[radio interference]
[man on radio] We're tracking a serious storm,
equivalent to a Category 4 hurricane,
that's set to hammer the Alaskan interior.
The remnants of Typhoon Merbok,
moving through the Bering Sea,
are on course to make landfall
in the next 24 hours.
And bring with it
strong winds, rain and snow.
Officials are expecting severe floods
to hit many parts of Alaska.
Apparently, in the forecast
this is supposed to be a five to 10 year event.
So, basically, it's batten down the hatches
for the worst?
[Paul Richardson] Yeah. That's what they're calling for
in the next couple days.
- [Carlos Minor] It's that bad, huh? - It's gonna be bad.
It rained all night.
- Real hard this morning. - [Paul] Yeah, it did.
[Dustin Hurt] I'm so sick of this [bleep].
I can't tell what this rain did to the creek.
So, we're about to go find out what happened at the creek,
and what happened to our stuff.
If it's flooding, if we can dive,
if we can still work in this stuff.
It doesn't seem like it.
We've got a weather pattern coming so,
is it really feasible to try to dredge today?
Well, what if this is the last day that we can dredge?
So, I say get in the water,
even if it's only half a day.
Then you better hit it while you can.
But we know we have more rain coming,
so were gonna have to pull the dredges up.
[Dustin] Yeah, we're on the gold.
Snow's obviously almost here,
and pushing us out the door.
And we're on the verge.
[Dustin] We're about to get caught out,
but I don't know what to do, so...
Probably the foolish thing to keep trying to get gold.
So, watch yourself out there.
Let's go find out what it looks like.
See if we can work there or not.
I don't know how we would recover
from another wet storm like we had before,
and they say it's gonna be worse.
I just don't know what to do.
If it rains too much,
it's gonna put us out of business.
[narrator] A massive storm
could end their recent run of luck.
[Dustin] I'm seeing gold!
[narrator] For three weeks in a row...
- [James Hamm] I knew there was gold in here! - [laughs]
...both crews have been on a pay streak.
Right now, we're on gold.
We're finally starting to see good gold.
Look at that! Whoo, doggy!
Everyday we're getting gold, so that's a great thing.
[narrator] Pulling up nuggets...
[James] There's a lot of gold in here.
[Carlos] You know we're on a pay streak
when you still get gold on a bad dive.
- We're getting it guys. - [Kayla Johanson] Yeah.
- This is starting to get exciting now. - [Paul chuckles]
[narrator] And last week there was clear evidence...
[Kayla] Today was the most gold that we've found so far.
...they're about to hit life-changing gold.
[Paul] We're on the gold streak.
Like a little plunge pool,
and all that gold will be lodged in those boulders.
This could be our best season ever.
There's some hope.
This is going to inspire everybody.
We're gonna get more gold than we ever [bleep] thought.
[narrator] If they can keep dredging.
[Carlos] Holy [bleep], man.
Did it rain here?
[James] Yeah. We were expecting a flood and we got no water.
I was not expecting this,
it rained all night.
and it must be mostly snow up to the top,
'cause the water, not only is it crystal clear,
it's low.
I expected this to be in, uh, complete shambles.
I don't know what the right move is.
This is like the best dive days I've seen ever.
[James] This is like picture perfect right now.
[Wes Richardson] We're on gold, we wanna keep dredging,
but we can't afford to lose all of our stuff either.
[Carlos] Are you gonna sleep worse,
knowing that you missed out on a good dive day,
having your [bleep] packed up,
or sleep better,
you had a good dive day, couple of ounces of gold,
and nothing packed up?
What's the lesser of the two evils?
[Dustin] I don't think we have a choice, but to dive.
I say we should do this.
I don't think it's the right thing to do.
I think it's what I want to do.
- We're gonna look for gold. - [Carlos] All right. I'm all with it, man.
[Dustin] I'mma dive.
The responsible thing right now,
would be to pack this place up right here,
and go pack up camp.
Do I do the responsible thing?
Or do I try to find gold?
Obviously, I'm putting on my dive suit.
and, uh, not doing the responsible thing.
Hopefully...
I can get us down to the bottom of this thing.
I believe that Nugget Creek
still has a huge payload,
and I'm gonna keep digging until I find it.
I'm gonna dig as deep as I can.
Tell my guys never to do it, but...
I dig straight down.
[narrator] With a storm bearing down,
and only days left
before the Alaskan winter forces them out,
Dustin Hurt and his crew
are throwing caution to the wind.
So, you guys wanna just go that way.
One right here is your deepest point, man.
Go suck that out. There's a lot of gold down there.
- [Dustin] All right. - [Carlos] A lot of rock moving.
It's probably filled in right now,
but with gold.
[narrator] Beneath the unstable
50-ton granite boulder,
they've discovered a rust-colored pay layer.
Now, if Dustin can clear the rocks,
and punch through,
he could hit a massive pile
of the legendary four ounce chunks
that gave Nugget Creek its name.
I'm happy that Dustin's getting in.
because ever day could be one of our last dives.
