[man 1] yeah, it'll be good to have kris back again, you know,
he's got a lot of responsibility now besides being the captain.
He's got a little baby now.
[man 2] there he comes.
[kris] I'm back.
Meet the newest member of the family.
Okay, so here's the deal, I just have my new baby,
I owe a bunch of money on my mining equipment and I'm not sleepy.
And while I was gone,
I had to trust my dad and brother to get gold.
It's cold out here.
Come on, baby, let's go.
-[man 2] this baby's cute as hell. -Be careful.
I know, let me watch my baby there.
[kris] I'm freaking out.
I need this to work more than ever.
I just need to stay positive, focus on the future.
And, man, I hope my dad and brother came through.
You better got gold yesterday.
[baby crying]
[andy] everything's actually going good today.
Kris ain't here, so I got to keep this [bleep] going,
and I told them I would, too,
so I'm a man of my word.
When I say I'm going to do something,
I'm going to [bleep] try my hardest.
[narrator] with bills to pay...
[andy] it's game time.
[narrator] ...There's a different kelly at the helm.
So my brother's in anchorage right now
dealing with his new daughter.
And here we are, we're making the operation run
while he's away and start the engines, suit up,
jump in the water and start making our money.
So my brother's down in anchorage dealing with his new baby.
He's worried about how the operation is going to run without him.
But think about it, without my brother,
there's not going to be yelling
and people are going to actually start working
and they're going to do what the hell I tell them to do.
I got this while he's gone.
It's a lot quieter without kris here.
He gets too excited too easy.
You know what I mean?
If he'd calm down,
take a step back and take a look at the operation,
it's running all right.
We're in debt this season and it sucks.
We need to get another six ounces just to break even.
The plan today is for me to go down first
and hit the box hard and then have another diver go behind me.
James is sick, so my brother has a new guy coming out,
so we'll check him out.
High pressures are on.
Once these things start [bleep], I can go sit up.
We never sit up until it's [bleep] running.
My brother's full of negativity and it brings the morale down
and makes it hard to be focused on the gold.
We just got to stay positive and on our game
and we'll make more gold.
[man speaking]
where's it? I packed it all.
I don't know how I didn't bring my boots.
I had it all packed.
[man speaking]
[man] I don't know how am I going to make it?
[man speaking]
[music]
[andy] my family just got bigger.
Need that money.
[air hissing]
andy, we just got to keep the operation going
while kris is away or you know what'll happen.
[andy speaking]
yeah. You're an uncle, I'm a grandfather now.
Yeah. Wow. This is great.
[andy] yeah.
[brad] how's it looking, andy?
[andy] it's looking good.
[brad] take your time, just work the material.
[andy] I am.
[brad] what material are you seeing, andy?
[andy speaking]
[andy] oh.
-Hey, pop. -[brad] what?
[andy speaking]
keep working that wall of gold, andy,
I love to hear that.
Put that gold in the box, that's all that matters andy.
[andy] oh yeah, there we go.
[brad] make sure your brother won a big clean out this time.
[narrator] while the kelly's skeleton team gets on the gold,
11 miles east.
[vernon] we got to get some gold today.
Got everything thought out.
We've got some good ground to work on.
We've got to take advantage of every minute.
[narrator] vernon adkison enters the home stretch,
and he's stretching his operation as far as it'll reach.
The deal is we want to stay on this much longer.
We had a 40-foot hose, which by the time you get down to the bottom,
it's only about a 20-foot radius to work in.
We put another 15 feet on the hose,
a lot more area, three times as much area,
which means we'll have to move three times fast.
This season has been balls to the wall fantastic.
And now we're on what's probably the best gold of my career.
That's why we're calling it primo gold.
I'm thinking we'll got more gold doing it this way.
I did not want to move again.
Problem is, the gold trail is going straight towards
that open water lead out there
and we've already tapped out this hole.
Honestly, that lead is getting bigger every day
and the ice is getting thinner.
It's not safe to move any closer to that lead.
But I can put an extension on this hose
and get my diver closer.
Let's keep the good times coming.
Bam!
[vernon] having a diver this far from the hole,
especially this close to the lead is very risky,
but we're aiming for 200 ounces
and I'm going to press our luck.
