Ben McDaniel

Summary

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True Crime All The Time Unsolved

Episode 470: Ben McDaniel

Release Date: June 22, 2026
Hosts: Mike Ferguson & Mike Gibson
Case: The disappearance of Ben McDaniel, a diver who vanished while cave diving at Vortex Spring, Florida, in August 2010.

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Episode Overview

This episode delves into the mysterious disappearance of Ben McDaniel, an experienced diver who went missing during a solo cave dive at the notorious Vortex Spring in Florida. The hosts, Mike Ferguson and Mike Gibson, explore Ben's personal struggles, the technical challenges and dangers of cave diving, the exhaustive (but unsuccessful) search efforts, and the varied theories about what really happened to Ben—including accident, foul play, or voluntary disappearance.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Background on Ben McDaniel (04:47–07:43)

• Ben, born in 1980 in Collierville, Tennessee, was the eldest of three sons and an avid outdoor enthusiast with experience in scuba diving and rock climbing.
• After a series of personal setbacks—failed business, divorce, significant tax debt, and the tragic loss of his younger brother Paul—Ben was in a difficult place emotionally.
• His parents, concerned for his wellbeing, offered him a sabbatical at their Florida beach house, hoping it would aid his mental health (08:29–09:12).

2. Vortex Spring: Setting & Dangers of Cave Diving (09:12–16:22)

• Vortex Spring is Florida’s largest diving facility, attracting about 30,000 visitors a year. The water is a constant 68°F and features a cavern and a dangerous cave system (09:42–10:23).
• The entrance to the cave is guarded by a locked gate (cave certification required for entry) and a sign with the Grim Reaper warning, “Stop. Go no farther. There’s nothing in this cave worth dying for.” (12:41–13:11)
  • Ferguson: “That’s words that I would probably take to heart. Alright, folks, let’s turn around. It’s literally telling me, don’t go in there.” (13:08)
• The policy came after the deaths of 13 divers in the cave in the 1980s, emphasizing the extreme risks even for experts (13:23–14:21).

3. Ben’s Experience & possible Rule-Breaking (16:22–18:28)

• Ben, though an open water-certified diver, was not certified for cave diving—requiring months of training and 125 dives with an instructor.
• Vortex Spring employees, such as Eduardo Tarrant and Chuck Cronin, suspected Ben was entering the cave by tampering with the security gate and considered him too confident for his level of certification (16:34–17:36).
• Gibson: “Tell somebody they can’t do it, they’re going to want to prove to you that they can…” (18:06)

4. Events of August 18, 2010: The Disappearance (21:23–26:35)

• The day Ben disappeared, he made preparations for a late-day dive at Vortex Spring. He was seen filling air tanks and inspecting equipment.
• Employees saw him enter the cave after the gate was unlocked (possibly for him) and left without waiting for his return bubbles as they had occasionally done.
• The next two mornings, Ben’s truck remained parked; personal items like his wallet with $700, phone, and his dog were left behind, which family and investigators considered a bad sign.

5. The Search & Forensic Challenges (27:20–36:39)

• Only a handful of qualified divers could aid the search; veteran diver Ed Sorenson led efforts, diving deep into dangerous, mapped, and unmapped portions of the cave—without finding Ben or evidence he’d gone beyond reachable points (31:44–34:06).
• Sorenson: “Without training, there was no way Ben could have gotten through some of the narrower restrictions… I don’t think Ben was in the cave.” (34:06)
• None of Ben's gear—which should be left as decompression markers if he had progressed far—has ever been recovered.

6. Alternative Theories (35:09–46:11)

• The hosts consider whether Ben might have chosen to disappear due to his troubled life, but his family rejects this, insisting he wouldn't inflict the same pain on them he suffered when his brother died.
• Some at Vortex Spring and even documentary producers entertained theories that Ben started a new life—but no activity showed up on his bank, email, or social accounts.
• In 2011, two cadaver dogs signaled toward the water, but repeated water tests showed no bacterial evidence of a decomposing body (43:38–44:17).

7. Foul Play and Vortex Spring Personnel (46:11–48:39)

• Family-hired PI Lynn Marie Carty found several people at Vortex Spring, besides owner Lowell Kelly, had criminal records.
• Kelly faced his own legal issues, including assault, and died under suspicious circumstances in 2012.
• Some considered the possibility of a wild-eyed drunk or teens being involved with Ben’s disappearance or some crime being stumbled upon.

8. Searches, Rewards, and Tragedy (48:53–50:28)

• The McDaniels’ offer of a $10,000 reward (eventually raised to $30,000) encouraged more risky dives, with some experienced divers feeling slighted and warning it would attract ill-prepared searchers.
• Diver Larry Higginbotham died in the cave during a presumed search for Ben, his body found quickly—fueling doubt that Ben’s body could have gone undiscovered.

9. Conflicting Expert Opinions & Continuing Mystery (52:28–55:00)

• Most expert divers believe Ben’s body is not in the accessible cave system, but some, like diver-filmmaker Jill Heinerth, think panic could have driven Ben into unreachable areas (“sometimes they burrow so deep they can’t be found”).
• As of 2026, Ben is still officially missing—no body, no additional gear, no clear evidence of foul play or disappearance.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the Cave's Danger:
  Mike Ferguson [13:08]: “It’s literally telling me, don’t go in there.”
• On Taking Risks:
  Mike Gibson [18:06]: “Tell somebody they can’t do it, they’re going to want to prove to you that they can...”
• On Expert Search Efforts:
  Mike Ferguson [34:06]: “Sorensen didn’t think Ben was in the cave.”
• On Family’s Heartbreak:
  Mike Ferguson [43:31]: “Would you ever really believe that your loved one would willingly leave your life, disappear, start a new life, never contact you again?”
• On Reward Dilemmas:
  Ed Sorenson (as quoted by Ferguson) [50:00]: “Not only did the reward endanger the lives of divers who would risk going farther than they should, it put all of our lives at risk because we have to go in to recover the body.”
• On the Ongoing Mystery:
  Mike Ferguson [52:50]: “The one thing I would say is that I think there’s been a lot more experts say there’s no way his body could be down there than say he is down there or could be down there.”

