Gold Rush: Alaska (2010–…): Season 3, Episode 16 - Redemption Road - full transcript
Out of Indian River paydirt, Todd comes up with a risky plan to hit his 1,000 ounce goal. A bad fall puts Fred out the game, leaving Dustin to dig the glory hole. Parker worries his season is over but his grandpa is convinced he's near the motherlode.
NARRATOR:
At the edge of the Arctic Circle...
(WHOOPING)
..three mining crews
are in a mad dash...
Bring 'em in.
..to get gold before
the Big Freeze shuts them down.
This is the last trick
I have up my sleeve, right here.
With just weeks left
to mine the Klondike,
the Hoffman Crew is only halfway
to their 1,000 ounce goal.
We're gonna run it all.
Out of pay dirt,
Todd makes a desperate and
dangerous move to save their season.
(HORN HONKS)
(BRAKES SQUEAL)
I want the 1,000 ounces but I don't
want somebody to die in the process.
And, at the Big Nugget mine...
I can't just lay everybody off.
..Parker Schnabel will find out
if his grandfather's hunch brings
them the gold he's desperate for.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
At Porcupine Creek, Dakota Fred
suffers a serious injury...
FRED: I heard it snap,
something go pop.
It could mean the end of his season.
I would hate to say that I just quit
right at the very end.
(THEME MUSIC)
At Indian River in the Klondike,
the season is coming to a close.
With about two weeks left,
the Hoffman crew has
a little over 500
of the 1,000 ounces
they want this season.
Give me what you can.
WALT: I've scratched about as much
as I can. It's about all I've got.
DAVE: Oh, crap.
You have the last load of this pit,
nice and easy on the way out.
Don't want you spilling nothing.
LOGAN ON RADIO: 10-4.
The terrace cut is almost finished.
Just running out of pay,
don't know what we're going to do.
Greg runs the last
of the stockpiled dirt...
GREG: This is the end of material
right here that I'm loading
Closing another chapter.
With nothing to run,
the crew has no option
but to shut down.
That's it, shut her down!
They won't run the wash plant
again this season
unless the Hoffman crew
can find some new pay dirt.
In desperation,
Fred Dodge pans in the cuts
looking for any gold
the crew missed.
Nothing.
No colour there.
There's a lot of areas in here,
there's no gold left.
Nothing.
Dave, I've got something important
I want you to look at.
What's up, Fred?
Have a look at this, Dave.
We need something special, Fred.
There we've got gold.
(LAUGHTER)
Oh my, now that's a pan right there.
Whoa.
I was down here doing
a bunch of test pans
and I'm noticing that there could be
a good channel back in here
that could carry better gold.
Fred believes that he's found
a narrow gold channel
that they missed on the slope
between Cut 1 and the upper terrace.
Well, it's a game-changer.
Fred got his best pans, he had 50
colours over there and it was chunky.
This is where we're going to get our
other 500 ounces out of Indian River.
Good call, Fred.
Thanks, Dave.
Dave has no time to lose.
He has to dig down to the pay gravel
so that the crew can fire up
the wash plant once again.
TODD: Pretty awesome.
It means we've got gold.
We've gotta hit it, man. We want it.
Hopefully it's as good as we think,
and 1,000 ounces, here we come.
DAVE: This is the last
big push right here.
I've got to get this cleared erm...
I've gotta take the chance of getting
gold out of this little channel.
Because without it, I just know we're
not going to get to 1,000 ounces.
This ground has been exposed
and thawing for months,
so Dave is able to dig the first
two metres of overburden.
But, just as he starts to hit pay...
(CRUNCHING)
..he is stopped in his tracks.
(BLEEPED)
The ground is harder than
anything I've mined.
It's just like ripping concrete
with an excavator.
It's so solid,
it's just frozen ice and gravel.
(MACHINERY CLANKING)
Todd, I got nothing, man.
How's it going here?
Everywhere I'm going, Todd,
we're at frozen pay.
You can see, I'm scraping this.
This is what I'm getting.
It's all ice.
It's all...ice.
Ice.
Crap.
You can see the ice here.
When your pay dirt
stops thawing out,
I mean, that's it,
that's the end so...
I think I'm gonna call it.
I say we go ahead and kill it.
I'll guarantee you
that without that cut,
we're not gonna go over a million
bucks this year on the gold,
let alone get 1,000 ounces.
South in Alaska...
..on the Porcupine Creek claim,
the Dakota boys are digging to
the bottom of an ancient waterfall.
(LAUGHS)
They are deep in the glory hole
and spirits are high.
Hi-ho, Silver. Let's go!
With two weeks left
in the mining season,
they have 139 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
They've almost reached
their 160 ounce goal...
DUSTIN: Whoo, we're digging now!
(LAUGHS)
DUSTIN: All I can think about
is finding that big, big payload.
Yeah!
Very nice, guys.
Look at our work here, you guys.
I mean, this is fantastic.
We're out there pushing
the equipment to the limit.
I mean, to the real limit.
All season,
the Dakota Crew has been following
the slope of an old waterfall.
They believe the mother lode
sits at the bottom.
They're now mining deeper than
anyone else has been at Porcupine
and have hit a concrete-like layer
that's almost too solid
to break through.
They've had to come up
with a new technique.
It takes two machines to dig this.
Every layer you go down,
it gets harder.
We need a ripper
and we need a mover.
Fred's the mover, I'm the ripper,
and we need each other right now.
Dustin uses the teeth
of the bedrock shark bucket
to break up the rock-like material.
Then, Fred uses the larger bucket
on his 340 to remove it.
Kinda like a dance,
two people real close together.
You gotta know what you're doing.
(DUSTIN LAUGHS)
It's getting a little tight in here.
It makes me a little nervous.
Got one wall on the one side and a
big, damn excavator the other side!
I'm not sure who I'm worried
about more, the wall or Fred!
(DUSTIN LAUGHS)
No further than that, Fred.
Any further than that
and you're going to hit me hard.
Dustin, dig a little to your left.
Look, go slow, go slow.
Dustin, follow me on over.
You're too close.
Dustin, follow me over, come on.
(CLANKING)
(BLEEPED)
(BLEEPED)
I don't think we can dig any more!
Look, this is (BLEEP).
The hole is too tight.
There ain't no more two
excavators down here. Period.
We need to rethink how we're
going to dig it out of there.
No more dancing.
Fred and Dustin
decide to call it a day.
There just isn't enough space
for two excavators.
But, they are now down so deep,
that even getting
out of the hole is dangerous.
Hey, Fred, give me a second
to spin around.
(MACHINERY CLANKING)
Today's the last day we're
going to put two excavators
in the hole at the same time.
It's too tight down there.
It's just too close
and too dangerous.
We're going to end up
getting hurt so...
We can't do it.
In need of a new plan,
Dustin decides to re-run
old material...
We're trying to run some of our
old tailings that we've run before.
(RADIO CRACKLES)
But, as he briefs Melody,
Dustin gets an urgent call.
Yeah, Fred.
(BLEEPED)
Fred is hurt.
(BLEEP) You fell, didn't you?
What'd you break?
FRED: I mean, it landed hard.
I heard it snap.
Something go 'pop'.
I don't know if my ankle
is broke or what.
