World records for horizontal extended reach of oil drilling is about 8 miles. There is a lot of effort to document and then publicly record the location of the horizontal laterals. Any oil company risking drilling outside the permit and legal mineral leases would like get all their operations shut down in the state. Not to mention intense scrutiny from IRS and everyone nearby every previous lease. There are not enough dollars to be made in those few miles to be worth the risk of all operations and effectively being shut out of the business.
Thanks!
Just seems to me (a non-petro layman) that natural gas pressure from two adjacent formations would seek a balance and gas would naturally migrate from the untapped towards the tapped.