[gary] there's a lot of gold down there.
I'm looking forward to the dive today,
it'd probably be a marathon.
[vernon] all right, gary.
-[laughs] yeah. -I like it.
Big money today.
[gary speaking]
good.
Diver's down.
Gary, good time. Good time, gary.
Be a little bit extra careful with that extension.
[gary speaking]
[vernon] the suction, does it feel about the same or less or what?
[gary speaking]
the more suction, the more material you can move,
so by adding the extra length to the hose,
we sacrifice some suction.
It took that much further, our system has to pull the material.
But I'm hoping we'll be able to, to function.
So, gary, tell me about the bottom,
what are you seeing down there.
[gary] uh...
[gary speaking]
[vernon] oh, hell, that's great man.
That's perfect.
[gary speaking]
oh, that, that is sweet. Very, very sweet.
[gary speaking]
[vernon] so far, it looks like there's something,
knocking on wood.
[gary] whoa, yeah.
[vernon] all right. Play it up.
We don't have much time left in this season,
so we got to make hay while the sun shines.
[gary] roger that, vernon.
Leave no gold behind, just suck it up.
[narrator] ten miles west.
[shawn] beautiful day in godiva,
but we have to get as much time on the bottom as possible,
figure out exactly which direction this gold's headed.
[narrator] the end of winter mining is fast approaching.
And shawn pomrenke believes
he's finally on to a storied jackpot,
lurking on an ancient riverbed on the tomcod claim.
I've seen really good gold, where I was diving,
going to head down and see if that thing continues to the west,
that big pile of gold. There's gonna be a big pile out there somewhere.
Season's almost over.
I still need 45 ounces to make all my payments,
so I need to pinpoint this jackpot.
Oh, yeah.
Last time I used the dowsing rods,
I got one of the most promising gold I've seen yet.
This is the spot. I'm feeling good.
[shawn speaking]
I took a big gamble hunting
for it this winter instead of playing it safe,
but I have faith, in the end,
it'll prove to be the right move.
Got the hot water on. Till we find some gold,
we're not giving up.
We're going to keep on fighting for it.
We'll get it.
Fix me up.
Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Good job closing up here.
[shawn] thank you.
Time is ticking. Failure is not an option.
I won't accept it.
I'm the top guy up here for a reason.
I plan on keeping that streak intact this winter.
We're running out of time.
We've got to make the best of this.
[shawn speaking]
[man 3] let me know when you want me to throttle up.
[shawn speaking]
[man 3] going for it.
[shawn speaking]
[man 3] we're getting close, close to it.
[shawn speaking]
[man 3] oh, nice.
Sounds like he likes what he's seeing.
[shawn speaking]
booyah.
[shawn speaking]
[shawn] there's a big pile of gold down here.
[narrator] throughout nome,
the fleet is keeping hope alive,
as time quickly runs out on the season.
And nine miles west.
[zeke] so I looked at shawn's gps
and where we're at is right
about at the southern boundary, where
shawn shoveled a whole bunch.
We found a little spot
and it's just over to the west.
He doesn't have any record of the christine rose having shoveled right there.
It may be a little too deep for the christine rose,
so I think that's a good next step for us.
[narrator] zeke tenhoff sees his last chance,
as his best chance.
-All right. -Let's go shovel, boys.
[man 4] shovel.
[zeke] this season has been brutal.
We basically have no gold.
We've moved over to the coveted tomcod claim,
but we're still coming up empty.
But finally, some positive vibes are coming our way.
Shawn gave us some coordinates
where he hasn't mined yet.
That probably means that there's some gold there.
If there is, we can get enough gold
to save our season and keep the operation going.
Look at all this water, it just poured out of here. Damn!
[zeke speaking]
...Causing the ice to be pressed down under the water level,
and it's just, it's not ideal.
This is the challenge for the last days of winter.
We're on what should be promising ground,
but we have massive overflow.
All this water is weighing down on the ice,
which is already pretty thin and weak
and could easily break apart.
We set up out here and the ice collapses,
like, us and all of our equipment could drop
into the bottom of the sea.
But there's nothing I can do about this overflow.
But I'm just going to set up in this big pool of water
and hope it works out.
I don't have a choice.
