Gold Rush: Alaska (2010–…): Season 3, Episode 15 - Bedrock Blowout - full transcript
Todd pushes Big Red to near breaking point on his best ground yet. Fred and Dustin battle to save an excavator as water floods the glory hole and Parker faces his worst nightmare as the dangerous mine road claims its first victim.
.
In the wilds of North America...
Whoa, whoa!
..four mining crews are on the hunt
for gold.
Step up and put more gold
in our pockets.
The Hoffman crew now has just one
claim to mine in their pursuit
of a million-dollar season,
and time is running out.
I'm worried about that bottom cut.
Let's just fricking go for it.
Man and machine...
Logan!
..are pushed to the limit
24 hours a day...
Something's not right.
But their endeavour may not
be rewarded.
We didn't have any pay dirt in there.
If there's no gold in that box,
we screwed up.
The Dakota boys battle to
keep their excavator from being
swallowed up by water pouring
into the bottom of the glory hole.
What we have here is
a nightmare situation.
And across the creek at Big Nugget,
Parker risks life and limb
to get his hands on the best gold
of the season.
(BLEEP!)
At the Indian River claim
in the Klondike...
Stop. Whoa, whoa, whoa!
Dave Turin and his team have
414 ounces of gold,
worth around $650,000.
But they have just three weeks left
to hit their 1,000 ounce goal.
Got most of the work done here
and take a little bit there.
Dave and Greg are trying figure out
how to get more pay dirt from their
bench cut.
We get every little nook and cranny
we can find.
We can get a few more ounces
out of this. The nice part about it
is it's thawed. Yeah.
We can get this pretty easy,
all the work's been done.
Just run the bedrock.
Sounds good.
The best gold's on bedrock
but it's the hardest rock to run.
Five weeks ago,
the crew opened a cut on the terrace
above their wash plant.
Here we go, opening cut two,
good day.
Last week they recovered
a staggering 137 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
We went past the break-even point.
(ALL CHEER)
Everything now
putting in our pockets.
Now, the terrace is
down to the bedrock layer.
The material left contains
large rocks.
It should be full of gold but it
could also cause blockages in
the wash plant.
Chris Doumitt feeds the first
bedrock chunks into the wash plant.
If you look at this pile you see
a lot of this is great big bedrock.
It holds a lot of gold but it
also holds a lot of problems.
You can see the bigger stuff
come tumbling down.
It's one scoop at a time
and it has to be baby-sat.
When you are running this
by yourself it's next to impossible.
So it better be rich.
Dave and Logan watch for
any problems.
Hey, Chris, I think we're gonna
keep running this dirt.
It looks good in the box. OK.
One of two things with
this material.
It's gonna help us get 1,000oz -
or it's gonna cost us a 1,000oz.
Walt panned it and got some really
good colours on it
so it's worth throwing the dice.
(METALLIC CLUNK)
Whoa!
Suddenly, something jams.
Logan!
Go left. Go left!
Shut her down, Chris, shut her down!
Holy (BLEEP!)
Well, we've got a flood going on.
That bedrock's hung up in
the pre-wash.
Rock, dirt, gold come
spilling over the top.
A major mess.
Chris, you got the bypass open?
This bedrock, it gets jammed up in
our feed shoot, it's big and blocky.
Oh, you've got to be quick, you got
to be watching it all the time.
The problem is
it's the best gold in the pit
and it's right at bedrock so you
end up with big chunks of bedrock.
It's not easy. It's not easy at all.
The problem with the blow out,
the reason you jump on it so fast
is because you lose gold.
It blows gold right out the bottom
of the sluice box and we are forced
to run this big crappy bedrock,
that's where most of the gold's at,
and it's clogging up the machine.
The wash plant is running for now,
but Dave is leaving the Klondike
to check on business at home,
leaving Todd in charge of
the whole operation.
How far are we on this bench?
We've been having some problems
with that chunky bedrock,
but that's where the gold is.
If we stay up there, I guarantee
you we won't get 1,000 ounces.
We've got to get that bottom cut
down there. You know?
I'm worried about that bottom cut.
I don't think we should start that.
At the beginning of the season, Dave
dug out cut one at Indian River.
The crew is now mining the upper
terrace, or bench cut, above.
Todd thinks the key to success now
is extending cut one.
I wanna talk to Mitch and Andy
and I'm gonna see if they will
go above and beyond and attack that
frickin' thing.
Hold on. Mitch and Andy were
supposed to be the night shift guys,
they were going
to watch out for the plant.
Now how you going to take them
and do that cut at the same time?
Let's just frickin' go for it.
If those two guys want to go
all night long, dude,
they can do it,
I believe they can do it.
Let's see how that plant runs after
you pull them off that night shift.
It'll break down.
That's the only thing we are getting
gold with, we don't have a trommel.
I see your point.
You are gonna take a risk of
losing that plant and that's
our only chance.
Don't step over a dime to pick up
a penny, OK, cos we've got a plant
that's running good.
I tell you what; we'll take it up
when you get back. OK.
Why don't you go home,
take care of your family bizz
and then we'll catch it
when you get back.
I hate leaving here,
it's just something I got to do.
Todd and I talked about that lower
cut. Todd wants to hit it.
Personally, I think it's a mistake.
The agreement that we left with is
we re-analyse this after a week,
I just hope he listens to what I say
and he puts value on it.
I told Dave when he gets back
we'll talk about it,
but I tell you what. I think we are
gonna get that cut done,
that's what we are gonna do. Dave's
still playing a 500 ounce game,
I'm playing a 1,000oz game,
and if you really believe in 1,000oz,
you'll do everything you can
to go for it.
South, at Porcupine Creek.
The Dakota Boys have 117 ounces,
worth over $180,000.
They're digging deeper than ever
in the glory hole
to hit their 160 ounce goal.
I'm looking for
the bottom of that waterfall,
whether I'll ever find it
I don't know.
It may not be physically possible
to reach that,
but we're sure hoping we can.
Fred and Dustin are fighting a
constant battle against the ground
water deep in the glory hole.
The pump is our lifeline, the main
thing we are relying on right now
to keep the water down so we can
get material out of the hole.
We are right at the limit of what
that pump can do.
Hey, Fred, we're at the max of
our pump right now,
we're gonna have to move it down.
I don't know if
it's gonna work or not.
It's at its limit right now, I don't
know far it's gonna go down
but we're gonna have to put it down.
Well, we can try, but...
erm... I don't really like that.
To mine even further down, the crew
will have to move their pump.
We have dug down as far as
we possibly can go
with the pump at
this particular level.
If we drop the pump lower it has to
pump up the hill a longer distance
and it could kill the pump.
However, we gotta take the chance.
We will set the pump down about
another ten feet lower.
How we going to get it down there?
Why not make a road so you can
drive almost down to it?
Fred builds a road down
as close as he can to the pump,
but he's still stretching
to reach it.
Are you ready? I'm about as ready
as I'm gonna get.
Melody, can you make sure
I've got slack on that rope?