Fred has fallen from his excavator
and severely injured his lower leg.
I can't do anything.
Use me. Put your arm over me.
Put your arm over me.
All right.
The pain almost made me throw up.
Here, just have a seat.
Boy, is it swelling up.
It's hotter than hell.
It was on which side, Fred?
It's both sides.
It's all the way across.
Let the ice kill the swelling.
And then, you need six weeks
to get that thing to work right.
I don't know if you know this,
but you just put yourself down
for six weeks, that's how it is.
(FRED YELLS IN FRUSTRATION)
Fred's a tough guy,
he's made for work.
He's going to
take this injury pretty bad.
This isn't going to go over well.
He's down for the season.
.
.
NARRATOR:
At Porcupine Creek in Alaska,
mine boss Fred is laid up
with a suspected broken ankle.
But, the Dakota Crew is still
21 ounces short of their goal.
DUSTIN: He's down for the season.
MELODY: Wow.
Just get over it.
We should start digging.
To hit their target,
Dustin has no choice but to
tackle the glory hole alone.
I'm just going to keep on.
I can do it.
I gave Fred my word that I'd get him
to 160 ounces at least this year,
and I will.
Dustin now has to dig
the hardest material they have ever
encountered at Porcupine on his own.
Come on!
Oh!
I keep having these fantasies
about finding 300, 400 ounces
at the bottom of this waterfall.
I need to dig the gold out.
That stuff's hard.
It's like concrete.
I can't stand it right now.
It just feels like a hell of a war,
me against this damn hole right now.
(MACHINERY RATTLING)
(BLEEPED)
It's just too hard to dig.
I'm trying to figure out what to do.
This is a Fred thing right here.
This is where Fred's 40 years or so,
of excavator experience
just comes in handy.
The rocky layer is just too tough.
Dustin is finished.
But, Fred is refusing to quit!
FRED: I can take care of that.
DUSTIN: What's that?
I can be out there
to take care of that digging.
I can walk on the sucker.
OK, I get it, you're a tough guy.
I get it.
But, we don't need you to be out here
all crippled up, so just let it go.
Fred ignores his son and the pain,
and returns to the dig site.
Fred, we've dug as far as we can,
the hole's done.
It's too tight down there.
I can't dig any further.
It's over with.
There's one more thing
that I've got to do,
I want to get that bottom
of that waterfall.
We're done digging, Fred.
I would hate to say that I just quit
right at the very end.
I want to know what's down there.
That's what it is!
Are we obsessed? No.
The injury on my ankle
is pretty rough,
but I set out a goal to double
what we did last year any way I can,
to see if we can
possibly get up there
and push it to the bitter end.
Fred's ankle may be broken,
but his spirit isn't.
Gonna give it one last try!
Across the creek
at the Big Nugget Mine...
..Parker Schnabel is just over
halfway to his 300 ounce goal,
161 ounces, worth over
a quarter of a million dollars.
But, the winter is coming
and he's completely out of ground.
PARKER: You want to know my problem?
I'm starting to run out of ideas
and places to dig.
You can't just lay everybody off.
I told them that I'd keep them on the
payroll through the end of the season
and I'm going to do that, you know.
The problem with me is...
I have to find out where that money
to pay them is going to come from.
Parker thinks he's mined every
last bit of Big Nugget ground.
But, to be sure, he brings in
his grandfather, John Schnabel.
So, we dug,
we dug quite the hole here.
(CHUCKLES) That is a big hole!
The first thing his grandfather
wants to see is Emerson Trench,
where Parker has been mining
on and off all season.
Oh! You made quite an impression
on this pile of dirt.
The problem is, we got down
to bedrock and there's no gold.
That happens to lots of people
and to me, too.
I dug down, got nothing.
I moved over 100 feet, I got lots.
So, do you think we just went,
went in the wrong spot?
Parker,
that slope indicates that
the main channel is over that way,
and you'll come across it
pretty soon.
Earlier in the season,
Parker mined the section of Emerson
towards the creek but found nothing.
John is convinced that the sloping
bedrock furthest from the creek,
indicates the location
of an ancient river channel.
He's confident that if they mine
all the way back to the wall,
Parker will find gold
in the river channel.
That means we've got
a lot of dirt to move.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
That's the old saying.
So, my Grandpa thinks that we missed
the channel with this first hole.
I think he's probably right,
and who cares how late it is?
This is our dig
and this is the time to do it,
and we're going to get
every flake of gold.
At Indian River in the Klondike,
the Hoffman crew is out of pay dirt
and their wash plant is shut down,
but Todd has a plan.
Here's the deal,
Indian River is out of pay,
but we have good gold in the cut
at Quartz, our ace in the hole.
Todd has 10,000 yards
of stockpiled Quartz Creek pay dirt
that was never run.
But, it's a 6km round trip
to get it to Indian River.
TODD: I'm going to suggest something
and you're not going to like it.
I say we truck Cut 3 from Quartz
down here and run it in this plant.
Think about it.
That's a long ways away.
I don't know if it will pencil out.
That's a lot of diesel to burn.
Anybody know how much
gold's in that?
I figured it out.
If it's one ounce per 100,
it's worth it.
But, if it's half an ounce per 100?
I'll tell you what,
let's truck for one fricking day,
we'll go in the box,
if we don't have gold...
That's it, we'll kill it
and that's our season.
All right. Let's give it a try.
Let's give it a shot.
OK.
Todd calls his crew to take
the rock trucks up to Quartz.
Let's get rolling.
This is the craziest thing
we've done all year.
We've got a lot of dirt to move
from Quartz, but here we go!
You've gotta do,
what you gotta do.
We've gotta get this dirt.
I need to go to college.
I need some gold!
It will take five days to move
all the dirt from Quartz to Indian.
They'll burn through roughly
$4,000 a day in fuel.
But, if there's not enough gold
in the box after just one day...
Todd will stop the operation.
We're down in Quartz Creek Cut 3.
We're finally going to be able to
get to run it after all this time.
RADIO: I'm ready to go, bud.
Bring 'em in.
There it is, our first load
of Quartz Creek dirt going out.
I've got to get
four loads per truck, per hour.
Three kilometres away
at Indian River,
Dave is ready to run the first
Quartz Creek dirt.
(INDISTINCT RADIO CHATTER)
Hey, Greg. How'd that work?
GREG ON RADIO: Pretty good,
everything went smooth.
Perfect, dump it right there.
Fire it up!
(MACHINERY RATTLING)
Quartz Creek dirt is the only shot
we got at 1,000 ounces.
We got to get it done.
(BLEEP) Todd!
After hauling dirt
for five hours straight,
Sterling spots a problem.
Yeah, I got a flat.
I got a gash in the side wall
of my tyre, it's leaking air.
Oh (BLEEP)!
We don't have a spare tyre
for these trucks,
so this truck is completely
out of commission.
Now, we've got three trucks
trying to do the work of four.
The three remaining rock trucks
move up a gear
to compensate
for the missing vehicle.
21-year-old Logan
pushes his truck hard.
Here we go, yee-haa.
Hey, Kevin you need to pull over.
I'm full, dude, the road's narrow.
Kevin? What the frick?
(TYRES SQUEAL)
Logan is forced off the road.
