True Crime with Kendall Rae - Disappeared in an Underwater Cave? What Happened to Ben McDaniel?

Episode Date: October 27, 2022

This episode covers the disappearance of Ben McDaniel, a man with a real passion for scuba diving. But when people realized he had yet to move his car from a dive site, and his dog was left with no one to care for it, it set off some alarm in the community. Where did he go? This episode is sponsored by: Everlywell Zocdoc Check out Kendall's other podcasts: The Sesh & Mile Higher Follow Kendall! YouTube Twitter Instagram Facebook Mile Higher Zoo REQUESTS: General case suggestion form: https://bit.ly/32kwPly Form for people directly related/ close to the victim: https://bit.ly/3KqMZLj Discord: https://discord.com/invite/an4stY9BCN CONTACT: For Business Inquiries - [e-mail]

Have a sensational summer with HEB brand products born and raised to be Texas favorites. Guaranteed! Spice up your backyard barbecues with HEB Prime 1 beef fiesta jalapeno burgers, with fresh pico de gallo and hunks of gooey cheddar cheese. And for fun in the Texas sun, play it safe with HEB sunscreen in delightful sense like peach, strawberry, and cucumber melon. Stuck up on all your summer favorites that could only come from AGB to Texas with love. confusing mysteries of all time, honestly. I'm surprised it's not more talked about. Not that many people know about this case, but it's just so weird. You're gonna

leave this video just wanting answers that you're not gonna get. There are all types of theories and really any of them could be valid. So this is Ben McDaniel. Ben was born on April 15th, 1980 in Memphis, Tennessee. Ben was described to someone who was really friendly, who was really charismatic and fun to be around. Apparently, he loved to be the center of attention and was always making jokes. You know, everyone that knew him described him as the classic life of the party guy.

He always had a big smile on his face, loved to make people laugh. And for the most part, people really liked Ben. Ben came from a very stable, close-knit, kind of wealthy family. He had two other brothers and him and his brothers and his parents were really, really close. So Ben skipped the whole college route and instead became an entrepreneur at age 18 and started his own construction company. And that actually was pretty successful for him up until 2008 when the economy crashed. And like many people, Ben was kind of screwed.

They just weren't getting enough jobs. I mean, that's the last thing people are going to want to pay to have done is construction, especially stuff that doesn't need to be done. And not only that, but one of Ben's employees started talking shit about him to all of their customers and ruined a bunch of client relationships, so they lost a bunch of people over that. And this employee literally convinced a bunch of their clients that they should just hire hint the employee instead, which I'm pretty sure is illegal, but eventually after 12 years in business, Ben had to completely close down because of all this stuff that had gone on.

2008 was a really rough year for Ben, like it was for a lot of people. Not only did he lose his business, but he also lost his wife. They got divorced and it was not a pretty situation. And that same year Ben's younger brother, who he was really close with, died of a stroke at age 22. So that just shook their whole family, their this really tight-knit family, and they were not expecting one of them to die so young. So it was just really emotionally traumatic for Ben. Ben and his brother Paul, the one who passed away,

were super, super close. So losing his best friend and his brother, essentially at the same time, was just beyond difficult to him and sent him into a total depression. After Paul passed away, it seemed like Ben was having a real difficulty bouncing back to his life. He also was in a lot of debt to the IRS, 40 to 50 grandage, so quite a bit. So eventually he felt like he had no choice but

to sell his house and move home, which always is just really hard mentally to have to make that choice. I mean, he's lucky to have loving parents that welcomed him back home and we're kind of happy to have him back. But, you know, it's still depressing. It doesn't feel great to have to sell your home and move in with your parents. So, he was at a terrible point in his life at this time. Ben's parents were very supportive of him during this time.

He stayed with them until 2010, actually. And he actually moved out because they had offered for him to take a sabbatical. Is it sabbatical? sabbatical? I don't know. Anyway, it basically means a break from life. It means that his parents were willing to pay his way in life so that he could just take time off of working and get his mental health back on track. And not only that, the family had a condo in Santa Rhodes of Beach, Florida, and they said that Ben could stay there, rent free, as long as he wanted to. So Ben decided to take them up on this offer, and he moved to Florida into the condo.