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Important Timestamps

• Ben’s Background & Lead-up (04:47–09:12): Ben’s life before disappearance, his losses, and the decision to move to Florida.
• Vortex Spring Dangers Explained (09:12–16:22): Layout of the spring, grim warnings, and risks.
• Suspicion & Rule-breaking (16:22–18:28): Ben’s lack of cave certification, employee suspicions.
• Day of Disappearance (21:23–26:35): Ben’s preparations, timeline, last sightings.
• Initial Search & Sorenson’s Efforts (31:44–36:39): Details on expert searches and lack of evidence.
• Alternative Theories & Polygraphs (35:09–46:11): Family’s thoughts; theories of run-away, foul play, and suspicious local characters.
• Reward Fallout & Tragic Aftermath (48:53–50:28): Unintended consequences of the reward, subsequent diver death.
• Expert Opinions & Unresolved Questions (52:28–56:07): Clash of expert beliefs, reflection on the enduring mystery.

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Tone and Listener Engagement

As always, the hosts maintain a tone mixing empathy, dark humor, and curiosity. They openly question each theory, reflect on their own risk appetites, and engage in lighthearted banter despite the grave topic.

• Listener Empathy: Genuine discussion of the pain for Ben’s family; understanding why they persisted in searching every avenue.
• Humor: Regular banter about their own lack of interest in risk-taking, references to Mensa, scuba dolls, and “digging to China.”
• Critical Discussion: Thoughtful breakdowns of technical and psychological aspects of both cave diving and missing person cases.

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Conclusion

Ben McDaniel’s disappearance remains a haunting case, perplexing even the most seasoned experts. Despite exhaustive searches, robust theories, and media attention, the truth of what happened to Ben at Vortex Spring remains elusive—a lasting and deeply personal tragedy for his family and a persistent enigma for the cave diving and true crime communities alike.

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Summary prepared by True Crime All The Time Unsolved Podcast Summarizer.

Transcript

[Commercial Announcer]

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[Juliette Cowley]

hi, I'm Juliette Cowley, a retired FBI profiler and host of the True Crime podcast the Real FBI Profilers. If you're fascinated with true crime and criminal profiling, then join us as we discuss real cases and examine the behavior exhibited before, during and after the commission of the crime. You can listen to the consult wherever you get your podcasts. It's as close as it gets to being in the room with the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit.

[Mike Ferguson]

Hello everyone, and welcome to episode 470 of the True Crime all the Time Unsolved podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson, and with me, as always, is my partner in true crime, Mike Gibson. Gibby, how are you?

[Mike Gibson]

I'm doing good, man. How about you?

[Mike Ferguson]

I'm doing great. I am as rested as I've been a long time. You and I are both just getting back from vacation. We took last week off. I went to Jamaica for my daughter's wedding. We had a blast. You went to Greece?

[Mike Gibson]

I did.

[Mike Ferguson]

And what happened?

[Mike Gibson]

I ate some good food, you know. Well, I did get engaged.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. That's kind of how you told the story at dinner. That was the last part of it, yeah. You talked about the food, you wearing a mankini, and then you said, oh, by the way, I got engaged.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, just building it up.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, congratulations.

[Mike Gibson]

Well, thank you.

[Mike Ferguson]

Let's go ahead and give our Patreon shout outs. We had Penny Lewis.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, Lewis.

[Mike Ferguson]

Jinxy.

[Mike Gibson]

What's going on, Jinxy.

[Mike Ferguson]

Mike Hawk.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, thanks, Mike.

[Mike Ferguson]

Heather Bellamy.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, Bellamy.

[Mike Ferguson]

Jennifer Monroe.

[Mike Gibson]

What's up, Monroe?

[Mike Ferguson]

Desiree Baker.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, Baker.

[Mike Ferguson]

And last but not least, Femke Van Heerden.

[Mike Gibson]

Well, thanks, Van. Her didn't.

[Mike Ferguson]

If we go back into the vault this week, we selected Jennifer Ratcliffe.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, thanks, Ratcliffe.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, we appreciate all the Patreon support we have. We have a new episode out right now on TCAT where we're talking about the murder of 25 year old Janet Abaroa. She was stabbed to death in her Durham, North Carolina home in 2005. You know, they kind of zeroed in on her husband early on, but it took a number of years before they finally made an arrest in her case. And it's a very strange case as far as the court and the outcome and all of that, but it's an interesting episode. Make sure you check it out.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah. Get out there and check it out now.

[Mike Ferguson]

All right, buddy. Are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime all the Time?

[Mike Gibson]

I am ready.

[Mike Ferguson]

Talking about the disappearance of Ben McDaniel. On August 18, 2010, Ben McDaniel went cave diving at Vortex Spring, a popular tourist spot in the Florida panhandle. He never resurfaced. Over a dozen expert divers spent days searching for Ben, but they didn't find him. Some came to believe that he wasn't ever in the cave at all. So we got a little bit of a mystery here.

[Mike Gibson]

Makes me nervous when I think about going into caves. Like those really narrow caves, you know, out of the water, above ground.

[Mike Ferguson]

Oh, yeah. And you add below the water.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

I would be doubly nervous now. I did do a little snorkeling in Jamaica. I've never actually gone scuba diving. I would love to try it.

[Mike Gibson]

Be fun.

[Mike Ferguson]

What I don't think I would do is try to scuba through an underwater cave. It just to me is kind of panic inducing just thinking about it.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah. I've watched the shows where they actually take the tank off, off their back and they slide it through the opening first and then they go in behind it. And I'm thinking, do you even know, is there a turnaround point?

[Mike Ferguson]

I mean, are you going to be able to get out? Yeah. That is very scary to me. Ben McDaniel was born on April 15, 1980. He was the oldest of three sons and grew up in Collierville, Tennessee. Ben always enjoyed outdoor activities such as scuba diving and rock climbing. And we just talked about it. Right. I don't think that would be something that would be for me, but there are a lot of people into scuba, rock climbing. Maybe some people who thrive on adrenaline or somebody you might call an adrenaline junkie. Yeah, some people love that and they can't get enough of it. They dive out of perfectly good airplanes, skydiving. These are all things that I have no interest in. In the late 2000s, Ben was going through an extremely difficult time in his life. He was living with his parents after his construction business failed. And after a divorce, he owed a tax debt of almost $50,000 to the IRS and the state. Ben was also grieving his younger brother Paul, who died in 2008 from a stroke. Paul was only 22 years old and was Ben's rock climbing partner. Ben found Paul unconscious in the family home and unsuccessfully tried to revive him.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, that's rough.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, I mean, you know, he's going through a lot, no doubt about it. But to lose a brother who's only 22 years old. Yeah, that is so young. To die from a stroke had to be devastating. Add on top of that to divorce, a failing business, a pretty large debt, you know, to the IRS in the state you're dealing with a lot and

[Mike Gibson]

doesn't sound like you're going to have much of a support system because like you said, divorce and then just lost your best friend and brother.