There's not a lot of line.
Come on up.
Swing, swing left!
I'm on such a bad angle here
I can't see it.
Watch me. Watch me!
What do you want?
Swing left, keep going!
Gentle, Fred.
(BLEEP)!
Fred, it's hooked on a rock.
You're gonna take it out.
I gave you everything I got.
The intake hose is snagged
underwater,
leaving the pump
dangling precariously in the air.
Fred's excavator arm is at full
reach and he can't get it free.
Pull on it!
Melody and Dustin
have to rely on brute strength.
Pull!
(GRUNTS)
Pull!
Did it break free?
Now it did.
Now it did.
Whoa!
Good. Set it down!
Looks good. All right.
We're going pipe fitting.
Hold up, that's it, we're good.
OK.
I need this to work
or I can't work today.
This is the only reason we can dig
is because this thing runs.
Fire it up.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Oh, my God!
Yeah! Whoo-hoo!
We got the pump running
and that's a big deal for us.
We are gonna push through this,
gonna keep everything running,
we're gonna keep on digging.
.
.
At Porcupine Creek
in Southeast Alaska,
the Dakota Boys and Melody have
moved their pump
deeper into the glory hole.
I have to get to my goal,
that's what it's about,
it's about me trying hard as I can,
even if it takes 30 hours,
to get one hour of
the plant running.
Dustin breaks up the hard,
rocky ground.
Digging the hell out of this stuff,
I got to rip it up.
While Fred moves the gold-bearing
material out of the hole.
Fred can't dig it unless I rip it.
Right now we're pushing everything
to capacity, everything is over
its limit;
everything is being pushed harder
than it could be.
Dustin! Stop! Stop!
Your track is off,
your track is off. Stop.
How bad is it, Fred?
It's cockeyed!
Go make sure that pump is pumping!
Dustin's excavator is crippled
deeper than they have
ever been in the glory hole.
Quite obvious
we've got a problem here.
Don't have to talk about it;
we just got to look at it.
Right there you can see whether
it's coming up or not.
It don't look like it's going down!
Dustin, I got to go prime the pump
again. It's barely pumping.
The water is not going down;
in fact it's coming up!
Let's stop the plant.
I gotta get it out of here
before the water gets up.
The pump is not running
and the hole is now filling up
with over 4,000 litres of water
a minute.
Water would destroy
the excavator's engine,
which could be covered
within one hour.
Well, our track came off while
we were trying to work in the hole
and at the same time our pump quit
on us so we got water coming up
and an excavator down in the hole.
We got to get a track back on -
and quickly.
What we have here is
a nightmare situation.
I'm in three foot of water
and can't really work on it,
it's dead in the water,
and the water's coming up on
the engine right now.
We gotta get the machine out.
Fred brings his 340 to try
to get the track back on.
All right, Fred, I need you
to come and give me a little nudge
on the end of the track.
I got to walk forward first.
Need to come farther forward?
You're good. That's good.
Go ahead and see if
you can shove it on.
Whoa. Look back there. No good.
(BLEEP)! It's getting worse.
Can you get the chain?
Fred can't force the track back on.
With no time to lose,
Dustin tries to lift it into place.
Want me to come up a little more?
Looks pretty close.
Yo. You're good.
It looks straight.
All right, Fred, right at the very
point, at the very point,
try and give her a little nudge.
While the track is raised,
Fred uses the bucket
to push it back into position.
Right there, give it a little tap,
a little bit more,
it's so close.
(CLUNK!) It's on! It's on.
We're on, we're on.
Whoo-wee.
Looks good.
We were successful
in getting the track back on.
If we can walk it out of this hole
we'll be in good shape.
Do your thing, Fred.
Fred slowly walks the excavator out
of the hole... and out of danger.
Take your time with it, Fred.
Slow down, man.
Across the creek at Big Nugget,
Parker Schnabel has 135oz
of the 300oz in gold
he wants this season.
He's on his new gold rich ground
at the Discovery claim.
I'm here because this is where the
gold is, we know there's gold here,
we're just taking the best stuff
we can find and haul it down
to the plant.
Parker has struggled to find
good gold all season.
That does not cover the expenses
of the mine. What the (BLEEP)!
But last week, he started digging
new ground, just uphill from
Big Nugget.
It's good-looking dirt. We'll be able
to get some pretty good gold
out of this.
He ran the new dirt and got some
of his best clean-ups so far.
Well, this is the stuff
that dreams are made of.
Parker's crew now knows that they
are onto a rich pay streak.
They rush to run as much material
as possible.
How does it look?
OK.
To have this come out of left field
it tops the tank off again.
It could potentially get us through
the season.
Parker is the gutsy one, goes for
the gold, and I kept telling him,
you get the dirt to the plant
and I'll get the gold.
The problem is that their new
pay dirt is three kilometres up
a treacherous dirt road,
with a 100m drop
down to the creek on one side.
This is a bad spot.
If it starts raining there's a few
spots that should get cleaned up.
It's leaning to the outside
on some soft ground
and that's asking for
trouble if it gets wet.
We are just going where the gold is.
If it's half way up the mountainside
on a road that we might die on,
well, then, so be it.
We'll do what it takes to get dirt.
If I can run it and make money
we are going to run it.
Parker insists on loading
and driving the pay dirt
to the plant himself.
I wanna get this done as quickly
as we can so we can plug the plant
full of dirt.
To keep the wash plant running
at capacity and to maximise
the gold take,
he needs to haul ten loads an hour.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
Parker, Parker, are you all right?!
.
.
At Big Nugget, Parker is hauling
discovery pay dirt
down a dangerous dirt road so he can
keep feeding his wash plant.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
I hope this thing's all right.
I'm all right
but the truck might not be.
The whole (BLEEP) thing
could have gone over the bank.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP!)
Good God.
(BLEEP) road's slippery and just
started sliding down this hill,
I tried to make the turn and the back
end caught and tipped right over.
I'm lucky that tractor
didn't go over.
(EXHALES)
OK. Yeah,
pretty scary. (BLEEP)!
It's not pretty.
Hey, Gary, can you see my truck
from where you're at?
Yeah, I can. You're pretty close
to the edge there.
(BLEEP) Do you wanna come up here
and take a look at it?
I don't know what to do.
Yeah, I'll be right there.
It looks like Parker's
had an accident up here.
I hope he's OK.
Parker flipped the truck over up
on this road going to
the Discovery claim.
I'm gonna run up and see if
I can give him some assistance.
The more rain we get on it,
the less we'll be able to use it.
That's pretty close to the bank.
Pretty close. Are you OK? I'm OK.
This doesn't look like you hurt
the truck. I haven't seen anything.
We'll need to look at the frame and
whatnot. That's a real risk, but...
it's really slick in here.
Pretty muddy stuff.
I knew we were pushing it
but that's good dirt. Right.
There's no point in wasting good
material. Get every day we can.
There's also no point in tipping
a truck over a cliff. No, we don't
to lose anybody or any equipment.
