mel waters
Well, if you looked at it, if you were walking up to it, you'd say, this is kind of an interesting looking well.
What it was is about nine feet across.
art bell
nine feet across.
mel waters
And there was stonework around it.
I don't know when the stonework got put into it, but it was sort of...
Yes, it was perfectly round.
art bell
And you're saying it was 9 feet in diameter?
mel waters
The diameter was 9 feet.
And what I did is I built a metal cover for the top, so when it wasn't being used as garbage disposal, for lack of a better term, it was covered up because I didn't want any problems, you know, people falling into it, kids falling into it, whatever.
art bell
Oh, yeah, you'd be charged with some crime or something.
mel waters
Well, yeah, I begin to wonder now if they would have ever been heard from again if it had gone into it.
art bell
I don't think so.
You'd just hear a scream disappearing.
mel waters
Yeah, just kind of going on into infinity.
But I'd written to you and I said, I've basically let like 80,000 feet worth of monofilament fishing line.
art bell
Oh, yeah, but there's even more before that.
I mean, you said that people were throwing like dead cows at the fish.
mel waters
Oh, yeah, cows.
I used to love.
One of my favorite things to chuck in there was like television tubes.
Man, I'd throw television tubes, the picture tube down there.
art bell
And it was big enough so you could drop it.
In other words, the hole, I take it for as far as one could see or hear went straight down.
It must have.
mel waters
If I would hold something over towards the center of the hole, I couldn't go all the way to the center because going by nine feet across, that's more than four and a half feet across.
But if I held something out like the size of a picture tube, a 19-inch picture tube from an old TV set and dropped that in there, I would never hear it hit anything.
It would just fall.
art bell
And fall and fall and fall.
mel waters
And that's what made me curious.
How come, you know, I mean, I didn't hear a splash.
art bell
No crash.
mel waters
No crashing.
I mean, I could hear something if I didn't get things like dead center there, you know, and if it spun and then eventually that sound would give up, too.
art bell
By the way, going back, do you have any idea what this hole originally was?
Was it anything?
Was it something that anybody dug, do you think?
Was it something that was naturally always there?
Or what do you think it was?
mel waters
As far as I can determine, and everyone that I'd spoken with said that hole has always been associated with that property.
One person that I talked to says, well, as far as we know, the hole there in your property's been there as long as the whale bone has been in the tree out there in Ellensburg.
Ellensburg is a strange place.
We've got a tree out in Ellensburg in someone's yard.
art bell
Yes.
mel waters
And there's a whalebone jaw growing out of the tree.
art bell
What?
mel waters
Yeah, the jaw of a whalebone, and it's like embedded in the tree.
art bell
Are you telling me the truth?
mel waters
Yeah, you can go to, in fact, I was familiar with, because I used to walk the neighborhoods there and see it.
You could see the tree, but you could actually go to the Yakima Herald newspaper and you could see a picture of it.
art bell
How, look, that's central Washington.
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
That's not the ocean.
mel waters
Yes, no, the ocean is a good, well, Puget Sound's a good 90 miles away.
art bell
90 miles.
So how could there be a whale bone growing out of a tree?
mel waters
There you go.
There you go.
But the whale bone's been there like for 100 years.
You know, and people tell me, you know, the ones I've talked to, well, your hole's been there as long as...
art bell
150 years.
mel waters
You know, so I mean, that, you know, it was a town.
art bell
So that hole was probably there long before.
mel waters
Way before that, and other people held the property.
And, you know, I don't know at what point did, you know, the rockery get built around it, but it's kind of nice.
You know, it looks nice.
art bell
So you're telling me like thousands of tires, refrigerators.
Oh, yeah.
Even dead cattle.
mel waters
Dead animals, dead dogs, whatever.
art bell
It's like you didn't have to burn trash.
mel waters
Oh, no, no, no.
And we're kind of what I would say is sort of ecologically sensible people there.
So we don't really generate a lot of garbage or trash or anything.
But yes, we did put our household trash in there if we didn't use it for compost or things like that.
Right.
So we threw a lot of stuff in there.
art bell
So after years and years, you finally got, and I understand, incredibly curious about how deep this damn thing really was.
mel waters
It was just one of those moments that, you know, all of a sudden you say, good grief.
You know, I've got to get to the bottom of this, right?
So to speak.
And so I used to, when I lived in California, I used to do a lot of shark fishing.
And so I had some of those big old reel-type fishing poles.
And so the first thing I did was empty, oh, it must have been about, oh, it could have been about 1,200 yards of fishing line down there.
art bell
What did you do?
Did you take a rod?
I mean, how did you load it?
mel waters
Yeah, the first adventure that I had with this, and this was kind of, you know, before the obsession began with finding out more about this, is that I basically sent down into the hole from just a big shark fishing fishing pole a fishing weight.
And next to the fishing weight, I also had a roll of lifesavers.
art bell
Life savers.
mel waters
And the reason I had the lifesavers at the end is that if I hit water, this old shark fisherman's trick, if I hit water, the lifesavers would melt.
art bell
Well, sure.
mel waters
Yeah.
See, we used to do that when we go fishing.
art bell
Yeah, in other words, it would be so far down that anything else you would put down there, I see, would obviously be dry by the time you got it back up again.
unidentified
Yeah.
mel waters
So, you know, I just emptied the fishing pole, and then when it got to the end of the line, I just let it sit there for a while.
And it takes a little while for all the lifesavers to melt.
But that's how it would determine that it was wet down there.
They hit water.
art bell
So how much initial line did you have on that first?
mel waters
I'm going through trying to remember what these big pen reels held, but it must have been about 1,200 yards on there.
art bell
1,200 yards?
mel waters
1,200 yards.
So that would have been about 3,600 feet at least.
That was the first expedition into the hole.
art bell
So you let it all the way out?
mel waters
That's right.
art bell
Could you feel at any point like the weight But could you still sense the weight at the end of that line as you hold it?
mel waters
Oh, yeah.
At that distance, you can actually move the line.
You can move it laterally, side to side.
But it was kind of an effort.
You could actually get a swing to it, but it was really hard.