He avoided a collision,
but his truck is damaged.
My truck's dead.
We got some big problem.
.
.
NARRATOR: Up in the Klondike,
Todd's convoy is down from
four trucks to just two.
LOGAN: My truck's dead.
We've got some big problem.
Now, he has even less dirt
to feed the wash plant.
I want to push hard.
I want the 1,000 ounces.
But, I don't want somebody
to die in the process.
If I lose two rock trucks,
we're done.
LOGAN ON RADIO:
My truck is dead, no acceleration.
Hey, Mitch, we've got Logan
down here, er, stuck.
Can you maybe go and give it a peek?
MITCH ON RADIO: Be right there.
Mitch, the crew mechanic,
races to the stranded truck.
What's going on, Logan?
Everything's on.
It's still in gear. I can stop.
Then I let off the break, it rolls.
It's still in gear,
it just won't accelerate.
Why don't you get in there and hit
the throttle and see what happens?
Yep.
Ready?
Yeah, go for it.
You've got nothing hooked to
the pedal, you lost a bolt,
so it's not throwing the throttle
like it's supposed to.
Running off the road
dislodged an accelerator bolt.
Looks like the bolt rattled out and
fell down below it on the belly pan.
Gonna try and pull it out.
Get it hooked back up,
get him back in action.
Try it, Logan.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Mitch quickly fixes the problem.
We're back in action.
Thanks, man. Talk to you later.
Logan is back on the road,
and once again, three trucks
are hauling Quartz Creek pay dirt.
(ROCKS CLATTERING)
Hey, Dave, you got a copy?
Can you meet me down here
at the sluice?
We'll go ahead, shut everything down
and take a look at this, huh?
Todd and Dave agreed, but if there's
less than one ounce of gold
in 100 yards of
Quartz Creek pay dirt,
they will stop hauling dirt
to Indian River.
That could mean
the end of their season.
All right, Dave,
why don't you look over there?
I'll look over here
and tell me what you think.
There's a chunk.
That's a piece of gold, Dave.
That's a piece of gold right there.
Hey, look at this!
Look at those chunks in there.
Holy crap.
There's another one under there.
Awesome.
I think our decision's made, buddy.
I say we keep going.
We'll see when we get
to the clean-up,
but it's better than
an ounce per 100.
I think you're right.
I know we're more than
one ounce per 100 in this material.
So, we're going to run it all.
With less than two weeks
of the season to go,
Todd and Dave decide to
run the convoy into the night.
(WOLF HOWLS IN DISTANCE)
At 11.00pm, Thurber does
his routine wash plant check.
Oh no!
Kevin! (BLEEP)
I got a large rock
in the sluice box.
KEVIN: How can rocks get through?
Rocks that big
shouldn't be making it.
Stones have somehow
reached the sluice boxes.
ANDY: Something's not right.
Gotta see what's going on.
Why don't you idle the water down,
all the way down?
I'll shut the shaker off.
They shut down to investigate.
There's our culprit right there.
We've got a hole in the screen.
You cannot run
with holes in your screen.
You get rocks in your sluice box,
it blows gold right out the back.
You know, it sucks.
So, the plant is shut down
for tonight.
South at the Big Nugget Mine...
Parker Schnabel calls Rick
over to Emerson Trench.
So, my grandpa thinks
that we missed the channel.
I think we should come back
into this hole over here.
There might be some evidence of it,
we just need to find it.
We've got time.
And, you know, I'm gonna keep going
till the end of the season.
I think this is where we should be.
As long as we're not doing this
just to keep busy.
If you really think that's
where we need to be then...
As long as the weather doesn't
go to (BLEEP) we'll do it.
It's Parker's last roll of the dice.
As far as this place goes,
we've dug everywhere,
and it seems like this pit
is our last chance and er...
If it doesn't work out,
I don't know where to go from here,
so hopefully at the bottom of
this pit we find some big nuggets
and this place lives up to its name.
(DRAMATIC MUSIC)
Following his grandfather's advice,
Parker starts digging
the Emerson Trench again.
He's searching for
an ancient pay streak
that he may have missed
earlier in the season.
We've got a bit of a plan here.
We're looking for like a line,
where the material goes
from junk to amazingness,
and it should be pretty distinct.
But, to find out if
the gold channel even exists,
his crew has to move
3,000 yards of overburden.
That means hauling hundreds of loads
of useless dirt a day,
with only one working rock truck.
RICK: It seems like all
we've done all season
is haul overburden
to this waste site.
Must be 75,000 freaking yards here.
How many loads are you at?
Seventy.
Really?
Yeah.
Nice job. Wow.
We need a lot of dirt,
so keep doing your thing.
You got it.
This is going to be a good day.
This is going to be a damn good day.
Oh... (BLEEP)
Rick's truck suddenly breaks down.
(BLEEPED)
(BLEEP) that truck!
What the hell is going on?
I don't even want to stick my head
in there to look it's so nasty.
It's really hot. Argh, oh!
You OK?
Yeah.
Hmm.
Yeah, I don't know what's going on.
It's not good.
I'll go grab that bucket of water.
See, on our site,
dump trucks are the most
important piece of equipment.
We can't move overburden,
can't bring dirt to the plant,
we can't do anything
without dump trucks.
Heck of a day to break down, huh?
I know. It's (BLEEP).
Parker and Rick
assess the situation.
That ain't fitting...
Oh, I think I've found the problem.
Oh yeah?
See that?
A radiator hose has blown...
Be careful, that thing's hot.
..causing the engine to overheat.
That's the one.
We'll have fun replacing this.
Let's go see if we can
find one of these.
Feel free to scavenge
anything and everything.
We're trying to scavenge a two-inch
radiator hose from something.
We can't run the truck without it,
so we need to try find one today.
See anything close?
Nah, I'm coming up short.
We'll just go and cannibalise
that other truck.
Probably not going to find anything
that's going to work but...
There is mountains to move here
and not a lot of time to do it.
Every minute spent dealing with
breakdowns and trying to find parts,
that's losing a lot of valuable time,
time we don't have right now.
Probably that top one?
I think we take the same one.
Got it.
Awesome.
It's time we should be hauling,
rather than working on the trucks.
Is it going to fit?
It's already on.
Let's fill it up, and then start it
and cycle it and see what happens.
Before firing up the truck,
they replace the radiator coolant.
You good, Rick?
Fine.
(ENGINE STARTS)
I think we're ready to go.
Awesome, good job.
Now you're talking!
North in the Klondike...
Big Red isn't running,
and the Hoffman crew's chance of
hitting their goal is slipping away.
The night shift found holes
in the shaker screen
that allowed stones
to pile up in the sluices.
DAVE: Yeah, that's ripped bad.
That's where all your big rocks
are coming from, Kev.
That's a blowout.
This is the issue we're having.
Oh, boy. (WHISTLES)
Holy cow, look at the rocks
in that one!
Yeah, Dave, it's not good.
What time did you catch it?
It was about 11 o'clock at night.
About 11.
That's bad, Kev.
We washed some gold last night.
I think we washed some out.
Vortices in the sluice cause gold
to settle behind the riffles.
But, if any rocks
get into the sluice,
the vortices are disrupted,
allowing gold to be washed right
out of the bottom of the box.