The risk, when we pull it back up,
if that tractor gets bound up it'll
tip over. Roll the tractor over too.
That's what we don't wanna have
happen. The 460's on the other side.
Yeah, it's two hours away.
We got the 330 -
Up at Discovery, yeah.
I think I can get it with that.
That's a pretty small excavator,
I might get in trouble,
but I gotta try it. Yeah.
If we get it at the right angle
we might pull it over.
I'll go get the 330
and it should just be a one-man job.
It'll take me a while.
Yeah, just go back to work.
OK.
Don't worry about it. If I need help
I'll get ya, but just keep calling.
Parker's 330 is strong enough
to lift the bed of the truck
when it's empty,
but loaded with pay dirt
it weighs more than the excavator
is designed to lift.
The backs of these trucks
are built tough,
and hopefully I can just grab the bed
and pull it over,
but we'll see what happens.
I mean, it's not always that easy.
(BLEEP)!
Boy, this thing is maxed out.
This excavator's not liking it.
Come on!
(BLEEP) thing. (BLEEP) road.
I mean, look how soft that is,
I barely even have to touch it.
We might still have a half way
functional truck, but,
there's gold out there
that is a lot easier than this.
Parker's truck isn't badly damaged
but the accident has
left him shaken.
It's September in Alaska and
the weather's not going to clear up,
this roads not going to get
any better,
in fact it'll get a lot worse.
I wouldn't put anybody else on it.
I've been sliding around all day
and I should have seen it coming,
but sometimes gold makes you do
stupid things.
This is the bad part,
dirt sitting up here,
waiting for a reason
to let gravity to take it
300 feet down to the creek.
Which a loaded dump truck
would do very nicely.
The Big Nugget crew is on
the best gold of their season.
This week alone, Glen has cleaned up
25 ounces from Discovery.
But Parker isn't happy.
Would you shut that thing off?
Look at that, I guess it's
kind of bittersweet, huh?
You guys saw I tipped that truck over
up on that road.
You could have rolled it
right off a cliff.
Yeah, another 20 feet and it would
have been a lot different story.
That road was getting pretty bad
and I don't want myself
or any of you guys on it, you know,
just because it's not worth it.
We can't get any more material
from up there.
I know it's the best gold we've seen
all season but we've got to shut
Discovery down.
I'm certainly glad
that no one was hurt,
but it's unfortunate we are
not able to get more of that gold
cos I haven't seen this much gold on
the table this entire season.
The problem is we are
really running out of options,
we are running out of ground -
Right.
But the gold's just not worth a life,
you know?
It ain't worth the risk.
That's the end of it for me.
It's tough.
No dig, and no dirt at the plant,
and a crew that's costing
a lot of money, you know?
I have to find out where that money
to pay them is going to come from.
We have no dirt at the plant,
we are unable to run,
we just don't have any material,
and if we don't have any material
there is nothing for me to do.
With no good ground left to dig,
Parker may be forced to shut down
the Big Nugget Mine.
At Indian River, in the Klondike.
While Dave Turin is away
on business,
Todd and his nightshift crew
meet at the new lower cut.
What I'm about ready to ask you guys
is above and beyond.
I've done the math and it don't add
up, we're not gonna get 1,000 ounces
without the gold out of this
fricking cut.
When Dozer Dave told me we can't get
this cut done,
something inside me pissed me off
and I wanted to at least give you
guys the opportunity
to step up, prove Dozer Dave wrong,
and put more gold in our pockets.
I don't like somebody telling me
I can't do something,
so that might be just the fire
we need for
Mitch and I to get this done.
So, we'll get it done.
Proving dozer Dave wrong at this
point in the game would
sure feel good.
We got to go try and get
a cut opened up.
We got a muddy mess down there
but me and Andy are gonna
go see what we can do.
Mitch and Andy have to remove mud
from a vast area
that, in some places,
is up to nine metres deep.
Dave doesn't think
that we can do this cut,
I say that within the next five
to seven days,
if we can get this mud off
we'll get down to pay dirt
and we'll frickin' run
that pay dirt.
This season,
that's our 1,000 ounces, man,
we're not gonna get it if we
don't run every bit of ground we can.
But I tell you what, unless you
fricking get up to the plate
and swing the bat,
you have no chance.
Mitch and Andy keep stripping ground
instead of doing their night shift
job, maintaining Big Red.
So it's 2:30 in the morning,
it is a muddy, sloppy mess.
But in the last six or seven hours we
have really made some good progress
so we are making headway,
it's a little hard to see but, you
know, we are running out of time.
We are working all night.
The pressure's on because if
we can't get it cleaned up
we're in trouble.
While Mitch and Andy open up
the new lower cut,
Todd runs the wash plant by himself.
He's loading bedrock from
the terrace cut at full speed.
The same material that blocked up
the plant on Dave's shift.
That's real pay dirt.
That is the best panned pay dirt
we've had since we've been here
this summer.
I'm expecting big things.
(METALLIC SQUEAL)
No, no, no!
Thurber, Thurber, quick,
cut the water.
Andy, Andy!
(BLEEP)! We've had a flow out!
OK, I got the pump, Todd.
Get up in there and take a look!
Large angular chunks of bedrock
have blocked the feed shoot,
causing water and pay dirt to pour
out from the top of the wash plant.
OK, it's this rock right here.
We're into big bedrock,
which is good,
but they just got
a little jammed up.
They quickly clear the blockage
and restart the wash plant.
What's going on? So I think we need
to slow the feed down a little bit.
No.
We are in the best dirt
we've ever had.
If we break the wash plant
we break the wash plant.
Let's go ahead and fire all the water
up. Get going! Fire it up!
(ENGINE STARTS)
To avoid more problems,
Andy suggests they run slowly,
but Todd insists on running
the plant at full speed.
(BLEEP)! We need to slow it down.
You got it set too fast.
Look at this, look at this.
Big chunky bedrock,
you know what that means, baby?
There's some gold in there. This is
gonna be exciting in the morning.
Yeah, this stuff's got good gold in
it. We don't want to screw anything
up here.
Something's not right.
(BLEEP)!
Hey. Pay dirt!
Get out the way. You didn't have any
pay dirt in there! Hit the bypass.
The water is running at full speed.
Look out!
The water right here, open it up.
But Todd has forgotten to put
pay dirt in the plant.
Clean water is rushing through
the sluice box and could be washing
out the gold.
It's right out of pay dirt.
That's not good!
Todd didn't have enough pay dirt in
there so all the water was running,
that can wash your gold
right out of the box.
Ran down and opened the bypass
to cut the water flow down
to hold our gold.
This is what can happen.
Everything has been going fine for
about the last two-and-a-half hours.
One problem and it all goes to hell
in a handbag real quick. You've got
to be paying attention all the time.
Sometimes it seems like
I don't need to be here,
but when something goes wrong
somebody must be here
that knows what they are doing.
Without experienced crew
at the wash plant,
Todd may have just lost
four days of Indian River gold.