Think about that.
You try to swing something.
It's 3,600 feet.
It's difficult, you know.
art bell
And as you let it down, you didn't feel any turns or twists or...
mel waters
Basically, I let the line go down freely with the weight on.
I had a one-pound fishing weight at the end of this line, and basically it went down and down and down and down and down.
It's at the same pace, basically.
And so, yeah, that's...
art bell
You must have been scratching your head saying, how many feet was that again?
mel waters
That was 3,600 feet.
art bell
3,600 feet.
I guess there are holes that go down 3,600 feet.
I'm not an expert on holes, but...
unidentified
Yeah.
art bell
And so I guess there are holes that maybe go that deep down.
mel waters
That's right.
art bell
But that is where the story continues.
So hold on, Mel.
This is Mel of Mel's Hole, back in the U.S. from Australia.
But then again, that's another story entirely.
You're just beginning to hear this one.
So, with a fishing reel, originally down 3,600 feet, no bottom.
But that is not the end of this story.
I'm Mark Bell.
This is Coast to Coast, AM.
playing a party in the picture show we'll take the long way home we'll take the long way home we'll take the long way home After the program we did with Mel and the one we're doing now, I found out quickly that there was an abiding, gigantic fascination for this kind of thing.
I mean, people, I guess, I don't know exactly what the fascination is.
Frankly, I really don't know.
All I know is I had thousands of emails and faxes from people wanting to know about this hole and telling me, in fact, about other holes.
Mel's hole is not the only deep mystery hole in the world, Mel.
There are others, and people have told me about them, but yours is quite spectacular, to be sure.
But there's some fascination, and you must have felt it when you got down 3,600 feet.
You must have been saying to yourself, what the hell?
mel waters
Well, at that point there, it became kind of a quest to find out how far this will go down.
So I went, basically, when it hit 3,600 feet and came up with dry lifesaver candies, I said, well, I'm going to need more fishing line than this.
And so basically, I let out the 3,600 feet, let another 3,600 feet in from a similar reel.
So I was down at that point to 3,636.
That's 7,200 feet.
art bell
So you're down over, you're like a mile and a half down.
mel waters
Over a mile at that point there.
And I was still going, you know, it was still going down.
At that point, there, the line is still going down.
I'm going down.
I'm going down.
art bell
Now, a number of people said after that first show that after a while, the weight on the end of the line would be insignificant with reference to the weight of the line itself.
mel waters
Yes, and in fact, I quite in fact recall that, and I was curious about it myself.
And the best I could do is, and I wasn't going to bring up all the line I'd let down at the point that we talked about this.
art bell
Yeah, you'd be cranking.
mel waters
Yeah, I would want to get like some sort of motor-driven winch at that point to deal with that.
I didn't want to deal with that.
But anyway, what I did is just attached, looped it around one of those spring fishermen's scales.
It depends you put in your tackle box there and kind of try to get a weight on that thing there.
And I think when I weighed it, it was like 17, 18, somewhere around there, 17, 18 pounds.
art bell
17 or 18 pounds?
mel waters
Yeah, I don't have this written down, so I don't remember exactly, but the combined weight of the weight that I had on there plus the weight of all the line that went into the hole when I took the final reading of line was about 17, 18 pounds of line down there.
And that's a lot.
When you think about a monofilament fishing line, I mean, that stuff, when you have, like, even if you have a spool of it, it's pretty insignificant stuff.
But when you've got that much out there, it's going to weigh a lot.
Almost sure.
art bell
How much, what was the final total of how much you got down there?
mel waters
Oh, I got down exactly at the point that I'd given up putting line in there.
And when I contacted you, I had 80,000 feet worth of line down in there.
art bell
80,000 feet.
mel waters
Zero.
And I don't know, that translates to like, what, 15 miles worth of line?
art bell
Oh, my God.
mel waters
80,000 feet.
art bell
Is there any way that you could be sure...
unidentified
Now, eventually you...
mel waters
No.
Oh, no.
No, I did not bring that line back up again there.
art bell
So you never saw the lifesavers from that far down?
mel waters
No, no, no.
There were lifesavers at the end of it for sure because I just let the assembly go down there.
But it was only, you know, it was just because it was already there.
But I never brought it up.
Not 80,000 feet worth, no.
art bell
And how far down again?
I'm sorry.
One more time.
mel waters
80,000 feet.
art bell
80,000 feet.
mel waters
That's 8,000 with three other zeros.
80,000 feet.
art bell
God, you must have been going out to buy fishing lines.
unidentified
Oh, yeah.
mel waters
Well, I would buy it in like...
If you ever...
art bell
No, I'm not.
That's why I'm struggling a little here.
mel waters
If you go to a professional fishing store where fishermen buy their stuff, they sell the line in the, well, they have the line there in huge bolts.
These things are like about a foot across, and they're big old things there, and they will fill each fisherman's reel from that.
I've got you.
art bell
So you bought the whole thing?
mel waters
I would buy a bolt of line, is what I did.
I said, I'm going to need this much here, and I figure I'll get a good deal on the line by the whole darn thing.
That was my way of doing that.
art bell
Were you telling anybody about this when you were doing this?
mel waters
Oh, when I was doing that?
Well, I think a couple people knew that.
When I went to buy the fishing line, I didn't tell them that I was going to use this to measure the hole on my property.
They don't really care what you're going to do with the fishing line.
As far as they know.
art bell
Yeah, they don't care.
mel waters
Yeah, you buy a fishing line there.
They say, well, you must have a lot of reels to fill.
So I think that was the thing there.
No, I didn't have any problem with that.
The only thing that really differed at that point in how I dealt with the line is that instead of when I exhausted the two fishing poles worth of line, I hooked the line up to what is known in fishing as an outrigger, which is kind of like a short little fishing pole that you would have, it was like about a foot and a half long.
And it went through that.
And I could kind of swivel it over to the side if I needed to, but it didn't, you know, I was going, you know, it wasn't like going down to the middle of the hole.
It was kind of, you know, about a foot and a halfway from the side and let it go down from there.