I'm trying to get a hole through this watery ice in this big puddle,
and it looks like a chainsaw is making pretty short work of it.
We can get our block free and get a get a hole open,
then we'll pull the sluice right into it,
we'll see how it works out.
I didn't anticipate being in water like this,
so it's going to be a challenge.
[screaming]
[zeke] everything is in place,
so there's no reason why I shouldn't be able to dive on this.
This whole setup is kind of crazy,
but this is it.
I got to find some gold here. It's over.
We need to catch a break here and get into some gold for sure.
[zeke speaking]
[man 5] what's the ground look like down there by?
[zeke speaking]
but these are all good signs.
[zeke speaking]
all right. That sounds great.
[zeke] this is good stuff. It's actually pretty phenomenal.
I love to hear it.
[zeke] I'm seeing some pieces of gold now.
Yeah.
Thank god.
[man 4] 40 ounces of gold.
Let's go!
[narrator] two miles east...
[brad] what's happening, andy?
You're on pretty good gold there?
[andy] yeah.
I got
flower gold all right here and then I got the bigger pieces over here.
[brad] you're kidding me. You hitting like that?
[andy] I got gold off [bleep].
[narrator] no kris?
No problem, as andy kelly is knee deep in the good stuff.
[andy] really good gold.
[brad] come on, andy. Lead us to victory.
We're on big gold right now.
Coarse gold, fine gold.
Andy, everything is running smooth.
This is how we need to run every day.
[andy speaking]
andy's on gold right now and there's chunkies on one side,
fine on the other.
So what more can you ask for, except for pounds...
Are you hungry? You want me to start barbecuing?
[andy speaking]
okay. Come on, andy.
This shift's over for you. Come on back up.
You did a good job.
Well, what do you know, kris is gone and we're having
the best day of the season yet.
Sometimes you just got to get that bad [bleep] out of the way
and things come together.
So here's the deal,
we're going to get more hours on the box.
We're bringing a guy to pull in the second shift.
I hear he's good, so hopefully, he keeps the gold flowing.
Kris calls me, said he had a baby,
so I said, "well, I'm in to help."
I need to redeem myself for the last one.
[narrator] if mikel henry looks familiar,
you may remember him from his short stint with vernon,
which didn't go so hot.
[mikel] oh, vernon, I didn't have any hot water,
so I had to come up three times...
[mikel speaking]
oh, [bleep] damn it.
[mikel speaking]
[mikel] I just sat there and froze for over 15 minutes trying to get this done.
He's aggravating the [bleep] out of me.
We're done.
And here I am.
[man 5] one thing I have to say about mikel,
the weights on his boots.
He brought his own weights though.
That's an indication that he possibly could know what the [bleep] he's doing.
Don't show these young guys that.
They will feel real bad if you show 'em up, okay?
-All right. -[man 5] are you ready to go?
[mikel] yes.
[mikel speaking]
[man speaking]
[brad speaking]
it's right where that nozzle is.
[mikel speaking]
[brad] are you seeing any gold?
That's the most important thing of all.
[mikel speaking]
andy's saying, do you have your glasses on?
Yeah.
[andy speaking]
don't look for chunkies, it's all flower.
Just work it out, mike.
[mikel speaking]
[brad] lots of quartz.
-[andy] I know. -[brad] that's a good sign.
[mikel speaking]
[brad] things are going smooth.
I mean, there's no problems with mike so far,
he's sucking up the material, everything's going real good.
[mikel speaking]
just pee, go pee real quick, mike.
[andy speaking]
[brad] come on, mike, you're doing good.
You got lots of material flowing through the box.
[mikel speaking]
[brad] are you [bleep] real?
[brad] it's like two minutes in.
[mikel speaking]
well, that sucked.
The jackass got cold after five minutes.
What the [bleep].
[mikel] I'm diving same way as andy,
and it just wasn't enough for water to get down in and stay in the boot.
Maybe we should have had mike dive in a hot tub.
It was a complete waste of time.
So when I was down there,
I got enough for the day to make it profitable,
so it wasn't a total loss.
He's not diving with us anymore, I can't have him.
Let's go and come back tomorrow,
if it's not blizzarding.
[narrator] hot gold versus cold feet.
