Mike McNeill’s Diary for Monday, February 23, 2026: Subsurface South Arkansas
One day back in April 2024, we simply quit producing an almost weekly report on oil and gas drilling activity in South Arkansas. No excuse. We just threw it under the bus. We have lately become inspired to pick it back up. We have re-branded it as “Subsurface South Arkansas.” It has a new logo that incorporates oil, gas, brine and lithium into the mix. We’ve also included a glossary of terms that may help demystify the industry. Today’s entry covers reports made to the Arkansas Oil and Gas Commission from January 1, 2026 forward. The commission usually posts weekly information on Fridays. We will endeavor to post our report shortly thereafter, but certainly by the following Monday if our schedule permits. One point of interest. The AOGC hasn’t issued a permit for a new oil well since November 3, when Betsy Production Co. of Magnolia got a permit for its Aubrey No. 1 in the McLendon Branch Field of Columbia County. Plenty of work is happening at existing wells in the region — just not many new ones. CLICK HERE to read Subsurface South Arkansas.
We were inside the Columbia County Courthouse on Friday afternoon when we heard the unmistakable roar of jet engines. Sure enough, FlightRadar24 helpfully told us that a twin-engine Cessna Citation V had taken off from Magnolia at about 3:10 p.m., enroute to Addison Airport just north of Dallas. It was owned by TAG Air, LLC, a private air charter company. This particular aircraft spent Wednesday and Thursday in Springdale before its flight to Magnolia, arriving about 2 p.m. Friday. It needed only 42 minutes to fly from Magnolia to Addison. It was soon airborne again for a short hop to Fort Worth. On Sunday, it made another short trip to pick up passengers at small airport north of Houston. From there, it winged its way to Las Vegas. The Cessna Citation V carries up to 11 people with a top speed of about 480 mph and a ceiling of 45,000 feet. Business jets do use Magnolia Municipal Airport.
Thursday, February 26 will be the 94th birthday of South Arkansas’ own, the late Johnny Cash. In case you want to wear black or something.
The Murphy Arts District in El Dorado is the subject of a two-page feature article in this week’s Arkansas Business magazine. Griffin Coop wrote the article, “Arts Appeal: District, Haywood Hotel bring visitors to El Dorado.”
If this is done fairly, it could get interesting. Starting this month, the U.S. Department of Transportation officially requires that all Commercial Driver’s License (CDL) tests, including knowledge and skills portions, be conducted exclusively in English. Further, there’s a two-step process to test the English literacy of commercial drivers who are stopped by law enforcement officers and roadside inspectors on the highways. LEOs and inspectors will engage drivers in verbal interviews in English. Drivers must be able to speak English and respond to official inquiries without the use of interpreters or translation apps. Drivers who pass the interview must demonstrate the ability to read and interpret standard U.S. highway traffic signs and electronic message boards. The apparent goal behind these tests and spot inspections is to curtail driving on American highways by people whose first language is not English. We say this could get interesting because we’re presuming that when it comes to literacy, American truckers largely mirror the total U.S. population. The National Literacy Institute says that 21 percent of adult Americans function at low literacy levels, with 54 percent reading below a 6th grade level. Even if you believe illiteracy among commercial drivers is half of what the experts say, it would mean that one driver in 10 is functionally illiterate. And let’s be real. All of us know people born and raised in the United States, to English-speaking parents, who can barely make themselves understood in written or spoken English, or both. Somewhere between 10-20 percent of would-be, American born and bred truckers would have to flunk their English test for us to believe the test has legitimacy.
Mr. President, the hospital ships USNS Mercy and USNS Comfort are properly referred to as ships, and not boats. And despite your promise to send one of them to Greenland, neither of them are headed anywhere soon. They’re both in drydock on the Alabama coast for repairs.
Fifteen years ago, we reported that a Camden man died in a logging accident near Magnolia. CLICK HERE to read the article.
We return to a poll question we’ve not asked in 10 years: What percentage of your monthly income do you set aside for retirement? CLICK HERE to vote.
Mike McNeill is publisher and editor of magnoliareporter.com. Email him at news@magnoliareporter.com or call him at 870-904-3865. Opinions expressed in this column are his own.
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