[Mike Ferguson]

According to the 2012 documentary Ben's Vortex, Paul died of anoxic encephalopathy due to combined drug toxicity. After his brother's death, Ben met his girlfriend, 33 year old Emily Greer, a wetlands biologist. They spent every night together talking about their future. They discussed starting a dive company together. In 2010, Ben's parents suggested he take a sabbatical. They offered to support him financially while he and his dog lived in the family's beach house at Santa Rosa beach on the Emerald coast of the Florida panhandle. Ben accepted their offer and moved into the house in April 2010.

[Mike Gibson]

Sounds like a decent offer.

[Mike Ferguson]

Sounds like a really good offer. No one has ever offered to pay me to live in a beach house.

[Mike Gibson]

No.

[Mike Ferguson]

Now I understand why they did it. We just talked about all the different things that he was going through. And it was said that Ben's parents and his girlfriend thought that the move was really good for his mental health and what it did was, you know, all this free time allowed him to participate in his favorite hobby, scuba diving. Ben had been diving since he was 15 years old. He started off by practicing in his family's pool. And if I was going to scuba dive, that's how I would want to start off.

[Mike Gibson]

That's normally where they have scuba diving schools or.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, pools.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Somewhere where I can stand up quickly if I start to freak out.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah. You've never scuba dive at all. Not those quick courses. As long as you have to wait a was a day after you fly in and you can't fly out for.

[Mike Ferguson]

No, no.

[Mike Gibson]

I did that once and they taught taught us in a pool and they

[Mike Ferguson]

actually had a place there at the Sandals. I could have done it.

[Mike Gibson]

Oh, really?

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, it was right there by my room and I did snorkeling, but nobody wanted to do the scuba thing. It was said that Ben preferred to dive in freshwater. He frequently visited Vortex Spring, a small vacation destination just outside the town of Ponce de Leon. Vortex Spring is the largest diving facility in the state. About 30,000 people visit Vortex Spring each year. Families can stay on site in cabins or campers. And they offer diving instruction for all levels. And divers enjoy water that stays 68 degrees year round, fed by the Floridian aquifer.

[Mike Gibson]

See, that's the thing about scuba diving, right? You got to know where you want to go because you can do cold water dives. I don't think that would be fun. I don't find that you have to put on a wetsuit or a thermal suit to go diving would be exciting, I would think. I just would rather go into warm water and just put the strap on my back and let me go.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Okay.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, I wouldn't say 68 degrees is warm. No, it's not cold cold.

[Mike Gibson]

But you probably got to put some type of wetsuit on this.

[Wayfair Announcer]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, can you at least wear trunks? Because for some reason I imagine you in scuba and nothing else and that's something I do not want to imagine.

[Mike Gibson]

I think that's the resort next year resort.

[Mike Ferguson]

It actually was. But this really does sound like an amazing place. You have 30,000 people a year going here to dive.

[Mike Gibson]

It tells you a lot.

[Mike Ferguson]

What does it tell me?

[Mike Gibson]

It's a place to be.

[Mike Ferguson]

Okay. Experienced divers come to Vortex Spring for the underwater wildlife and the cavern, a feature that starts at 58ft below the surface. All divers are required to present proof of open water certification and sign a release of liability. And see, that's where you lose me right there.

[Mike Gibson]

I knew you Were going to have an issue.

[Mike Ferguson]

I feel like anytime you have to sign a release of liability and it says on there, this may cause injury, including death, I'm going to pass.

[Mike Gibson]

Like, okay, I'm out.

[Mike Ferguson]

But again, I'm not the adrenaline seeker that a lot of people are. I know some people crave it. They can't live without it. They need that rush, and that's obviously a lot better way to get it than drugs or something like that. The main attraction of Vortex Spring is the cave, which starts 300ft from the cavern at a depth of 115ft. Also, why are you talking like you're this expert on scuba diving? You just said you went one time to, like, a little instruction pool.

[Mike Gibson]

Hey, you learn a lot in that little bit of time. Plus Mensa.

[Wayfair Announcer]

Oh.

[Mike Ferguson]

The comeback for everything. Mensa. So at the entrance to the cave is this sign with a picture of the Grim Reaper and a warning that says, stop. Go no farther. There's nothing in this cave worth dying for. That's words that I would probably take to heart. All right, folks, let's turn around. It's literally telling me, don't go in there.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah. It sounds ominous. Yes.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, it does. The cave entrance is also blocked by a gate. Divers can only get the key to the gate from the dive shop when they present a cave diving certification.

[Mike Gibson]

Well, they're really making you think about this.

[Mike Ferguson]

They are, but they're also safeguarding it. Right. It's. It's obviously not for the novice, I don't think. You know, they. They only want you to try to tackle this if you've got quite a bit of experience. You've got all the right certifications. The policy was instituted after the deaths of 13 divers in the cave during the 1980s and in response to threats from the state to ban diving in the cave entirely. So. No doubt, Gibbs. I mean, this is not without its dangers. They're not joking with the sign thing. I mean, they are probably. It's a little tongue in cheek, but obviously this is a very dangerous activity. 13 people died trying to dive these caves. It's also the reason why I don't go bungee jumping, because there are too many YouTube videos of a bungee cord snapping.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Or them forgetting to hook the safety harness correctly or tie the right knot.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Things can go bad. And I get it. Things can go bad driving down the street.

[Mike Gibson]

Sure.

[Mike Ferguson]

I do understand that.

[Mike Gibson]

You just have to have the right appetite for risk.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. And there's just some risks that I don't have. The Appetite for, you know, as you

[Mike Gibson]

get older, that appetite kind of disappears.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, I would agree with that. Well, you know, you, you get married, you have kids, you stop maybe doing some of the things that you did when you were 20 because you thought you were bulletproof at 52 years old. I know I'm not bulletproof.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, that's true.

