Gold Rush: Alaska (2010–…): Season 7, Episode 11 - Game Over - full transcript

Narrator:
On this "gold rush"...

[ truck horn blows ]

whoa,
whoa, whoa, whoa!

This is quite a commotion,
isn't it?

It's like having
unprotected sex.

This isn't the spo --
way it's supposed to be.

Okay?

Here's 40.

Oh, yeah.
We're in trouble.

Hey, hey, hey!
Knock it off!

That cut's done!
I'm done!



Oregon was meant to be
a beautiful homecoming.

Good luck.

This has turned into
an absolute nightmare.

captions paid for by
discovery communications

a little more.
Right there.

Beautiful.

We're done.
That's it.

I still need you
to put this section in.

You can't take the 200
and dig the hole?

I can't operate
that 200.

I'll sink it --
I've already wasted an hour.

I should be doing
overburden.

Narrator: At the buckland mine
in oregon...

Keep going.
Keep going.



The hoffman crew
is facing failure.

All right, andy.
We're hooked up.

I'm outta here.
Nobody's been paid

for over a month.

And they're at breaking point.

Todd,
you got a copy?

Hey, andy. How you doin'?

I got a problem with randy.
I need you to talk to him.

Try to keep it positive
if you can, buddy.

I got 5 feet of water.
The pumps don't work.

Narrator:
Halfway through the season,

they've mined just
204 ounces worth less

than $250,000.

Todd hoffman's 5,000-ounce
season goal is history.

This has really turned out to
be
a really rough, rough year.

We okay?
-No.

-I've already wasted an hour.

-Well, do you want me
to do your job?

-Why?
Why is this a problem?

-You [bleep] start screaming
and yelling at me.

No, listen to me.
-Because I have a --

-no. Listen to me!
No more [bleep]!

-Can I --
and this is why I'm leaving.

-No, listen to me!
-Don't! No!

Come here!
We don't quit.

Come on!

Hoffman: Hey.
Hey.

Calm down. Don't leave me.
I love you

don't...
I love you.

Listen.
Calm down.

Listen to me.
Come on.

[ voice breaking ]
I can't do it.

Come on, man.
No. No, no, no, no.

No, no, no, no.

It's okay.
It's okay.

You're doin' good.

You're doin' good.
We've had a hell of a summer.

It's okay.
All right?

Sometimes,
you just stand down.

It's okay.

Do you want me
to go back to work or not?

I want you to go back
to work, man.

I want you to go back to work.
You're all right.

[ truck engine starts ]

tempers are flaring.

Every --
everybody's pissed

because we're not
getting gold.

And it's just tough.
Um, you know,

when your mechanic
just frickin' shed a tear...

You know it's bad
when your mechanic is crying.

It's not easy to do
when you're losing, man.

And all we've been doing
this summer is losing.

I don't know. I gotta try
to keep these guys together.

And it's not easy, man.
It's not easy at all.

Narrator: After a disastrous
start to the season,

the hoffman crew came
to the buckland mine

5 weeks ago,

determined to turn
their fortunes around.

Krisher: No one's been in
here,
seriously, since the '20s.

How do we know they didn't
just pick it clean?

The dredge didn't make it
to the bottom.

There will be gold
at the bottom.

Dig down right in here.

Narrator: But last week,

their dreams of bedrock
gold were shattered.

Bedrock.

[ sighs ]
nothin'?

The dredge didn't really
miss jack [bleep].

We're looking down a barrel
of a serious failure.

Enough is enough.

Narrator: Freddy dodge,

todd's gold recovery
expert and friend

for the last 7 years
called it quits.

I gotta go,
for now.

I know.
It just hurts.

We started stripping
this cut

hoping that the dredge
had not gotten down to
bedrock.

Unfortunately, they have.

It's gonna be sidepay.

It's what the dredge
couldn't get.

That's what we're chasing.

Narrator:
The crew's only option --

dig alongside the wall
of old dredge tailings

in search of another
small pocket of sidepay.

And this cut has been
an absolute pain in the butt.

The pay wasn't where
we started, you know?

And now, I got nothin'
but water problems.

Todd:
How's it going?

Not very good.

Crap. Well, we need more pay
to keep that sucker runnin'.

We've got our
work cut out.

But I'll get
your pay dirt.

It's all I can ask,
buddy.

We're in trouble.

Narrator:
No one knows if there's gold

and no one's getting paid
'til they hit a real pay
streak.

I just bought
my first house.

And, [bleep].

It's so -- it's nerve-racking
not getting paid.

Tensions are pretty high.

Hunter:
It's hard to keep working when

it's really frustrating.