Now this was a really beautiful area in North Florida. It would be a great place for someone to kind of take a break from it all, kind of get off the radar, connect with nature, and just heal from all the hard times that he had been going through. So he moved into the condo by himself other than his dog, who was named Spooner, and Ben was very attached to his dog Spooner. He absolutely loved her and took her everywhere that he could most of the time, except for when he went diving. Weddings are the celebration of all the details that make a couple perfect for each other. And you can find your perfect fit too, at Indochino. Choose every detail of a custom tailored suit, from lapels to linings and more, starting

at just 4.99! My bash! Sorry! Find the suit that's perfect for you. Go to Indochino.com and use code podcast for 10% off any purchase of 399 or more. That's 10% off 399 or more at INDOCHINO.com. Code podcast. From joyful occasions to the unexpected, first Franklin financial makes loans for living, offering fixed rates and flexible terms on loans up to $15,000.

The next time you're looking for some extra cash to help make ends meet, come see the friendly Franklin folks, or visit us at 1ffc.com to learn more. All loans in terms of APRs depend on meeting our underwriting and income criteria and may require collateral. First Franklin Financial Corporation is licensed by the Virginia State Corporation Commission CFI-215, Georgia Residential Mortgage Licency 5656, MMLS, and the 141654, not available in North Carolina. So long before all this, when Ben was a child, he loved the ocean. He was fascinated by marine life, by the sand, by the waves, just love the beach.

And he was really into snorkeling and collecting like small, you know, anettimiz or starfish or little fish and just checking them out. And he actually started scuba diving diving legitimate scuba diving when he was Pretty young and he had kind of lost this passion in his life as time went on and he got older But now that he was moving back to Florida He figured that this was the perfect time for him to pick up his old hobby and start scuba diving again He also had talked about wanting to be an instructor one day possibly and now that he was was in Florida, he could just spend all of his time doing that. And he got super, super into it. Anyone that talked to Ben, especially around this time, said that it's all he really

wanted to talk about with Scoopadiving. So now is the perfect time for him to finally work towards becoming an instructor. So in the first couple of months that he was in Florida, he had already loved 250 dives, so quite a bit. He was really kind of rushing through it, honestly. It seemed like he was very eager to learn as much as he could and become an instructor's fastest possible. So things in Florida were going much better for him, his mental health, with really recovering, he was feeling a lot better and happier, spending most of his time in the water.

In August of 2010, Ben took a trip to go see his parents in Tennessee for his mom's birthday. His mom is named Patty and his dad is named Shelby and they were super excited to have their son back. They loved when their kids would come and visit them. They said it was a great birthday celebration. And while he was there, Ben was telling his family about his next scuba diving adventure.

He was going to try to become a master in cave diving. His parents were a little nervous but also excited for him. They knew that he was an adventurer. Ben was not afraid of anything according to them and they figured he would be just fine. But unfortunately this is the last time that they would see Ben. He said bye to his family and he made the seven hour trip back to Florida. So then two days later, on August 18, 2010, Ben woke up right and wanted to get a jumpstart on diving for the day. He left his house and drove an hour inland to get to an area called Ponce de Leon in Florida. This area is a pretty small town that's really known for its beautiful natural springs.

And it also was the home of an underwater cave called the Voritex. Now Ben actually loved to go to the Voritex. He was known as somewhat of a regular there. He was there as often as he could be and was super interested in the cave system there. Now this area is super popular for divers because it actually stays at about 68 degrees even though it's hot as balls in Florida.

And normally water that sits there heats up pretty fast, but this just stayed nice and cool. So it's a really popular area for people to dive. In fact, people travel from all over the world to come to the vortex. And it's one of the best places to cave dive and to get experience with cave diving. So once Ben got to the vortex, he spent some time checking all his equipment, making sure he was all set to go. And then he did a couple exploratory dies where he just dove all the way down there

and then went up pretty quickly and logged how deep he had gone and how long it took, et cetera. Now, according to that log, it seems like Ben went down into the cave several times, went pretty deep into it and then came back up and logged at each time. He spent the entire day doing this and then at 7 p.m. he decided that he was going to do his final dive down there for the day. So he got into the water, went down to the cave, went about 300 feet in, and at this point there is a gate and a sign.