You can't win them all.
[vernon] gary, give me an update.
[gary speaking]
yeah, yeah, I see it, gary.
[gary speaking]
[vernon] that's great, man.
[vernon speaking]
...We'll finish this damn season with a bang.
[narrator] after four hours at the end of 40 feet of hose
underneath a widening open water lead,
diver gary simpson is leading the charge straight into primo gold.
[vernon] it's about as good as it gets right here.
We're on the best ground that you can imagine.
Very little overburden,
there's gold in the two or three inches of overburden there is down there.
It doesn't get any sweeter than this.
A lot of people who looked out there at that lead
and said "the hell with it" and hightailed out of there.
But I'm a greedy son of a bitch.
If I'm on great gold and there's something standing
in my way to keep me from getting more,
you can bet your bippy,
I'll figure out a way of getting around it.
And that's what this hose extension is going to do today.
[gary speaking]
hey, that's money n the bank, baby.
[gary speaking]
[vernon] all right, gary, get that gold.
[gary speaking]
you got four hours and 40 minutes.
[gary speaking]
okay.
This gold cow, boy, a couple more days,
I'll hit a record for sure.
Milk it baby.
But the ice has got to hold out.
That's the great unknown,
moving forward this late in the season.
Yeah.
If it does, I'll be giving mr. Gold a run for his money.
You can bet on it.
We'll see who's the daddy goose around here.
That went really well.
Where we dredged, there's gold.
[vernon] you got everywhere, everywhere.
Absolutely.
Good dive. Good dive.
[narrator] twelve miles west.
We're seeing some good stuff down there.
[shawn speaking]
hell, yeah.
[narrator] for shawn pomrenke,
the trail to a golden jackpot keeps getting hotter and hotter.
[shawn speaking]
perfect.
[shawn speaking]
let me see if I can get you a little more umbilical.
[shawn speaking]
I think that's about all we got.
[shawn speaking]
yeah, sounds good. Where at, you reckon?
[shawn] probably, here right north.
All right. We'll all just auger a hole and I'll tie a rope to that one, red hook,
drop her down, so we can find you.
[shawn] okay.
[man 2] shawn's stretched out into the drift right now,
we're going to see if we can find him.
That will give us a little bit of an idea
where we want to do our next dive hole.
[driller whirring]
we're going to tie a rope to this hook here,
and we'll lower it down the hole
we just augured and see if shawn can find it.
He's seeing some really good gold over this way.
Here goes.
Well, right here. You almost hit me.
[shawn laughing]
I got a few air bubbles coming up out of the hole here.
Looks like he might be in the vicinity.
[shawn] there it is.
You get a hold of that hook down there.
[shawn] ...Yeah. You're good, buddy.
That... Just pulled on top of my head.
You drilled it right in the right spot.
Booyah, that's right where we want to go, eh?
[shawn] yeah, that's exactly where we want to move to.
Ah, perfect. Excellent.
[shawn] I'm out of here.
[shawn] gold is scorching hot at the end,
it kills me that my umbilical couldn't reach further,
this jackpot keeps teasing me.
At least now I know where the crazy good stuff is,
and we'll have the hole ready.
Only thing is I don't know how much time we have left.
Whatever the bering sea gods have in store for us,
I'll be ready.
I stretched out all the way down to my line.
There's a bunch of gold right there.
There's going to be some gold in that hole.
We're going to keep fighting for it.
Hey, how you doing down there, bud?
[zeke speaking]
[gabe] you're perfecting the art of this whole thing,
punching around.
This is the area that shawn kind of gave us the okay that the shovels didn't hit.
Now at least we have some good looking ground.
[narrator] after nearly six hours down below,
zeke's last ditch effort is paying off.
[zeke speaking]
right. Well, that's great.
Now we're onto something.
[zeke speaking]
yeah, come on up.
We got lots of work left to do.
[zeke] okay.
[zeke speaking]
[gabe] yeah.
Ye-hee-hee-hee!
How you feeling?
Good. I'm over the moon.
That is awesome.
You gave the direction and you do--
[zeke speaking]
[zeke] dude, that could've gone a lot of ways,
it's really like really hot, it really could have.
I feel vindicated. I feel relief and hope.
We're on some gold.
