Gold Rush: Alaska (2010–…): Season 7, Episode 8 - Mega Barge & Kid Commando - full transcript
Something break?
Narrator: On this "gold
rush"...
That doesn't sound right.
It's broke.
It's cracked right off.
Ow!
We're [bleep].
[ horn blowing ]
enough is enough.
It's scary.
We ain't got gold
in that cut.
You're nowhere
near deep enough.
You're going to be
well over 100 feet.
So you're telling me
that I'm only halfway down?
I'm scared.
I'm really scared now.
captions paid for by
discovery communications
narrator: At paradise hill,
tony beets is expanding
his viking fleet
so he can transport
his new dredge
100 miles up the yukon river.
The two halves of his
30-ton barge
must become one
massive steel hull.
Okay, up.
Narrator: His challenge --
perfectly line up
two 15-ton steel sections
and weld them solid.
Narrator:
To make the vessel seaworthy,
a team of specialists
arc weld the barge
at over 20,000 degrees.
Narrator: Last year,
tony paid $1.5 million
for a second dredge
150 tons heavier
than his first.
It was built in 1946
but is now abandoned 70 miles
south at thistle creek.
Narrator: To move the dredge
to eureka creek,
tony will load it
onto his barge
and pull it upriver
like tugboating.
Tony's foreman,
gene cheeseman,
has worked on the tugboat,
kid commando,
for three weeks.
He's split it
into three parts,
ready to haul it down
to the yukon river,
15 miles away in dawson.
When we it down to the river,
then we've got to put
the top house on it
and the wheelhouse and get
all the systems hooked back
up.
It's a lot of work.
Narrator: While the barge
gets a coat of paint,
tony enlists his family
to transport the tug.
Narrator: Son mike is
the point man in the oshkosh,
a 22-year-old 12-liter,
8-wheel-drive
combat transporter.
Get moving,
'cause I'm not stopping.
[ air horn blows ]
go, go, go, go!
Mike: Only [bleep] concern
I have is might be too high.
Mike: Oh, yeah, I know.
It says 5.3 and you guys
were estimating 5.2, right?
Mike: If it doesn't fit,
we'll just cut the bridge.
Minnie:
Just keep him going, mike.
Narrator: Even if
tony's math is correct,
kid commando has just
four inches' clearance.
One wrong move from mike
could damage the tug
and the bridge,
putting the whole project
back by weeks
and cutting off access
to the city.
Minnie: It looks really good
from the back side.
Mike: Go, go, go, go.
Minnie: It's awesome, mike.
He's fine, tony. He'll fit.
[ horn blows ]
todd: Buckland is
our second chance.
Let's hope it's not
our last chance.
Narrator: This season,
todd set a massive
$6 million,
5,000-ounce target,
but so far,
he's only mined 138 ounces,
worth just $165,000.
Things are so bad,
todd's not paying his crew
until they strike more gold.
Spinks: The bottom line is is
that we all have bills to pay.
You know, logan just
bought his first house.
Kevin had another baby.
We all have families.
Hunter:
All these guys, they didn't
so they're obviously all not
super happy right now.
My dad has
the pressure on him
to get some gold
for the whole team
and their whole families.
Narrator:
They're running buckland
but no one knows
if they've hit the pay streak
that would turn
their season around.
Todd: We're going 50 feet deep
to get to this pay dirt here.
Oh, what
a nerve-wracking situation.
You know, kevin,
all these guys,
they've dug just
a monster cut down there.
Let's hope that there's gold
in the bottom of it.
I've heard lots of stories
and I just -- I don't know.
That's -- that's the truth.
Narrator: Now,
after two days of running,
dave and kevin shut down to
see
if they're finally on the
money.
Hiatt: That's it.
We are done for the day.
Let's go check the sluices
and see how much gold we got.
There's no gold on this side.
I don't see a single piece.
I don't see anything in here.
I'm not seeing
any gold up in here.
There's nothing here.
That was 1,200 yards
we just ran through there.
It ain't good enough.
Back to the drawing board.
[ groans ]
we got all our eggs
in this basket right here,
and if this doesn't work,
I mean, we're done.
I mean, we're done-done.
This is it.
This is the last chance.
Marvin better
have some answers.
Narrator:
They lease the buckland mine
at 50 feet, it's the deepest
cut todd's ever mined.
His whole operation
hangs in the balance.
Dude, we got a problem.
We ain't got gold
in that cut.
I'm telling you, todd.
That doesn't sound right.
We dug down probably 50 feet,
tested all the way down.
Well, I'm going to
tell you this.
You're nowhere near
deep enough.
What?
You're going to be
well over 100 feet.
You're telling me we're
not even halfway there yet?
Todd, that's a whole
different level of mining.
We're talking about hundreds
of thousands of dollars'
worth of fuel, labor,
time, energy.
Listen, todd.
If you open this up,
you can't run out on this
if it doesn't work out
exactly as you planned.
The question that I have
is do we have the ability
to dig that deep?
I'm going to be
honest with you.
If you're not
smart enough to do it,
you might as well
just go home now
and just save
everyone the trouble.
There'll be gold
at the bottom.
Let's kick some ass!
I was really hoping for a ton
of gold in the box today.
Narrator:
A third of the way through
parker schnabel has just
787 ounces of gold,
worth $944,000.
Parker:
Gold's not really coming in
narrator: To stand any chance
of reaching his 4,000-ounce,
$4.8 million goal,
he needs sluicifer
to run klondike pay dirt
for 12 straight hours a day.
Parker: You know,
I thought we'd be up there
at three ounces an hour or so,
but we're more like two.
That's a pretty big
difference.
