sentences:  This first commercial effort to exploit the oil sands probably hoped to find free oil at the base of the sands, as drillers had in the gum beds of southern Ontario a few decades earlier.Although the Survey's three wells failed to find oil, the second was noteworthy for quite another reason.Drilled at a site called Pelican Portage, the well blew out at 235 metres after encountering a high-pressure gas zone.