Morale's really low.

Narrator: One hundred feet
down in the cut,

everyone's pinning
their hopes on andy spinks

finding a new
pocket of pay.

Spinks:
I keep diggin' a hole deeper

I've got a bunch of water
coming into my cut

where I'm trying to dig.

I don't want to
waste another day

or 2 trying to reset
all my pumps.

My biggest concern is just
getting paid to the plan.

Pierce: Andy, the high wall's
comin' down.

Ah [bleep]!

Oh, you've gotta be [bleep]
kidding me.

Can I get one more thing
to go wrong today?

Narrator:
At paradise hill,

tony beets'
$250,000 power barge

is finally finished.

It's the linchpin of his plan
to expand his mining
operation.

Tony's new
$1.5 million dredge

lies abandoned
100 miles south.

He'll use the power barge
to retrieve it.

But first, he has to get
the barge 15 miles

down to the yukon river.

Yeah.

The barge is so big,

tony's hired a team of welders

to build his own
monster trailer.

Tony has constructed a steel
bed

80-feet-long-by-8-feet-wide.

His plan: Take the front axles

and 6-foot wheels
from two old loaders,

weld them directly
to the base of the bed

to create a monster trailer
capable of hauling

his 26-foot-wide 60-ton barge.

Just gonna go around,
right here.

And then we'll roll them
things in there.

A little more,
jay!

More!

All right.

Tony has spent 2 weeks

and $10,000 building
his trailer.

Tony: [ laughs ]

cheeseman:
Just go around to the other
end. I wanna lo

narrator: Foreman gene
cheeseman
is worried about the height.

It's gonna be
pretty tall.

Nine-foot-eight.
It'll be damn close.

Gotta go double-check
our measurements at the
bridge.

The only route
to the yukon river

passes through
a box bridge.

Hurry.

26, 11.

I think we're,
like, 26, 6.

So we got, like,
4 1/2, 5 inches.

The clearance on the bridge

is less than 17 feet, 4
inches.

The power barge and the
monster
trailer combined stand

at just over 17 feet.

I don't know
what to say.

Minnie:
Hey, guys.

I don't like
the sound of that?

You know,
I don't get it.

Why didn't you
measure it?

Yeah, it's too close.
We're not...

So...

We spend
a lot of money on --

on the welders
and everything else.

And we have
nothing for it.

So don't you think
you guys

maybe should get going
and find something else?

[ sighs ]

just deal with it.
Go fix it now and get going.

Schnabel: I'm really not happy
with where we're at this point

in the season.

The halfway mark, and we're
nowhere [bleep] near halfway.

Narrator: At scribner creek,
parker schnabel

is halfway through the season

but has only mined
1,075 ounces,

around a quarter of his
4,000-ounce $4.8 million goal.

He needs around 150 ounces
a week to stay on target.

But last week's haul
was just 96.

Parker's come to the cut

to investigate
what's going wrong.

Schnabel: [bleep] [bleep]!

Kelly's left [bleep] a
mountain
of pay in the cut.

And it's the best stuff.

People need to start
gettin' their [bleep]
together.

They can't be makin'
any more [bleep] mistakes.

Narrator: Tyson is loading
the feeder.

[ remote beeps ]

schnabel: Hey, kel.
Think you'll be able

to get another 20, 40 feet?

Yeah,
you betcha.

Narrator:
And kelly is digging pay.

Come here.

I just want to look
at somethin' with ya.

There's [bleep]
pay all over here, kelly.

Right? All this?

That's all
river rock.

Look at that.

That's the best stuff.
All that's pay.

All of this
is pay.

I've been trying to figure out
why our numbers are so bad.

And I think
it's because of --

I think it's because
a lot of the best pay,

we're leaving
in here.

Look at all of that.
That's all river gravel.
Right?

But, parker,
all the sand's out of it.

No! No!

If a rock
like this is --

if a rock like this
gets down here,

then, uh,
how's a flake of gold

that's one-ten-thousandth
the size of that?

You looked at
the whole cut with me.

Not one bucket that you --
that you --

that you
complained about.

I'm looking at what
we've got right here.

[bleep] supposed to be,
well, that's not the way it's
parker.

But are we --
no, you're right.

This isn't --
this isn't

the way it's supposed
to be.

Okay?
I'm not --

I'm not gonna talk
about this any more.

We'll put a plan together
to get the rest

of the pay
out of the cut.

If you want me to scrape it
all up and get a truck --

no, I don't
really want you to.

I don't.
Um...

That -- that is not
the way we dig pay.

Narrator:
The boundary-cut extension

has around 20 feet of
worthless

overburden sitting
above the pay.