The sign literally has the grim reaper on it. There's no in hell. I would go forward if a sign had a grim reaper on it, but it basically worn divers that you should dive at your own risk in this area that there is nothing in there worth dying for and it's incredibly dangerous. And that's why they have a gate down there blocking people from going further. Now this gate is actually locked to the public most of the time and you can only get a key to it if you are a certified cave diver. You have to go to the front desk, prove your certification, they give you the key,

and you go in, you take the key with you, and then you're supposed to lock up on your way out and bring the key back to them. And that's how they keep track and make sure that no one's still in the cave. Apparently back in the 90s, like 13 people died trying to dive in this cave. So the owners of this area were told

if they didn't put up a sign or try to prevent people from going there, it would be shut down completely. So that's why they put the sign up, but in this case, Ben was not scared and decided he was going in anyway. Ugh, another pointless video call where nothing gets done.

I think you're on mute, David. Uh, sorry. What did I miss? I teach just approved Miro for the whole company. Miro? That's the... Online whiteboard. For team collaboration, we can make these long video meetings so much shorter with Miro

boards. We can share ideas, feedback, and updates on them whenever. Actually, see what we're talking about. It's all online. Mirror will make her flexible work set up so much easier, with one virtual space for our brainstorms, projects, presentations. Oh, that sounds kind of amazing. So I don't need to wake up for 6am calls with the London office anymore.

Now you're getting it. Don't let time zones get in the way of your team working well together. See why 99% of the Fortune 100 trust Miro to get good work done from anywhere. Get your first three boards free at Miro.com. That's M-I-R-O-D-D-C-M. So two employees who happen to be diving at the same time in the same area, notice Ben go in to the cave through the gate and continue to swim into the cave for a deep penetration dive.

Now, Ben had actually, according to his logs, had done this dive before and it had gone fine. But unfortunately, this was the last time that Ben would ever be seen. So two days later on August 20th, Friday morning, one of the employees at the Springs named Eduardo noticed that Ben's truck was still parked in the exact same place that he had parked on Wednesday morning.

He realized that he had never seen Ben get back out of the water and he was very concerned about the fact that his truck was still sitting in the same place. Obviously at a place like this, you think the worst immediately maybe Ben drowned down there, maybe he stuck somewhere in the cave. And that's exactly what Eduardo was thinking. Now, in Wardo actually was one of those two employees that saw Ben trying to go through that gate. So soon he put the pieces together that that was last time he saw him and his car is

still here. So he started to think that maybe he didn't come out of the was last time he saw him and his car is still here. So he's starting to think that maybe he didn't come out of the cave. So he goes in and tells his manager, they freak out and they immediately call the police. They called the Holmes County Police Department and when they got there they didn't really know what to do because this is an normal situation and normal protocols just won't work here. So they ended up calling in some expert divers. Now Eduardo was one of the divers that they decided to have go in there and look for Ben and they were all pretty sure that they were not going to find Ben alive. I mean in most situations of missing divers like 99% of the time you're not going

to find someone alive. It's normally a recovery mission to get someone's body because the caves are very very high pressured and there's no way that you could survive in there for two days with the oxygen supply that he would have had. I have made your air pressure issues like I cannot go below 10 feet. I get super claustrophobic. I cannot imagine cave diving. There's nothing else that sounds more scary than like running out of oxygen or panicking when you're in a cave and not being able to get out. So they formed a group of divers and they all went into the cave together to see if they could find them. Meanwhile,

back on land police are searching Ben's truck to see if there's any evidence or clues that they might find in there. But there were no red flags and no sign of foul play. Ben's wall was still in the car and still had over a thousand dollars of cash sitting inside of it. His cell phone was there as well and it was pretty clear that Ben was planning to come back to his truck. He also had his dog, Spooner at home, who Ben loved, and he wouldn't have just left her for days without anyone to check on her.