So I would let the line go through the outrigger is basically what I did.
art bell
How could there be a hole?
I mean, even if you had hit bottom at 80,000 feet, how could there be a hole?
mel waters
Let's say it stopped running at 50,000 feet.
You know, I would have, you know, the line stopped running at 50,000 feet, you know, and I got a reading there 50,000 feet and it stopped.
I said, boy, that's a deep hole, 50,000 feet.
art bell
About 80,000 and no stop.
mel waters
Yeah, it hadn't stopped at that point.
Well, you know, I...
The only thing that we kind of think came out of it is some guy who had a hunting dog that passed away, dog died, he put the dog in the hole, threw the dog in the hole, and it was the belief of several people that the dog came back from the dead.
art bell
And out of the hole?
mel waters
Well, they didn't see it from the hole.
They saw the dog out around town and in the area and stuff.
art bell
So then you're telling me the guy threw his dead dog in the hole.
mel waters
Dead dog in the hole.
art bell
And then the same dog was seen later around.
unidentified
That's right.
mel waters
That's right.
In fact, there was one other situation.
art bell
Well, you know, I always wondered, Mel, you'd once told me when you die, you wanted to be thrown in the hole.
mel waters
That was in my will, and that's how I wanted my remains to be dealt with.
art bell
Or reverently dropped, I guess.
mel waters
Well, I was willing to take that journey.
I thought it would be a great journey.
I believe when I wrote to you, I said the hole was kind of my dogs wouldn't go anywhere near it and things like that.
It kind of had a weird feeling.
art bell
Yeah, well, maybe they knew that another dog got dropped.
mel waters
That could be.
But there was a weird, just a neary sense about it.
And, you know, I thought about that because, you know, I've talked to you, what was...
I'm going to kind of describe the feeling to you.
art bell
All right, please.
mel waters
Sensation that you got there.
Have you ever been surprised by the moon?
It's like you go out, you look out the window, and the moon is up there, and it's just, it's like for a second you don't realize it's the moon.
art bell
Sure.
mel waters
You get that eerie sense.
And then your brain puts together that it is the moon.
art bell
Yeah.
unidentified
Sure.
art bell
That's happened to everybody.
mel waters
But that feeling is like you got that feeling a lot around the hole there.
You felt that feeling.
It was that kind of feeling that you would have.
You get that sense that you were constantly surprised by the moon during the day or during the night.
It didn't matter if the moon was in, the moon was out, didn't matter.
That was the sensation.
And I finally was able to nail it down.
It occurred to me, and I said, That's the same feeling I used to get when I was at my property.
It was that strange feeling.
art bell
Well, you said there was one other thing, too, that happened with that hole that was unusual besides the story about the dog.
mel waters
There's a lot of unusual things about it.
There's a specific unusual thing that you know about it.
Well, the one thing that it was said, are we talking about the thing where people would see like the dark black shaft of light coming out of it?
art bell
No, but tell me about that.
mel waters
Well, this is something, again, that was told to me, but it was the people said that from time to time, what they would see when they would look over towards the property, or if they were on my property and looking out that way, they would see like a shaft of the blackest black that they'd ever seen.
art bell
Coming out of the hole.
mel waters
coming out of the hole and extending up into the sky.
unidentified
Oh, it was like just the that is weird.
mel waters
Yeah, that that is the uh that is a totally and and uh let me ask you this, Mel.
art bell
It's a pretty wide hole nine feet.
Could you take a real high-powered light?
mel waters
Yes, I did shine lights down there and really didn't get very far with the lights that I had.
art bell
I would presume you would see the sides of the lights.
mel waters
I could see that side and I could see where the rock work, and the rock work went down several feet, ran out, and then it was the masonry work around there, you know, where it was like dirt or rocky below that.
But I could definitely see that far.
art bell
And then I guess the light would just flat disappear.
mel waters
Yeah, you just run out of light.
And I'm not sure if I had one of those huge 250,000 candle light power, I don't know how far it would have gone down.
art bell
I've got a 6 million candle power light.
mel waters
Yeah, I'm not.
art bell
But I mean, even that would just poop out.
mel waters
I mean, those kind of things are cool to shoot into the sky.
art bell
I rather found them useful for pointing at photographers hanging around.
mel waters
Oh, those are I've had similar uses of.
art bell
Yeah, they take their video cameras and they split, man.
mel waters
Yeah, they take that a little bit.
Especially if they have the night vision on, you know?
art bell
So then you were so much of a believer in, I don't know, dare I say, the power of the hole?
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
That you wanted to be, you know.
mel waters
Yeah, I wanted to be, when I died, my body was supposed to be put into the hole.
art bell
And I take it your real reason, if I were to ask you for that, is because of the dog story.
mel waters
Absolutely.
Absolutely.
And it was just such a strange thing.
I have talked to people about what the hole actually is.
I mean, not the people that know what it is.
art bell
But there are people who know what it is.
mel waters
Oh, absolutely.
But I cannot go to the people that had my property and say, look, why don't you just fess up there and tell me what it is?
They're not going to tell me.
art bell
All right.
What happened was that you came on my program.
mel waters
Yes.
art bell
Maybe your biggest mistake.
mel waters
Yes.
Yes.
art bell
You told this whole story.
mel waters
Innocently.
art bell
Innocently, that's right.
Absolutely innocently.
And then it was like the next day or a couple of days or how long was it?
mel waters
It was, you know, I talked the day I sent you the facts.
I sent you the facts.
And then I sent the facts, and I believe you read the facts that evening.
And then I went out to the property just to think, oh, good grief, I'm going to have a bunch of people down there.
And so I went out there, and then I came back home.
I wasn't living at the property there because our dwelling unit there got caved in from the snowstorm there.
Some of these little tin shacks here don't hold up too when you've got two feet of snow on top.
So we moved, you know.
I had rented an apartment in Ellensburg.
And so, you know, I went back to the apartment that night, and that's when I talked to you.
I don't remember.
All right.
art bell
And then it was a day or two or whatever.
You went back to the property.
mel waters
Oh, yeah.
art bell
To the show.
mel waters
Yeah, what happened is that it was like the following day.