The richest pay is in the top

4 feet of fractured bedrock.

Parker thinks kelly has
taken the first 2 feet,

leaving 2 feet
of gold-rich material

that he now wants
tyson to run.

Bedrock definitely is not
the fun stuff to run.

It's the stuff that has
the gold in it, though.

See? There's some pretty meaty
ones in there.

[ remote beeps ]

[bleep] grizzlies!

Hey, parker.
Do you have a copy?

What's up?

They are not
going up or down.

Narrator: The grizzly bars
stop large rocks

getting into the wash plant.

When ever there's
a buildup of rocks,

tyson uses a remote
to lift the bars.

But the remote-control system
isn't working.

It's just not sending
out the signal

for the grizzly bars
up, I believe.

With mechanic mitch
away getting married,

it's up to parker
to find a solution.

They've got a part.
But it's down south.

So may take a while
to get here.

Tyson? I think we just
say [bleep] it.

We're not gonna
have any.

We're just gonna
leave 'em up.

Okay.

This is gonna
be fun.

Parker has decided
to run the plant

with the grizzly bars open.

I know parker wants
to get running. And I do, too.

Ness: But running that feeder
with the grizzlies wide-open

in the air
is not a good idea.

You know, one big chunk
of bedrock falls in there,

straight onto that rubber
belt.

It's gonna tear it.
Maybe we'll get lucky.

But it ain't a good idea.

Hiatt: The stuff's wet,
but, you know,

I'm just seeing
a lot of clay in it.

And the best pay that we've
had
so far has been a l --

really rocky and sandy.

Narrator: In oregon, kevin
hiatt
is running 300 yards

an hour through the wash
plant.

Seems like the material that
andy sends isn't that great.

Narrator: But he's not
convinced
it contains gold.

Hiatt:
I hope andy's not just sending

running pay that has no gold
in it, that won't help.

They've gotta come up
with a better plan.

Narrator: Down in the pit,
andy is struggling

after a wall
of fine tailing's collapsed.

Spinks:
I just spent all day diggin',

that just filled up
full of mud in about 2
seconds.

Now I got a whole pile
of crap to deal with.

Hiatt:
Andy, do you copy?

[indistinct]

do you have any pay you can
send up here to the plant?

I am just about out.

We need some pay,
like, right now.

You're gonna have
to shut it down.

Dude,
this ain't cool.

We can't shut
the plant down, andy,

because you guys
couldn't get us pay.

I'm not talkin' about
this any more.

You're gonna have to just
wait.
I'll get it as quick as I can.

Running out of pay!
Andy's got no pay to send us.

We gotta
shut down now.

Trey, I'm shuttin' down
the, uh, wet feeder.

We got no gold
in the sluice box.

How you gonna catch gold if
you
don't have any frickin' pay?

Narrator:
Until andy sends more pay,

the plant crew's only option
is maintenance.

It just gets worse
every frickin' day.

I got a brand-new baby at home
that I don't get to see.

And I'm here doing this crap.

I'm not even getting paid
for it right now.

Ah, damn it.

Hiatt: Dave, do you copy?

Yeah, go ahead, kev.

Do you have
the grease gun?

Sterling's greasin'
something down there.

Sterling!

Its just been a crappy year,
all the way around.

I cannot believe
we're not gettin' any gold.

Get the [bleep]

-hey, hey!

Hey!
-Whoa, whoa! What!

Hey! Knock it off!

-Hey!
-Hey! Stop!

-Stop, stop,
stop! Get off!

-Hey! Come on!
-You [bleep]!

-Grab him, grab him!
Hey! Kevin! Knock it off!

-Stop, stop.
-You [bleep].

-Take a break.

I've been sick
of this place.

I'm sick of this crew.

I'm sick of [bleep] oregon.

[ panting ]

turin: I've never seen the
crew
like this before.

I'm tappin'.
It's happenin' bad.

And you know what,
dude?

If we don't get gold
pretty quick,

it's --
it's gonna get worse.

Lee: We don't have
any grizzly bars.

So we're just dumping that
thick bedrock into the system.

Those big rocks
can be a real issue.

But that's the risk
we run running no grizzlies.

I mean, we don't
really have a choice.

It's either don't run,
or run without the grizzlies.

Narrator: At scribner creek,
the grizzly bar's

remote-control system
is broken.

And parker is gambling
on running with the bars open.

Lee: Oh [bleep].

[bleep] jammed!
For [bleep] sakes!

[bleep] sakes, man.

[bleep], [bleep].

Ah.

I can't wait for these [bleep]
grizzlies to work.

