The Disappearance of Ben McDaniel

human beings have a tendency to want to push the boundaries of what we can explore from traveling the skies to the depths of the ocean while some of us are perfectly happy staying out of harm's way if we can help it others are more bound for a treacherous lifestyle in this case a diver who went where he was told not to go let's talk about the strange disappearance of Ben McDaniel [Music] McDaniel had been diving since he was 15 years old mostly in the freshwater vortex spring near his parents beach home vortex spring is a popular location for both experienced and novice divers located in Ponce de Leon Florida the site also has campgrounds picnic areas volleyball and basketball courts canoeing paddle boating and fishing the spring is also known to have an underwater cave that is restricted to experienced cave divers only usually covered up with a gate to stop anyone else from entering Ben McDaniel was born into a wealthy family in 1980 in late 2000s he had been dealing with a tough time his marriage had just failed his construction business had tanked and he owed 50 grand to the IRS and state worst of all he was grieving from the loss of his younger brother Paul who had died in 2008 of a stroke when he was only 22 Ben had found him unconscious in the family home and tried to revive him to no avail his parents wanted to help and suggested Ben take a sabbatical at their family beach house while they supported him financially he accepted the offer and moved into the house April of 2010 Ben had big dreams of becoming a diving instructor and getting certified to do cave dives however on the day he went to explore the vortex spring cave he was not certified other divers saw him inspecting the area around the cave as if he was planning something after a surfacing he got his tank refilled at the dive shop he spent the rest of the afternoon around the spring recording in his dialogues that evening he would take one more dive down to the restricted cave this wasn't the first time Ben had ignored the rules employees had seen him regularly forced open the cave gate in order to explore where he wasn't supposed to this time however he never returned two days went by when someone noticed Ben's truck was still sitting in the parking lot police were called to the scene where they discovered Ben's wallet and $700 they contain in the truck diving equipment he had rented was not present in the truck since he hadn't returned and there was no sign of a struggle back at his house they found his underfed dog and came to the conclusion that he'd never resurfaced and had drowned in the cave trying to get out divers were called to the rescue and scoured every crevice of the cave thinking he may have gotten into a tight space in a panic when his tanks ran low a pattern found in other cave dive deaths however after a weekend long search they were unable to find Ben they did however locate two tanks near the entrance of the cave that had belonged to him divers usually have extra tanks for decompression and leave them along the route in order to follow them out it was unusual that Ben had left them at the entrance of the cave and weirder still that the tested material inside them was just air not the special mixture of gases Ben would have used had he been researching the cave like his parents said he was on August 22nd diving expert edy Sorensen arrived at vortex to explore where others were too afraid to go they warned him that it was a dangerous trip but he liked the challenge and wanted to find Ben he made three separate trips further into the cave he found no body or evidence that anyone had travelled as far in as he did there's no way he declared that Ben is still in that cave Ben's parents didn't want to believe Ed's verdict and hired the man who originally mapped the vortex cave to search he and 16 other divers found absolutely nothing and this was when theories started to arise divers who had found nothing believed that Ben wasn't in the cave that he had been washed out by the current or had not gone in at all some thought that he had faked his death to avoid the amount of debt he'd built up police conducted 30 tests in the water for decomposition and they all came up negative cadaver dogs were used to search the wooded area surrounding the vortex spring and still came up empty all and pointed to been just vanishing but his parents continued to press on they offered a $10,000 reward for divers who could find their son and over time increased the reward to 20k and 30 K but this was coming at a greater price divers were risking their own lives in an attempt to find Ben and gain the reward till one Larry Higginbotham died in an attempt to locate him afterwards the parents removed the reward feeling it was putting other divers at risk the next step of suspicion rested on the parks owner Lowell Kelly Ben's parents thought he might have been murdered at vortex and Lowell wasn't all that clean he pled no contest to some charges against him involving beating an employee that owed him money he was to serve seven years of probation for this but never even served one Lowell has sustained a head injury when he fell down some stairs at a chili cook-off at the vortex after being taken home he was found comatose the next morning a month later he died one last investigation came from cave diver Jill heiner's who traveled to vortex to make a short film documentary and show it to the McDaniels in hopes to give them closure as well as demonstrate how dangerous cave diving can be she discovered during her trip Ben's dive logs and a map of the cave he had made it proved that he did indeed get further into the cave than previously thought and she stated it was possible that he was in there after all the documentary titled Ben's vortex was released in 2012 to this day nobody knows what happened to Ben but a lot of people think they do but what do you think is his body still in the depths of the cave did he owe a deadly debt to the wrong people or did he just up and leave town thanks so much for watching if you have a case you'd like me to cover leave it in the comments below within the first few days of this video up or I am me on Twitter for those of you who want me to do more harsh controversial cases keep in mind that YouTube does automatically D monetize those so I'll be spreading them out a little bit more until next time be well [Music]

Channel: Lady White Rabbit

Views: 950,044

Keywords: Lady White Rabbit, ladywhiterabbit, Ben McDaniel, diver, disappearance, mystery

Id: w4vNFubZwW8

Length: 7min 37sec (457 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 06 2020