You know,
over a 1,500-hour
sluicing season,
that's 1,500 ounces
short we'd be.
That doesn't sound right.
No.
Doumitt: Rattling going on
in the wash plant
somewhere doesn't
sound quite right.
We're not sure if it's a rock
or broken spring or what it
is.
[ rattling ]
narrator:
It's foreman rick ness' job
ness: Wow.
Holy [bleep].
What do we got going on?
There's a plate that goes
from the prewash
to the shaker deck.
It's [bleep] broke.
It's cracked right off.
Something break?
Yeah, bad.
The whole [bleep] plate
that transitions
from the prewash
to the shaker deck
is in three [bleep] pieces.
[bleep]'s sake.
Narrator: Every hour
the wash plant is down
costs parker $2,500
in lost gold.
I don't know what the [bleep]
we can do about this one.
Narrator: It's down to
mechanic mitch blaschke
to fix the problem.
How's it going?
Not good.
Oh, it's [bleep].
Why?
[bleep] the screen cage
is in half, almost.
We've got something
major going on.
It's basically
tearing itself apart.
Narrator:
When the plant is running,
the inlet chute
never gets closer
than three inches
from the prewash.
But as the machine shuts down,
the irregular vibrations
cause the plate
to hit the prewash,
resulting in a series of
cracks.
Blaschke: Right now, we're
just
going to get it welded up,
but for the amount of hours
we've got on this wash plant,
we've got big problems.
We've kind of pushed
everything
back up in place.
We're welding it
from the top side,
welding it from the bottom
side,
should make it a lot stronger.
We're just trying to get
through it as fast as we can.
They cut the lip down on it,
took about a half an inch off.
So we gave it a little bit
more clearance.
[bleep]
oh, [bleep]! Ow!
[ laughs ]
I'm watching a forest fire
start in parker's hair.
[ laughs ]
parker: Mitch and jordan
have done a great job
of getting this thing fixed.
Now we're just putting
things back together.
And we'll be --
we'll be sluicing again
in 20, 30 minutes.
Narrator: In just two hours,
mitch welds the cracks
with an ingenious bush fix.
And you can see
all the welding
we had to do here
where the tray broke,
you can see the gussets
that we added in here
to give it some strength.
It was broke pretty good.
Everything's holding
together well.
And it doesn't look like it's
breaking back apart anymore.
Really happy.
[bleep] gold mining.
Parker: Now we're
so you're telling me
that I'm only halfway down
to where we got to end up?
And it's been a chore
to get to this part.
Narrator:
At the buckland mine in
oregon,
andy spinks has opened up
a 50-foot cut.
They've just discovered he
might have to dig another 50.
All of my knowledge
and everything that I've done
as far as stripping
and doing a cut,
I've pretty much exhausted it.
I've never dug a hole
this deep before.
Either we figure out
a solution or we're done.
I'm scared.
I'm really scared now.
What's the solution?
What are we going to do?
It's not going to be easy by
any stretch of the
imagination,
but I've got the solution.
It's going to take some
planning, but we'll do it.
How?
Switchback it
the whole way down,
just like a mountain pass.
Build zigzags to the bottom
till we hit bedrock.
Establish a face,
mine our way out.
Narrator: Unlike andy,
safety officer trey poulson
has spent two decades
in deep-pit mining operations.
Digging below 50 feet
will open up
a whole new raft of
challenges.
Spinks:
What you're talking about is
so it might as well
be another language.
You show me how
and I'll dig the dirt out.
It's above me.
It's above my pay grade.
I'm not going to lie,
it's got me nervous,
but we'll get there.
For everybody's sake here,
I hope you're right,
because everybody's futures
are relying on this.
It's a hell of a plan.
Let's see if we can
fricking pull it off.
Andy, do it?
Let's do it.
Let's do it.
Narrator: Andy and his crew
get to work,
digging down one bucket
at a time
in a desperate search
for the pay streak.
Spinks: So todd and trey and I
just had a meeting,
and looks like we've got to
go down 100 feet total in
depth.
It's not the news
that I was hoping for.
I've never dug a hole
this deep before.
You know, right now, all I
can hope for is the pay
streak.
Guys are getting tired of
moving dirt every day
and not seeing any gold.
Narrator: Over the next 10
days,
andy plans to dig down
five feet a day.
We got some water, todd.
Todd: Holy frig.
What do you mean
"some" water?
Overnight, we've got 20 foot
of water in our ditches.
That's a lot of water.
We don't know how fast
it's coming in.
[ groans ]
we've gone down 50 feet
and that's what we hit,
and we've got
another 50 to go.
If we don't get gold
in this hole,
I honestly don't know
what we're going to do.
This'll probably
be our last cut ever.
So either we get
this water figured out
or we're screwed,
completely screwed.
If we don't get gold
in this hole,
I honestly don't know
what we're going to do.
What do you guys want to do?
What should we do?
Narrator: The hoffman crew
is trying to dig down
to a gold-rich pay streak,
but they've hit
the water table
and their cut is flooded.
I think we just put a pump
right in the corner,
bring it all the way down
to the end of our mine limit
and put it in those
old existing ponds.
You guys figure out the plan
where we're going to
take the water.
Let's do it.
Let's do it.
Narrator:
Trey's toughest challenge?
Pump the water
60 feet vertically
to get it out of the cut.
He needs a 200-horsepower pump
and a heavy-duty
piping system.
Paulson:
This pump with this size pipe,
going to be moving
2,500 gallons per minute.
What we're going to do
is weld the pipe.
Then we'll run
all the way down
to where we're going to
turn into our pond.
The cut's drowning
and we've got to get
ahead of this water.
Ho!
Come into the center
right here.
Ibarra: The pump,
it'll be sending the water up
through this pipe and out.