Let's take a look,
see what we can do to fix it.
All right, Dave.
Mitch arrives with new screens.
The Hoffman crew only has
days left in the season,
and Big Red hasn't been
running all morning.
DAVE: We're going to lose
half a day at least.
KEVIN: That's right. We're losing
precious sluicing time, Dave.
Stay there, Logan.
LOGAN: Muscles here!
Oh, yeah!
I want two guys in here and then two
guys on the outside putting nuts on.
We've got the screens
getting installed right now.
We have to tighten the retainers for
those and we're back in business.
KEVIN: How are those looking?
Are those lining up OK?
Yeah, perfect.
(WHIRRING)
Let's fire this thing up.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Big Red is running again,
but there is a good chance
the Hoffman crew have lost a day's
worth of gold, up to $30,000,
right out of the end
of their wash plant.
This is desperate times right now.
We're rapidly approaching
the end of the season.
Last year, we were
seven ounces short of 100.
I don't want to be seven ounces
short of 1,000 ounces.
At Porcupine Creek...
Despite a possible broken ankle,
Dakota Fred is pushing through
the pain barrier,
to get as much gold as he can.
Fred's the most driven man
I've ever met in my life,
almost to a point of obsession.
There's nothing,
there's nothing going to stop him.
I think that er,
we've still got a chance of
finding the bottom of this thing.
The next bucket of dirt
is going to hit the payload.
(RATTLING)
Uh-oh, I think we're back into
some hard (BLEEP) here.
The compacted rock and dirt
he's digging is as hard as concrete.
Miserable, miserable
digging conditions, miserable.
(RATTLING)
Extremely hard layer
of material here.
The 340 can't even dig this stuff.
Argh!
We're absolutely reaching the limits
of what we can get out of here.
Dustin's given up.
The pressure's on Fred
to break through to more gold.
DUSTIN: Damn!
Come on, Fred, dig this (BLEEP).
Look, I am in a difficult
digging situation.
I don't feel like (BLEEP)
talking about it right now.
Calm down, Fred.
Calm down.
Ohh.
Oh, for crying out loud!
(BLEEPED)
(THUD)
Oh, man!
That's it, we're done.
The material is just too hard.
This thing just doesn't
have enough power to continue.
We can't go back down there no more.
The dirt at the bottom of
the waterfall is just too tough.
Dustin, Melody,
y'all come down here a little bit.
I have just been digging
and digging and digging.
I just can't get it any more.
We gotta shut it down.
This is it down here.
MELODY: I'm a little disappointed.
I would have really liked
to have seen the bottom but...
Me too.
Oh.
I really wanted to see
the bottom of this hole, Fred.
Over 30m down in the glory hole,
they could be a few centimetres from
a deposit worth millions of dollars.
Argh!
Fred's not ready
to give up just yet.
We're gonna have to come up
with something different.
We're gonna have to come up
with Plan B.
We don't give up.
I mean, we got to get to
that waterfall.
We'll do it.
We're gonna do it.
All right. Sounds good.
Come on, guys.
We're not quite finished
with that yet.
.
.
NARRATOR: At the Big Nugget Mine...
..Parker's crew is searching
for an ancient pay streak
that his grandfather believes
runs alongside the bedrock wall.
RICK: Parker, I hit bedrock.
You should come take a look at this.
PARKER: It's definitely bedrock.
Nice find.
Rick has finally hit the wall,
but to find out if
there is gold below,
they will need to dig and run
thousands of yards of dirt.
We want to get that to the plant.
I hope it has gold in it.
I've got a good feeling about this.
First, Parker tests some of
the Emerson Trench dirt.
This dig does mean a lot to me,
because the future of the mine...
..really does depend on it.
If this dig isn't amazing,
then, you know,
there's nothing left.
He has no plan B.
If there's no gold in the sluices,
his season is over.
Where's the (BLEEP) gold?
We just took a look in the box
and I don't see much of anything.
So, I don't know what to say.
Did you see anything
in the sluice box at all?
Not really.
Well, we'll see
at the end of the day.
It's not looking good,
but Parker has one last hope.
Shut it down.
He stops the wash plant
to see if any large gold
has been caught in the jig.
Whoa!
Holy cow, look at the nuggets there.
RICK: Be careful.
That little pocket
right there is loaded.
Bingo bango!
Oh, my gosh.
Nice!
That's what we're used to
seeing in the jig.
This is really fantastic.
Quarter ounce of nuggets,
it's amazing
Good job, guys, you found
that channel we're looking for.
If we could run this every day
for the season,
we could find millions
of dollars in gold.
So, we're going to dig
the whole damn thing out.
Parker has found his grandfather's
gold-rich channel.
You may have just saved your bacon.
(PARKER LAUGHS)
With just days left in his season,
he may have found the mother lode.
North, at Quartz Creek
in the Klondike.
After 600 truckloads
and $20,000 in diesel,
the Hoffman crew is loading the last
of the Quartz Creek pay dirt.
Hey, Walt, what do you think,
is that it?
Yeah, Todd, I've scraped about
all I can out of this pit.
OK, last truck.
WALT ON RADIO: Hopefully this pit
gave us the extra boost we needed
to make our 1,000 ounces.
I hope so. We'll find out.
Push him on out of here.
Yah!
That's it for Quartz Creek, Greg.
That's the last of
the Quartz Creek dirt.
GREG ON RADIO: 10-4.
Let's scratch up whatever we can.
Yep, 10-4. Let's see what we can do.
In just over five days,
they've hauled and washed
nearly 10,000 yards
of what they hope is gold-rich dirt.
DAVE: Shut it down.
(ENGINE WINDS DOWN)
FRED: Go, go, go,
or they're going to freeze down.
With just days left in the season,
the Hoffman crew has 521 ounces.
They need another 479 ounces,
around three quarters
of a million dollars,
to hit their 1,000 ounce goal.
FRED: Hopefully it comes out
looking good.
Hi ya, Jack.
How's it going, man?
It's all right, but it's not good.
I'm getting nothing but rocks.
We're getting lots of rocks in
this stuff. It looks like (BLEEP).
There are small stones
on the gold table, a bad sign.
The crew may have lost
a lot of gold.
We're done, Jack.
You wanna weigh this up?
OK.
To date, their best clean up
is 137 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
To have any chance of hitting
their 1,000 ounce goal,
they need a record-breaking clean up
from the Quartz Creek dirt.
I think Quartz Creek is good
and it's going to be the best
clean up we've ever had.
Dave Turin is not so sure.
We lost gold, I don't know how much,
and right now,
we're going to find out.
TODD: Hey, there's Jack.
JACK: You know er...
I'd like to tell you something.
I wanna tell you there's
100 ounces in this jar.
(LAUGHTER)
But, what I also wanna
tell you is...
..there's 100 ounces in this jar.
MAN: Woo! Right on the button, huh.
(CHEERING)
That's 721 ounces.
(WHOOPING)
Nobody thought we'd get to this point
but we ain't stopping here.
We can get to 1,000 ounces,
I really think we can.
MAN: 1,000 ounces, Todd, whoo!
A week of dedication and
backbreaking work has paid off.
This 200 ounce clean out,
worth around $320,000,
brings the Hoffman's
1,000 ounce goal, within reach.
