Toilet Lake

Lake Peigneur was an 11-foot-deep, 1300-acre lake near New Iberia, Louisiana. Then on November 21, 1980, an oil rig that was drilling in the middle of the lake hit a little snag. The drill seized up at 1230 feet, and when the workers tried to free the drill, they suddenly heard some popping noises, and the whole rig started tilting over. The men evacuated the rig, which soon turned completely over and vanished into the supposedly shallow water! In minutes, the water was spinning in a whirlpool like a giant toilet! Trees, structures, docks, a parking lot, 11 barges from a nearby canal, and a tug boat were flushed away!

What happened? Somebody on the oil rig miscalculated and accidently drilled into Diamond Crystal salt mine deep underground. What began as a 14-inch-wide hole was ripped wider and wider as the lake water melted away the salt. Soon the mine shafts started to collapse. It was perhaps a miracle that all 50 miners evacuated safely.

Lake Peigneur was completely drained of freshwater in 3 hours and soon began filling up with saltwater from the nearby canal. Nine of the sunken barges popped back up from the depths like coffins in a flood, but most of the property that was sucked into the salt mine was never seen again. Today Lake Peigneur is a 1300-foot-deep saltwater lake.