Bliss: So we had to make
another sweep 90
for the suction
on the back of the pump.
So juan and I have built
a 90 out of scrap iron
in the middle of the desert.
I like it, man.
Huh?
What do you think of that?
Spinks:
So we've got the pump set.
Now we've just got to
put the pipe in.
It's going to come up,
travel here,
make a corner,
loop all the way
around to the pond.
Should be good to go.
Let's do it.
How many feet?
We got about 1,100 feet?
1,100 feet of pipe.
Once we get this
water out of it,
we can see what
the bottom holds.
We're good to go.
Keep your fingers crossed.
Hey, todd,
are you guys in place?
Yeah, we're in place.
Fire it up.
Moment of truth.
So either we get this water
figured out or we're screwed.
Here we go, guys.
[ motor cranking ]
come on, baby.
[ motor cranking ]
[ motor starts ]
I can hear air pushing out.
Can you hear it?
Anything yet?
Nope, nothing yet.
Narrator: Trey has been
working
with high-powered
centrifugal pumps
all his mining career.
Poulson: We've got a big
bubble
of air in there,
so helping the valve let
the air out moved the water.
Keep your fingers crossed,
randy.
Todd: This had better work.
Got 'er.
We got some water coming out.
That's awesome!
She's pumping.
All right!
Yeah!
Man, randy,
we dodged a bullet there.
Woo, buddy.
We needed some good news.
A little bit's better than
none.
Narrator: Todd and his team
can get back to digging down
to the elusive pay streak.
Todd: Let's go
get some gold!
Working!
That's what we needed
right there.
Up, up, up, up.
Narrator: In dawson city,
tony beets puts together
kid commando,
the tugboat that will
transport his dredge
from thistle creek.
Happy?
Yep.
When it's put together,
it's really tall,
so I'm a little worrisome.
We even got a crowd to watch.
Wow.
More, more, more, more.
More, more, more, more.
Keep her --
keep her rolling,
keep her rolling.
There you go,
there you go.
Back it up, back it up,
back it up, back it up,
back it up, back it up.
Easy on the brake pedal.
Keep her going,
keep her going.
Keep her going.
Bit more, bit more.
Back in there, mike.
Keep her going.
Keep her going.
It's not floating.
Cheeseman:
We're starting to get
a little water
on the deck there.
Narrator: The stern of
kid commando is in the river.
If water gets into the hull,
the whole vessel could sink.
Tony: Back it up, back it up.
Back it up, back it up.
Narrator: Tony beets' tugboat,
kid commando,
is on the point of flooding
because it won't float free
from the lowboy.
Narrator: Gene's got a plan --
fire up the engines
and attempt to back
kid commando off the lowboy.
Boat, swing.
Gene's trying the engines.
Minnie: Woo!
It's floating!
Come on. Deck it.
Oh, look at it lean.
Look at it lean.
Ew! I'm not going
on that boat.
Hell, no! Woo!
Hell, no.
There's always another step.
Never ends.
If it did,
I'd be out of a [bleep] job.
Lee: We're getting down
to the bare minimum
pay left in this section
of the boundary cut.
Narrator: At scribner creek,
tyson is running the last few
thousand yards
of boundary cut dirt
before the crew moves on
to a new cut.
Lee: We probably have
another two shifts left.
This pay is pretty
good right now
'cause it falls through
the grizzlies nicely.
Sluicifer's hungry and so it's
all up to us to keep her fed.
Narrator:
To hit their 4,000-ounce,
he needs to keep 250 yards
an hour running
through the plant.
Up at the screen deck,
foreman rick makes
his daily inspection.
Ness: Oh, that's just great.
Well, there's just lots of
dirt
and rocks coming out of the
side
of our shaker box,
covered up our bypass
valve for our plant.
Why the [bleep]
is it doing that?
Where's mitch?
Narrator:
Once again, it's down to mitch
yes, this couldn't have
come at a worse time.
I'm flying out tomorrow,
heading to oregon
to get get married.
I got 10 other projects
I wanted to get done,
and at the end of the day,
there's only so many hours.
Some things you can
be late for in life.
I'm thinking wedding,
probably not a good one.
What's going on, man?
I don't [bleep] know.
Should shut it down.
Blaschke:
You can see how this side o
and this side,
we got six inches of rock.
Ness: That's [bleep].
Blaschke: When the water's
working right,
these valves cross so that
it's not pushing one way
more than the other.
I'm looking at our plate here
and it just looks like
we're hitting way off the
side.
So we need to make sure that
our
water's hitting nice and
center.
Parker: I'm [bleep] glad
you're still here, mitch.
Holy [bleep].
I'm glad this didn't
happen 10 days later.
Yeah.
Parker: Mitch is about to
leave
for his wedding.
I'm damn glad that
he's not gone now,
because for things like this,
there's -- there's not
too many people
I know that can deal
with it better, you know?
He'll get this thing
back running.
Blaschke:
Tyson, why don't you go ahead
lee: Okay.
Narrator:
Mitch adjusts the pressure o
equalizing
the water distribution
in the prewash to keep
the pay dirt flowing steadily.
The water was
short on this side
so it was pushing more
on the far side
and it was pushing all
the material over this way.
Parker: That's more like it.
Narrator: Parker's lost less
than two hours of mining,
and mitch can get back
to his to-do list
before leaving tomorrow
to get married.
All righty. Later.
Later, mitch.
Thanks, mitch.
Spinks: We've moved
a tremendous amount of dirt
and todd's spent
a lot of money.
Bottom line is if there's
not gold in the ground,
nobody gets paid.
So I'm very,
very nervous right now.
