Rick and Marty Lagina gather their team, including Craig Tester, Dave Blankenship, Dan Blankenship, Charles Barkhouse, Jack Begley, Doug Crowell, and metal detection expert Gary Drayton, in a newly constructed War Room to launch Season 6. The agenda centers on the "Big Three": the Money Pit, Smith's Cove, and the swamp. Among last season's key finds were two 17th-century coins, a brooch containing a hand-cut rhodolite garnet, and the lead cross from Smith's Cove bearing a striking resemblance to a carving in a Templar prison in Domme, France. Marty proposes clearing the overgrown western lots so Gary can metal detect there, while Rick pushes for a seismic survey of the Money Pit and Craig outlines plans for a massive steel cofferdam at Smith's Cove to expose the U-shaped structure Dan Blankenship discovered in 1970.
Eagle Canada conducts a test-line seismic scan across the Halifax Tunnel, a 110-foot shaft dug in 1867 approximately 200 feet south of the Money Pit. Some 150 charges, each containing 20 grams of dynamite, are detonated while geophones record the sound waves. Geophysicist Jeremy Church presents the results via videoconference, confirming a disruption between 90 and 120 feet that corresponds to the Halifax Tunnel's known location. The detection marks the first time in 223 years that anyone has imaged what lies beneath the Money Pit area. With the proof of concept established, the team commits to a full-scale 3-D survey using 1,300 charges and 1,500 geophone receivers arranged in a grid pattern around the C-1 and H-8 shafts.
At Smith's Cove, Marty, Gary, Charles, and archaeologist Laird Niven search the beach near where the lead cross was recovered the previous year. Gary recovers a piece of cut lead that he associates with Spanish galleon waterproofing, noting it could also be connected to the mysterious U-shaped structure buried beneath the cove. On Lot 2, Rick, Gary, and Jack Begley locate a King George III cartwheel two-pence coin dated to 1797, just two years after the Money Pit's discovery, one of 720,000 such coins minted during a British shortage of small currency. Nearby, Gary discovers an iron spike completely embedded in a large granite boulder, with several drilled holes of uniform diameter visible once the moss is cleared. The feature resembles a ringbolt of the type used to thread chains for hauling heavy cargo, and the team identifies what appears to be a carved triangle on the stone's face, possibly a Mason's mark. Laird determines the site requires formal archaeological evaluation before further excavation can proceed.
Continuing on Lot 21, near the protected foundation of Daniel McGinnis's home, Rick and Gary unearth an old iron hinge before pulling a bejeweled brooch from the soil, heavier and more ornate than the one found on Lot 8 the previous season, and set with a red stone. Gary calls it a top-pocket find, and the team plans to have both brooches professionally examined to determine whether they are related and how far back they might date.
Craig Tester, Peter Fornetti, and Dave Blankenship travel to the University of New Brunswick in Fredericton to have the lead cross tested by Dr. Chris McFarlane, a professor of geochemistry, assisted by lab technician Brandon Boucher. Using laser ablation, McFarlane vaporizes a microscopic sample and feeds it into a mass spectrometer. The results reveal trace silver in the lead, consistent with old-fashioned smelting, and isotope ratios that do not match any deposit in North America. The cross was definitively crafted from European lead. Craig shares the findings in a War Room conference call, and the team sees the result as strengthening rather than eliminating the Templar connection. Separately, Peter, geophysicist Mike West, and technician Andrew Gillis conduct an EM61 deep-metal survey at Smith's Cove, where readings spike to 3,000 to 3,400 millibels against a baseline near zero, indicating a significant metal object buried well below the surface. Rick, Craig, and Dave also visit Irving Equipment's headquarters in St. John, New Brunswick, where an augmented-reality HoloLens simulation of the planned 525-foot cofferdam is presented and the team gives the green light for construction.