We've just dug 200 fricking ounces
out of the ground.
But, are we at our goal of 1,000?
No, we're not.
Can we get there?
You're damn right we can get there.
At the edge of the Arctic Circle...
(WHOOPING)
..three mining crews
are in a mad dash...
Bring 'em in.
..to get gold before
the Big Freeze shuts them down.
This is the last trick
I have up my sleeve, right here.
With just weeks left
to mine the Klondike,
the Hoffman Crew is only halfway
to their 1,000 ounce goal.
We're gonna run it all.
Out of pay dirt,
Todd makes a desperate and
dangerous move to save their season.
(HORN HONKS)
(BRAKES SQUEAL)
I want the 1,000 ounces but I don't
want somebody to die in the process.
And, at the Big Nugget mine...
I can't just lay everybody off.
..Parker Schnabel will find out
if his grandfather's hunch brings
them the gold he's desperate for.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
At Porcupine Creek, Dakota Fred
suffers a serious injury...
FRED: I heard it snap,
something go pop.
It could mean the end of his season.
I would hate to say that I just quit
right at the very end.
(THEME MUSIC)
At Indian River in the Klondike,
the season is coming to a close.
With about two weeks left,
the Hoffman crew has
a little over 500
of the 1,000 ounces
they want this season.
Give me what you can.
WALT: I've scratched about as much
as I can. It's about all I've got.
DAVE: Oh, crap.
You have the last load of this pit,
nice and easy on the way out.
Don't want you spilling nothing.
LOGAN ON RADIO: 10-4.
The terrace cut is almost finished.
Just running out of pay,
don't know what we're going to do.
Greg runs the last
of the stockpiled dirt...
GREG: This is the end of material
right here that I'm loading
Closing another chapter.
With nothing to run,
the crew has no option
but to shut down.
That's it, shut her down!
They won't run the wash plant
again this season
unless the Hoffman crew
can find some new pay dirt.
In desperation,
Fred Dodge pans in the cuts
looking for any gold
the crew missed.
Nothing.
No colour there.
There's a lot of areas in here,
there's no gold left.
Nothing.
Dave, I've got something important
I want you to look at.
What's up, Fred?
Have a look at this, Dave.
We need something special, Fred.
There we've got gold.
(LAUGHTER)
Oh my, now that's a pan right there.
Whoa.
I was down here doing
a bunch of test pans
and I'm noticing that there could be
a good channel back in here
that could carry better gold.
Fred believes that he's found
a narrow gold channel
that they missed on the slope
between Cut 1 and the upper terrace.
Well, it's a game-changer.
Fred got his best pans, he had 50
colours over there and it was chunky.
This is where we're going to get our
other 500 ounces out of Indian River.
Good call, Fred.
Thanks, Dave.
Dave has no time to lose.
He has to dig down to the pay gravel
so that the crew can fire up
the wash plant once again.
TODD: Pretty awesome.
It means we've got gold.
We've gotta hit it, man. We want it.
Hopefully it's as good as we think,
and 1,000 ounces, here we come.
DAVE: This is the last
big push right here.
I've got to get this cleared erm...
I've gotta take the chance of getting
gold out of this little channel.
Because without it, I just know we're
not going to get to 1,000 ounces.
This ground has been exposed
and thawing for months,
so Dave is able to dig the first
two metres of overburden.
But, just as he starts to hit pay...
(CRUNCHING)
..he is stopped in his tracks.
(BLEEPED)
The ground is harder than
anything I've mined.
It's just like ripping concrete
with an excavator.
It's so solid,
it's just frozen ice and gravel.
(MACHINERY CLANKING)
Todd, I got nothing, man.
How's it going here?
Everywhere I'm going, Todd,
we're at frozen pay.
You can see, I'm scraping this.
This is what I'm getting.
It's all ice.
It's all...ice.
Ice.
Crap.
You can see the ice here.
When your pay dirt
stops thawing out,
I mean, that's it,
that's the end so...
I think I'm gonna call it.
I say we go ahead and kill it.
I'll guarantee you
that without that cut,
we're not gonna go over a million
bucks this year on the gold,
let alone get 1,000 ounces.
South in Alaska...
..on the Porcupine Creek claim,
the Dakota boys are digging to
the bottom of an ancient waterfall.
(LAUGHS)
They are deep in the glory hole
and spirits are high.
Hi-ho, Silver. Let's go!
With two weeks left
in the mining season,
they have 139 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
They've almost reached
their 160 ounce goal...
DUSTIN: Whoo, we're digging now!
(LAUGHS)
DUSTIN: All I can think about
is finding that big, big payload.
Yeah!
Very nice, guys.
Look at our work here, you guys.
I mean, this is fantastic.
We're out there pushing
the equipment to the limit.
I mean, to the real limit.
All season,
the Dakota Crew has been following
the slope of an old waterfall.
They believe the mother lode
sits at the bottom.
They're now mining deeper than
anyone else has been at Porcupine
and have hit a concrete-like layer
that's almost too solid
to break through.
They've had to come up
with a new technique.
It takes two machines to dig this.
Every layer you go down,
it gets harder.
We need a ripper
and we need a mover.
Fred's the mover, I'm the ripper,
and we need each other right now.
Dustin uses the teeth
of the bedrock shark bucket
to break up the rock-like material.
Then, Fred uses the larger bucket
on his 340 to remove it.
Kinda like a dance,
two people real close together.
You gotta know what you're doing.
(DUSTIN LAUGHS)
It's getting a little tight in here.
It makes me a little nervous.
Got one wall on the one side and a
big, damn excavator the other side!
I'm not sure who I'm worried
about more, the wall or Fred!
(DUSTIN LAUGHS)
No further than that, Fred.
Any further than that
and you're going to hit me hard.
Dustin, dig a little to your left.
Look, go slow, go slow.
Dustin, follow me on over.
You're too close.
Dustin, follow me over, come on.
(CLANKING)
(BLEEPED)
(BLEEPED)
I don't think we can dig any more!
Look, this is (BLEEP).
The hole is too tight.
There ain't no more two
excavators down here. Period.
We need to rethink how we're
going to dig it out of there.
No more dancing.
Fred and Dustin
decide to call it a day.
There just isn't enough space
for two excavators.
But, they are now down so deep,
that even getting
out of the hole is dangerous.
Hey, Fred, give me a second
to spin around.
(MACHINERY CLANKING)
Today's the last day we're
going to put two excavators
in the hole at the same time.
It's too tight down there.
It's just too close
and too dangerous.
We're going to end up
getting hurt so...
We can't do it.
In need of a new plan,
Dustin decides to re-run
old material...
We're trying to run some of our
old tailings that we've run before.
(RADIO CRACKLES)
But, as he briefs Melody,
Dustin gets an urgent call.
Yeah, Fred.
(BLEEPED)
Fred is hurt.
(BLEEP) You fell, didn't you?
What'd you break?
FRED: I mean, it landed hard.
I heard it snap.
Something go 'pop'.
I don't know if my ankle
is broke or what.
Fred has fallen from his excavator
and severely injured his lower leg.
I can't do anything.
Use me. Put your arm over me.
Put your arm over me.
All right.
The pain almost made me throw up.
Here, just have a seat.
Boy, is it swelling up.