[Mike Ferguson]

That's something that you learn over time.

[Mike Gibson]

Maybe as we get older, we're switch and be like, okay, we're fearless. We'll do it.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, like 87 maybe.

[Mike Gibson]

Bucket list.

[Mike Ferguson]

I might dive this cave.

[Mike Gibson]

Maybe you will one day.

[Mike Ferguson]

So starting at the gate, about 1500ft of the cave has been mapped. The map portion ends at a restriction like this narrow passage about 150ft deep and 10 inches wide.

[Mike Gibson]

Oh my gosh, man.

[Mike Ferguson]

So some divers say it's impassable. Others say you can get in but you can't get out. Some expert divers can get through extremely narrow restrictions by removing their tanks, which you talked about pushing the tanks forward through the passage and, and twisting their bodies in a certain way to get through.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, they say you can get in but you can't get out. But how do you know that until

[Mike Ferguson]

you got in, until you and couldn't get out?

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Also, you know, I think we have to talk about body size here. You know, unless I'm wearing a suit that is like of Spanx material.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

I know for a fact I'm not getting through this 10 inch wide gap.

[Mike Gibson]

No, not going to happen.

[Mike Ferguson]

I would have to be extremely more slim than I am today. Actually, I have a pretty big head. I'm not even sure my head would fit through. I was just wondering about that, a 10 inch wide gap.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, I've had other issues on getting through that.

[Mike Ferguson]

So in the summer of 2010, Ben visited Vortex Spring often enough that the dive shop employees and other frequent visitors got to know him. Eduardo Tarrant, an employee at the dive shop, suspected Ben was covertly exploring the cave system even though he didn't have the required certification. He did this by tampering with the gate. Now, Ben was a certified open water diver, but not a certified cave diver. He would have needed two months of training and 125 dives with an instructor.

[Mike Gibson]

So they take it seriously.

[Mike Ferguson]

They do. That is quite a bit of training. 125 dives. You're not doing that in a weekend.

[Mike Gibson]

No.

[Mike Ferguson]

That is going to take quite a long period of time. Employee Chuck Cronin believed that while Ben had equipment and diving knowledge, he was overly confident in his abilities. That sounds like somebody else that I know.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Who is sitting across from the this desk for me. You are overly confident in your abilities on so many levels. But I'm also thinking, Gibbs, you know, people died in this cave, right. There are people who are saying you can get in, but you can't get out. It's a tight squeeze. I just wonder if that makes some people want to do this even more.

[Mike Gibson]

Absolutely. Tell somebody they can't do it, they're going to want to prove to you that they can do it.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. I do think there's a lot of people who have that way of thinking.

[Mike Gibson]

And if you have nothing to lose, you push yourself even further because you're like, I have nothing to lose. If I get stuck on the other side, I get stuck on the other side. That's the scary people for me.

[Mike Ferguson]

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[Mike Gibson]

He was.

[Mike Ferguson]

And I think he was hell bent on, on doing this cave diving for sure. He returned to Florida on August 14, 2010. He left a note thanking his parents for the sabbatical and the opportunity to reinvent himself and promising to look after them as they got older. On August 18, 2010, Ben returned to Vortex Springs. He did one dive in the middle of the day. Other divers saw him looking closely at the area around the cave. He was recorded on security camera at the dive shop making a transaction to fill his air tanks. He spent the rest of the afternoon testing his equipment and making notes in his dive log. As evening came, Ben prepared for another dive. He called his mother on his cell phone, which was the last contact he had with his family. Around 7:30pm Ben began another dive. Vortex Spring employees Chuck Cronin and Eduardo Taren were coming up from a dive at that time and they passed a bit. They were friends in addition to being co workers at the dive shop, and they often went diving together on Windy on Wednesdays after the shop closed. So these two guys, they passed Ben as they were swimming out. They had noticed the gate to the cave had been tampered with and they suspected it was Ben. So this is the second time that we've heard this, Right? Right. This gate is locked for a reason. It's because you got to get the key and to get the key you have to have a certain level of certification that we know Ben was working on, but he didn't yet have, but

[Mike Gibson]

sounded like he didn't have the patience to wait either.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, it could be. It could be. That he was so eager to dive this cave that he didn't want to.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Wait.

[Mike Ferguson]

I mentioned it, right? It took 125 dives with an instructor.

[Mike Gibson]

It's a long time and a lot of money.

[Mike Ferguson]

Both. Terran swam back to the cave and used his key to open the gate. Now, the sources didn't really explain exactly why he chose to do this. The commercial appeal noted that Taran had gotten to know Ben over the weeks he spent diving at Vortex Springs. So perhaps that had something to do with his decision. Terran saw Ben go in, and then he returned to Chuck Cronin. On some nights when they had seen Ben dive late, the two had stayed at the spring until they saw bubbles on the surface, indicating he was beginning to decompress and to safely resurface. On the night of the 18th, they didn't stay, and instead they went back to Eduardo's house for coffee. Ben's truck was still in the parking lot the next morning, but the employee said they were too busy to notice because they had a lot of visitors that day. On the morning of the 20th, they saw that his truck was still in the parking lot. After determining that no one had seen Ben, Eduardo Taran called the Holmes county sheriff's office. Ben's tanks, wetsuit, and other diving equipment weren't found, and there were no signs of a struggle near his truck. His wallet, which had almost $700 in cash, and his phone were in the cab of his truck. His dive log showed that he explored the cave and had made a map. So I think, you know, that confirms it right there.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

He had been diving the cave illegally. Yeah, I don't know. Illegally, but against the rules of the place of Vortex Spring. I don't know if it was against the law, but it also makes it seem that more than likely, he might have been the person to tamper with the gate.

[Commercial Announcer]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

That's how he was getting in. Now, it does seem as though the night that he made that last dive, Taran opened the gate for him. That's the way it made it seem.

[Mike Gibson]

And if that's true, is there any liability there?

[Mike Ferguson]

I would say so. You have this rule, but you're breaking the rule to allow this guy to go in when he's not certified to do it. At his home in Santa Rosa beach, officers found Ben's dog, which was hungry after going two days without food or puppy. So, you know, you talk about the worry scale, and we do in many, many episodes, and there's a lot here to kind of weigh on the Scale.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Most people don't leave behind a wallet with $700 in it.

[Mike Gibson]

That is very true.