That was very out of character for him. So it really seemed to them that Ben was lost somewhere and the cave was planning to come back out and never did. So soon after the divers went into the cave, one of the divers came up with three decompression tanks. All three of the tanks had Ben's name on it, so they knew that they were his tanks. Now I don't know anything about this because I will never screw dive in my life with my beer pressure issues, even though I would love to.

But decompression tanks are used for people that go on deep penetration dives. Because of the depths that they go in, they experience really intense pressure. And when they come back up to the surface, they have to do it really slowly. And they use these tanks to help alleviate the intense nitrogen levels that build up in your body when you're on a deep dive. If you have too much nitrogen in your body, it can be toxic. And if you don't use the decompression tank to help get rid of the nitrogen, then you can get decompression sickness to help get rid of the nitrogen, then you can get decompression sickness,

commonly known as the bends. Now, two of the tanks were found outside of the cave, like right outside of it, and one of them was found inside the cave. One was still completely full, one was half full, and one was completely empty. So that kind of tells us that Ben had tried to use them at some point in the dive.

But because they were all found in the water still, it leaves most people to believe that he never came out of the water. So the group of divers that they kind of had just gathered had to come up without anything but those decompression tanks. No sign of Ben, they said they did not see him in there, but of course they're not the best of the best out there as far as cave diving. So police started contacting some of the best divers in the country to come and search the

vortex for Ben. Meanwhile, the police in Tennessee actually went to the house of Paddy and Shelby and told them that their son Ben was believed to be missing, but was most likely dead because he never emerged out of a very deep cave. And they were absolutely shocked and devastated. His mom said she could barely even walk when she found out the news. She was just horrified. They were all just so surprised that this could happen to him because they said he was super prepared. He was constantly studying about cave diving and the risks of it. And his girlfriend even said that in the weeks leaving up to his disappearance, Ben's desk was literally covered with books

about cave diving and he was just obsessed with it. He made it his life. So they were really surprised that something could happen to him. So his family headed straight down to Florida to see if they could help in any way. So at this time, investigators are really looking into the vortex and trying to understand what's going on

here without having to go down there and dive to see it themselves. They realized that there was this gate and that this was a protected area that you were only supposed to go in if you are a certified cave diver. They found out about the whole key thing, how he would have had to get key from the front desk, and this is when they found out that Ben did not get the key because Ben was not cave certified. He was self-taught. He really believed in self-teaching, actually. And yes, a lot of people choose to live that way in the diving world, but most people in the diving community

are very against that and are really pro-certification. A lot of divers talk about how even if you were certified for every other type of dive, and you've done all these dives, you've experienced it and the pressure and all that That's great, but it's nothing like a cave dive I mean this is a whole different beast people who cave dive all the time say it's crucial that you have that Certification so it's very disappointing that Ben did not have it and it seemed that he was sneaking into the cave He was somehow able to like shimmy underneath the gate and was

getting in there all the time. So Ed Wardo, like I said, was in the area that last time that he went through the gate. And this time, instead of having him go underneath it, I mean, he knew he was going to sneak in there anyway. He decided that he was just going to open it with his key and just let him in, which I assume the owners of the vortex would not have approved of. So Eduardo finally told all of this to the police. He felt really guilty that he was the one who let him in there without a key,

but it seemed like he was going to be going in there whether Eduardo had let him in or not. Ben was a big guy, he was over six feet, and he was really strong. So he was able to get through that gate, no problem. So now they know he for sure went in the cave. There's multiple witnesses that saw him go in, one of them let him in. But how are they not able to find his body? Because a cave is essentially like a tunnel. There's one way in, one way out. There was no other way to get through out

anywhere else. Like you go in and then you turn around and come back out. Some parts of the cave were so narrow that groups of divers had to go in like a single file line. It was super, super dangerous, very, very sketchy to go through. The cave itself was 1500 feet long, so a lot of space that Ben could be. And since the divers were not finding a body, they were looking for any other signs that Ben was there and possibly may have had a struggle of some sort. They thought that if he had panicked or run out of oxygen or something malfunctioned that there would be scratches on the wall, there was limestone on the wall, which is pretty easy to scratch. And there were some parts that were just really narrow that they