It's hotter than hell.
It was on which side, Fred?
It's both sides.
It's all the way across.
Let the ice kill the swelling.
And then, you need six weeks
to get that thing to work right.
I don't know if you know this,
but you just put yourself down
for six weeks, that's how it is.
(FRED YELLS IN FRUSTRATION)
Fred's a tough guy,
he's made for work.
He's going to
take this injury pretty bad.
This isn't going to go over well.
He's down for the season.
.
.
NARRATOR:
At Porcupine Creek in Alaska,
mine boss Fred is laid up
with a suspected broken ankle.
But, the Dakota Crew is still
21 ounces short of their goal.
DUSTIN: He's down for the season.
MELODY: Wow.
Just get over it.
We should start digging.
To hit their target,
Dustin has no choice but to
tackle the glory hole alone.
I'm just going to keep on.
I can do it.
I gave Fred my word that I'd get him
to 160 ounces at least this year,
and I will.
Dustin now has to dig
the hardest material they have ever
encountered at Porcupine on his own.
Come on!
Oh!
I keep having these fantasies
about finding 300, 400 ounces
at the bottom of this waterfall.
I need to dig the gold out.
That stuff's hard.
It's like concrete.
I can't stand it right now.
It just feels like a hell of a war,
me against this damn hole right now.
(MACHINERY RATTLING)
(BLEEPED)
It's just too hard to dig.
I'm trying to figure out what to do.
This is a Fred thing right here.
This is where Fred's 40 years or so,
of excavator experience
just comes in handy.
The rocky layer is just too tough.
Dustin is finished.
But, Fred is refusing to quit!
FRED: I can take care of that.
DUSTIN: What's that?
I can be out there
to take care of that digging.
I can walk on the sucker.
OK, I get it, you're a tough guy.
I get it.
But, we don't need you to be out here
all crippled up, so just let it go.
Fred ignores his son and the pain,
and returns to the dig site.
Fred, we've dug as far as we can,
the hole's done.
It's too tight down there.
I can't dig any further.
It's over with.
There's one more thing
that I've got to do,
I want to get that bottom
of that waterfall.
We're done digging, Fred.
I would hate to say that I just quit
right at the very end.
I want to know what's down there.
That's what it is!
Are we obsessed? No.
The injury on my ankle
is pretty rough,
but I set out a goal to double
what we did last year any way I can,
to see if we can
possibly get up there
and push it to the bitter end.
Fred's ankle may be broken,
but his spirit isn't.
Gonna give it one last try!
Across the creek
at the Big Nugget Mine...
..Parker Schnabel is just over
halfway to his 300 ounce goal,
161 ounces, worth over
a quarter of a million dollars.
But, the winter is coming
and he's completely out of ground.
PARKER: You want to know my problem?
I'm starting to run out of ideas
and places to dig.
You can't just lay everybody off.
I told them that I'd keep them on the
payroll through the end of the season
and I'm going to do that, you know.
The problem with me is...
I have to find out where that money
to pay them is going to come from.
Parker thinks he's mined every
last bit of Big Nugget ground.
But, to be sure, he brings in
his grandfather, John Schnabel.
So, we dug,
we dug quite the hole here.
(CHUCKLES) That is a big hole!
The first thing his grandfather
wants to see is Emerson Trench,
where Parker has been mining
on and off all season.
Oh! You made quite an impression
on this pile of dirt.
The problem is, we got down
to bedrock and there's no gold.
That happens to lots of people
and to me, too.
I dug down, got nothing.
I moved over 100 feet, I got lots.
So, do you think we just went,
went in the wrong spot?
Parker,
that slope indicates that
the main channel is over that way,
and you'll come across it
pretty soon.
Earlier in the season,
Parker mined the section of Emerson
towards the creek but found nothing.
John is convinced that the sloping
bedrock furthest from the creek,
indicates the location
of an ancient river channel.
He's confident that if they mine
all the way back to the wall,
Parker will find gold
in the river channel.
That means we've got
a lot of dirt to move.
Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
That's the old saying.
So, my Grandpa thinks that we missed
the channel with this first hole.
I think he's probably right,
and who cares how late it is?
This is our dig
and this is the time to do it,
and we're going to get
every flake of gold.
At Indian River in the Klondike,
the Hoffman crew is out of pay dirt
and their wash plant is shut down,
but Todd has a plan.
Here's the deal,
Indian River is out of pay,
but we have good gold in the cut
at Quartz, our ace in the hole.
Todd has 10,000 yards
of stockpiled Quartz Creek pay dirt
that was never run.
But, it's a 6km round trip
to get it to Indian River.
TODD: I'm going to suggest something
and you're not going to like it.
I say we truck Cut 3 from Quartz
down here and run it in this plant.
Think about it.
That's a long ways away.
I don't know if it will pencil out.
That's a lot of diesel to burn.
Anybody know how much
gold's in that?
I figured it out.
If it's one ounce per 100,
it's worth it.
But, if it's half an ounce per 100?
I'll tell you what,
let's truck for one fricking day,
we'll go in the box,
if we don't have gold...
That's it, we'll kill it
and that's our season.
All right. Let's give it a try.
Let's give it a shot.
OK.
Todd calls his crew to take
the rock trucks up to Quartz.
Let's get rolling.
This is the craziest thing
we've done all year.
We've got a lot of dirt to move
from Quartz, but here we go!
You've gotta do,
what you gotta do.
We've gotta get this dirt.
I need to go to college.
I need some gold!
It will take five days to move
all the dirt from Quartz to Indian.
They'll burn through roughly
$4,000 a day in fuel.
But, if there's not enough gold
in the box after just one day...
Todd will stop the operation.
We're down in Quartz Creek Cut 3.
We're finally going to be able to
get to run it after all this time.
RADIO: I'm ready to go, bud.
Bring 'em in.
There it is, our first load
of Quartz Creek dirt going out.
I've got to get
four loads per truck, per hour.
Three kilometres away
at Indian River,
Dave is ready to run the first
Quartz Creek dirt.
(INDISTINCT RADIO CHATTER)
Hey, Greg. How'd that work?
GREG ON RADIO: Pretty good,
everything went smooth.
Perfect, dump it right there.
Fire it up!
(MACHINERY RATTLING)
Quartz Creek dirt is the only shot
we got at 1,000 ounces.
We got to get it done.
(BLEEP) Todd!
After hauling dirt
for five hours straight,
Sterling spots a problem.
Yeah, I got a flat.
I got a gash in the side wall
of my tyre, it's leaking air.
Oh (BLEEP)!
We don't have a spare tyre
for these trucks,
so this truck is completely
out of commission.
Now, we've got three trucks
trying to do the work of four.
The three remaining rock trucks
move up a gear
to compensate
for the missing vehicle.
21-year-old Logan
pushes his truck hard.
Here we go, yee-haa.
Hey, Kevin you need to pull over.
I'm full, dude, the road's narrow.
Kevin? What the frick?
(TYRES SQUEAL)
Logan is forced off the road.
He avoided a collision,
but his truck is damaged.
My truck's dead.
We got some big problem.
.
.
NARRATOR: Up in the Klondike,
Todd's convoy is down from
four trucks to just two.
LOGAN: My truck's dead.