What scares me is we might have
blown gold out.
The only way we can tell is
to check it in the morning.
If there's no gold in that box,
we screwed up.
At Porcupine Creek,
the Dakota Boys are running material
from deep in the glory hole.
And after five days of running...
Go ahead, shut it down.
..they start the clean-up.
Pull it back. Wait, wait.
We'll save that
in our pile of parts.
We'll see if we got any gold
in this stuff.
We got a goal set to get 160 ounces,
and that's what our aim is for.
It's really important
that we reach our goal.
That's what we came here to do and
we are making every effort to do it.
That looks good.
That'll work. OK, good.
(STARTS ENGINE)
There we go.
Every piece counts, it all adds up
and we want it all,
we want to reach that goal.
The crew needs an average of
two ounces a day to hit their goal
for the season.
They need at least 12 ounces
from this week's clean-up.
How's it looking over there?
We got a pile of it.
I tell you what, let's just weigh it
up, find out what we got.
The moment of truth.
There's six,
there's ten,
there's 14,
17...
Go, Fred.
18.
Come on, baby.
20! Whoo-hoo!
21.
Nice!
22,
22.4.
(ALL WHOOP)
22.4. A good one there.
We're getting there.
I'll tell you what.
I like that, that's nice.
They now have 139 ounces of gold,
worth close to a quarter of
a million dollars.
They're on track to
reach their goal of 160 ounces.
I put more work into that pile
of gold than any other gold
we've ever gotten.
It's amazing that just that little
bit is worth so much cash.
About $32,000-worth of gold
sitting right there.
22 ounces is great for us.
That's an accomplishment.
At Indian River,
Mitch and Andy have worked through
the night to extend cut one.
They are fighting against
the deep black mud on no sleep.
There's a lot of dirt back there, so
we're just gonna keep ploughing away
and try and get through it.
A lot of people don't think
we can get through the mud
but we make this work out right
we'll have over a million-dollar
season, so we'll give it a try.
You know, we got a limited period of
time out here on this cut
that we're doing,
but it's really deep
so it's big long pushes
which are hard on these dozers.
It just takes a long time.
It's frustrating, it's a mess,
and that's what's making it
challenging,
but if everything was easy
it'd get boring.
I don't want 990,
I want a thousand ounces.
.
.
At Indian River,
Todd is about to find out
if he accidentally washed
their best gold yet
out of the wash plant
the night before.
The crew looks for gold
in the sluices.
Chris, how's it looking?
It's looking pretty weak, Andy.
We'll just have to wait and see.
Come down this morning to
check the mats
and it makes me nervous when I don't
see the amount of gold that the guys
were running during the day shift,
so we're just hoping that
we didn't blow any gold out.
We will find out as soon as
we clean these mats up.
It's probably more dirt and rock
than it is gold.
Not going to know how much we have
until we do this. There we go.
Dave Turin has just returned
from Oregon.
It doesn't take him long to see that
things aren't the way he left them.
Todd! I notice you did a lot of work
on that cut? I thought we were gonna
leave it till I got back.
You think its stripped ready to go,
you think we are ready to get pay
out of there? No.
You took a huge gamble and I don't
know if it's gonna pay off.
It might have been a mistake.
And then I see all this huge bedrock
and that is beating this thing up.
What is going on?
Well, yeah,
we had some issues at night.
Well, what happened?
We had some pretty big rocks -
they were huge.
We could have screwed something up.
Could you have blown some gold out
of this sluice? (SIGHS)
I don't know, Dave.
It didn't look good.
The only way we'll be able to tell
is on this clean-up.
He took a risk on that cut
and he put this plant in jeopardy.
He may have blown out some gold,
I don't know yet.
We're going to find out
when we do the clean-up.
In the gold room,
Thurber is running the clean-up.
I'd love to have no gold
in this pan.
That tells me everything's
being caught in the upper carpets.
I've never done just the lower
carpets before by themselves.
The sluice box is designed to catch
the gold in the first two metres
of carpet.
But it has an extra seven metres
to recover any gold
that is washed down
by too much water.
If Thurber finds a lot of gold in
the bottom mats,
they can be sure that they've
washed gold out of the plant.
There's some gold.
This is out of the bottom mats.
That's probably two ounces
of gold there,
and to me that's an awful lot of
gold to be that far in the box.
That's a 30-foot sluice box.
I don't wanna see gold that far
down. Another couple of inches,
it's gone forever. How much blew out
I have no idea but
I'll go show this to Jack,
let him see.
Hey, Jack.
Hey, Dad, come here.
What have you got?
Well, that was gold that was in that
bottom carpet. Yeah, oh, my gosh.
That made it all the way down, huh?
That's clear at the bottom.
That's our last chance grab,
that much.
We must have lost a lot,
if there is that much at the bottom
end of that thing.
You got fine gold and you got pretty
good-sized pieces of gold there,
that's cruising out of there.
My worst fears were confirmed. We did
lose a bunch of gold out of the box.
We'll never know how much but
I got a feeling it was quite a bit.
This is definitely gonna affect
our total at the end
and we went backwards, that night
we went fricking backwards.
Thurber and Jack clean up
the rest of the carpets.
There's not a lot of gold but still,
I guess it means you are through
shovelling
when you are back here looking.
Thurber thinks it's gonna be 40,
but anything is better than nothing.
The crew waits for Jack
to finish weighing the gold.
I hope I'm wrong but I got a bad
feeling that we blew gold out that
one night.
What do you guys think? Dave?
I...
Pass? Pass.
It was horrible to run, horrible.
I think it's been a rough week.
Welcome to mining,
that's the way it is, it's tough.
We'll find out here pretty soon.
You know, the clean-up
isn't quite what I expected.
What's our total?
It's... er... 107.
That's $150,000!
(ALL LAUGH) Awesome!
Despite their worst fears,
the Hoffman crew has one of
their biggest cleanouts yet.
It brings their season total
to 521 ounces,
worth around $830,000.
You guys should be proud of
yourselves.
Never would have expected that. Oh,
no, this is awesome! This is great.
Just a triple digit
flipping clean-up.
I'd never imagined
we'd get clean-ups like this.
Dude, we just did 107 ounces.
That's a lot of gold.
They are now just
one big clean-out away
from one million dollars in gold.
Guys, we are gonna make it.
It's gonna be by
the skin of our teeth but I think
we are gonna make it.
Let's just kick some ass
and finish this up strong.
We just did 107 ounces,
which is $150,000-worth of gold
in one clean-up, so...
We are approaching
a million-dollar season.
Can we get there?
Damn right we can get there.
We got a fresh week coming,
we'll kick some ass.
This was a wakeup call.
The good news is we are learning, we
move on and be better miners for it.
It's a great thing.
We are accomplishing a lot,
we're getting a lot of gold.
But we have a goal
and I want to get to that goal.
Dad, do you wanna say a prayer
for us? Yeah, sure.
Heavenly Father,
we thank You for getting us gold,
You are going to make our goal.
