In the small town of Monahans, a dozen people huddle around a 10-foot deep hole in the parched West Texas soil. The group falls silent in anticipation as well-control specialist Hawk Dunlap, in a red jumpsuit, scrapes at the soil with a shovel. A lawyer in a hardhat peers down and trains his iPhone camera on the excavation.
Dunlap unearths what was buried decades ago. Not a cadaver, but a plugged oil well.
Or at least it was supposed to be plugged. Decades underground had corroded the metal casing and cement that sealed the half-mile deep well. Leaking crude oil had stained the casing black. Gas hissed from the rusted, stained well head. Contractors got to work, collecting soil samples and measuring compounds in the gas. The well was clearly leaking.