I went back to my property, and there were, you know, I don't want to sound like I'm a lunatic here, but there was like armed people on my property.
I couldn't get in.
There was barricades there.
There was already a whole bunch of yellow gear.
Your earth-moving equipment was at my property.
Oh, yes.
And I was basically told that there was an airplane accident there.
An airplane crashed on the property and that I couldn't go in there.
art bell
You told them it was your property.
unidentified
Oh, yes.
mel waters
In fact, I think they knew it was my property.
I mean, there was, you know, there was no, you know, I mean, it was, you know, I let them know this is my property.
So, well, you know, we're going to have to, you know, we have to deal with the situation.
Well, I didn't see any smoke.
I didn't see any evidence of a plane crash or anything, but they were not going to let me onto my property.
You know, so I decided, well, I'm going to go back to town at that point there.
You know, it says, okay, this stuff is going on.
And I believe I had talked to you again at that point there, and we discussed.
art bell
You did.
I remember you called me that night and you said, my God, there's armed people up there, and they won't let me in.
mel waters
That's exactly it.
Okay.
And so, again, all this time here, you know, what I have is a situation where my property was taken over.
And why they were out there, how come they chose to go to my particular property that they knew was there.
art bell
Well, obviously there's only one answer.
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
And it's that you were on this program talking about that.
mel waters
That's right.
But for someone to have that incredible level of mobilization, curiosity, wherewithal, and all these things here to deal with that.
You know what I'm saying?
It's like this is a big production.
Well, they want it this program.
art bell
Maybe a hole of this kind justifies that kind of big production.
I mean, maybe there's something.
Well, I can imagine there's something really unusual, special that.
mel waters
There has been some properties that someone was highly interested in that they thought was very valuable to have and that they had to have.
That makes sense, doesn't it?
art bell
They, to you, meaning the government.
mel waters
That's right.
art bell
Were these government employees?
mel waters
At the property, I had both civilian and military people that were there.
art bell
Yeah, that would fix it.
mel waters
But I've got to tell you something.
I mean, I was in the Army many, many years ago, and I know what a green uniform looks like, and the fatigues and so forth.
But I've got to tell you something.
When I'm thinking about it there, I couldn't tell you which army they were.
art bell
Which army?
mel waters
Yeah, I mean, all I knew is they were in military uniforms, okay?
Arms.
I couldn't tell you if they were U.S. I couldn't tell you if they were German.
I told you that they were.
art bell
Did they have sidearms?
mel waters
Did they have they all had weapons.
Everyone there had weapons.
art bell
As well as like semi-automatic weapons or automatic weapons?
mel waters
Exactly.
From what I could tell, they also had fully automatic weapons.
art bell
Fully automatic weapons.
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
Well, that's really intimidating.
I've been in countries where I've encountered people with fully automatic weapons who frowned at me, and I didn't like it.
mel waters
You went to Israel.
You got used to seeing people everywhere you go.
art bell
There's Israel.
That's right.
mel waters
You bet.
art bell
No, hold on.
We'll be right here.
This is Coast to Coast AM.
unidentified
It's time to get ready To realize just what I have found Oh I have to stand on that pair of one line in.
It's all clear to me now.
I have to stand on that pair of one line in.
art bell
Once again, Mel from Mel's Hole fame.
And Mel, somebody just sent me a really interesting fax.
mel waters
Okay.
art bell
Somebody named Scarlett.
It says, how far is Mel's Hole from the place where Dr. Reed had his encounter with the alien?
You know, and that never hit me until I just got this fax.
They are similar areas, I think.
mel waters
Indeed, also not far from where my property was.
Well, I mean, relatively speaking, is where they found Kennewick Man.
art bell
Kennewick Man, yes, right.
mel waters
Along the Silverbridge.
art bell
Well, that's a very unusual area up there.
mel waters
Yeah, I was talking with my nephew about how peculiar Ellensburg is.
I mean, it's a little town, about 12,000 people, half of them college students, actually more than half of them college students.
So you basically got about 6,000 locals there.
Pretty small place.
unidentified
All right.
art bell
Let me stop you.
When you and I last spoke, your encounter with those strange folks up there, you had another encounter with them, and they made you an offer you couldn't refuse.
mel waters
Yeah, well, at first they intimidated the hell out of me because basically they said, look, you know, one of the civilian fellows there said, hey, you know, we could find a drug lab out here and we could put you out of business in a hurry.
You know what I'm talking about?
art bell
That's right, I remember, yes.
mel waters
And for all intents and purposes, it sure as heck could have looked like I had a drug lab out there.
I had a lot of strange non-native plants growing there.
None of them, I have to say, of narcotic nature.
These are just your typical desert, high desert type plants.
And they basically said, hey, we could shut you down, and we don't have to worry about all of this.
Ultimately, they did make me an offer that I could not refuse.
And I will tell you the offer that they made me.
And it had to do with going to Australia.
And I needed money to go to Australia, and I wanted to continue my research in medicinal plants.
And so we put together a very interesting package and a very interesting lease on the land to this party.
art bell
Well, as a matter of fact, you told, did you tell me you were going to Australia?
mel waters
Yes, you did.
Yes.
art bell
Yeah, you told me that they had made you an offer for the land, essentially, which was going to be, if I recall correctly, leasing it in perpetuity.
In perpetuity.
In other words, forever, or for your life anyway.
mel waters
Exactly.
art bell
And so then you were off to Australia with a parcel of money.
mel waters
I'll tell you, they basically gave me a quarter of a million dollars a month for the property.
art bell
A quarter of a million dollars a month, my God.
And so you were, and I know you were in Australia because you sent me a number of emails, which I did mention to my audience from Australia.
I mean, there was no question whether it's from it.
mel waters
Oh, no, I was set up in Australia.
I actually, for a good while, lived out there in Perth, which I loved living in Perth.
art bell
In Perth.
mel waters
Oh, it's wonderful out there.
I loved Australia.
art bell
I thought, here's Mel gone to Australia.
I had no idea you were getting that much money.
Obviously set for life.
mel waters
I'll tell you, it was great.