Lord, we ask that You just richly
bless us with gold. Amen. (ALL) Amen.
subtitles by Deluxe
In the wilds of North America...
Whoa, whoa!
..four mining crews are on the hunt
for gold.
Step up and put more gold
in our pockets.
The Hoffman crew now has just one
claim to mine in their pursuit
of a million-dollar season,
and time is running out.
I'm worried about that bottom cut.
Let's just fricking go for it.
Man and machine...
Logan!
..are pushed to the limit
24 hours a day...
Something's not right.
But their endeavour may not
be rewarded.
We didn't have any pay dirt in there.
If there's no gold in that box,
we screwed up.
The Dakota boys battle to
keep their excavator from being
swallowed up by water pouring
into the bottom of the glory hole.
What we have here is
a nightmare situation.
And across the creek at Big Nugget,
Parker risks life and limb
to get his hands on the best gold
of the season.
(BLEEP!)
At the Indian River claim
in the Klondike...
Stop. Whoa, whoa, whoa!
Dave Turin and his team have
414 ounces of gold,
worth around $650,000.
But they have just three weeks left
to hit their 1,000 ounce goal.
Got most of the work done here
and take a little bit there.
Dave and Greg are trying figure out
how to get more pay dirt from their
bench cut.
We get every little nook and cranny
we can find.
We can get a few more ounces
out of this. The nice part about it
is it's thawed. Yeah.
We can get this pretty easy,
all the work's been done.
Just run the bedrock.
Sounds good.
The best gold's on bedrock
but it's the hardest rock to run.
Five weeks ago,
the crew opened a cut on the terrace
above their wash plant.
Here we go, opening cut two,
good day.
Last week they recovered
a staggering 137 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
We went past the break-even point.
(ALL CHEER)
Everything now
putting in our pockets.
Now, the terrace is
down to the bedrock layer.
The material left contains
large rocks.
It should be full of gold but it
could also cause blockages in
the wash plant.
Chris Doumitt feeds the first
bedrock chunks into the wash plant.
If you look at this pile you see
a lot of this is great big bedrock.
It holds a lot of gold but it
also holds a lot of problems.
You can see the bigger stuff
come tumbling down.
It's one scoop at a time
and it has to be baby-sat.
When you are running this
by yourself it's next to impossible.
So it better be rich.
Dave and Logan watch for
any problems.
Hey, Chris, I think we're gonna
keep running this dirt.
It looks good in the box. OK.
One of two things with
this material.
It's gonna help us get 1,000oz -
or it's gonna cost us a 1,000oz.
Walt panned it and got some really
good colours on it
so it's worth throwing the dice.
(METALLIC CLUNK)
Whoa!
Suddenly, something jams.
Logan!
Go left. Go left!
Shut her down, Chris, shut her down!
Holy (BLEEP!)
Well, we've got a flood going on.
That bedrock's hung up in
the pre-wash.
Rock, dirt, gold come
spilling over the top.
A major mess.
Chris, you got the bypass open?
This bedrock, it gets jammed up in
our feed shoot, it's big and blocky.
Oh, you've got to be quick, you got
to be watching it all the time.
The problem is
it's the best gold in the pit
and it's right at bedrock so you
end up with big chunks of bedrock.
It's not easy. It's not easy at all.
The problem with the blow out,
the reason you jump on it so fast
is because you lose gold.
It blows gold right out the bottom
of the sluice box and we are forced
to run this big crappy bedrock,
that's where most of the gold's at,
and it's clogging up the machine.
The wash plant is running for now,
but Dave is leaving the Klondike
to check on business at home,
leaving Todd in charge of
the whole operation.
How far are we on this bench?
We've been having some problems
with that chunky bedrock,
but that's where the gold is.
If we stay up there, I guarantee
you we won't get 1,000 ounces.
We've got to get that bottom cut
down there. You know?
I'm worried about that bottom cut.
I don't think we should start that.
At the beginning of the season, Dave
dug out cut one at Indian River.
The crew is now mining the upper
terrace, or bench cut, above.
Todd thinks the key to success now
is extending cut one.
I wanna talk to Mitch and Andy
and I'm gonna see if they will
go above and beyond and attack that
frickin' thing.
Hold on. Mitch and Andy were
supposed to be the night shift guys,
they were going
to watch out for the plant.
Now how you going to take them
and do that cut at the same time?
Let's just frickin' go for it.
If those two guys want to go
all night long, dude,
they can do it,
I believe they can do it.
Let's see how that plant runs after
you pull them off that night shift.
It'll break down.
That's the only thing we are getting
gold with, we don't have a trommel.
I see your point.
You are gonna take a risk of
losing that plant and that's
our only chance.
Don't step over a dime to pick up
a penny, OK, cos we've got a plant
that's running good.
I tell you what; we'll take it up
when you get back. OK.
Why don't you go home,
take care of your family bizz
and then we'll catch it
when you get back.
I hate leaving here,
it's just something I got to do.
Todd and I talked about that lower
cut. Todd wants to hit it.
Personally, I think it's a mistake.
The agreement that we left with is
we re-analyse this after a week,
I just hope he listens to what I say
and he puts value on it.
I told Dave when he gets back
we'll talk about it,
but I tell you what. I think we are
gonna get that cut done,
that's what we are gonna do. Dave's
still playing a 500 ounce game,
I'm playing a 1,000oz game,
and if you really believe in 1,000oz,
you'll do everything you can
to go for it.
South, at Porcupine Creek.
The Dakota Boys have 117 ounces,
worth over $180,000.
They're digging deeper than ever
in the glory hole
to hit their 160 ounce goal.
I'm looking for
the bottom of that waterfall,
whether I'll ever find it
I don't know.
It may not be physically possible
to reach that,
but we're sure hoping we can.
Fred and Dustin are fighting a
constant battle against the ground
water deep in the glory hole.
The pump is our lifeline, the main
thing we are relying on right now
to keep the water down so we can
get material out of the hole.
We are right at the limit of what
that pump can do.
Hey, Fred, we're at the max of
our pump right now,
we're gonna have to move it down.
I don't know if
it's gonna work or not.
It's at its limit right now, I don't
know far it's gonna go down
but we're gonna have to put it down.
Well, we can try, but...
erm... I don't really like that.
To mine even further down, the crew
will have to move their pump.
We have dug down as far as
we possibly can go
with the pump at
this particular level.
If we drop the pump lower it has to
pump up the hill a longer distance
and it could kill the pump.
However, we gotta take the chance.
We will set the pump down about
another ten feet lower.
How we going to get it down there?
Why not make a road so you can
drive almost down to it?
Fred builds a road down
as close as he can to the pump,
but he's still stretching
to reach it.
Are you ready? I'm about as ready
as I'm gonna get.
Melody, can you make sure
I've got slack on that rope?
There's not a lot of line.
Come on up.
Swing, swing left!
I'm on such a bad angle here
I can't see it.
Watch me. Watch me!
What do you want?