Narrator:
In oregon, the hoffman crew's
water problem is under
but monster red is shut down
until andy hits a pay streak.
Already over 50 feet,
he may need to dig down to
100.
Todd: Andy's the best
operator we got.
Maybe we'll find
a little pay dirt here.
We've got to keep digging
deeper, find that damn gold.
We've got no other choice.
Spinks:
I'm just going to dig as f
for right now,
and just see if I can
pull anything up
that looks different
than what we've been digging.
Narrator: Rather than excavate
the entire pit,
andy digs a trench to
fast-track
towards a pay layer.
If he doesn't find one,
todd's dream of
a 5,000-ounce season
will be shattered.
10 feet down,
he stops to check.
Todd: What's it look like?
In that ditch right there.
Can probably see it
better down here.
It started dropping.
We all of a sudden
started getting into gravels.
We got into that.
Oh, good.
Went down deep,
it just kept going,
and then right on that
placing,
there is a black layer.
Todd: Look at that.
That's mineable, there.
Poulson: That's a pay layer.
Todd:
That's going to make everybody
this ground isn't
as deep as marvin thinks.
All year we've been
getting our ass kicked,
but, damn, this sure
looks good right now.
Jack:
That right there tells me a
lot, just the ang
the type of rock,
the way it's laid in there.
I know there's gold right
there.
Spinks: I would do this.
Take this layer, this material
that came right off of
bedrock,
that ditch, 1,000-yard run
through the plant.
Todd:
I think our luck's changing.
Let's just call this
the ditch test.
Let's just run it.
Pull the mats,
see what we got.
That's probably
where we're going to get
our whole season's
worth of gold.
All right. [ bleep ].
Let's go.
[ air horn blowing ]
[ motor starts ]
narrator: Todd can finally
fire up monster red
and run a 1,000-yard test
to see if they've found
the elusive pay streak.
Todd:
Hopefully there's enough gold
in these guys' pockets,
'cause I'll tell you what.
They deserve it.
Narrator:
Parker has a reputation fo
even his dog dozer
seems to agree.
Parker: Get in there.
You still mad at me
driving like an idiot, dozer?
I'm rebuilding the trust.
Dozer, I'll take it easy.
Come on!
Up.
Is this so bad?
Remember?
You used to love this [bleep].
Lee: 10-4.
This is my last scoop.
You know, we've been
running non-stop
for three days
with minimal downtime,
so we're really hoping
to see the runs lit up today.
Narrator: After two months
and 100,000 yards,
sluicifer runs the final
boundary cut pay.
There will be
one last gold wave
before parker starts
mining his new cut.
All righty,
let's do this cleanup
and let's try and make it
quick
so we can get this beast
back to chowing dirt.
Parker: So,
this is the last of it,
the last of
the boundary cut here.
She's been a good cut.
Narrator: To be on track
for his 4,000-ounce,
$4.8 million goal,
parker needs his final
boundary cut cleanup
to produce 148 ounces.
Parker: 40,
60,
100.
140.
Keep shaking.
Holy cow.
Come on.
192.4.
Narrator: 192 ounces
is worth around $230,000.
You know, you do the math,
that's, like, a lot.
[ laughter ]
the best cut we've ever done.
Yeah, by far.
A lot.
It's our best one yet.
If we keep some cleanups
like this going,
we're going to hit
that 4,000-ounce goal.
Hell yeah,
buddy.
So...
Don't leave, mitch.
Sorry, buddy.
I got to go.
Actually, you know, mitch,
we do have something for ya.
It's fresh out
of the sluice box.
It's your share
of the gold cut.
We really appreciate
what you do there.
[ laughter ]
nice!
Here you go.
We found it somewhere.
Yeah, buddy.
We got lots of belt
repairs right there.
[ laughter ]
I think I'd better be
on that flight.
I've missed a lot
of things for work,
but you know what?
I think this is
one of those, boys.
You don't want to make
your own wedding one of them?
[ laughter ]
to mitch and haley.
To mitch and haley.
Thanks, boys.
Cheers.
Mike: This [bleep] barge
is definitely a lot heavier
than the tug.
I put this sucker at double.
Narrator: Every day,
tony is getting closer
to transporting
his 70-year-old dredge
from thistle creek.
His tug, kid commando,
is in the water,
and he's finished painting
and welding his barge.
Narrator: All he needs now
is for his son mike
to truck the 30-ton
steel vessel down to dawson
and launch it into the river.
[ horn blowing ]
mike: Yeah, it's always fun
driving that oshkosh.
Can't state that enough.
Narrator: Next,
mike needs to float the barge.
Getting the tugboat in
was tough,
but the barge is twice as
wide,
twice as long, and nearly
three times the weight.
Narrator: Just like the
tugboat,
mike can't drive
the oshkosh deep enough
to get the barge
to float free.
If mike goes any further,
he could sink the oshkosh
with him inside it.
Enough is enough.
It's scary.
Narrator: But mike is not
prepared to quit.
[ engine starts ]
mike: Here goes nothing.
Back it up, back it up,
back it up.
Oh, my god! Yeah!
That's awesome.
Mike: We just drove forward
and backed up, hit the brakes.
Eh, it came clean off.
Whoa [bleep] [ bleep ]
smart [bleep].
Minnie: Cheers.
Prost.
Minnie: To a job well done.
Cheeseman: One step closer
in moving the second dredge,
that's for sure.
Sluicifer!
Narrator: Next time,
one mega-packed "gold rush."
look out! Rick!
There's no gold here.
Dave's dozing the pay.
Whoa!
What are you doing?
Get out of the way.
I'm going to go down in that
cut
and find that damn gold.
Tony: I don't have
the right [bleep] tools.