Mother Nature's, uh, rearing her head,
saying, "Winter's coming early."
[Dustin] Everything good?
- All good? - [James on radio] Have a good dive, man.
[Dustin] All right. Let's rock and roll.
[Dustin] Hello, old friend.
Let's see if I can find some gold.
All right. I'm gonna need a basket.
It's a double-edged sword we've got going on right now.
Do we keep trying to find gold?
Or do we secure our stuff at camp?
Water's down and clear.
We're gonna take a chance today.
Man, there could be a bonanza sitting right there.
We're gonna push it to the limits now.
It's, uh, now or never.
Feel a bit jealous that I'm not diving right now.
That water's so [bleep] dang clear.
There is big gold in there. I know that for a fact.
He might be able to actually see gold,
pick it out like we used to back in the old days, you know?
[Dustin on radio] Start to take this out.
Missed this[bleep], man.
I missed diving.
I hope there's a lot of gold down here.
That's gotta be the clearest I've seen the water yet.
I don't wanna be a Debbie Downer,
but if this weather system is as bad as they're calling for,
there's a chance that today might be the last dive.
I just want a successful dive today
and get as much as we can.
With the way that this weather forecast is looking,
I think I'm gonna get in the water.
Only because if it's the last dive
- I need a much material moved as possible. - Yeah.
[Kayla] So, it needs to be a fast,
one-and-done type of thing.
[Justin Peterson] Okay.
Work on getting that other dredge
taken apart and pulled up.
[Paul] We can definitely do that.
But that way we're still moving material,
making progress, but...
- we won't get caught if the water starts coming up. - [Paul] No, I agree.
How's it going, Fred?
I'm gonna have these guys start breaking down
the other dredge.
Get you with, uh, working on the winch remotes.
- Yeah. All right. - All right.
- So, everyone knows what they're doing? - Yup.
- We got a game plan in place? - Yup.
[Kayla] Let's get it.
I'm gonna try to get as much material
moved as possible in a short amount of time,
'cause this very well could be the last day
that we get to dredge this season.
So, we need to make the most of it, really.
Hopefully, there will be a lot bigger gold at the bottom.
[narrator] Two days ago,
at 10 feet down,
Paul discovered a plunge pool,
that could hold the deepest point in the creek.
In just minutes,
he dredged up their best gold of the season.
Now, if Kayla can remove the last rocks from the bottom
and get to the lowest point,
there should be a golden payday
for the taking.
The pressure is definitely on.
We definitely don't have enough gold to show
for all of the hard work that we've put in.
Hopefully, today will change that.
Well, I wish her a good day of, uh,
dredging today.
Hopefully uneventful.
Other than get some gold.
Hopefully at the event happens at the end
when we all look at the sluice box and...
- that's the event I want. - [chuckles]
[Paul over radio] All right. You're good. Good luck.
[Paul] Kayla is one of the best divers we have.
So, we figured, get her in,
she's dredging that nice, little plunge pool.
This could be one hell of a gold cache.
Where should we start breaking this down?
[Paul] We'll pull the sluice box out.
We'll take the engines off.
Anything that's heavy on this dredge,
if we can get it off and get it up there,
and then we're just down to a frame with some floats.
That's gonna make it easier trying to pick it up and out.
[Justin] Oh, yeah. There we go.
Man that was wedged in there good.
Now that's a true Alaskan.
Short-sleeved shirt.
It's 38 degrees out here and raining.
[chuckles] Justin's gotta be awful tough
to do that, that's all I got to say. [chuckles]
[Kayla] There's some rusty stuff down here.
[Paul on radio] That's a good sign.
That's where all the gold is, in that rusty layer.
[Kayla] Hey, guys. I see a piece of gold in the bottom.
There's a crack in the bedrock
and can I see a piece of gold.
[Paul on radio] Seriously?
[Kayla] There's a crack in the bedrock.
and I can see a nice picker laying in it.
- [Justin] Whoo! - [Paul] Nice.
[Justin] Dig it out. Dig it out!
[water gurgling]
[Kayla] Hey guys, I see a piece of gold in the bottom.
There's a crack in the bedrock.
and I can see a nice picker laying in it.
[narrator] With a typhoon threatening to wreak havoc
on southeast Alaska,
Kayla is running out of time
to uncover the big gold
Nugget Creek was named for.
[Paul] So far, Kayla's dive is going pretty well.
She's kicking ass today, holy[bleep].
We know we've got rain coming, but...
this is the start of it.
I just want the rain to hold off for today
so we can finish this dive, get to the bottom,
and, uh, see if we can get a lot more gold.
[Dustin] The good news is
I went in that bedrock straight down, but...
bad news I can't see anything.
[narrator] Down creek,
Dustin is diving blind
beneath a 50-ton boulder.
His mission, remove the rocks
that stand in the way of the bedrock gold.
[Dustin] Sorry, there's a rock right here
that is just not gonna give its way.
Carlos, can you grab me a choker, please?