I built some facilities out there off the Outback, basically, where I can grow the various plants that I was allowed to bring with me and cultivate them over there.
And we also did a fair amount of wombat rescue out there, which was very gratifying.
art bell
Wombat rescue.
mel waters
Yeah, yeah.
They're native marsupials out there, kind of good-sized critter out there, but a lot of them were becoming endangered.
And I can tell you this right now.
The wombats now, and I do believe to some degree with the work that I've done out there, they're making a comeback out there.
art bell
Well, that's wonderful.
But, Mel, what the hell happened?
In other words, here you were in Australia with all this money, and now you're back here, and you've fallen on hard times.
mel waters
Well, you know, I'll tell you, I accepted their offer as I could.
I was basically, you know, I was to leave town.
I left town.
I was actually told to leave my car and wait at the rest stop.
We get off the road outside of Ellensburg, and I was taken to the airport and then taken to San Francisco and then taken to Australia.
And so I'd left the country.
I had my two dogs with me.
art bell
They wanted to be damn sure you were going to Australia.
mel waters
I took my dogs.
I was set up there.
I already had an account already set up for me.
The complex paperwork that was involved in moving as a resident to Australia was all taken care of for me.
I mean, it was a piece of cake.
They'd made the arrangements, and so there was some cooperation on the Australian Government's part.
art bell
Holy smokes.
I know they can do this kind of thing, but I mean, it tells you how important this hole must be.
mel waters
They were basically willing to give me $3 million a year for the use of the property and, you know, basically non-disclosure on certain aspects.
And, you know, I can only disclose as much as I can disclose, and there's a lot of things I don't know.
art bell
Well, listen, I can sympathize with that.
Take the money and run.
Hell yes.
mel waters
Hey, you know, to me, it was fine.
art bell
On the one hand, you got the guys with the automatic weapons, and on the other hand, you got the guys with the money and the ticket.
unidentified
Yeah, so I...
mel waters
No, no. 99 of 100 people in the same situation would take it.
art bell
And I don't blame you for one second.
And so you went to Australia?
mel waters
Well, it was wonderful.
art bell
I loved it.
mel waters
I did a lot of good work out there.
art bell
What happened?
What happened, Mel?
mel waters
Well, a number of things happened there.
And I'll tell you, one of the things was I did continue my work with the herbs.
I had some incredible successes out there with some of the things that I'd actually imported from my property out there to Australia.
art bell
They usually don't like that stuff.
mel waters
Pardon?
art bell
They usually don't like that stuff.
mel waters
No, but we had found some of the plants that I had grown out there had some very remarkable properties.
art bell
Do you think that anything to do with the area where they were originally near the hole?
mel waters
Absolutely because I've had other plants there that were not native to the whole property that did not have similar results.
So I know that growing in proximity of the whole, and we did a lot of cultivation there.
One of the reasons for being where I was in central Washington was the type of climate that was there was very conducive to growing to the various things I did.
And I tried to find similar conditions out there in Australia as well.
art bell
Yeah, but when I say, Mel, what happened?
I mean, how did you go from being relatively rich and well-off in Australia, now you're back here, not well-off?
mel waters
I'm back here, and as you recall, I was to make an appearance on the show, I believe.
art bell
Yeah, that's right.
You sent me YouTube.
mel waters
I told you I was going to be in town.
We got in touch, and I actually talked to you here from the States.
art bell
I promoted it.
I said, Mel's got hold of me.
He's in the States.
He's going to come on the show.
And then, of course, you were a no-show.
mel waters
Well, I'm going to relate to you the chain of events that occurred from the day that I was supposed to appear on the show as much as I can remember and bring it up to date till now.
Okay, on the day that I was going to be on the show, I helped my nephew move from his apartment.
art bell
Right.
mel waters
We got him a place down in the Olympia area.
art bell
Right.
mel waters
And so, you know, we moved him down there and all of that.
And we got him down here.
And then I was going to basically, we had to return the truck back to the Tacoma area.
So we got him all settled here.
I got up to Tacoma, returned the truck, and I was going to take the bus down to Olympia.
Just take the transit.
There's a bus that runs from Tacoma to Olympia.
So I got on the bus and ran down there.
And I got on the bus, and there was an altercation on the bus.
There was fighting.
There was commotion going on.
Anyway, we pulled into the, and some of you listeners might actually remember this, but if they were on the bus, or they might have heard of it.
But we pulled into the 512 park and ride, and some apparent transit people got on the bus, and they wanted to ask questions about what happened on the bus.
And, you know, and I got off the bus and I said I'd talk to these guys here, but I have to get back to Olympia here because they're going to do all of this here.
And so they said, that's no problem.
We're going to, you know, we've got the transit bus here.
We'll just take you back to Olympia.
And I says, okay.
And that's the last thing I remember.
art bell
The last thing you remember?
unidentified
About what was it?
mel waters
About 12 days later, I found myself in San Francisco.
art bell
Somebody hit you.
Did what did you?
mel waters
I had no idea.
At that point, I found myself in San Francisco in a pretty rough part of town in an alley.
These bums were basically trying to wake me up.
art bell
Holy mackerel.
mel waters
They were trying to get me to sing.
I remember this.
They were trying to get me to sing on the road again because I sort of looked like Willie Nelson.
art bell
No, are you sure?
mel waters
This is exactly what happened.
art bell
And you lost how many days?
unidentified
Twelve days.
art bell
From an altercation on a bus.
mel waters
I was told that they wanted to talk to me about it, and they were willing to take me back to Olympia from there.
So, you know, I got onto the little transit van.
That's the last thing I remember.
art bell
So 12 days gone when you, God knows what, were knocked out or kept in some kind of coma or.
mel waters
When I woke up there, you know, I had nothing on me.
I had no identification.
I had no wallet.
I had no keys.
I had the clothes I had when I was moving.
They were still as grubby and filthy as after you move, you get all grubby and filthy.
I was in my clothes.
I oriented myself down there.
I looked around.
I noticed there was pain in my arm.
I rolled up my sleeve.
It looked like looking at my elbow now here.
It looked like, what would you say?