[Mike Ferguson]

Most people don't leave their phone. And you know what people really don't do? Leave their dogs alone for two days without food and water.

[Mike Gibson]

No way, man. You're going to either take that dog with you or have someone take care of it for you.

[Mike Ferguson]

So to me, that's a very bad sign. Also the fact that all of his diving equipment, his wetsuit, you know, none of that was found. It makes it seem as though he made the dive but didn't come back

[Mike Gibson]

up, never came back out.

[Mike Ferguson]

So based on all these circumstances, police and the dive shop employees assumed Ben never resurfaced and had likely drowned in the cave while trying to get out. Captain Harry Hamilton, an investigator in Holmes county, thought a large number of divers would volunteer to search for Ben. Hamilton soon realized that there are very few divers who have the training and skill to navigate cave diving. Several experienced divers did volunteer and searched small crevices and fissures of the cave that Ben might have entered in his attempt to escape as his tanks ran low. This is a pattern found in other cave diving deaths.

[Mike Gibson]

Interesting. You chose the term fissures. You hear that a lot in colonoscopies.

[Mike Ferguson]

You hear it that you have a fissure, they say.

[Mike Gibson]

That's what I hear. Oh, but you hear it in that, you know, when they talk about certain things.

[Mike Ferguson]

How do you know that unless you were in there when the doctor said, hey, Gibby, you have an anal fissure?

[Mike Gibson]

One, I went to med school. Two, I practiced medicine at a very young age.

[Mike Ferguson]

And three, you now have an anal fissure.

[Mike Gibson]

But you know, when you think about these experts for these caves being so limited, it's kind of scary at one point that if you got lost or missing above ground, you have a better chance of people coming out and helping you. In this case, you're going to get whoever's qualified and willing to put their life at risk going into these very tight knit places.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it really takes very little to no experience to help volunteer to search ground. You're essentially walking and sometimes they give you flags. You plant a flag if you see something and then somebody comes and checks it out. You don't need a lot of experience, you just need to be willing to help out. In this case, though, it's not enough to be willing to help out. You have to be able to do it. You have to be certified because it's very dangerous. But the one thing that really got to me was how scary this situation must be. Right. You're in a underwater space that you can't figure out how to escape from, and your tanks are getting low, and at some point, they're so low that you're trying to find a little spot, maybe to get a breath, I don't know. But so scary to think about. It must be a horrible way to die.

[Mike Gibson]

I would think so. I just think it would be scary to be trapped there, not knowing if you can ever get out. And you know what, if you went further than some people have ever went in those caves and then found yourself in a jam, well, maybe nobody will ever get that far when they're trying to find you.

[Mike Ferguson]

But isn't that the danger of this type of activity?

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, right.

[Mike Ferguson]

Unfortunately, I think in a lot of these things, when you think of extreme sports or extreme situations, you don't know that you've gone too far until it's too late. Ben's parents and his girlfriend Emily drove to Florida to observe the dives. Despite multiple searches that weekend, Ben was not found. And you can only imagine the worry of his parents and his girlfriend. Two tanks known to belong to Ben were found outside the entrance to the cave. This was unusual because cave divers typically leave tanks for decompression along their exit route. Ben's tanks contained only air, not a gas mix as required for cave diving. Without the gas mix, divers can feel intoxicated, and decision making becomes harder. If Ben had been researching cave diving like he said he was, then he should have been aware of this.

[Mike Gibson]

You think that would be one of the first things talked about in the cave diving research.

[Mike Ferguson]

But if he didn't use the mix, it sounds like he would have, you know, become disoriented pretty quickly. And, you know, that would have been a recipe for disaster.

[Mike Gibson]

Sure. You know, you're in a cave, you don't know which way is up, down, out. It's a problem.

[Mike Ferguson]

On August 22, Ed Sorenson, a veteran diver and recovery specialist, received a text from his wife. Diver missing searches Friday and Saturday. Unsuccessful. Ed Sorenson has done between 7,000 and 8,000 dives in his career. He's considered the nation's leading expert in dive rescues and recovery. He's the only person on earth who has done more than one successful cave rescue in his lifetime.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Wow.

[Mike Ferguson]

So, you know, you can throw around the word expert, you know, cavalierly, and some people do. Right, right. Not here. This guy is an expert in this field.

[Mike Gibson]

Absolutely.

[Mike Ferguson]

No doubt about it. He returned from his yacht trip to the Bahamas. The following day, he received calls from other recovery divers about the search. One told him he almost died in the cave. An official with the International Underwater Cave Rescue and Recovery told Sorensen not to go. But on August 23, 2010, Ed Sorenson arrived at Vortex Spring to search for Ben. He did three dives that day. He used a diver propulsion vehicle and smaller tank to increase his range. And I think this goes back to what we talked about.

[Mike Gibson]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

You tell somebody they shouldn't do it. They can do. Might make them want to do it even more.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Now, there's the added element here that, you know, there's somebody missing. So this is not for sport.

[Wayfair Announcer]

Sport.

[Mike Ferguson]

I mean, he's doing this to try to save a life or make a recovery.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, I think at this point, it's to make a recovery. Right?

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, because I think so, too.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Sorensen made it 1700ft into the cave, which is 200ft past the official map. He saw marks on the limestone where another recovery diver had been earlier. He managed to go forward another 20ft. Ben was 6 foot 1 and weighed 210 pounds. He was an inch taller and. And 20 pounds heavier than Sorensen. Sorensen knew that if Ben had gotten to that point, there would be marks on the limestone from where his helmet scraped the ceiling of the cave, or marks in the bottom where he took off his tanks and swam with one in front of him. There should also be extra tanks left behind for the journey out. Sorensen also knew that there would be signs if Ben's body was in the cage, such as increased activity from aquatic scavengers. But there was nothing. Sorensen said that without training, there was no way Ben could have gotten through some of the narrower restrictions. Sorensen didn't think Ben was in the cave.

[Mike Gibson]

All right, so we have a diving expert saying, I don't think he's in here.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, and it's based off some, you know, pretty good information.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

He made it a really far distance into the cave. He didn't see Ben, obviously. He didn't see any marks where he felt Mark should have been, if he made it that far. And he didn't see any of the tanks that should have been left for the, The. The return trip. So what does that mean, that he made it even further? I don't think so, because I think you still would have seen the marks. Yeah, that he really didn't know exactly what he was doing. He didn't have the right mix. He didn't leave the tanks where he should have left Them and his body is somewhere that they just still haven't found, or he's not down there at all. There's a number of different scenarios. But let's explore just for a minute, Gibbs, the. He's not down there at all.