thought they would see some evidence of him having gone through it. Some people thought that maybe he was even underneath the silt at the bottom of the cave So they searched through all the sand like they went through this whole cave as much as they possibly could every last Inchevitt. Every cave diver that they sent down there would come up saying the same thing that there's really no way that Ben is in there. And at this point this story had gone really viral on the internet, especially for the cave diving community and just the scuba diving community in general. Now there were a few really deep parts of the cave that no one had gone into yet, so there's still a possibility that Ben was in there and just hadn't been seen yet. So that's

when this guy named Ed Swaronson got involved. Now Ed is an international underwater cave rescuer. He's very very well known in the community and anytime there's a serious cave diving issue Ed normally gets involved with the rescue. If there was anyone that was gonna find Ben in the cave it was going to be Ed. So Ed went down into the cave to search for Ben himself and he came up with absolutely nothing. Ed said that he went as far as a human could possibly go into that cave. There were some points where he couldn't even hold his head upright. He had to turn it sideways to fit himself through some of those tunnels. Can I get a fuck now? But despite getting into all those little nooks and crannies, every possible place a human could be, Ed came up absolutely empty-handed.

Which leaves us with a huge mystery. Where is Ben McDaniel? Ed came up absolutely empty handed, which leaves us with a huge mystery. Where is Ben McDaniel? After Ed was not able to find anything, Ben's family felt really hopeless. Their last shot was this guy who had originally mapped out the cave when it was first kind of discovered. The guy had told them that he would try to go in there and bring a camera, but then eventually he said his camera was too big, and then after a while I guess he kind of ghosted them and that whole lead was kind of shut down It seemed like no one else could help and they were getting extremely frustrated

They just wanted answers. I mean they'd already had one son die and they knew exactly how he died He died of a stroke and it's terrible But you can mourn and you can move on you can accept they were able to you know Very him and have closer to the situation, but with Ben they have no idea where he is. They don't even know if he's for sure alive or not. I mean there is a chance that he's still alive. I mean not in the cave, but maybe he got out of it. I mean they have no idea and the possibilities are kind of endless here. Eventually they came up with a $10,000 reward for anyone that could go in the cave and find any sign of Ben or figure out what happened.

And they actually ended up getting a lot of heat from the diving community. They thought it was super dangerous for them to be offering people $10,000 to risk their lives and go into incredibly deep areas of the cave where, you know, Ed couldn't even get to. It just seemed very unsafe and too risky. So eventually police decided to bring back dogs to the area to see if they could catch, then send anywhere, see if he left the water, and immediately the dog started alerting to the water, which is really interesting. So they decided to test a sample of the water

to see if there was anything decomposing in it. If there was a body decomposing in that cave, they'd probably be able to pick it up in a water test. And they did find bacteria in the water, however, they were not able to confirm if it was from Ben, or if it was just from some decaying animal who had fallen into the water. So about a month into the search,

police ended up sending a remote control camera down into the cave so that they could watch back on shore and send that into areas that humans just can't get. They were hoping that they could get to the very end of the cave that no one has been able to get to yet and get some footage of it. So they were able to get the camera in 700 feet into the cave, but eventually it became too narrow and too tight for the camera to continue. It was bashing into everything, not getting any good footage. They couldn't see anything, so they brought it out and nothing new came out of this. So as I start looking into Ben's personal life, they start seeing how troubling his past was.

And start thinking maybe he was, you know, suffering from depression. Please start thinking that maybe he had gone into the cave, knowing he wouldn't make it out, that it was some type of suicide attempt. Which just doesn't sit right with me. I don't know about you guys. I just don't understand how that makes a difference here because that still doesn't answer the question of where his body is. And I don't know why someone who loves diving so much would choose to end their life with something that they love and they were so passionate about. The police had talked about how Ed, the professional diver, had said that there were areas in the cave where it got too narrow for you to get back out. Like if you were to continue any further,

there's no way that you'd be able to get out. So they started theorizing that he purposely went and lodged himself in one of those areas. But again, that seems like the weirdest possible way to end your life. And like I mentioned, they weren't able to find any trace of scratching on the wall, which you definitely would find in a situation like that.