An IV was taped to my skin.
Yeah.
There was still the residue of tape on my arms.
art bell
Yeah, I understand.
So obviously somebody kept you out for 12 days for some reason.
mel waters
And you listened to the first part of your show.
And, you know, you're talking about teeth.
All of my back teeth have been removed.
art bell
What?
mel waters
I have no back teeth.
art bell
You have no back teeth?
mel waters
You don't mean like...
art bell
You're not talking about wisdom teeth.
mel waters
No back teeth.
None on top, none on bottom.
Why would they take your teeth?
I have no idea, Art.
The next thing I had, I got in touch with my nephew.
I said, look, I'm down here.
He gets me a Greyhound ticket to pick up at the bus station over there.
I get on the bus.
art bell
You were broke?
mel waters
I had nothing.
art bell
Nothing.
mel waters
I had nothing.
That was it.
He gets me on the bus.
I take the bus back.
He told me he was just absolutely frantic because I'd called him collect from down there.
art bell
I was frantic, too.
I couldn't figure out what happened to you.
mel waters
So what happened is there I am.
It looked like something had occurred to me there.
I had no teeth there.
I have no idea why I have no teeth in the back.
Bad front teeth.
art bell
Were there scars where your teeth had been under...
mel waters
Oh, yeah.
In fact, at the time there, I was still bleeding from the back of the mouth.
I mean, I could still taste blood in the back of my mouth there.
So it was pretty ugly.
art bell
Boy, you were screwing with somebody you shouldn't have been screwing with.
mel waters
Well, I would think that the easy answer would be that it had something to do with I'm going to get on the air and blah, blah, blah, and say this and that.
art bell
In other words, since I had promoed the show.
mel waters
Yeah, but that's really not it.
art bell
If that is it, then you could be in danger now.
mel waters
Well, I don't believe that was it because there's a lot of things that I was doing.
I got myself in trouble.
art bell
Yeah, but Mel, if you think about the fact that look what happened after the first time you came on my show, then look what happened after I promoed years later that you were going to be on my show again and you're gone for 12 days, you have to imagine there's a possibility of a relationship there.
mel waters
We could take the connection and we could put it on the back burner.
But I'm a curious fellow.
I mean, any guy that runs 80,000 feet of line into a hole.
art bell
He's a curious guy, yeah.
mel waters
He's a curious guy.
You know, I got back to my nephews, and I'm still with my nephew now.
art bell
Don't even say where.
mel waters
No, but I found out that I don't know if you can appreciate this or that, but the next thing that happened to me is that I found that there was some legal action taken against me.
art bell
Legal action?
mel waters
And the legal action was taken on behalf of my former wife.
art bell
Your former wife?
mel waters
Yeah.
Basically, I had the property on the monastashes.
art bell
You had said it was her property.
mel waters
It was her property, and it was basically she had leased it to me in perpetuity as part of our divorce settlement.
I had helped her go through school.
art bell
All right, Mel, Mel, Mel.
Yeah, hold on.
We're at the bottom of the hour.
Oh, it just gets worse and worse.
unidentified
And a kid without a set.
art bell
Hope she didn't do that to him.
unidentified
And maybe grow up to be friends.
mel waters
We'll be right back.
unidentified
America.
America.
mel waters
I was without my belt buckle, and that really, you know.
art bell
They took your belt buckle?
mel waters
Yeah, I had to buy.
art bell
Now that's really low.
mel waters
Well, it was just, you know, I had everything else, and there was another belt buckle on here.
It was dope, but I had made a belt buckle out of a silver fork, eating fork, and bent it.
I used to bend metal and do all kinds of things with it, and fashioned a nice belt buckle out of that.
art bell
That was gone.
mel waters
And I used to tumble stones and stuff, too.
And I just had a nice-looking rock that I had on there, too, that I picked up and put on there.
And it was like, you know, I had my pants, I had my shoes, I had my socks, and why take my belt buckle?
But even that might be getting ahead of myself here.
But anyway, I get back and find out that there was some legal action taken against me here, and it was initiated by my former wife.
art bell
I see.
mel waters
Basically, I had the property through part of the divorce settlement there, and I helped her with her school, and it was pretty worthless land.
And she said, well, I'll give you that as part of the settlement there.
art bell
So then what was the legal action?
She wanted the whole back?
mel waters
Well, what happened was that the papers I was served with said that I was in violation of the terms of the lease with her.
art bell
With her?
mel waters
Exactly.
You know, as part of the divorce settlement, and the number of things that occurred at my property.
One, that there were underground fuel tanks put in.
Number two, there was a septic system put in.
art bell
Oh, this is what the people who came up there put in.
mel waters
Number three, there was some paving of roads, and these were all things that were not supposed to occur on the property.
art bell
Gotcha.
mel waters
And so basically, I had lost all rights to the property out there, period.
The sad thing about it was I was giving my former wife, because we kind of had an agreement there, that if I were to profit from the property, I would, you know, take care of her.
We had, you know, we didn't, you know, we didn't have enough there to keep a marriage going, but certainly didn't have anything against her.
I was giving her $25,000 a month.
art bell
Oh, it's pretty generous.
mel waters
Yeah, I would.
art bell
I figured that would keep her.
unidentified
Well, she must have smelled the colour of the money.
mel waters
Basically, I figured.
art bell
She must have known if you were giving her $25,000, there was a lot more in that hole, huh?
mel waters
But, I mean, there's no way that she would have had access to the property as far as I can tell, and someone had to get to her.
art bell
Well, yeah, but if she's got control of the property now, then she's probably made dealing with them, yes.
With them.
And you're out in the cold, and you get left with the bums in San Francisco and no back teeth.
mel waters
I'm down there in a really ugly part of town.
I've got to tell you there, I don't have any back teeth.
I don't even have my belt buckle.
And, you know, right now I'm at the point there where I'm actually, you know, you could probably tell I'm a smoker, but I'm actually having to sell plasma in order to buy cigarettes.
That's how bad I am right now.
art bell
Oh, my God.