[Mike Gibson]

Right. Because I think we have to go down that avenue.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. And just talk about it a little bit. How many times do you and I talk about why would someone just want to up and leave and kind of start a new life?

[Mike Gibson]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

In a lot of scenarios. It does not make sense. Does it make maybe a little more sense here? We detailed out, you know, all of the different things Ben was going through. He lost his brother, his best friend, the divorce, the big debt to the IRS and to the state. Now, he still had his parents. He had a new girlfriend. But could there have been some things in his life that made him want to start a new one and kind of get away from some of his baggage? Possibly. I don't know.

[Mike Gibson]

Definitely potential.

[Mike Ferguson]

I would say more so here than in a lot of the cases we do. Questions continue to arise in the weeks after Ben's disappearance. A few days after Ben went missing, his mother, Patty McDaniel, recalled a feeling that God was telling her that Ben's soul was in heaven, but his body was still in Vortex Spring. The family wondered if perhaps Ben was buried under silt in a nook someone had missed. Divers explained to them that it would be like someone lying down in the yard with scuba gear on buried under leaves. It would be very noticeable.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah. So they're saying that's not the case. Then we would have, we would have seen them.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. No way.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

And to me, it's a, it's a great description. Think about being in scuba dive gear in a yard under some leaf. Yeah. You know, you're going to be able to tell.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

That something's there.

[Mike Gibson]

It's like taking your scuba Steve doll, because I know you have two of them.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yep.

[Mike Gibson]

I know why you have two.

[Mike Ferguson]

One I bathe with and one I sleep with.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Gibson]

And this, you know, putting a little pile of leafs on it out in the front yard. Smaller scale, but you would see it.

[Mike Ferguson]

I like the analogy.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

But I get the family, too. Right. They're, they're, they're grasping at straws. Of course, at this point, trying to think of anything that could be possible. If you're anxiety, depression or ADHD or more than just a rough patch, you might need more than talk therapy or self help tools. Talky at tree connects you with real psychiatric care. So you can actually understand what's going on and get a treatment and medication plan that works. Talk I tried is a 100% online psychiatric practice that provides comprehensive evaluations, diagnoses and ongoing medication management for conditions like adhd, anxiety, depression, bipolar disorder, ocd, ptsd, insomnia, and more. Unlike therapy only platforms, Talk I atry is psychiatry. You're seeing a medical provider who can diagnose mental health conditions and prescribe medication when it's appropriate. All 800 plus clinicians are in network with major insurers so you can use your existing insurance instead of paying monthly subscriptions or out of network costs. More than 300,000 patients have already found high quality psychiatric care through Talkiatry. Head to talkiatry.com unsolved to complete the short assessment and get matched with an in network psychiatrist in just a few minutes. That's talkiatry.com unsolved to get matched in minutes. Insurance isn't one size fits all, and shopping for it shouldn't feel like squeezing into something that just doesn't fit. That's why drivers have enjoyed progressives Name your price tool for years, with the name your price tool, you tell them what you want to pay and they show you options that fit your budget enough. Hunting for discounts, trying to calculate rates, and tinkering with coverages. Maybe you're picking out your very first policy. Or maybe you're just looking for something that works better for you and your family. Either way, they make it simple to see your options. No guesswork, no surprises. Ready to see how easy and fun shopping for car insurance can be? Visit progressive.com and give the name your price tool a try. Take the stress out of shopping and find coverage that fits your life on your terms. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates Price and Coverage Match Ltd. By state law, the family agreed to put up $54,000 to guarantee the cost of replacing a remotely operated underwater camera borrowed by the Sheriff's office. After eight hours, the camera only made it 1300ft into the cave. The family hired a guy named Steve Keen, who spent more than 100 hours with a team that mapping the cave. In 2003, Keane did seven dies, he told Ben's father, Shelby McDaniel, per the Tampa Bay Times. We went through the whole cave. If he's in there, I don't know where he'd be. So there's not a lot of people looking for him just because there's not a lot of people who can, right? But the people who are are extremely experienced and it sounds like they have searched pretty much all of the cave

[Mike Gibson]

that can be searched, saying, he is not there, he is just not there.

[Mike Ferguson]

And I, in my mind, keep going back to, well, could he have gone farther, or could his body have drifted farther? But then how do you explain there not being the marks where there should be marks made by the helmet, made by the scuba tanks as the other divers mate?

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, either he got really lucky in getting through there without having to mark up anything, but he was a big guy, so I can't imagine it not happening.

[Mike Ferguson]

In total, 16 divers spent 36 days looking for Ben with no results. Volunteer searches continued in October and November. Some of the best divers in the country came to believe Ben was not

[Mike Gibson]

in the cave, which is adding up based on what the experts divers have. Have said and seen. So if he's not in the cave, where is he at?

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, there's a lot of people coming to this opinion. And these are not novices again. Right. These are expert divers, and they're basing this opinion on their own personal dives.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

So places where they're marking, they didn't see his marks. Stuff like that's pretty compelling.

[Mike Gibson]

And when you hear all this coming, the surface, see what I did there?

[Mike Ferguson]

I'm not mensa, but I'm not a dummy.

[Mike Gibson]

It makes you want to know, okay, he's not here, but now what? Now where do we put our efforts? If we believe all this now we have. That means that he's got to be somewhere else. What is that? Somewhere else?

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. And you also have to get into the area of, did he leave willingly, let's say in order to start another life, get away from some of his troubles, or did he meet with foul play? But after he came out of the cave and surfaced, I. You know, there's a lot unknown here. The McDaniels offered a reward to divers who were brave enough to go deeper into the cave. And I get it, you know, if I'm the family, I'm spending whatever I can. Right. To try to find my loved one. Vortex Spring employee Chuck Cronin and owner Lowell Kelly theorized that perhaps Ben ran away to start a new life, a theory Ben's family rejected. Ben's parents believed that since he knew how badly Paul's death hurt them, he wouldn't leave with no notice. And I get that also, again, if you're the family, would you ever really believe that your loved one would willingly leave your life, disappear, start a new life, never contact you again?