I can't [bleep]
get anything done.
How much?
Holy [bleep]!
Narrator: On this "gold
rush"...
That doesn't sound right.
It's broke.
It's cracked right off.
Ow!
We're [bleep].
[ horn blowing ]
enough is enough.
It's scary.
We ain't got gold
in that cut.
You're nowhere
near deep enough.
You're going to be
well over 100 feet.
So you're telling me
that I'm only halfway down?
I'm scared.
I'm really scared now.
captions paid for by
discovery communications
narrator: At paradise hill,
tony beets is expanding
his viking fleet
so he can transport
his new dredge
100 miles up the yukon river.
The two halves of his
30-ton barge
must become one
massive steel hull.
Okay, up.
Narrator: His challenge --
perfectly line up
two 15-ton steel sections
and weld them solid.
Narrator:
To make the vessel seaworthy,
a team of specialists
arc weld the barge
at over 20,000 degrees.
Narrator: Last year,
tony paid $1.5 million
for a second dredge
150 tons heavier
than his first.
It was built in 1946
but is now abandoned 70 miles
south at thistle creek.
Narrator: To move the dredge
to eureka creek,
tony will load it
onto his barge
and pull it upriver
like tugboating.
Tony's foreman,
gene cheeseman,
has worked on the tugboat,
kid commando,
for three weeks.
He's split it
into three parts,
ready to haul it down
to the yukon river,
15 miles away in dawson.
When we it down to the river,
then we've got to put
the top house on it
and the wheelhouse and get
all the systems hooked back
up.
It's a lot of work.
Narrator: While the barge
gets a coat of paint,
tony enlists his family
to transport the tug.
Narrator: Son mike is
the point man in the oshkosh,
a 22-year-old 12-liter,
8-wheel-drive
combat transporter.
Get moving,
'cause I'm not stopping.
[ air horn blows ]
go, go, go, go!
Mike: Only [bleep] concern
I have is might be too high.
Mike: Oh, yeah, I know.
It says 5.3 and you guys
were estimating 5.2, right?
Mike: If it doesn't fit,
we'll just cut the bridge.
Minnie:
Just keep him going, mike.
Narrator: Even if
tony's math is correct,
kid commando has just
four inches' clearance.
One wrong move from mike
could damage the tug
and the bridge,
putting the whole project
back by weeks
and cutting off access
to the city.
Minnie: It looks really good
from the back side.
Mike: Go, go, go, go.
Minnie: It's awesome, mike.
He's fine, tony. He'll fit.
[ horn blows ]
todd: Buckland is
our second chance.
Let's hope it's not
our last chance.
Narrator: This season,
todd set a massive
$6 million,
5,000-ounce target,
but so far,
he's only mined 138 ounces,
worth just $165,000.
Things are so bad,
todd's not paying his crew
until they strike more gold.
Spinks: The bottom line is is
that we all have bills to pay.
You know, logan just
bought his first house.
Kevin had another baby.
We all have families.
Hunter:
All these guys, they didn't
so they're obviously all not
super happy right now.
My dad has
the pressure on him
to get some gold
for the whole team
and their whole families.
Narrator:
They're running buckland
but no one knows
if they've hit the pay streak
that would turn
their season around.
Todd: We're going 50 feet deep
to get to this pay dirt here.
Oh, what
a nerve-wracking situation.
You know, kevin,
all these guys,
they've dug just
a monster cut down there.
Let's hope that there's gold
in the bottom of it.
I've heard lots of stories
and I just -- I don't know.
That's -- that's the truth.
Narrator: Now,
after two days of running,
dave and kevin shut down to
see
if they're finally on the
money.
Hiatt: That's it.
We are done for the day.
Let's go check the sluices
and see how much gold we got.
There's no gold on this side.
I don't see a single piece.
I don't see anything in here.
I'm not seeing
any gold up in here.
There's nothing here.
That was 1,200 yards
we just ran through there.
It ain't good enough.
Back to the drawing board.
[ groans ]
we got all our eggs
in this basket right here,
and if this doesn't work,
I mean, we're done.
I mean, we're done-done.
This is it.
This is the last chance.
Marvin better
have some answers.
Narrator:
They lease the buckland mine
at 50 feet, it's the deepest
cut todd's ever mined.
His whole operation
hangs in the balance.
Dude, we got a problem.
We ain't got gold
in that cut.
I'm telling you, todd.
That doesn't sound right.
We dug down probably 50 feet,
tested all the way down.
Well, I'm going to
tell you this.
You're nowhere near
deep enough.
What?
You're going to be
well over 100 feet.
You're telling me we're
not even halfway there yet?
Todd, that's a whole
different level of mining.
We're talking about hundreds
of thousands of dollars'
worth of fuel, labor,
time, energy.
Listen, todd.
If you open this up,
you can't run out on this
if it doesn't work out
exactly as you planned.
The question that I have
is do we have the ability
to dig that deep?
I'm going to be
honest with you.
If you're not
smart enough to do it,
you might as well
just go home now
and just save
everyone the trouble.
There'll be gold
at the bottom.
Let's kick some ass!
I was really hoping for a ton
of gold in the box today.
Narrator:
A third of the way through
parker schnabel has just
787 ounces of gold,
worth $944,000.
Parker:
Gold's not really coming in
narrator: To stand any chance
of reaching his 4,000-ounce,
$4.8 million goal,
he needs sluicifer
to run klondike pay dirt
for 12 straight hours a day.
Parker: You know,
I thought we'd be up there
at three ounces an hour or so,
but we're more like two.
That's a pretty big
difference.
You know,
over a 1,500-hour
sluicing season,
that's 1,500 ounces
short we'd be.
That doesn't sound right.