Swing left, keep going!
Gentle, Fred.
(BLEEP)!
Fred, it's hooked on a rock.
You're gonna take it out.
I gave you everything I got.
The intake hose is snagged
underwater,
leaving the pump
dangling precariously in the air.
Fred's excavator arm is at full
reach and he can't get it free.
Pull on it!
Melody and Dustin
have to rely on brute strength.
Pull!
(GRUNTS)
Pull!
Did it break free?
Now it did.
Now it did.
Whoa!
Good. Set it down!
Looks good. All right.
We're going pipe fitting.
Hold up, that's it, we're good.
OK.
I need this to work
or I can't work today.
This is the only reason we can dig
is because this thing runs.
Fire it up.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Oh, my God!
Yeah! Whoo-hoo!
We got the pump running
and that's a big deal for us.
We are gonna push through this,
gonna keep everything running,
we're gonna keep on digging.
.
.
At Porcupine Creek
in Southeast Alaska,
the Dakota Boys and Melody have
moved their pump
deeper into the glory hole.
I have to get to my goal,
that's what it's about,
it's about me trying hard as I can,
even if it takes 30 hours,
to get one hour of
the plant running.
Dustin breaks up the hard,
rocky ground.
Digging the hell out of this stuff,
I got to rip it up.
While Fred moves the gold-bearing
material out of the hole.
Fred can't dig it unless I rip it.
Right now we're pushing everything
to capacity, everything is over
its limit;
everything is being pushed harder
than it could be.
Dustin! Stop! Stop!
Your track is off,
your track is off. Stop.
How bad is it, Fred?
It's cockeyed!
Go make sure that pump is pumping!
Dustin's excavator is crippled
deeper than they have
ever been in the glory hole.
Quite obvious
we've got a problem here.
Don't have to talk about it;
we just got to look at it.
Right there you can see whether
it's coming up or not.
It don't look like it's going down!
Dustin, I got to go prime the pump
again. It's barely pumping.
The water is not going down;
in fact it's coming up!
Let's stop the plant.
I gotta get it out of here
before the water gets up.
The pump is not running
and the hole is now filling up
with over 4,000 litres of water
a minute.
Water would destroy
the excavator's engine,
which could be covered
within one hour.
Well, our track came off while
we were trying to work in the hole
and at the same time our pump quit
on us so we got water coming up
and an excavator down in the hole.
We got to get a track back on -
and quickly.
What we have here is
a nightmare situation.
I'm in three foot of water
and can't really work on it,
it's dead in the water,
and the water's coming up on
the engine right now.
We gotta get the machine out.
Fred brings his 340 to try
to get the track back on.
All right, Fred, I need you
to come and give me a little nudge
on the end of the track.
I got to walk forward first.
Need to come farther forward?
You're good. That's good.
Go ahead and see if
you can shove it on.
Whoa. Look back there. No good.
(BLEEP)! It's getting worse.
Can you get the chain?
Fred can't force the track back on.
With no time to lose,
Dustin tries to lift it into place.
Want me to come up a little more?
Looks pretty close.
Yo. You're good.
It looks straight.
All right, Fred, right at the very
point, at the very point,
try and give her a little nudge.
While the track is raised,
Fred uses the bucket
to push it back into position.
Right there, give it a little tap,
a little bit more,
it's so close.
(CLUNK!) It's on! It's on.
We're on, we're on.
Whoo-wee.
Looks good.
We were successful
in getting the track back on.
If we can walk it out of this hole
we'll be in good shape.
Do your thing, Fred.
Fred slowly walks the excavator out
of the hole... and out of danger.
Take your time with it, Fred.
Slow down, man.
Across the creek at Big Nugget,
Parker Schnabel has 135oz
of the 300oz in gold
he wants this season.
He's on his new gold rich ground
at the Discovery claim.
I'm here because this is where the
gold is, we know there's gold here,
we're just taking the best stuff
we can find and haul it down
to the plant.
Parker has struggled to find
good gold all season.
That does not cover the expenses
of the mine. What the (BLEEP)!
But last week, he started digging
new ground, just uphill from
Big Nugget.
It's good-looking dirt. We'll be able
to get some pretty good gold
out of this.
He ran the new dirt and got some
of his best clean-ups so far.
Well, this is the stuff
that dreams are made of.
Parker's crew now knows that they
are onto a rich pay streak.
They rush to run as much material
as possible.
How does it look?
OK.
To have this come out of left field
it tops the tank off again.
It could potentially get us through
the season.
Parker is the gutsy one, goes for
the gold, and I kept telling him,
you get the dirt to the plant
and I'll get the gold.
The problem is that their new
pay dirt is three kilometres up
a treacherous dirt road,
with a 100m drop
down to the creek on one side.
This is a bad spot.
If it starts raining there's a few
spots that should get cleaned up.
It's leaning to the outside
on some soft ground
and that's asking for
trouble if it gets wet.
We are just going where the gold is.
If it's half way up the mountainside
on a road that we might die on,
well, then, so be it.
We'll do what it takes to get dirt.
If I can run it and make money
we are going to run it.
Parker insists on loading
and driving the pay dirt
to the plant himself.
I wanna get this done as quickly
as we can so we can plug the plant
full of dirt.
To keep the wash plant running
at capacity and to maximise
the gold take,
he needs to haul ten loads an hour.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
Parker, Parker, are you all right?!
.
.
At Big Nugget, Parker is hauling
discovery pay dirt
down a dangerous dirt road so he can
keep feeding his wash plant.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP)!
I hope this thing's all right.
I'm all right
but the truck might not be.
The whole (BLEEP) thing
could have gone over the bank.
(BLEEP)!
(BLEEP! BLEEP! BLEEP!)
Good God.
(BLEEP) road's slippery and just
started sliding down this hill,
I tried to make the turn and the back
end caught and tipped right over.
I'm lucky that tractor
didn't go over.
(EXHALES)
OK. Yeah,
pretty scary. (BLEEP)!
It's not pretty.
Hey, Gary, can you see my truck
from where you're at?
Yeah, I can. You're pretty close
to the edge there.
(BLEEP) Do you wanna come up here
and take a look at it?
I don't know what to do.
Yeah, I'll be right there.
It looks like Parker's
had an accident up here.
I hope he's OK.
Parker flipped the truck over up
on this road going to
the Discovery claim.
I'm gonna run up and see if
I can give him some assistance.
The more rain we get on it,
the less we'll be able to use it.
That's pretty close to the bank.
Pretty close. Are you OK? I'm OK.
This doesn't look like you hurt
the truck. I haven't seen anything.
We'll need to look at the frame and
whatnot. That's a real risk, but...
it's really slick in here.
Pretty muddy stuff.
I knew we were pushing it
but that's good dirt. Right.
There's no point in wasting good
material. Get every day we can.
There's also no point in tipping
a truck over a cliff. No, we don't
to lose anybody or any equipment.
The risk, when we pull it back up,
if that tractor gets bound up it'll
tip over. Roll the tractor over too.