Talk about a richest durag story.
mel waters
I mean, we're talking all the way around there.
art bell
Well, and still you're pursuing this, Mel.
mel waters
Now, I don't have to know.
art bell
I don't want to name these people.
You know, you've got some names here.
mel waters
Yeah.
art bell
And I don't want to name them on the air because I just want to be careful here.
unidentified
Okay.
art bell
But you want to find, for example, the Mexican fellow who used to throw the...
Why do you want him?
A Catholic priest you're looking for.
mel waters
That's right.
There's a priest.
There's a Hungarian fellow that I need to get in touch with.
art bell
People who have something to do with the hole.
My question is, after all of this, Mel, what do you think you can do?
mel waters
Well, you know, maybe I should run this back to my time in Australia, okay?
art bell
All right.
mel waters
And, you know, I did bring some of the various plants that we had grown on the property by the hole there.
And it was just various plants.
If anyone wants to, they could probably do a little research and find out exactly which plants they are because the plants themselves have been written about for the last hundred years.
And they had remarkable properties.
Like one.
Pardon?
art bell
Like one.
mel waters
Well, I'm not going to say the names of plants.
unidentified
No, no, no.
art bell
Properties.
mel waters
Remarkable.
Oh, they were used, for instance, by a certain Army doctor for dealing with the great influenza that we had at the turn of the century.
The one that killed all those people?
art bell
Yes, millions.
mel waters
Yes, and the people that reserve received this, it was an Indian concoction.
We're just fine.
And no problems whatsoever.
art bell
But, I mean, you have been, pardon the pun, kicked in the teeth over this now.
And so why do you want to keep pursuing it?
unidentified
I mean, if you keep going after this.
mel waters
It doesn't matter at this point in a lot of ways.
I'm 68 years old.
art bell
Yes, sir.
mel waters
Or I will be 68 in June.
I mean, I had a simple life before this.
I had, you know, I had an extraordinary run for the last several years.
And I still need to get some answers for things.
I need to get hold of the guy that I gave the gun to.
I believe he contacted you.
art bell
So where did you get that gun?
mel waters
That I dug up on the property.
I planted various things out there.
And from time to time, when I'm clearing a piece of land to plant on, I'll dig up rocks and I'll dig up metal and all kinds of things there.
And I found this gun and a holster and those little odds and ends along with it there.
And I just basically took this and threw it in my drawer in my little workshop there, my office that I had on property there.
And then when I had a move, I gave it to this fellow because I needed to move into the apartment, I gave it to him as a deposit on the apartment.
art bell
So it must have been a decent gun.
mel waters
It was, from what I could tell, and I'm not a big gun man, but it was a German P-38.
It looked like one of those, you know, like the Nazis used to use back in World War II.
art bell
Yeah, you might have really had something on your hands there, and you gave it to the guy.
mel waters
Well, again, I'm not a gun person.
I figure I might be worth something.
I don't know.
It didn't make any sense.
art bell
Why do you think getting hold of him now would be meaningful?
mel waters
Well, for one, we can't get hold of him.
And two, for some of the things that I remember about the gun now and that I also found out and also what he had indicated to you about the gun as well.
And what I had found out, and I talked with his son, his son basically says that this fellow is he left the family, he left his wife, he left everyone there, he can't be found at all.
And so I'd like him to contact me.
art bell
So he's disappeared, too.
mel waters
And he had the gun that I gave him there, and it was found on the property.
art bell
And suppose you found the Mexican guy who threw down all the tires, thousands of tires.
What would you do with him?
mel waters
Well, part of this is also connected with the gun.
So I'm going to tell you a little bit more about this here and what I found out about it.
And I might be able to verify it with some of my own experience.
Fire away.
I had talked with this guy's son, and this guy said that his father kind of became obsessed with this gun here, and I believe what he'd indicated to you is that he would shoot this gun and it wouldn't make a sound.
art bell
Yeah, I remember that.
That was a long time ago, didn't I?
mel waters
Yes, yes.
unidentified
Well, I knew exactly who it was.
mel waters
I'm here to tell you the guy is speaking the gospel there when he contacted you.
But this thing was like dead silent and was really weird.
Well, I talked to this guy's son because he's kind of close with my nephew and we got talking.
He says, you know what was interesting about this, what my dad told me, and when we were talking about it, and he kind of demonstrated for him, is that he would set the gun down near the radio and it would pick up signals from all over the place,
like from the past, from the present, from any type of radio signals, and you could change the channels on the radio.
art bell
This is really weird, Mel.
mel waters
Look, this is the best.
art bell
Everything that comes out of the area of that hole is weird.
mel waters
Well, this is what I'm telling you here, is that he would do that if he would just like about a foot away from it, wave his hand near the gun.
The channels would change there, and he would get something like a baseball game from 1963, or it would be a weather report from Iowa, or it would be something from Canada, or it would be Mexican music playing.
But if he was very still, it would stay exactly on a certain channel there, and he would get something like out of time with it.
art bell
That's weird.
mel waters
Okay?
art bell
That's really weird.
mel waters
And so that is.
art bell
Now I see why you want to find the gun.
mel waters
Well, I'd like to find him.
I'd like to find out that he's okay and that he hasn't done anything really peculiar or very strange.
art bell
Maybe it's true that everybody who in any way encountered the hole in the area came to problems.
mel waters
Well, the guy with the tires, I want to get in touch with him because I had given his it must have been a son or it must have been a grandson of his.
He once drove the truck out there and he had some problems on the property and his son drove out there after him to help him with the truck and get him going there.
And he had trouble there too.
To make a long story short, I gave him a couple of buckets of five-gallon paint buckets full of rocks and metal and stuff that I'd picked up on the property.
Instead of chucking them aside, I would just toss them in these buckets and occasionally I'd sort through them and see what's going on.
But I gave it to him to put in the back of his car so he can get out of there because he wasn't getting any traction.
So normally out there when you're in that part of the country, you always carry a couple of bags of sand or something in the back of your vehicle for traction.
So he has a couple of buckets of rocks and possibly dirt and stuff that I want to get on my hand.
art bell
So you think then that anything that came from that area has unusual properties?
mel waters
I'm beginning to believe that.