I'm just trying
to get it up high enough

[bleep] rolling downhill.
That I can roll it off without

schnabel: All the big rock
and everything is goin' right

through the plant.

And I've been bailin' pay.
I'm trying to keep 'em out.

You can see
the little pile of rocks

right there
that I've picked out.

But I can't catch 'em all.

It's like having
unprotected sex.

It's not -- it's not a matter
of if something goes wrong,

it's just when.

Yeah, hopefully.

Narrator: Tony's monster
trailer
has proved

an embarrassing
$10,000 mistake.

He's had to compromise
and rent a lowboy trailer

to get his power barge
through the dawson bridge.

It's half the width
of the monster trailer,

which will make it
less stable.

Todd: Up! Whoa!

We gotta come over 3 inches.

I hope so.

Kevin: We are playing
with some very big toys.

If it [bleep] [bleep] the
lift,

that's what this thing is.

Honestly, just lifting,

we gotta play around
with each [bleep] corner.

Narrator: Tony needs to
balance
the $250,000 barge precisely.

We need to come this way
about 6 inches.

If monica or kevin
are just 1 inch out,

the barge could tip
and crash to the ground.

Do I gotta go down, too?

Narrator: The convoy heads
toward dawson city

with tony in the pilot car.

To prevent anyone hitting
the oversized barge,

tony leads the way.

Tony: [ laughs ]

narrator:
The barge has only a 2-inch

one wrong move could
destroy the barge

or shut down
the only bridge into town.

Ready to go?

About 6, 7 inches.

I got lots of room
on this side.

Whoa, whoa, whoa!

Cheeseman:
Whoa, whoa, whoa!

Tony: Hey, hey!

Narrator: Tony beets
is trying to navigate

his 26-foot-wide power barge

through the dawson bridge

with just inches on each side.

Good on this side.

Looking good
over here.

[ truck horn blowing ]

schnabel: Really harsh bedrock
that's [bleep] us over.

Narrator: At scribner creek,

tyson is fighting
to keep the plant running.

He's loading sharp bedrock

without the protective
grizzly bars.

Leaving the grizzly bars
off is just crazy.

This rocky bedrock can do
so much damage to the belt.

And that's an $8,000 belt.

[bleep] piece of [bleep]!
Schnabel:

The [bleep] rollers
are trying to kill me.

Narrator:
Running unprotected has taken
a serious toll on the c

giant rip in our conveyer.

Lee: [bleep] stinks, man!

[bleep] takes out
his bull [bleep].

This bracket is completely
torn off the middle rollers.

That's probably where it
ripped.

It probably ripped along
this section of metal here

and this section of metal
here.

That's the bracing
for the roller to sit on.

Ness:
Where's the tear?

Lee:
It's up by the stand.

[bleep] sake.
Oh, for

that's the risk
you take when you're runnin'

big rock
on rubber conveyors.

This is the kind of [bleep]
that mitch is good at.

Should we just go ahead and
wait
'til Sunday when he gets back?

Yeah.

Ah, let's go gather
our [bleep] that we need.

Narrator: Every hour the plant
is down costs parker $2,500.

[ drill buzzing ]

we're going on 4 hours
of downtime right now.

I think that'll get her.
The belt's back in one piece.

Time to roll.

That's it.

We are back in business.

Narrator:
After 5 hours, tyson and rick

have the wash plant
back up and running.

But that means parker's lost
over $12,000 worth of gold.

Ness:
It's lookin' good for now.

Hopefully, we can get
a bit of time out of it.

[ truck horn blowing ]

narrator: Tony beets has
finally
got his power barge

down to the yukon river.

Cheeseman:
Super trucker.

This is quite a commotion.

Yeah, I just wanna get him
over
and then we'll go on.

We can start hauling stuff,
which will be awesome.

Narrator:
Tony's all set to head out and

we just got back with our new
controller for our grizzly
bars.

We're gonna install this.

And hopefully,
it fixes our problem.

Narrator: At scribner creek,
crew mechanic mitch

is back from his wedding...

-There we go.
-...And straight back to work.

Blaschke: Yeah! That's what
we're looking for.

Thought this was our problem.

And sure enough,
looks like it was.

Welcome back, man.
How was the wedding?

Oh, it was awesome!
Ness: Weirdos?

Yeah, nothing weird.
No wedding crashers.

No, uh, no fights, no, uh,
nobody getting too wasted.

How were
the bridesmaids?

Oh, dude, you shoulda been
there. They were lookin' good.

[ chuckles ]

went off real smooth.

Couldn't have
went any better.

-Right on.
-Wish we could say the same.