No.
Doumitt: Rattling going on
in the wash plant
somewhere doesn't
sound quite right.
We're not sure if it's a rock
or broken spring or what it
is.
[ rattling ]
narrator:
It's foreman rick ness' job
ness: Wow.
Holy [bleep].
What do we got going on?
There's a plate that goes
from the prewash
to the shaker deck.
It's [bleep] broke.
It's cracked right off.
Something break?
Yeah, bad.
The whole [bleep] plate
that transitions
from the prewash
to the shaker deck
is in three [bleep] pieces.
[bleep]'s sake.
Narrator: Every hour
the wash plant is down
costs parker $2,500
in lost gold.
I don't know what the [bleep]
we can do about this one.
Narrator: It's down to
mechanic mitch blaschke
to fix the problem.
How's it going?
Not good.
Oh, it's [bleep].
Why?
[bleep] the screen cage
is in half, almost.
We've got something
major going on.
It's basically
tearing itself apart.
Narrator:
When the plant is running,
the inlet chute
never gets closer
than three inches
from the prewash.
But as the machine shuts down,
the irregular vibrations
cause the plate
to hit the prewash,
resulting in a series of
cracks.
Blaschke: Right now, we're
just
going to get it welded up,
but for the amount of hours
we've got on this wash plant,
we've got big problems.
We've kind of pushed
everything
back up in place.
We're welding it
from the top side,
welding it from the bottom
side,
should make it a lot stronger.
We're just trying to get
through it as fast as we can.
They cut the lip down on it,
took about a half an inch off.
So we gave it a little bit
more clearance.
[bleep]
oh, [bleep]! Ow!
[ laughs ]
I'm watching a forest fire
start in parker's hair.
[ laughs ]
parker: Mitch and jordan
have done a great job
of getting this thing fixed.
Now we're just putting
things back together.
And we'll be --
we'll be sluicing again
in 20, 30 minutes.
Narrator: In just two hours,
mitch welds the cracks
with an ingenious bush fix.
And you can see
all the welding
we had to do here
where the tray broke,
you can see the gussets
that we added in here
to give it some strength.
It was broke pretty good.
Everything's holding
together well.
And it doesn't look like it's
breaking back apart anymore.
Really happy.
[bleep] gold mining.
Parker: Now we're
so you're telling me
that I'm only halfway down
to where we got to end up?
And it's been a chore
to get to this part.
Narrator:
At the buckland mine in
oregon,
andy spinks has opened up
a 50-foot cut.
They've just discovered he
might have to dig another 50.
All of my knowledge
and everything that I've done
as far as stripping
and doing a cut,
I've pretty much exhausted it.
I've never dug a hole
this deep before.
Either we figure out
a solution or we're done.
I'm scared.
I'm really scared now.
What's the solution?
What are we going to do?
It's not going to be easy by
any stretch of the
imagination,
but I've got the solution.
It's going to take some
planning, but we'll do it.
How?
Switchback it
the whole way down,
just like a mountain pass.
Build zigzags to the bottom
till we hit bedrock.
Establish a face,
mine our way out.
Narrator: Unlike andy,
safety officer trey poulson
has spent two decades
in deep-pit mining operations.
Digging below 50 feet
will open up
a whole new raft of
challenges.
Spinks:
What you're talking about is
so it might as well
be another language.
You show me how
and I'll dig the dirt out.
It's above me.
It's above my pay grade.
I'm not going to lie,
it's got me nervous,
but we'll get there.
For everybody's sake here,
I hope you're right,
because everybody's futures
are relying on this.
It's a hell of a plan.
Let's see if we can
fricking pull it off.
Andy, do it?
Let's do it.
Let's do it.
Narrator: Andy and his crew
get to work,
digging down one bucket
at a time
in a desperate search
for the pay streak.
Spinks: So todd and trey and I
just had a meeting,
and looks like we've got to
go down 100 feet total in
depth.
It's not the news
that I was hoping for.
I've never dug a hole
this deep before.
You know, right now, all I
can hope for is the pay
streak.
Guys are getting tired of
moving dirt every day
and not seeing any gold.
Narrator: Over the next 10
days,
andy plans to dig down
five feet a day.
We got some water, todd.
Todd: Holy frig.
What do you mean
"some" water?
Overnight, we've got 20 foot
of water in our ditches.
That's a lot of water.
We don't know how fast
it's coming in.
[ groans ]
we've gone down 50 feet
and that's what we hit,
and we've got
another 50 to go.
If we don't get gold
in this hole,
I honestly don't know
what we're going to do.
This'll probably
be our last cut ever.
So either we get
this water figured out
or we're screwed,
completely screwed.
If we don't get gold
in this hole,
I honestly don't know
what we're going to do.
What do you guys want to do?
What should we do?
Narrator: The hoffman crew
is trying to dig down
to a gold-rich pay streak,
but they've hit
the water table
and their cut is flooded.
I think we just put a pump
right in the corner,
bring it all the way down
to the end of our mine limit
and put it in those
old existing ponds.
You guys figure out the plan
where we're going to
take the water.
Let's do it.
Let's do it.
Narrator:
Trey's toughest challenge?
Pump the water
60 feet vertically
to get it out of the cut.
He needs a 200-horsepower pump
and a heavy-duty
piping system.
Paulson:
This pump with this size pipe,
going to be moving
2,500 gallons per minute.
What we're going to do
is weld the pipe.
Then we'll run
all the way down
to where we're going to
turn into our pond.
The cut's drowning
and we've got to get
ahead of this water.
Ho!
Come into the center
right here.
Ibarra: The pump,
it'll be sending the water up
through this pipe and out.
