A strange phone call to a late-night radio program in 1997 gave birth to one of America’s most puzzling legends. In that call, Mel Waters described a mysterious pit on his property, soon to be known as Mel’s Hole, that he claimed had no bottom.
He said he lowered the fishing line with weights for miles and found no end. He spoke of dark beams rising out of the shaft, animals brought back to life, and government agents who later forced him off the land.
The tale spread fast. Newspapers in the Pacific Northwest reported on it, residents debated it, and carried the mystery for decades. Skeptics labeled it a hoax, while others embraced it as folklore on par with Bigfoot, Skinwalkers, or UFO encounters.
It continues to inspire curiosity, with every retelling inviting new seekers to question the truth behind Mel’s Hole. We will now take you deep into the origins, myths, facts, and mysteries to uncover every layer of this story.
Origins of Mel’s Hole and the First Wave of Public Attention
The story of Mel’s Hole can be traced to a single moment in broadcast history.
On February 21, 1997, a man who called himself Mel Waters phoned into Art Bell’s Coast to Coast AM, the nationally syndicated late-night radio show known for UFOs, conspiracies, and strange phenomena.
What he described that night, a seemingly bottomless pit on his rural property outside Ellensburg, Washington, was unlike anything listeners had ever heard.
The Claims That Sparked the Legend
Waters told Bell that he had tried to measure the depth of the hole using fishing line and weights.
He said the line had passed 80,000 feet without striking bottom. He also claimed that animals avoided the area, that a neighbor’s dead dog returned alive after being thrown into the pit, and that a black beam once shot upward from the shaft.
Most extraordinary of all, Waters alleged that federal agents later seized his land and pressured him to leave the United States.
Immediate Media Curiosity
Within days of the broadcast, local newspapers and radio outlets in Washington began to investigate.
Reporters combed through Kittitas County property records but found no trace of a Mel Waters owning land in the area.
The lack of evidence only fueled speculation. Was the story a hoax staged for entertainment, or was the man’s identity hidden for a reason?
Community Buzz in Ellensburg
Ellensburg locals recall the sudden attention the story brought. Some residents treated it as an amusing curiosity, while others organized informal expeditions into the Manastash Ridge area, hoping to find a shaft that matched the description.
Hunters, hikers, and students at nearby Central Washington University swapped theories, but no one produced verifiable proof.
Why It Caught Fire
The timing could not have been better for a story like this to explode. Coast to Coast AM was at its peak in the late 1990s, pulling in millions of insomniacs, truckers, and night-shift workers who tuned in because they wanted to hear something that felt dangerous and out of reach of the mainstream press.
Art Bell had built a stage where UFO sightings, shadow people, and government plots were not laughed at but treated as worthy of airtime.
So when Mel Waters described his bottomless pit in rural Washington, the audience was primed to believe.
It had all the right ingredients: an isolated patch of land, a mysterious narrator with no clear identity, and the hint of government agents swooping in to bury the truth.
For a generation steeped in X-Files paranoia and Y2K anxiety, the story of Mel’s Hole was irresistible.
Here is the full conversation between Mel Waters and Art Bell.
What the Evidence Really Shows?
The legend sounds bulletproof on the radio, but once people started digging for proof, the holes in the story appeared faster than the hole itself.
Journalists went straight to the records office in Kittitas County, expecting to find paperwork tied to Mel Waters.
Property deeds, tax bills, or any other documents that would prove he owned land near Ellensburg. They found nothing. Not one trace of his name in the county files. For a man claiming to hold the most mysterious piece of land in Washington, he left no paper trail at all.
Geologists stepped in next, and their verdict cut straight through the fantasy. The ground around Ellensburg is made up of basalt flows, volcanic ash, and layers of glacial debris.
A shaft stretching tens of thousands of feet through that kind of terrain is not only unlikely, it is impossible.
At such depths, the heat climbs fast and the pressure builds until rock collapses in on itself. Even the fishing line Waters said he used would snap or melt long before hitting the numbers he bragged about.
That didn’t stop the faithful from searching. In 2002, a local figure known as Red Elk gathered a group of hikers and led them into the ridges west of town.
Cameras rolled, people whispered about strange energy in the air, and the crowd hoped for a revelation. What they came back with was nothing but tired boots, photos of old mine shafts, and plenty of stories to tell over coffee. The infamous bottomless pit never appeared.
Hard Pieces on the Table
- No record of Mel Waters owning property in Kittitas County
- No geological evidence that a vertical shaft of that scale could exist in the region
- Expeditions turned up abandoned mines and deep ravines, but no “bottomless” hole
- Every surviving detail rests on radio calls and secondhand stories, not physical proof
The deeper investigators went, the more the mystery unraveled. Yet the lack of evidence did not kill the legend. It made it stronger, because a secret without proof leaves room for endless imagination.
Why the Mystery of Mel’s Hole Still Pulls Us Back?
More than twenty years after the first mention, Mel’s Hole has not slipped into silence. Search engines still show new articles every year.
YouTube uploads continue to attract views in the hundreds of thousands. Paranormal podcasts dedicate full episodes to the pit, often drawing in listeners who had never heard the name before.
The Internet Keeps It Alive
Online communities are the new stage for this story. Reddit groups trade coordinates, drone photos, and theories.
TikTok creators deliver short clips retelling the strangest details, from the revived dog to the black beam, with slick editing that catches millions of eyes.
@prettygrittytours The legend of Mel’s Hole in Ellensburg, WA. #history #legend #wa #explore #prettygrittytours #ellensburg #fyp ♬ Mysterious – Andreas Scherren
What began as a single voice on a radio line has become a stream of modern content that keeps the legend circulating.
A Local Curiosity That Never Dies
Ellensburg itself has absorbed the legend. Visitors ask locals about the hole. Some hike into the Manastash Ridge area hoping to stumble across something unusual.
Even without proof, the name alone has turned into a lure for tourism and curiosity.
The Legend That Refuses to Die
After decades of speculation, Mel’s Hole remains as elusive as ever. Property searches turned up nothing. Geologists dismantled the idea of an endless shaft beneath Washington soil. Expeditions into the Manastash Ridge produced only old mines and deep ravines. On paper and in science, the story has no legs.
Yet here we are, still talking about it. That is the true power of the legend.
Some will always call it a hoax. Others will insist there is truth hidden in the ridges outside Ellensburg. But the debate itself has become the story. Every new listener, every fresh retelling, keeps the pit alive.
The legacy of Mel’s Hole is not in what was found but in what remains missing. Until someone can prove it exists or prove it never did, the ground in Washington will hold more than basalt and ash.
It will hold a legend that refuses to stay buried.