And everyone in Ben's personal life said there was just no way that even though he had been through some hardships, that he was finally in one of the happiest times in his life. He was loving diving, loving living in Florida, and he was finally getting his life back on track. It just wouldn't add up for him to at this point go and end his life. Also, most divers think that there's just no way that Ben's body is anywhere in that cave. They said that if he was decomposing

somewhere that there would be fish and other creatures attracted to the decomposing smell, and they would be all over that area. But they said it was like a ghost town down there. So most professional divers, especially ones that have actually gone in there, think that Ben is not in the cave. So where the hell is he? So as time has gone on, people have of course come up with a bunch of different theories about what could have possibly happened to Ben. Now one of the most popular theories is that maybe Ben actually planned this whole thing out that he wanted to leave his current life, stage his death, and then purposely disappear. Some people theorize that he left his car there, he pretended he was going into the cave, and

then snuck out the water and went to Mexico or somewhere like that. People think that the reason that he left those tanks there were to make it look like he was going on a deep dive and make them think he went into the cave but he actually never went in or went in some ways and came right out and snuck out of the water and when started a new life. Others think that it was a stage suicide like the police said that he wanted everyone to think that he went in the cave and actually went and killed himself in some other way But these situations just don't make sense to his family. They said there's just no way he would have done that to them He was very close with his parents and they knew they had already been through hell by losing their other son at age 22 to a stroke

They said that he just wasn't the type to Disappear like that and leave them wondering what happened the rest of their lives He loved his family. he loved his dog too. Like he wouldn't have just left his dog. But I guess those theories are a possibility. Investigators also really looked into his whole background. They looked at his phone records, his financial records, his personal writings and stuff in his house. And there was absolutely no indication of any type of planning for him to leave the country

or to stage anything like this. And then there's the possibility that Ben's body is still in that cave somewhere that he's just, you know, really small crevice or somewhere where people have not been able to get to and he's just stuck. Most divers, statuses, very, very, very unlikely, but I guess it's an actual phenomenon that sometimes divers if they panic, like if something gets in their mask or if they're running out of oxygen or something scares them, sometimes they can panic so much and become disoriented. I mean, you are deep under the water, not in your normal surroundings, and sometimes you can become very confused. And sometimes in that panic, people can wedge themselves into a

tiny tiny space that you normally wouldn't think a person could fit. As time went on, the diving community online was pretty brutal towards Ben and his family. They were really pissed off that he was not a certified cave diver and snuck under the gate and stuff. So there was a lot of backlash towards him. It became very well known and very controversial and a lot of different divers wanted to prove their theory was right. And then in February of 2011,

six months after Ben had disappeared, Ben's family was contacted by this woman. Her name is Jill Heinerth. She's an Australian and she is known as one of the best cave divers in the entire world. Jill and her husband had seen all the terrible things being said about Ben online and all of the arguments that people were having over what could have happened

and decided that she wanted to go down there and figure out what happened herself. So she and her husband went down to Florida and they took cameras into the cave and they actually filmed something called Ben's War Text. It's a documentary and they took cameras down there in an effort to show Ben's parents that he wasn't in there, you know, to show them the very ends of the cave. Now, Jelner Husband, like everyone

else, did not find Ben in the cave. However, they found something that no other diver had found and it was Ben's shovel. It's not able to be proven that this was Ben's shovel, but his family said that he liked to take his shovel on cave dives to look for things and it looked like his shovel. So they believe that it is his and it was at the very end of the cave. However, law enforcement looks more into the shovel and they determined that it actually belonged to one of the people who had originally mapped out the cave. So they don't even know if Ben had made it that far in. So really nothing came out of this documentary. A lot of people said it's an interesting watch. I'll link it below if you want to check it out, but it did not lead to finding Ben and it is