It's not just a few specks at gold.
It's really good gold.
It may be the 11th hour, but we're definitely on it.
Now we've just got to milk it for as long as mother nature will allow.
[indistinct chatter]
yeah.
[narrator] back in nome.
[shawn] no, it's there.
Sooner or later,
there's nuggets in this dirt pouring
out of the, out of the gravels
or they're just going to be like a slab of gold in there.
I got it. Put her on the scale.
That was easily the hottest gold I've been in this season.
Only got a few hours on it.
But if this is a big number,
it can mean the rest of the season is going to be massive.
See what we got.
Four, five, six, seven,
eight, nine, 10, 11,
17.40.
Oh, yeah.
Perfect.
[narrator] 17.4 ounces is worth over $30,000,
a hefty haul for a limited day and quite possibly
the sign of bigger things to come.
[shawn] we need to keep it up.
This is looking good.
Complete confirmation.
This spot's exactly what we've been looking for.
I just need mother nature
to cooperate a little bit longer.
These numbers are going to get sick.
I'm talking nuggets.
I'm thinking it's that good.
We're definitely on the trail.
-Mm-hmm. -Oh, yeah.
-We'll come across it. -We'll get on it.
[narrator] on the other side of town.
[andy] take a look what we got.
[andy speaking]
oh, yeah.
[narrator] after their new diver left them out in the cold,
it's time for the kris-less kellys to weigh their riches.
[andy] good job. Let's see.
So mikel was a complete waste of time jackass
before his epic five-minute dive,
I knew I was on some really hot stuff and it's been peaceful
with my brother being gone and out of our hair.
Okay. Go.
[brad] hopefully, I'm happy with this.
One-and-a-half, two, two-and-a-half.
[andy] still keeping the operation running.
[brad] three, three-and-a-half, four,
four-and-a-half, five--
six.
Almost six-and-a-half ounces, you did real good.
Proud of you.
[narrator] 6.43 ounces is worth just over $12,000.
And despite the absence of their fearless leader,
the kelly's have hit their season goal of 25 ounces,
getting themselves out of debt and into the black.
They'll be happy [bleep].
[brad speaking]
no, pour it back in the jar and hand me the jar [bleep].
[brad] I was just checking...
-Yeah. -We're not...
[brad] I wasn't really going to take it,
I'm just seeing if you are into it.
No.
So a shocker, my brother goes to anchorage
to deal with all his [bleep] and everything else,
and we had the best clean out.
We hit our goal.
Get rid of the negativity, and everything's good.
[brad] okay. Let's get out of here.
[andy] yeah, that's the real deal.
[narrator] and now, bering sea gold goes to the dogs.
[brad] here comes my dog.
Here he comes. [whistles]
come on, boy.
Good boy.
[gabe] stormy! Come here, boy!
Yeah, he's probably over at the kelly's.
...Only knows what he gets up to over there.
Drinking cheap beer...
[man 7] come here, boy. Come on.
Hi, beautiful. Pretty good, baby.
Oh, he's hungry.
Yeah, he is. There you go.
The new addition to the reaper crew.
Hi, beautiful.
He's a good-looking dog, eh?
-Yeah. -There you go. [bleep]
I can't help it, man. I love animals.
-[man 7] you want another hotdog? -[man 8] yeah.
Stormy is zeke's little mascot.
Don't worry, zeke,
we're feeding your dog for you.
Stormy loves being at the reaper,
because we feed him smokeys, hamburgers.
And yeah, we take good care of that dog.
I think the dog gained another 10 pounds this season.
We have special connection with animals.
The kellys are serious animal lovers.
But I'm just worried that my dad is going to steal the dog.
[brad] this dog's not liking the cigarette smoke.
-[andy] well, the dog can get the [bleep] out then. -Come on, boy.
[zeke] I mean, that was some good gold, that's for sure.
I would see gold under some rocks
and I would see it on the clay.
So I'm super stoked.
[narrator] as the end of winter looms,
zeke tenhoff may be breathing
a life-saving gasp into his season.
[zeke] there's lots of gold out there,
you know, I'd see it under the gravel and sometimes
I'd see it on top of the rocks.
Finally, the season was looking like it was essentially over,
but we finally got into some gold on tomcod.