Bliss: So we had to make
another sweep 90
for the suction
on the back of the pump.
So juan and I have built
a 90 out of scrap iron
in the middle of the desert.
I like it, man.
Huh?
What do you think of that?
Spinks:
So we've got the pump set.
Now we've just got to
put the pipe in.
It's going to come up,
travel here,
make a corner,
loop all the way
around to the pond.
Should be good to go.
Let's do it.
How many feet?
We got about 1,100 feet?
1,100 feet of pipe.
Once we get this
water out of it,
we can see what
the bottom holds.
We're good to go.
Keep your fingers crossed.
Hey, todd,
are you guys in place?
Yeah, we're in place.
Fire it up.
Moment of truth.
So either we get this water
figured out or we're screwed.
Here we go, guys.
[ motor cranking ]
come on, baby.
[ motor cranking ]
[ motor starts ]
I can hear air pushing out.
Can you hear it?
Anything yet?
Nope, nothing yet.
Narrator: Trey has been
working
with high-powered
centrifugal pumps
all his mining career.
Poulson: We've got a big
bubble
of air in there,
so helping the valve let
the air out moved the water.
Keep your fingers crossed,
randy.
Todd: This had better work.
Got 'er.
We got some water coming out.
That's awesome!
She's pumping.
All right!
Yeah!
Man, randy,
we dodged a bullet there.
Woo, buddy.
We needed some good news.
A little bit's better than
none.
Narrator: Todd and his team
can get back to digging down
to the elusive pay streak.
Todd: Let's go
get some gold!
Working!
That's what we needed
right there.
Up, up, up, up.
Narrator: In dawson city,
tony beets puts together
kid commando,
the tugboat that will
transport his dredge
from thistle creek.
Happy?
Yep.
When it's put together,
it's really tall,
so I'm a little worrisome.
We even got a crowd to watch.
Wow.
More, more, more, more.
More, more, more, more.
Keep her --
keep her rolling,
keep her rolling.
There you go,
there you go.
Back it up, back it up,
back it up, back it up,
back it up, back it up.
Easy on the brake pedal.
Keep her going,
keep her going.
Keep her going.
Bit more, bit more.
Back in there, mike.
Keep her going.
Keep her going.
It's not floating.
Cheeseman:
We're starting to get
a little water
on the deck there.
Narrator: The stern of
kid commando is in the river.
If water gets into the hull,
the whole vessel could sink.
Tony: Back it up, back it up.
Back it up, back it up.
Narrator: Tony beets' tugboat,
kid commando,
is on the point of flooding
because it won't float free
from the lowboy.
Narrator: Gene's got a plan --
fire up the engines
and attempt to back
kid commando off the lowboy.
Boat, swing.
Gene's trying the engines.
Minnie: Woo!
It's floating!
Come on. Deck it.
Oh, look at it lean.
Look at it lean.
Ew! I'm not going
on that boat.
Hell, no! Woo!
Hell, no.
There's always another step.
Never ends.
If it did,
I'd be out of a [bleep] job.
Lee: We're getting down
to the bare minimum
pay left in this section
of the boundary cut.
Narrator: At scribner creek,
tyson is running the last few
thousand yards
of boundary cut dirt
before the crew moves on
to a new cut.
Lee: We probably have
another two shifts left.
This pay is pretty
good right now
'cause it falls through
the grizzlies nicely.
Sluicifer's hungry and so it's
all up to us to keep her fed.
Narrator:
To hit their 4,000-ounce,
he needs to keep 250 yards
an hour running
through the plant.
Up at the screen deck,
foreman rick makes
his daily inspection.
Ness: Oh, that's just great.
Well, there's just lots of
dirt
and rocks coming out of the
side
of our shaker box,
covered up our bypass
valve for our plant.
Why the [bleep]
is it doing that?
Where's mitch?
Narrator:
Once again, it's down to mitch
yes, this couldn't have
come at a worse time.
I'm flying out tomorrow,
heading to oregon
to get get married.
I got 10 other projects
I wanted to get done,
and at the end of the day,
there's only so many hours.
Some things you can
be late for in life.
I'm thinking wedding,
probably not a good one.
What's going on, man?
I don't [bleep] know.
Should shut it down.
Blaschke:
You can see how this side o
and this side,
we got six inches of rock.
Ness: That's [bleep].
Blaschke: When the water's
working right,
these valves cross so that
it's not pushing one way
more than the other.
I'm looking at our plate here
and it just looks like
we're hitting way off the
side.
So we need to make sure that
our
water's hitting nice and
center.
Parker: I'm [bleep] glad
you're still here, mitch.
Holy [bleep].
I'm glad this didn't
happen 10 days later.
Yeah.
Parker: Mitch is about to
leave
for his wedding.
I'm damn glad that
he's not gone now,
because for things like this,
there's -- there's not
too many people
I know that can deal
with it better, you know?
He'll get this thing
back running.
Blaschke:
Tyson, why don't you go ahead
lee: Okay.
Narrator:
Mitch adjusts the pressure o
equalizing
the water distribution
in the prewash to keep
the pay dirt flowing steadily.
The water was
short on this side
so it was pushing more
on the far side
and it was pushing all
the material over this way.
Parker: That's more like it.
Narrator: Parker's lost less
than two hours of mining,
and mitch can get back
to his to-do list
before leaving tomorrow
to get married.
All righty. Later.
Later, mitch.
Thanks, mitch.
Spinks: We've moved
a tremendous amount of dirt
and todd's spent
a lot of money.
Bottom line is if there's
not gold in the ground,
nobody gets paid.
So I'm very,
very nervous right now.
Narrator:
In oregon, the hoffman crew's
water problem is under
but monster red is shut down
until andy hits a pay streak.