still just as much of a mystery today. In March 2012 the reward increased to $30,000. The family still wants answers about what happened to Ben and right after this a man named Larry Hagenbotham actually went in the cave and he died in there. But unlike Ben's, his body was recovered. Now a lot of people think that even though it hasn't been confirmed that Larry was down there looking for Ben or possibly trying to get that reward. So after getting a lot of backlash about it, they ended up canceling that reward offer,

which I think was a good decision. Now obviously this wouldn't be a true prime case without a theory about possible foul play. And there's actually some interesting information here. So the night that Ben was at Bortek Springs, the owner was also there. His name is Low Kelly, and he's known for being kind of a sketchy guy. He was actually facing criminal charges at the time that this all happened. Allegedly, he had taken one of their employees who confronted him about him not paying him, and he said he owed him thousands of dollars,

and he took this guy out into an isolated wooded area, and beat him really badly with a bat. The man escaped luckily, and he thinks that he probably would have killed him if he wasn't able to escape, but later, Lil Kelly was charged with assault and kidnapping. So this is really not a great guy. He was fined and sentenced to seven years of probation. However, he didn't even complete this whole thing because he did pass away. He died at a vortex spring chilly cook-off. Apparently, he fell down in flight of stairs and hurt his head, which sounds really sketchy to me. He didn't die from this right away, but friends took him home, got him all

comfortable in bed, and his condition worsened overnight, and he later passed away. However, he was alive and well, and there, on the day that Ben McDaniel was at Vortex Springs. Some people think that maybe they got into an altercation. That Ben was confronted about going into the tunnel under the gate, or getting in there when he wasn't supposed to. So maybe Ben really did emerge out of the water and then low killed him as soon as he got out. Somehow he got rid of his body two days later, they find his car and the whole thing starts.

Now remember this pure speculation, there's absolutely no evidence to prove that this happened, the only reason people even theorize about it is because low will such a sketchy guy and because he was there. Another theory is that Ben's body was found by some of the employees that maybe Lowell had ordered them to get rid of him. That maybe they didn't want it to look bad on vortex that a guy had gone through the gate and had died on their property and they didn't want to create any more problems for the business

So they decided to discard his body and by the time the police found out and gotten wild It was all too late to come forward about what really happened and this could be a possibility But you'd think that they would be smart enough to also move Ben's truck out of the property to make it look like he left And so it wouldn't be his last destination, but who knows. Again, this is all theory's pure speculation. No one has any idea what happened to Ben McDaniel that day. Some people even think Ed Wardo could have had something to do with it since he was the last one to see him. He let him in to the gate, but he took a polygraph test and apparently passed. So Ben is still missing to this day and it's really, really hard for his family. They have absolutely no

answers. His parents said it's just ruined for his family. They have absolutely no answers. His parents said it's just ruined their lives really. They've started a grief counseling group for other parents who've lost their kids in an undetermined way. They still have Ben's dog, spooner living with them, and they love her. It's kind of like a memory of him in a way. Ben's family is pretty religious and they said that they've come to the conclusion that he did pass on, they believe that he's in heaven and that gives them some closure but they would love to know what truly happened and so would everyone else.

I mean, I'm sure a lot of you out there are dying to know what happened to Ben because it drives me crazy. I was literally up last night thinking about it before filming this until late hours thinking about how scary it would be to be stuck in a narrow cave and Not be able to get out, but just the fact that they didn't find his body in there I mean it makes no sense how how I mean if he died in there he would have been found, right?

This just makes no sense This wasn't a typical cave with really small areas that you could wedge a person's body into. It had small tunnels, but it didn't have like crevices like that. Just listening to the way divers explain it, there's just no way his body's in there, dude. That is gonna be it for me today, guys. Thank you for joining me for another episode. And make sure you follow the show on Spotify and Apple Podcast. It really does help me out. If you want to watch the video version of this show, you can find it on my YouTube channel,

which will be linked, or you can just search Kendall Ray. I will be back with another episode soon, but until then, stay safe out there. you