That's what we don't wanna have
happen. The 460's on the other side.
Yeah, it's two hours away.
We got the 330 -
Up at Discovery, yeah.
I think I can get it with that.
That's a pretty small excavator,
I might get in trouble,
but I gotta try it. Yeah.
If we get it at the right angle
we might pull it over.
I'll go get the 330
and it should just be a one-man job.
It'll take me a while.
Yeah, just go back to work.
OK.
Don't worry about it. If I need help
I'll get ya, but just keep calling.
Parker's 330 is strong enough
to lift the bed of the truck
when it's empty,
but loaded with pay dirt
it weighs more than the excavator
is designed to lift.
The backs of these trucks
are built tough,
and hopefully I can just grab the bed
and pull it over,
but we'll see what happens.
I mean, it's not always that easy.
(BLEEP)!
Boy, this thing is maxed out.
This excavator's not liking it.
Come on!
(BLEEP) thing. (BLEEP) road.
I mean, look how soft that is,
I barely even have to touch it.
We might still have a half way
functional truck, but,
there's gold out there
that is a lot easier than this.
Parker's truck isn't badly damaged
but the accident has
left him shaken.
It's September in Alaska and
the weather's not going to clear up,
this roads not going to get
any better,
in fact it'll get a lot worse.
I wouldn't put anybody else on it.
I've been sliding around all day
and I should have seen it coming,
but sometimes gold makes you do
stupid things.
This is the bad part,
dirt sitting up here,
waiting for a reason
to let gravity to take it
300 feet down to the creek.
Which a loaded dump truck
would do very nicely.
The Big Nugget crew is on
the best gold of their season.
This week alone, Glen has cleaned up
25 ounces from Discovery.
But Parker isn't happy.
Would you shut that thing off?
Look at that, I guess it's
kind of bittersweet, huh?
You guys saw I tipped that truck over
up on that road.
You could have rolled it
right off a cliff.
Yeah, another 20 feet and it would
have been a lot different story.
That road was getting pretty bad
and I don't want myself
or any of you guys on it, you know,
just because it's not worth it.
We can't get any more material
from up there.
I know it's the best gold we've seen
all season but we've got to shut
Discovery down.
I'm certainly glad
that no one was hurt,
but it's unfortunate we are
not able to get more of that gold
cos I haven't seen this much gold on
the table this entire season.
The problem is we are
really running out of options,
we are running out of ground -
Right.
But the gold's just not worth a life,
you know?
It ain't worth the risk.
That's the end of it for me.
It's tough.
No dig, and no dirt at the plant,
and a crew that's costing
a lot of money, you know?
I have to find out where that money
to pay them is going to come from.
We have no dirt at the plant,
we are unable to run,
we just don't have any material,
and if we don't have any material
there is nothing for me to do.
With no good ground left to dig,
Parker may be forced to shut down
the Big Nugget Mine.
At Indian River, in the Klondike.
While Dave Turin is away
on business,
Todd and his nightshift crew
meet at the new lower cut.
What I'm about ready to ask you guys
is above and beyond.
I've done the math and it don't add
up, we're not gonna get 1,000 ounces
without the gold out of this
fricking cut.
When Dozer Dave told me we can't get
this cut done,
something inside me pissed me off
and I wanted to at least give you
guys the opportunity
to step up, prove Dozer Dave wrong,
and put more gold in our pockets.
I don't like somebody telling me
I can't do something,
so that might be just the fire
we need for
Mitch and I to get this done.
So, we'll get it done.
Proving dozer Dave wrong at this
point in the game would
sure feel good.
We got to go try and get
a cut opened up.
We got a muddy mess down there
but me and Andy are gonna
go see what we can do.
Mitch and Andy have to remove mud
from a vast area
that, in some places,
is up to nine metres deep.
Dave doesn't think
that we can do this cut,
I say that within the next five
to seven days,
if we can get this mud off
we'll get down to pay dirt
and we'll frickin' run
that pay dirt.
This season,
that's our 1,000 ounces, man,
we're not gonna get it if we
don't run every bit of ground we can.
But I tell you what, unless you
fricking get up to the plate
and swing the bat,
you have no chance.
Mitch and Andy keep stripping ground
instead of doing their night shift
job, maintaining Big Red.
So it's 2:30 in the morning,
it is a muddy, sloppy mess.
But in the last six or seven hours we
have really made some good progress
so we are making headway,
it's a little hard to see but, you
know, we are running out of time.
We are working all night.
The pressure's on because if
we can't get it cleaned up
we're in trouble.
While Mitch and Andy open up
the new lower cut,
Todd runs the wash plant by himself.
He's loading bedrock from
the terrace cut at full speed.
The same material that blocked up
the plant on Dave's shift.
That's real pay dirt.
That is the best panned pay dirt
we've had since we've been here
this summer.
I'm expecting big things.
(METALLIC SQUEAL)
No, no, no!
Thurber, Thurber, quick,
cut the water.
Andy, Andy!
(BLEEP)! We've had a flow out!
OK, I got the pump, Todd.
Get up in there and take a look!
Large angular chunks of bedrock
have blocked the feed shoot,
causing water and pay dirt to pour
out from the top of the wash plant.
OK, it's this rock right here.
We're into big bedrock,
which is good,
but they just got
a little jammed up.
They quickly clear the blockage
and restart the wash plant.
What's going on? So I think we need
to slow the feed down a little bit.
No.
We are in the best dirt
we've ever had.
If we break the wash plant
we break the wash plant.
Let's go ahead and fire all the water
up. Get going! Fire it up!
(ENGINE STARTS)
To avoid more problems,
Andy suggests they run slowly,
but Todd insists on running
the plant at full speed.
(BLEEP)! We need to slow it down.
You got it set too fast.
Look at this, look at this.
Big chunky bedrock,
you know what that means, baby?
There's some gold in there. This is
gonna be exciting in the morning.
Yeah, this stuff's got good gold in
it. We don't want to screw anything
up here.
Something's not right.
(BLEEP)!
Hey. Pay dirt!
Get out the way. You didn't have any
pay dirt in there! Hit the bypass.
The water is running at full speed.
Look out!
The water right here, open it up.
But Todd has forgotten to put
pay dirt in the plant.
Clean water is rushing through
the sluice box and could be washing
out the gold.
It's right out of pay dirt.
That's not good!
Todd didn't have enough pay dirt in
there so all the water was running,
that can wash your gold
right out of the box.
Ran down and opened the bypass
to cut the water flow down
to hold our gold.
This is what can happen.
Everything has been going fine for
about the last two-and-a-half hours.
One problem and it all goes to hell
in a handbag real quick. You've got
to be paying attention all the time.
Sometimes it seems like
I don't need to be here,
but when something goes wrong
somebody must be here
that knows what they are doing.
Without experienced crew
at the wash plant,
Todd may have just lost
four days of Indian River gold.
What scares me is we might have
blown gold out.
The only way we can tell is
to check it in the morning.