[Mike Gibson]

No.

[Mike Ferguson]

It'd be really hard to Believe that.

[Mike Gibson]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

But it has happened.

[Mike Gibson]

It has.

[Mike Ferguson]

I still don't think it's the norm, but it has happened. Both Eduardo Taran and Chuck Cronin passed polygraphs. The police monitored Ben's bank, phone, email and Facebook, but there was no activity. In the spring of 2011, the sheriff's office brought two cadaver dogs to Vortex Springs. One dog reacted strongly to the water, indicating the presence of decomposing remains. The other dog reacted as well. The water was sampled 30 times over several months, but none of the tests indicated a spike in bacteria consistent with decomposition.

[Mike Gibson]

But yet these dogs were going crazy. Why is that?

[Mike Ferguson]

I don't know. Now, there had been people who had died there before, but again, if they're only reacting, or supposed to react to decomposition, I can't imagine there would be anything left over from the 1980s, right. When these 13 people died that would cause these dogs to react. But I don't know that to be a fact. Rick Russo, a state licensed water and wastewater operator, told the Tampa Bay Times, we couldn't find a trace of anything. I hate it for the parents, but to say a man is down there, in my opinion, that's false.

[Mike Gibson]

So another expert saying, yeah, I don't think he's down there.

[Mike Ferguson]

Investigators theorized that if Ben died and his body washed out of the cave system with the natural flow of the water, he probably wouldn't have gone far past the mouth of the spring. Team searched the swamps and forests downstream, but found nothing. By 2011, the family began considering the possibility that Ben died as a result of foul play and his disappearance was a cover up. The family hired PI Lynn Marie Carty, who found that other people associated with Vortex Spring, besides owner Lowell Kelly, had criminal records. Carty told the Commercial Appeal, there's just as much reason to look above the water for Ben's body as there was to look below it in the cave. So apparently there were a number of people associated with Vortex Spring who had criminal records. Now, what does that mean? Maybe they gave people a chance.

[Mike Gibson]

Maybe. Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Or maybe you had people doing criminal things. Maybe Ben stumbled upon something that he shouldn't have seen.

[Mike Gibson]

Maybe they were like Yellowstone. They wanted to give criminals a chance and brand them, you know?

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah, there was no talk of branding, but I get the. I get where you're going.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, it could happen. You branded me.

[Mike Ferguson]

You asked me to do that. You wanted Mensa on your chest. Instead of getting a tattoo, you want it branded.

[Mike Gibson]

For some reason, it seemed like the smarter thing to do.

[Mike Ferguson]

There were a few Suspicious events reported on the day Ben went missing that could possibly support the foul play theory. Lowell Kelly reported that on the evening Ben disappeared, a wild eyed drunk man appeared at the shop and asked if it was too late to dive. The possibility has been raised that this man, if he exists, may have been involved in Ben's disappearance.

[Mike Gibson]

Wild eyed. Gotta watch out for those type of guys.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, especially a wild eyed drunk.

[Mike Gibson]

Yes.

[Mike Ferguson]

Earlier that day, a diver had a confrontation with several teenagers on the property about their drinking. They left, but it was suggested that perhaps they came back for revenge. Former owner Lowell Kelly died under suspicious circumstances in early 2012. When Ben disappeared, Kelly was awaiting trial on charges that he, he drove a temporary employee into the woods, accused him of stealing $30,000 and beat him with a baseball bat. Kelly pleaded no contest and was given a fine and probation.

[Mike Gibson]

Okay, got some violent activities going on here.

[Mike Ferguson]

And how in the world do you beat somebody with a baseball bat and get a fine and probation?

[Mike Gibson]

That I don't understand.

[Mike Ferguson]

Investigators said they interviewed Kelly and found nothing suspicious. Ben's family was frustrated by the limitations of the search and believed he was in a part of the cave no one had reached. As I mentioned earlier, Ben's family offered a $10,000 reward to anyone brave enough to find him in the cave. This insinuation alienated previous divers who risked their lives searching the cave and raised fears that it would encourage untrained divers to risk their lives for money. And Ben's parents increased the award twice. But I get that right. If you're one of these guys who in the beginning, you know, just did this to help find Ben, now you're, you're hearing that they're offering money for anyone, quote, unquote, brave enough to do it.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

That you would take that the wrong way.

[Mike Gibson]

Absolutely. I did it for no money.

[Mike Ferguson]

And I was brave enough.

[Mike Gibson]

I was brave enough. And you sounds like maybe you didn't like my results.

[Mike Ferguson]

Yeah. Now I'm not blaming his parents because again, if I was in that situation, I'd do anything I had to do.

[Mike Gibson]

Sure you would.

[Mike Ferguson]

To try to find my.

[Mike Gibson]

My child.

[Mike Ferguson]

In March 2012, when the reward was at $30,000, something tragic happened. On March 17, 2012, Larry Higginbotham, a diver from Biloxi, Mississippi, died in the cavern at Vortex Spring. His body was retrieved the next day by Ed Sorenson. There was no explicit evidence Higginbotham was trying to find Ben, but the divers who found his body believed he was. He was found near a shovel, near a restriction. So Small. No one could get through, according to Sorenson, who pulled his body out. Ed Sorenson told the Commercial Appeal, not only did the reward endanger the lives of divers who would risk going farther than they should, it put all of our lives at risk because we have to go in to recover the body.

[Mike Gibson]

That's true. I mean, you got somebody that you know is not coming out and you got to go to recover that body. And maybe it's a little trickier than it should be. And.

[Mike Ferguson]

But what does this say about the search for Ben? They found this guy the very next day.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, it makes you think that most likely he's not there, because how many times did they search? They never found anything.

[Commercial Announcer]

Right.

[Mike Gibson]

This guy, you find in one day.

