> The council said that excavating the landfill site would let harmful substances escape into the environment, endangering residents with "potentially serious risks which raises public health issues and environmental concerns," the ruling said.

The extreme unlikelihood of finding the drive in a salvageable condition combined with the near certainty of polluting the local community makes it a pretty clear decision to me.

They'd need to provide sufficient confidence that they were going to continue to operate the landfill in accordance with all regulations, not just declare bankruptcy when the hunt is over and leave an unsafe mess and a financial black hole. Possibly the set intersection of treasure hunters with that character AND optimism that the drive remains useful is rather small.

They'd still need permission from the licensing authority technically, waste is a pretty highly regulated thing here and rightly so. Plus, this guy could be misremembering.