God, this is great.
I love this.
If we can keep grinding on this pastry,
I think we'll get enough gold to keep this operation alive.
Fingers crossed.
It's a tidy little pile of gold here.
I'm not afraid of this weigh out.
[gabe] all right, here we go.
[speaks indistinctly]
I'd always thought tomcod had been beat up and dredged out.
This tells me that it's clearly not.
It's clearly not.
Yeah, we're up to almost two ounces here.
All right. 2.94.
That'll do.
[narrator] 2.94 ounces is worth over $5,000.
And while it's not breaking the bank,
it's the mad scientist's biggest haul of his winter
and just in the nick of time.
This is my favorite way to make money.
[zeke] yeah, I'll do solid. Hopefully, this keeps up.
I need at least eight ounces to get through till summer,
and it really doesn't matter if everything sucked up until today.
All it matters is the final tally,
when we walk off the ice,
and for the first time all winter,
I'm starting to feel optimistic.
It's going to take another couple of clean -outs to buy a caddy,
but we'll get there. We will.
[zeke] I like it. I'm really happy that shawn bought tomcod.
I could see myself dredging out there for the next decade.
[narrator] across town.
-[vernon] we're still on the gold. -[man 9] yeah.
Adding an extension on the hose, that was key.
That gave us that much more ground.
Three times as much ground to work.
[narrator] the man with the hottest hand in nome
prepares to weigh yet another solid haul.
[vernon] so, yeah, weigh it up, gary. Let's see what we got there.
[gary] all right.
[vernon] all right. Let's go. That's two...
[gary] three, four, five,
six, seven, nine, ten, eleven,
twelve, thirteen, fifteen, sixteen
seventeen, eighteen...
...Twenty...
[vernon] 20.36.
[gary] all right.
[narrator] 20 ounces is worth $38,000,
and the current king of nome still has his grip on the crown.
We're still on the gold.
-Yeah. -Okay.
And I think we've got enough ground left down there for one more cleanup,
but we don't have time to move.
When you got it, you got it.
The gold just keeps getting hotter.
Everything's going right these days.
If it keeps up like this,
I may have to go over to tomcod
and give shawn a few tips on gold getting.
The proof is in the pudding and there's the pudding right there, baby.
We're going to finish with a bang,
looks like to me.
[narrator] while vernon hauls in a bundle...
[kris] back in nome.
I got everything else.
[man speaking]
now you [bleep] start taking bags.
[narrator] kris kelly's back with a bundle of his own.
[kris] $1,900 down on baby crap so far.
But that's a drop in the bucket, I hear.
Now, I'm going to need three times the amount of gold.
I'm a dad now.
That's crazy,
but pretty awesome at the same time.
Hi, my baby.
And here we are the newest member to the kellys.
Christine jade kelly.
She even looked at me when I said it.
In all that time I was gone and worrying about my dad
and brother taking care of things,
they crushed it.
Hell, we're out of debt now. They did so good.
It's a little stressful.
A couple of months of hell and then hopefully 20 years of happiness.
But you know, when you look at her,
you know it's all going to be worthwhile.
Kris started his own little family now.
It's perfect.
[kris] I guess in the end, you need to rely on family,
because family relies on you.
That's the only way to weather this stuff,
what life in mining throws at you.
Now it's all about the future,
and it's never looked brighter.
She just looked at me.
I bought enough food for four children for three months.
You're going to feed andy...
[andy] well, you know, like, I don't think so.
[narrator] vernon played chicken with the lead
and widens his lead over the rest of the fleet.
[vernon] milk it, baby.
[narrator] next time on bering sea gold...
Basically, we've cracked the ice
in a complete circle around us sitting on a chunk of ice,
floating in the middle of the bering sea.
It could go really bad.
[man 8] there's so much snow on the ice,
it's pushing us down and the water's coming up.
[man 9] we're going to flood this entire [bleep] area.
[vernon] if we can do eight hours,
it'll be the gold gorilla.
[man 10] I'm on the gold, man, I'm on the gold.
Does gold dust shoot this far?
[man speaking]
[man 10] move it, move it, move it.
[man speaking]
do hell with gold mining, nobody said it was going to be a safe job.