-Yeah.
-Yeah? How'd it go?

We had a bunch of pay
that got left in the cut.

That's what
we ran here.

Just runnin' straight bedrock
through that thing.

Yeah.
That's pretty rough on 'em.

Yeah.

Narrator:
Running without grizzlies

caused costly breakages.

But parker believes the jagged
bedrock will prove rich in
gold.

All right.
Let's weigh this [bleep].

To get back on track
for his 4,000-ounce goal,

parker needs at least
160 ounces.

There's 40, 80...

Oh!

100, 102.65.

Yeah.
Worth just $120,000,

the bedrock failed to deliver.

We're well-behind
right now.

Yeah.
We're in trouble.

Well, we're never
gonna hit our goal

if cleanups keep
going like this.

Yeah.
Yeah. I know.

How close are you
to being able to sluice

down there
at indian river?

Well, I mean,
we've been stripping

down there for a month.
It's goin' really good.

I think we have
to get it goin'.

So if we're serious about
trying
to do 4,000 ounces,

which I am...
Yeah.

Big red has
to get runnin' down there.

We'll go
start workin' on it.

Yeah.
Let's get after it.

Narrator: On-and-off
for the last 6 weeks,

rick has been attempting
to start up their second
claim.

Right, man. This is what
I've been waiting for.

Indian river, you know?
I just wanna get up there,

start runnin' some dirt,

see some indian river gold,
man.

Blaschke:
How's it going?

Narrator:
In the boundary cut,

rick is recovering
from a wasp sting.

Hey, you feelin'
any better?

Yeah,
I'm feeling better.

It's bad [bleep]
news though.

Doctor said I have
a severe allergy to beestings.

It got me,
like, right here.

And it's all swollen down
to here.

I've got, like,
a woman's breast.

[ laughs ]

it's like a c cup.
Like, it falls.

Like, it's --
no. It's absurd.

The nurse
was laughing at me.

Ness:
There's a wasp in my cab.

Get out of here, [bleep].

Ah! [bleep] off!

[bleep] wasp.
They're, uh,

spinks: Frickin' walls
are fallin' in!

I can't keep the dirt out.
It's too stinkin' deep.

I'm tired of it.

Narrator:
After 5 weeks at buckland

and digging down
over 100 feet,

andy is still searching
for a pocket of gold

that will finally
give the crew a paycheck.

I told them to fuel my
stinkin'
excavator up. I get in here.

And I got no fuel.
So I gotta go get fuel now.

This stuff is startin'
to really piss me off.

Perfect. Great spot
to park your truck, guys,

right in front
of this fuel tank.

This ain't
a frickin' parking lot!

Anybody copy who parked
this truck up here

in front of the fuel truck
with no stinkin' keys in it?

I need this thing
moved right now.

[ sighs ]

todd:
What's going on?

You know what? I've had it!
I've had enough!

I'm done
with this!

Is this where we're at?
Really?

This is ridiculous.

I'm down there
diggin' dirt.

I got walls
cavin' in.

Pumps aren't
pumping water.

That cut's done.
I'm done!

Wait a minute!

Andy!

-The hell is goin' on?
-Andy --

-he just walked off.

[ truck engine starts ]

well,
I didn't see that comin'.

Maybe you could
talk to him, dave.

I think
we're past it.

I'll be honest with you.
I don't know what we need to
do.

You know, I --
I don't know what to do,
either.

But I know we're not gonna get
any gold at all

if we just
keep imploding.

You know?

We can't break
apart.

Then we got
no chance.

We already have no chance.
Andy's gone.

I can follow his plan
for another couple days.

And then what?

We've lost freddy.

We've lost andy.

I'll be honest with you.
We've lost this team.

And with out this team,
we can't do it.

At some point,
you gotta know when to quit.

I love you
like a brother.

But on
this one...

No, not you.
I gotta go.

Not you.

I can't run this
without you, dave.

Good luck, man.
No. Seriously?

Come on.
No. I gotta go, man.

Sorry.

Todd: Well,
I lost my whole team.

That's it.

I don't know
what I'm gonna do.

Oregon was meant to be
a beautiful homecoming.

It's just turned into
an absolute nightmare.

Narrator: On the next
"gold rush"...

It's a very gentle procedure
as you can see.

[ truck horn blows ]
whoo!

We've gotta get big red
sluicing as soon as we can.

Easy.

[ bang ]

what the [bleep]
was that?

We're killing ourselves right
now trying to run this mine

with four guys.

I never thought
it'd come to this.

Hey, feeder's blowing water
out the back.

Shut it down!

Ugh.