I'm beginning to believe that.
And if we reel this story up to Australia, is that I was approached when I was in Australia because I was dealing with some people in the various ministries there, the government things, the ministries of health and different things there.
And they were kind of interested in what I was doing.
And I was approached at one point to take some of the things that I had brought from the U.S. And we gave them to some people up there, three men who had like advanced HIV.
I mean, these guys were in hospice.
art bell
Yeah.
mel waters
Well, they're not in the hospice anymore.
They're not on death story anymore.
These guys are doing just fine.
art bell
Wow.
mel waters
This was stuff that we've grown.
unidentified
And Mel, why did you...
This is some story.
mel waters
Oh, I just came back here to be with my family and what family I have here.
art bell
Obviously a big mistake.
mel waters
Back in the U.S. here, and that was my primary reason for coming up here.
art bell
Yeah, I know.
But if you had stayed there, you might still be sipping piña coatas and stuff.
mel waters
You know, I do wish I was there.
I've got to tell you, on the beaches in Australia, the women there were barely more than two band-aids and a postage stamp.
I've heard that, Mel.
I mean, it's gorgeous.
More ways than one out there.
art bell
So the money's gone, the postage stamp girls are gone, the keys are gone.
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
Belt buckle's gone.
mel waters
Belt buckle's gone.
Sun's gone.
I'm trying to get hold of a few people.
The Hungarian man, he lived in the area, and actually I have a lot of interest in getting to him.
The priest fellow, same thing.
He's kind of connected to the Hungarian fellow.
art bell
Mel, you know, I'm going to make a suggestion to you.
Maybe you should do what a lot of people do, and you should write a book about this.
Have you considered it?
mel waters
I don't know.
I mean, my nephew was writing something based on me.
He just thought it was great.
He says, oh, I know this celebrity kind of guy here.
art bell
People wrote songs about what happened to you.
mel waters
Oh, I know.
My nephew just showed me the other day.
He had a compact disc called The Ballad of Mels Hole.
I mean, it's incredible.
People told me they had drinks named after all of this.
art bell
Mels Hole drinks?
mel waters
Yeah, you know, in the various bars in town in Ellensburg.
And I mean, it was quite a remarkable phenomenon out there.
It was really amazing.
I couldn't, you know, it really created quite a stir out in that part of the country.
art bell
Well, you know, have you tried, this is a key question, have you tried to go back to the hole or the property where the hole is?
mel waters
No, I can't say that I blame you really.
Right now, I'm keeping some of my cards close to the vest because I'd like to put some of the screws on my former wife there to see that, hey, let her know, and I hope she's listening, that, hey, you know what happened to me?
art bell
Can happen to you?
mel waters
Can happen to you, and it might be worth your while to keep me a little bit quiet about things, you know.
art bell
Say $25,000?
mel waters
Look, right now, I'm happy for an acre or two of land and a trailer I can call my own, you know, where I can keep doing my work.
art bell
Well, this is some odyssey.
This is something you've been through, Mel.
All over us.
Well, I was going to say stinging hole is not a stinging hole.
It's an unusual hole.
mel waters
Yeah, basically it's a hole, but I really did get the shaft in the end here.
art bell
It's not funny.
Sorry.
mel waters
It has been a remarkable thing.
I don't know.
Did you read the facts that I sent you?
unidentified
Yes.
Okay.
mel waters
I mean, did you read it to the audience?
art bell
Oh, no.
Because there were names in it.
mel waters
I didn't want to.
Is there anything in there you wouldn't want me to talk about on the air?
art bell
Only the names.
mel waters
No specific names?
art bell
No specific names.
mel waters
Specific incidents?
art bell
Well, we've covered a lot of that.
mel waters
Okay.
Can I say this?
There is a very, very, very strong connection with the Heavensgate incident and my property.
art bell
Well, okay, I will say this.
You wanted to make contact with anyone who saw Marshall Applewhite up in that Ellensburg area prior to the last appearance on Coastal Coast.
By the way, Mel, for your original appearance here was, damn, I had it here.
mel waters
In February of 97.
art bell
I think it was February 21st of 1997.
I got a call from my board up during the break here.
And he said February 1st, 1997.
And so you think somehow there's some connection to the whole Heaven's Gate thing?
mel waters
I do believe.
And that occurred, as you recall, about a month after my appearance.
art bell
I recall, yeah, I recall the show.
mel waters
And I don't want to hurt anybody's feelings.
art bell
Well, there's no way for people to get hold of you, is there?
I mean, nothing that you can give out.
mel waters
I will give out an email address if anybody wants to get in touch with you.
art bell
Really?
unidentified
Yes.
art bell
Okay, buddy, go for it.
mel waters
Okay, Mel Waters.
art bell
Mel Waters.
mel waters
One word, run it together, at home.com.
unidentified
Mel Waters at home?
mel waters
Home, H-O-M-E.
art bell
At home.
mel waters
Oh, I don't have a domain name for.
art bell
So that's M-E-L-W-A-T-E-R-S at home, H-O-M-E-H.com.com.
Well, you're going to get a lot of email, Melbourne.
mel waters
Well, I really want to know if something, if that priest will contact me.
art bell
I want anyone that knows any of the people from back then that had to do with you.
And the whole.
mel waters
That's right.
The Hungarian man I'm very, very, very anxious to get hold of, and I do believe he would get in touch with me.
art bell
Well, Mel, I'm so sorry all this has happened to you.
We're running out of time here, but you will never know how sorry I am that all this has happened to you.
mel waters
I'm going to move along here.
art bell
You will prevail.
mel waters
And who knows?
unidentified
You may not have heard the last of all of this.
art bell
Oh, listen.
unidentified
And if my wife is listening, ex-wife is listening.
mel waters
Hey, you owe me.
art bell
All right, that's Mel Waters at home, H-O-M-E.com.
You brought here from the media, too.
Listen, buddy.
mel waters
Hold it on your website, Bear.
I want those people to get hold of me.
art bell
Hold on to your front teeth, Mel.
mel waters
Thank you.
art bell
Later, buddy.
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