We've got some big problem.
Now, he has even less dirt
to feed the wash plant.
I want to push hard.
I want the 1,000 ounces.
But, I don't want somebody
to die in the process.
If I lose two rock trucks,
we're done.
LOGAN ON RADIO:
My truck is dead, no acceleration.
Hey, Mitch, we've got Logan
down here, er, stuck.
Can you maybe go and give it a peek?
MITCH ON RADIO: Be right there.
Mitch, the crew mechanic,
races to the stranded truck.
What's going on, Logan?
Everything's on.
It's still in gear. I can stop.
Then I let off the break, it rolls.
It's still in gear,
it just won't accelerate.
Why don't you get in there and hit
the throttle and see what happens?
Yep.
Ready?
Yeah, go for it.
You've got nothing hooked to
the pedal, you lost a bolt,
so it's not throwing the throttle
like it's supposed to.
Running off the road
dislodged an accelerator bolt.
Looks like the bolt rattled out and
fell down below it on the belly pan.
Gonna try and pull it out.
Get it hooked back up,
get him back in action.
Try it, Logan.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Mitch quickly fixes the problem.
We're back in action.
Thanks, man. Talk to you later.
Logan is back on the road,
and once again, three trucks
are hauling Quartz Creek pay dirt.
(ROCKS CLATTERING)
Hey, Dave, you got a copy?
Can you meet me down here
at the sluice?
We'll go ahead, shut everything down
and take a look at this, huh?
Todd and Dave agreed, but if there's
less than one ounce of gold
in 100 yards of
Quartz Creek pay dirt,
they will stop hauling dirt
to Indian River.
That could mean
the end of their season.
All right, Dave,
why don't you look over there?
I'll look over here
and tell me what you think.
There's a chunk.
That's a piece of gold, Dave.
That's a piece of gold right there.
Hey, look at this!
Look at those chunks in there.
Holy crap.
There's another one under there.
Awesome.
I think our decision's made, buddy.
I say we keep going.
We'll see when we get
to the clean-up,
but it's better than
an ounce per 100.
I think you're right.
I know we're more than
one ounce per 100 in this material.
So, we're going to run it all.
With less than two weeks
of the season to go,
Todd and Dave decide to
run the convoy into the night.
(WOLF HOWLS IN DISTANCE)
At 11.00pm, Thurber does
his routine wash plant check.
Oh no!
Kevin! (BLEEP)
I got a large rock
in the sluice box.
KEVIN: How can rocks get through?
Rocks that big
shouldn't be making it.
Stones have somehow
reached the sluice boxes.
ANDY: Something's not right.
Gotta see what's going on.
Why don't you idle the water down,
all the way down?
I'll shut the shaker off.
They shut down to investigate.
There's our culprit right there.
We've got a hole in the screen.
You cannot run
with holes in your screen.
You get rocks in your sluice box,
it blows gold right out the back.
You know, it sucks.
So, the plant is shut down
for tonight.
South at the Big Nugget Mine...
Parker Schnabel calls Rick
over to Emerson Trench.
So, my grandpa thinks
that we missed the channel.
I think we should come back
into this hole over here.
There might be some evidence of it,
we just need to find it.
We've got time.
And, you know, I'm gonna keep going
till the end of the season.
I think this is where we should be.
As long as we're not doing this
just to keep busy.
If you really think that's
where we need to be then...
As long as the weather doesn't
go to (BLEEP) we'll do it.
It's Parker's last roll of the dice.
As far as this place goes,
we've dug everywhere,
and it seems like this pit
is our last chance and er...
If it doesn't work out,
I don't know where to go from here,
so hopefully at the bottom of
this pit we find some big nuggets
and this place lives up to its name.
(DRAMATIC MUSIC)
Following his grandfather's advice,
Parker starts digging
the Emerson Trench again.
He's searching for
an ancient pay streak
that he may have missed
earlier in the season.
We've got a bit of a plan here.
We're looking for like a line,
where the material goes
from junk to amazingness,
and it should be pretty distinct.
But, to find out if
the gold channel even exists,
his crew has to move
3,000 yards of overburden.
That means hauling hundreds of loads
of useless dirt a day,
with only one working rock truck.
RICK: It seems like all
we've done all season
is haul overburden
to this waste site.
Must be 75,000 freaking yards here.
How many loads are you at?
Seventy.
Really?
Yeah.
Nice job. Wow.
We need a lot of dirt,
so keep doing your thing.
You got it.
This is going to be a good day.
This is going to be a damn good day.
Oh... (BLEEP)
Rick's truck suddenly breaks down.
(BLEEPED)
(BLEEP) that truck!
What the hell is going on?
I don't even want to stick my head
in there to look it's so nasty.
It's really hot. Argh, oh!
You OK?
Yeah.
Hmm.
Yeah, I don't know what's going on.
It's not good.
I'll go grab that bucket of water.
See, on our site,
dump trucks are the most
important piece of equipment.
We can't move overburden,
can't bring dirt to the plant,
we can't do anything
without dump trucks.
Heck of a day to break down, huh?
I know. It's (BLEEP).
Parker and Rick
assess the situation.
That ain't fitting...
Oh, I think I've found the problem.
Oh yeah?
See that?
A radiator hose has blown...
Be careful, that thing's hot.
..causing the engine to overheat.
That's the one.
We'll have fun replacing this.
Let's go see if we can
find one of these.
Feel free to scavenge
anything and everything.
We're trying to scavenge a two-inch
radiator hose from something.
We can't run the truck without it,
so we need to try find one today.
See anything close?
Nah, I'm coming up short.
We'll just go and cannibalise
that other truck.
Probably not going to find anything
that's going to work but...
There is mountains to move here
and not a lot of time to do it.
Every minute spent dealing with
breakdowns and trying to find parts,
that's losing a lot of valuable time,
time we don't have right now.
Probably that top one?
I think we take the same one.
Got it.
Awesome.
It's time we should be hauling,
rather than working on the trucks.
Is it going to fit?
It's already on.
Let's fill it up, and then start it
and cycle it and see what happens.
Before firing up the truck,
they replace the radiator coolant.
You good, Rick?
Fine.
(ENGINE STARTS)
I think we're ready to go.
Awesome, good job.
Now you're talking!
North in the Klondike...
Big Red isn't running,
and the Hoffman crew's chance of
hitting their goal is slipping away.
The night shift found holes
in the shaker screen
that allowed stones
to pile up in the sluices.
DAVE: Yeah, that's ripped bad.
That's where all your big rocks
are coming from, Kev.
That's a blowout.
This is the issue we're having.
Oh, boy. (WHISTLES)
Holy cow, look at the rocks
in that one!
Yeah, Dave, it's not good.
What time did you catch it?
It was about 11 o'clock at night.
About 11.
That's bad, Kev.
We washed some gold last night.
I think we washed some out.
Vortices in the sluice cause gold
to settle behind the riffles.
But, if any rocks
get into the sluice,
the vortices are disrupted,
allowing gold to be washed right
out of the bottom of the box.
Let's take a look,
see what we can do to fix it.
All right, Dave.
Mitch arrives with new screens.
The Hoffman crew only has
days left in the season,
and Big Red hasn't been
running all morning.
DAVE: We're going to lose
half a day at least.