[Mike Ferguson]

The following month, the family rescinded the award. They had not received any tips on the hotline they created, and they realized that if anyone had information, they weren't going to talk. It wasn't worth risking the lives of other divers. Shelby McDaniel told the Commercial Appeal, we didn't want somebody to go into the cave and drown because they were looking for Ben. In 2012, the popular show Disappeared covered Ben's disappearance. That year, the documentary Ben's Vortex was also released. Ben's Vortex was produced by Jill Heinerth and her husband Robert McClelland. Jill has dived deeper than any other woman in history and had been following Ben's story. She and a partner filmed in the cave. She also read Ben's diving log, which showed he was mapping the cave and made at least one dive to the far reaches of the cave, she said in an email to the Commercial Appeal. I explained how divers panic and burrow themselves in beyond the reach of prudent diversity. Sometimes they burrow so deep that they can't be found. I simply see no reasonable evidence that he is not in the cave. Robert McClellan said he leaned toward the possibility that Ben might have decided to reinvent himself and start a new life. The McDaniels maintain that this is the least plausible of all the theories. In 2013, the state of Florida issued a death certificate to Ben's family. His family strongly believes his body is in an accessible area of the Vortex spring cave system. As of 2026, Ben has not been found dead or alive. Besides the two tanks found outside the cave, none of his gear or equipment has ever been found. His disappearance and presumed death remains one of the biggest mysteries in the cave diving community.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, it seems like a big mystery and you have experts on both sides saying different things. You Know, at first they're saying there's no way he could be down there. We searched everywhere. And then you have somebody else, another expert, saying that she sees no evidence that would tell you that he's not down there.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Again, mystery.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Right.

[Mike Ferguson]

The one thing I would say is that I think there's been a lot more experts say there's no way his body could be down there than say he. He is down there or could be down there.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Now, take that for you know what it's worth. I also think it's very interesting that none of his gear has ever been found.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

No.

[Mike Gibson]

It's bizarre. So did someone hurt him to get that, Steal his gear? Did he take it somewhere? Did, you know, just maybe he. Like some people thought, did he just

[Mike Ferguson]

decide to disappear or did someone hurt him and bury him with his gear so that it would never be found? There is a lot of possibilities here, but I don't know how anyone is ever going to get to the truth unless his body is recovered.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Or his remains are recovered at this point. Or someone comes forward to tell the story of what they know, if they were involved in. In some, you know, type of foul play that ended his life. But I can see why people are, especially in the dive community, are really fascinated by this case or intrigued by it because it is very mysterious. You know, when Jill says that she found evidence that he had gone further than what people thought.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Right.

[Mike Gibson]

Okay.

[Mike Ferguson]

I don't know. What's that mean? Is it possible that he went further than anybody else and that's why they can't find his body? She's. I think that's what she's kind of hinting or saying.

[Mike Gibson]

I think it's a possibility.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, again, there's. There's too many possibilities. Right. That's the problem.

[Mike Gibson]

I mean, that tree removed the obvious things like he's not, you know, visible to us. And the parts of caves that we went through.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yes.

[Mike Gibson]

But maybe he found a different entry point somewhere else to another section of the cave. Or he went further than anybody's other people did.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

Well, the other thing is we don't know how big this cave is. We don't know where it leads, so we don't know where it ends.

[Mike Gibson]

Could took them all the way to China.

[Mike Ferguson]

That is the one thing I'm sure did not happen.

[Mike Gibson]

Hear people say that when you're growing

[Mike Ferguson]

up about a million times, digging your way to China, that's every. Everybody used to say that. Yeah, everybody knows that's not possible, but people said it Anyway, they did. Even if you could get to the. What is it?

[Ad Caller / Listener]

The.

[Mike Ferguson]

The molten core.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Gibson]

What is that? The mandalay.

[Mike Ferguson]

Did you just say mandalay?

[Mike Gibson]

I started to. I pulled back. I was gonna go with the mandolin or the. Which is not. That's a thing in the kitchen that you.

[Mike Ferguson]

You know, it's an instrument.

[Mike Gibson]

It's an instrument, too.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Yeah.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

So now I don't really know what you're saying, but I say we just move on.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, I think we do, because I

[Mike Ferguson]

don't think you're gonna right that ship, but, I mean, that's it for our episode on Ben McDaniel. No doubt. It is a very mysterious case.

[Mike Gibson]

Really intriguing.

[Mike Ferguson]

It is. And hopefully one day the mystery will be solved.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah.

[Mike Ferguson]

You'd like that for his family.

[Wayfair Announcer]

Sure.

[Mike Ferguson]

Obviously. But we got a voicemail. You want to check that out?

[Mike Gibson]

Let's hear it.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Hey, Mike and Gibby, this is Al from Massachusetts, the Adams, Massachusetts area. And I am rehashing the True Crime all the Time Unsolved podcast and listened again to the Molly Bish episode. And I have a dear friend that lives in Massachusetts who. Her sister had been murdered. Lisa Zeigert. You should check out that crime and the amazing way that it had been solved after so many years and the love that the family had for their daughter and sister and how they would never let it rest and how a lot of the local people, some of them were suspects for years and could not get out from under that shadow. But anyway, you guys are great. I'm not Team Gibby. I'm not Team Mike, Team True Crime. You guys are one of the best podcasts on. On social media. Love you guys. Talk to you soon. Bye.

[Mike Ferguson]

All right, love you too, brother. Thanks for the voicemail and the kind words. It's very much appreciated, and we will definitely check that case out.

[Mike Gibson]

Yeah, you definitely sound like Team Gibby. Why can't people just say that better than you said? You. You, like, even went up an.

[Mike Ferguson]

You know, why can't you just say, oh, that's great? You know, you don't have to be team one or the other. You just. You just want everyone on your side. All right, buddy, that is it for another episode of True Crime. All the Time unsolved. So for Mike and Gibby, stay safe. Keep your road time ticking.

[Ad Caller / Listener]

Sam.

[Mike Ferguson]

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[Mike Ferguson]

It's just so Beautiful on Pluto TV. Free streaming of Terminator 2, Fringe Arrow, the 100 and the X Files Mako cause excitement, loss of sleep and sudden belief in extraterrestrials. No credit cards or alien encounters necessary. Pluto TV stream now.

[Commercial Announcer]

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[Wayfair Announcer]

Hey there, it's Wayfair here, where delivery and setup are as easy as a few taps on your phone. You're relaxing in an old hammock, scrolling Wayfair's app when you spot it. A brand new patio set. Next thing you know, Wayfair delivers it right to your patio and sets it up. Oh, you need a new grill too. Alright, Wayfair's got you covered. With Wayfair's room of choice delivery and fast expert setup on qualifying orders, life gets a little easier. Visit Wayfair.com or the Wayfair app.

[Mike Gibson]

Wayfair Every style, every home.