0:00

Pushkin. Hey, it's Jake. If

0:11

you liked Deep Cover season one, The Drug

0:13

Wars, I have a podcast to recommend

0:15

for you. It's called

0:17

Varnam Town. It's hosted

0:19

by Twin Peaks star Kyle McLachlan

0:22

and New York Times bestselling journalist

0:24

Joshua Davis. The story

0:26

centers around a rural fishing town in

0:28

North Carolina called Varnam Town. Back

0:31

in the 1980s, this town effectively

0:33

did a deal with the Colombian

0:36

drug lord Pablo Escobar. The

0:38

deal allowed Escobar to use the town

0:41

as a shipping and transportation hub. It

0:43

quickly became the busiest port of entry

0:46

for illegal drugs into the US. So

0:49

what really happens when a fire hose

0:51

of money and cocaine is turned on

0:54

a small, tight-knit community? Well,

0:56

Kyle and Josh travel to the

0:58

sleepy backwater fishing town in Brunswick

1:00

County, North Carolina to find out.

1:03

They speak to local residents, former dealers,

1:05

and law enforcement, all with a tale

1:08

to tell. Because as

1:10

you can imagine, everyone's life changed

1:12

for better or worse. Check

1:15

out Varnam Town, wherever you get

1:17

your podcasts. OK,

1:19

Kyle, tell me what you know about

1:22

the connection between Ario Speedwagon,

1:24

the superband from the 70s

1:26

and 80s, and Pablo Escobar,

1:28

the drug kingpin. It's

1:32

a story that revolves around a

1:34

little town in North Carolina on

1:37

the coast, fishing village,

1:39

really. A town of about 300 people,

1:42

very small. This is

1:44

my friend Kyle McLachlan, the star of Twin Peaks.

1:46

And he's telling me about how he discovered

1:49

a real-life Twin Peaks in rural North Carolina,

1:51

not far from where he filmed Blue Velvet. the

2:00

same last name, which is Barnum.

2:03

And the name of the town is Barnum Town.

2:10

My name is Joshua Davis, and I'm an

2:12

investigative reporter. Kyle and I talk all

2:14

the time about the strange things we come across. I've

2:17

worked as a war reporter covering conflicts

2:19

in Iraq and Libya, Colombia, and

2:21

I've written about people in challenging circumstances.

2:24

And Kyle is drawn to odd things too. What

2:28

does REO Speedwagon and Pablo

2:30

Escobar have to do with

2:32

this town? Well, sometime in the early 80s,

2:35

REO Speedwagon's airplane made an

2:37

unannounced middle of the night

2:39

landing just outside of Barnum

2:41

Town. And

2:46

it wasn't a small plane. This

2:48

was a Lockheed Bloatstar, World

2:50

War II, prop plane, cargo plane.

2:52

Huge. And it had the REO

2:55

Speedwagon logo emblazoned

2:58

on the side of the plane. But here's the

3:00

weird part. The pilot didn't seem to know how

3:02

to fly the plane. In fact,

3:04

he overshot the runway, so he pulled back

3:06

up again. So

3:08

the plane seemed out of control because it turns

3:10

out there were actually two pilots in the cockpit,

3:12

and they were having a fistfight over the control

3:15

of the plane. Wait, the pilots were punching each

3:17

other. Yes. Yes. What were they fighting about? Well,

3:19

the story goes, one of the

3:22

pilots didn't believe that the other pilot could

3:24

actually land the plane. Okay. And was struggling

3:26

to arrest control from the pilot who was

3:28

trying to land the plane. They had like

3:30

a fistfight in the cockpit. They had a

3:33

fistfight in the cockpit. The pilot who actually

3:35

knew how to land it, he manages to

3:37

land the plane. He jumps out in the

3:39

plane, runs into the forest. The other pilot

3:42

sees the engines are running, leaves them running,

3:44

and takes off himself. Leaving the plane? Leaving

3:46

the plane. Okay. Completely abandoned. Was Ario Speedwagon

3:49

on the plane? No. No, they

3:52

had sold the plane, but they forgot to

3:54

take their logo off. Oh, that's

3:56

funny. Yeah. What was on the plane? What was on the

3:58

plane was copious amounts of drugs. you