KEVIN: That's right. We're losing
precious sluicing time, Dave.
Stay there, Logan.
LOGAN: Muscles here!
Oh, yeah!
I want two guys in here and then two
guys on the outside putting nuts on.
We've got the screens
getting installed right now.
We have to tighten the retainers for
those and we're back in business.
KEVIN: How are those looking?
Are those lining up OK?
Yeah, perfect.
(WHIRRING)
Let's fire this thing up.
(ENGINE STARTS)
Big Red is running again,
but there is a good chance
the Hoffman crew have lost a day's
worth of gold, up to $30,000,
right out of the end
of their wash plant.
This is desperate times right now.
We're rapidly approaching
the end of the season.
Last year, we were
seven ounces short of 100.
I don't want to be seven ounces
short of 1,000 ounces.
At Porcupine Creek...
Despite a possible broken ankle,
Dakota Fred is pushing through
the pain barrier,
to get as much gold as he can.
Fred's the most driven man
I've ever met in my life,
almost to a point of obsession.
There's nothing,
there's nothing going to stop him.
I think that er,
we've still got a chance of
finding the bottom of this thing.
The next bucket of dirt
is going to hit the payload.
(RATTLING)
Uh-oh, I think we're back into
some hard (BLEEP) here.
The compacted rock and dirt
he's digging is as hard as concrete.
Miserable, miserable
digging conditions, miserable.
(RATTLING)
Extremely hard layer
of material here.
The 340 can't even dig this stuff.
Argh!
We're absolutely reaching the limits
of what we can get out of here.
Dustin's given up.
The pressure's on Fred
to break through to more gold.
DUSTIN: Damn!
Come on, Fred, dig this (BLEEP).
Look, I am in a difficult
digging situation.
I don't feel like (BLEEP)
talking about it right now.
Calm down, Fred.
Calm down.
Ohh.
Oh, for crying out loud!
(BLEEPED)
(THUD)
Oh, man!
That's it, we're done.
The material is just too hard.
This thing just doesn't
have enough power to continue.
We can't go back down there no more.
The dirt at the bottom of
the waterfall is just too tough.
Dustin, Melody,
y'all come down here a little bit.
I have just been digging
and digging and digging.
I just can't get it any more.
We gotta shut it down.
This is it down here.
MELODY: I'm a little disappointed.
I would have really liked
to have seen the bottom but...
Me too.
Oh.
I really wanted to see
the bottom of this hole, Fred.
Over 30m down in the glory hole,
they could be a few centimetres from
a deposit worth millions of dollars.
Argh!
Fred's not ready
to give up just yet.
We're gonna have to come up
with something different.
We're gonna have to come up
with Plan B.
We don't give up.
I mean, we got to get to
that waterfall.
We'll do it.
We're gonna do it.
All right. Sounds good.
Come on, guys.
We're not quite finished
with that yet.
.
.
NARRATOR: At the Big Nugget Mine...
..Parker's crew is searching
for an ancient pay streak
that his grandfather believes
runs alongside the bedrock wall.
RICK: Parker, I hit bedrock.
You should come take a look at this.
PARKER: It's definitely bedrock.
Nice find.
Rick has finally hit the wall,
but to find out if
there is gold below,
they will need to dig and run
thousands of yards of dirt.
We want to get that to the plant.
I hope it has gold in it.
I've got a good feeling about this.
First, Parker tests some of
the Emerson Trench dirt.
This dig does mean a lot to me,
because the future of the mine...
..really does depend on it.
If this dig isn't amazing,
then, you know,
there's nothing left.
He has no plan B.
If there's no gold in the sluices,
his season is over.
Where's the (BLEEP) gold?
We just took a look in the box
and I don't see much of anything.
So, I don't know what to say.
Did you see anything
in the sluice box at all?
Not really.
Well, we'll see
at the end of the day.
It's not looking good,
but Parker has one last hope.
Shut it down.
He stops the wash plant
to see if any large gold
has been caught in the jig.
Whoa!
Holy cow, look at the nuggets there.
RICK: Be careful.
That little pocket
right there is loaded.
Bingo bango!
Oh, my gosh.
Nice!
That's what we're used to
seeing in the jig.
This is really fantastic.
Quarter ounce of nuggets,
it's amazing
Good job, guys, you found
that channel we're looking for.
If we could run this every day
for the season,
we could find millions
of dollars in gold.
So, we're going to dig
the whole damn thing out.
Parker has found his grandfather's
gold-rich channel.
You may have just saved your bacon.
(PARKER LAUGHS)
With just days left in his season,
he may have found the mother lode.
North, at Quartz Creek
in the Klondike.
After 600 truckloads
and $20,000 in diesel,
the Hoffman crew is loading the last
of the Quartz Creek pay dirt.
Hey, Walt, what do you think,
is that it?
Yeah, Todd, I've scraped about
all I can out of this pit.
OK, last truck.
WALT ON RADIO: Hopefully this pit
gave us the extra boost we needed
to make our 1,000 ounces.
I hope so. We'll find out.
Push him on out of here.
Yah!
That's it for Quartz Creek, Greg.
That's the last of
the Quartz Creek dirt.
GREG ON RADIO: 10-4.
Let's scratch up whatever we can.
Yep, 10-4. Let's see what we can do.
In just over five days,
they've hauled and washed
nearly 10,000 yards
of what they hope is gold-rich dirt.
DAVE: Shut it down.
(ENGINE WINDS DOWN)
FRED: Go, go, go,
or they're going to freeze down.
With just days left in the season,
the Hoffman crew has 521 ounces.
They need another 479 ounces,
around three quarters
of a million dollars,
to hit their 1,000 ounce goal.
FRED: Hopefully it comes out
looking good.
Hi ya, Jack.
How's it going, man?
It's all right, but it's not good.
I'm getting nothing but rocks.
We're getting lots of rocks in
this stuff. It looks like (BLEEP).
There are small stones
on the gold table, a bad sign.
The crew may have lost
a lot of gold.
We're done, Jack.
You wanna weigh this up?
OK.
To date, their best clean up
is 137 ounces,
worth around $220,000.
To have any chance of hitting
their 1,000 ounce goal,
they need a record-breaking clean up
from the Quartz Creek dirt.
I think Quartz Creek is good
and it's going to be the best
clean up we've ever had.
Dave Turin is not so sure.
We lost gold, I don't know how much,
and right now,
we're going to find out.
TODD: Hey, there's Jack.
JACK: You know er...
I'd like to tell you something.
I wanna tell you there's
100 ounces in this jar.
(LAUGHTER)
But, what I also wanna
tell you is...
..there's 100 ounces in this jar.
MAN: Woo! Right on the button, huh.
(CHEERING)
That's 721 ounces.
(WHOOPING)
Nobody thought we'd get to this point
but we ain't stopping here.
We can get to 1,000 ounces,
I really think we can.
MAN: 1,000 ounces, Todd, whoo!
A week of dedication and
backbreaking work has paid off.
This 200 ounce clean out,
worth around $320,000,
brings the Hoffman's
1,000 ounce goal, within reach.
We've just dug 200 fricking ounces
out of the ground.
But, are we at our goal of 1,000?
No, we're not.
Can we get there?
You're damn right we can get there.