If there's no gold in that box,
we screwed up.
At Porcupine Creek,
the Dakota Boys are running material
from deep in the glory hole.
And after five days of running...
Go ahead, shut it down.
..they start the clean-up.
Pull it back. Wait, wait.
We'll save that
in our pile of parts.
We'll see if we got any gold
in this stuff.
We got a goal set to get 160 ounces,
and that's what our aim is for.
It's really important
that we reach our goal.
That's what we came here to do and
we are making every effort to do it.
That looks good.
That'll work. OK, good.
(STARTS ENGINE)
There we go.
Every piece counts, it all adds up
and we want it all,
we want to reach that goal.
The crew needs an average of
two ounces a day to hit their goal
for the season.
They need at least 12 ounces
from this week's clean-up.
How's it looking over there?
We got a pile of it.
I tell you what, let's just weigh it
up, find out what we got.
The moment of truth.
There's six,
there's ten,
there's 14,
17...
Go, Fred.
18.
Come on, baby.
20! Whoo-hoo!
21.
Nice!
22,
22.4.
(ALL WHOOP)
22.4. A good one there.
We're getting there.
I'll tell you what.
I like that, that's nice.
They now have 139 ounces of gold,
worth close to a quarter of
a million dollars.
They're on track to
reach their goal of 160 ounces.
I put more work into that pile
of gold than any other gold
we've ever gotten.
It's amazing that just that little
bit is worth so much cash.
About $32,000-worth of gold
sitting right there.
22 ounces is great for us.
That's an accomplishment.
At Indian River,
Mitch and Andy have worked through
the night to extend cut one.
They are fighting against
the deep black mud on no sleep.
There's a lot of dirt back there, so
we're just gonna keep ploughing away
and try and get through it.
A lot of people don't think
we can get through the mud
but we make this work out right
we'll have over a million-dollar
season, so we'll give it a try.
You know, we got a limited period of
time out here on this cut
that we're doing,
but it's really deep
so it's big long pushes
which are hard on these dozers.
It just takes a long time.
It's frustrating, it's a mess,
and that's what's making it
challenging,
but if everything was easy
it'd get boring.
I don't want 990,
I want a thousand ounces.
.
.
At Indian River,
Todd is about to find out
if he accidentally washed
their best gold yet
out of the wash plant
the night before.
The crew looks for gold
in the sluices.
Chris, how's it looking?
It's looking pretty weak, Andy.
We'll just have to wait and see.
Come down this morning to
check the mats
and it makes me nervous when I don't
see the amount of gold that the guys
were running during the day shift,
so we're just hoping that
we didn't blow any gold out.
We will find out as soon as
we clean these mats up.
It's probably more dirt and rock
than it is gold.
Not going to know how much we have
until we do this. There we go.
Dave Turin has just returned
from Oregon.
It doesn't take him long to see that
things aren't the way he left them.
Todd! I notice you did a lot of work
on that cut? I thought we were gonna
leave it till I got back.
You think its stripped ready to go,
you think we are ready to get pay
out of there? No.
You took a huge gamble and I don't
know if it's gonna pay off.
It might have been a mistake.
And then I see all this huge bedrock
and that is beating this thing up.
What is going on?
Well, yeah,
we had some issues at night.
Well, what happened?
We had some pretty big rocks -
they were huge.
We could have screwed something up.
Could you have blown some gold out
of this sluice? (SIGHS)
I don't know, Dave.
It didn't look good.
The only way we'll be able to tell
is on this clean-up.
He took a risk on that cut
and he put this plant in jeopardy.
He may have blown out some gold,
I don't know yet.
We're going to find out
when we do the clean-up.
In the gold room,
Thurber is running the clean-up.
I'd love to have no gold
in this pan.
That tells me everything's
being caught in the upper carpets.
I've never done just the lower
carpets before by themselves.
The sluice box is designed to catch
the gold in the first two metres
of carpet.
But it has an extra seven metres
to recover any gold
that is washed down
by too much water.
If Thurber finds a lot of gold in
the bottom mats,
they can be sure that they've
washed gold out of the plant.
There's some gold.
This is out of the bottom mats.
That's probably two ounces
of gold there,
and to me that's an awful lot of
gold to be that far in the box.
That's a 30-foot sluice box.
I don't wanna see gold that far
down. Another couple of inches,
it's gone forever. How much blew out
I have no idea but
I'll go show this to Jack,
let him see.
Hey, Jack.
Hey, Dad, come here.
What have you got?
Well, that was gold that was in that
bottom carpet. Yeah, oh, my gosh.
That made it all the way down, huh?
That's clear at the bottom.
That's our last chance grab,
that much.
We must have lost a lot,
if there is that much at the bottom
end of that thing.
You got fine gold and you got pretty
good-sized pieces of gold there,
that's cruising out of there.
My worst fears were confirmed. We did
lose a bunch of gold out of the box.
We'll never know how much but
I got a feeling it was quite a bit.
This is definitely gonna affect
our total at the end
and we went backwards, that night
we went fricking backwards.
Thurber and Jack clean up
the rest of the carpets.
There's not a lot of gold but still,
I guess it means you are through
shovelling
when you are back here looking.
Thurber thinks it's gonna be 40,
but anything is better than nothing.
The crew waits for Jack
to finish weighing the gold.
I hope I'm wrong but I got a bad
feeling that we blew gold out that
one night.
What do you guys think? Dave?
I...
Pass? Pass.
It was horrible to run, horrible.
I think it's been a rough week.
Welcome to mining,
that's the way it is, it's tough.
We'll find out here pretty soon.
You know, the clean-up
isn't quite what I expected.
What's our total?
It's... er... 107.
That's $150,000!
(ALL LAUGH) Awesome!
Despite their worst fears,
the Hoffman crew has one of
their biggest cleanouts yet.
It brings their season total
to 521 ounces,
worth around $830,000.
You guys should be proud of
yourselves.
Never would have expected that. Oh,
no, this is awesome! This is great.
Just a triple digit
flipping clean-up.
I'd never imagined
we'd get clean-ups like this.
Dude, we just did 107 ounces.
That's a lot of gold.
They are now just
one big clean-out away
from one million dollars in gold.
Guys, we are gonna make it.
It's gonna be by
the skin of our teeth but I think
we are gonna make it.
Let's just kick some ass
and finish this up strong.
We just did 107 ounces,
which is $150,000-worth of gold
in one clean-up, so...
We are approaching
a million-dollar season.
Can we get there?
Damn right we can get there.
We got a fresh week coming,
we'll kick some ass.
This was a wakeup call.
The good news is we are learning, we
move on and be better miners for it.
It's a great thing.
We are accomplishing a lot,
we're getting a lot of gold.
But we have a goal
and I want to get to that goal.
Dad, do you wanna say a prayer
for us? Yeah, sure.
Heavenly Father,
we thank You for getting us gold,
You are going to make our goal.
Lord, we ask that You just richly
bless us with gold. Amen. (ALL) Amen.
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