Already over 50 feet,
he may need to dig down to
100.
Todd: Andy's the best
operator we got.
Maybe we'll find
a little pay dirt here.
We've got to keep digging
deeper, find that damn gold.
We've got no other choice.
Spinks:
I'm just going to dig as f
for right now,
and just see if I can
pull anything up
that looks different
than what we've been digging.
Narrator: Rather than excavate
the entire pit,
andy digs a trench to
fast-track
towards a pay layer.
If he doesn't find one,
todd's dream of
a 5,000-ounce season
will be shattered.
10 feet down,
he stops to check.
Todd: What's it look like?
In that ditch right there.
Can probably see it
better down here.
It started dropping.
We all of a sudden
started getting into gravels.
We got into that.
Oh, good.
Went down deep,
it just kept going,
and then right on that
placing,
there is a black layer.
Todd: Look at that.
That's mineable, there.
Poulson: That's a pay layer.
Todd:
That's going to make everybody
this ground isn't
as deep as marvin thinks.
All year we've been
getting our ass kicked,
but, damn, this sure
looks good right now.
Jack:
That right there tells me a
lot, just the ang
the type of rock,
the way it's laid in there.
I know there's gold right
there.
Spinks: I would do this.
Take this layer, this material
that came right off of
bedrock,
that ditch, 1,000-yard run
through the plant.
Todd:
I think our luck's changing.
Let's just call this
the ditch test.
Let's just run it.
Pull the mats,
see what we got.
That's probably
where we're going to get
our whole season's
worth of gold.
All right. [ bleep ].
Let's go.
[ air horn blowing ]
[ motor starts ]
narrator: Todd can finally
fire up monster red
and run a 1,000-yard test
to see if they've found
the elusive pay streak.
Todd:
Hopefully there's enough gold
in these guys' pockets,
'cause I'll tell you what.
They deserve it.
Narrator:
Parker has a reputation fo
even his dog dozer
seems to agree.
Parker: Get in there.
You still mad at me
driving like an idiot, dozer?
I'm rebuilding the trust.
Dozer, I'll take it easy.
Come on!
Up.
Is this so bad?
Remember?
You used to love this [bleep].
Lee: 10-4.
This is my last scoop.
You know, we've been
running non-stop
for three days
with minimal downtime,
so we're really hoping
to see the runs lit up today.
Narrator: After two months
and 100,000 yards,
sluicifer runs the final
boundary cut pay.
There will be
one last gold wave
before parker starts
mining his new cut.
All righty,
let's do this cleanup
and let's try and make it
quick
so we can get this beast
back to chowing dirt.
Parker: So,
this is the last of it,
the last of
the boundary cut here.
She's been a good cut.
Narrator: To be on track
for his 4,000-ounce,
$4.8 million goal,
parker needs his final
boundary cut cleanup
to produce 148 ounces.
Parker: 40,
60,
100.
140.
Keep shaking.
Holy cow.
Come on.
192.4.
Narrator: 192 ounces
is worth around $230,000.
You know, you do the math,
that's, like, a lot.
[ laughter ]
the best cut we've ever done.
Yeah, by far.
A lot.
It's our best one yet.
If we keep some cleanups
like this going,
we're going to hit
that 4,000-ounce goal.
Hell yeah,
buddy.
So...
Don't leave, mitch.
Sorry, buddy.
I got to go.
Actually, you know, mitch,
we do have something for ya.
It's fresh out
of the sluice box.
It's your share
of the gold cut.
We really appreciate
what you do there.
[ laughter ]
nice!
Here you go.
We found it somewhere.
Yeah, buddy.
We got lots of belt
repairs right there.
[ laughter ]
I think I'd better be
on that flight.
I've missed a lot
of things for work,
but you know what?
I think this is
one of those, boys.
You don't want to make
your own wedding one of them?
[ laughter ]
to mitch and haley.
To mitch and haley.
Thanks, boys.
Cheers.
Mike: This [bleep] barge
is definitely a lot heavier
than the tug.
I put this sucker at double.
Narrator: Every day,
tony is getting closer
to transporting
his 70-year-old dredge
from thistle creek.
His tug, kid commando,
is in the water,
and he's finished painting
and welding his barge.
Narrator: All he needs now
is for his son mike
to truck the 30-ton
steel vessel down to dawson
and launch it into the river.
[ horn blowing ]
mike: Yeah, it's always fun
driving that oshkosh.
Can't state that enough.
Narrator: Next,
mike needs to float the barge.
Getting the tugboat in
was tough,
but the barge is twice as
wide,
twice as long, and nearly
three times the weight.
Narrator: Just like the
tugboat,
mike can't drive
the oshkosh deep enough
to get the barge
to float free.
If mike goes any further,
he could sink the oshkosh
with him inside it.
Enough is enough.
It's scary.
Narrator: But mike is not
prepared to quit.
[ engine starts ]
mike: Here goes nothing.
Back it up, back it up,
back it up.
Oh, my god! Yeah!
That's awesome.
Mike: We just drove forward
and backed up, hit the brakes.
Eh, it came clean off.
Whoa [bleep] [ bleep ]
smart [bleep].
Minnie: Cheers.
Prost.
Minnie: To a job well done.
Cheeseman: One step closer
in moving the second dredge,
that's for sure.
Sluicifer!
Narrator: Next time,
one mega-packed "gold rush."
look out! Rick!
There's no gold here.
Dave's dozing the pay.
Whoa!
What are you doing?
Get out of the way.
I'm going to go down in that
cut
and find that damn gold.
Tony: I don't have
the right [bleep] tools.
I can't [bleep]
get anything done.
How much?
Holy [bleep]!