[Carlos on radio] Hell yeah!
[Dustin] I bet there's gold down here
at the bottom of this damn hole.
[Carlos] Oh, there's some gold right there! Gold!
[James on radio] There's gold in the box already.
Go. Whatever you're doing, just keep doing it.
[Dustin] So, we are getting gold, huh?
See a little something?
[James] Yup. Already got gold in the box,
that's[bleep] awesome, dude.
[Carlos on radio] Good job!
Getting gold!
[James] I have a good feeling about, uh,
how much gold we're gonna have in the box
at the end of the day.
[Wes] Yeah, if he can get deep enough, for sure, hopefully.
[Dustin] There's a whole bunch of gold down here.
Can take any more of it. [chuckles]
This is a pile of rocks.
I'd love to get out of here.
[Dustin groaning]
[Wes on radio] You all right?
[Dustin] I just need a second.
Scratched my hand.
Wow. That was something.
My thumb is destroyed, dude.
He [bleep] smashed it between the rock
and the [bleep] edge of the dill
That [bleep] got him hard. I just saw it.
That's a heavy [bleep] he just had right there.
[Dustin grunts]
[Dustin groaning]
[Dustin] That was something.
[crane whirring]
Yeah. There's another gigantic boulder down there.
Imagine what's under these.
I wonder if these are sitting on bedrock.
[Carlos] I think right here is the deepest spot, right here.
[Wes] All is takes is that deep hole pocket.
- [Carlos] That's it. - [Wes] That's all it takes.
A coffee can full of nuggets
- is a lot of gold. - [Carlos] Absolutely.
[Dustin] All right. Hopefully I got it.
Come on, baby.
[Carlos] Whoo!
Look at that boulder, you see how red it is?
[Dustin] Oh, yeah. That rusty stuff?
[Wes] That last foot and a half of that
is supposed to be full of gold.
[Carlos] Ooh!
Oh, my... [laughing]
[Wes] Can, uh... think it'll pull up?
Woo-hoo!
[Dustin] Oh, my[bleep] still on.
[Wes grunts]
See that[bleep]?
- [all exclaiming] - [Dustin laughing]
- [Dustin] Look at that[bleep]. - [Carlos laughing]
- [Carlos] What. - [Dustin] Dude, that looked like[bleep] gold.
- [Carlos] Oh! - [Dustin] Yeah, look at that[chuckles].
I can't believe that held.
Look at it. That does not look like it should've held.
If that boulder was sitting on bedrock,
there should be some nice gold.
The gold would be visible
if it was not encased in all the orange rust.
[Dustin] I got all the big boulders out, finally.
Now I've got bedrock
all the way to this big rock right here.
[Wes] It's just one boulder after another.
And they keep getting larger as we go, so...
Sooner or later we get under the right boulder,
that's just gonna have a lot of gold there.
[Kayla] Ah! All right.
Pull up on the basket, please.
Up and out.
[narrator] Up creek, Kayla inches closer
to bedrock.
[Kayla] That was on the very bottom.
Where you left off, Paul.
[Paul] Oh, wow.
[Kayla] It was wedged in there.
That thing was a[bleep] to get out.
Kayla's down there moving them big ole rocks,
that, uh, 200 pound guys,
picking up and moving around,
just grabbing them and moving them around and, uh...
underwater, uh, she's moving them up.
and getting them into the basket.
Good for her.
[Paul] You got some really nice material coming through.
[Kayla] You know, it's really rusty down there.
[Paul] That's what we're looking for.
[Kayla] Red-clouded myself out.
Lots of rust down here.
Hopefully there's a good amount of gold in that material.
[narrator] Four hours in,
Kayla has hit 13 feet,
the deepest point yet in the plunge pool.
I was under mine, some of the big rocks,
now, it's kinda tunneled, so...
I'm running out of material I can work.
Pretty insane.
[narrator] Kayla's desperate bid
to tunnel vertically down to bedrock,
has left widowmakers hanging up above.
Before they can go any deeper,
they'll need to widen the mouth of the dive hole.
[Kayla] All righty. I'm gonna put this...
hose up and I'm gonna come up.
[Fred Hurt on radio] Copy that.
[Kayla] Nozzle is hooked.
Coming up.
I ran out of material to work.
without going from the top and expanding
and then coming back down.
I got some more depth though.
[Paul] Good deal.
That's badass you saw a piece of gold down there.
I like that.
[Fred] The prettiest sight would be some gold in the box.
How'd you make out?
- That's the piece I saw in the bottom. - [Fred] There you go.
- [Justin] Nice. - [Fred] There's some pieces right there.
[Kayla] Yeah.
[Fred] That the one y'all saw earlier?
- [Kayla] Yeah. - Ah, no [bleep].
- [Kayla] It was stuck in a crack. - Damn.
- [Fred] There's a bunch of other little pieces in there. - [Kayla] Yeah there's a...
- a bunch right here. - [Fred] Quite a few of them.
[Kayla] There's one. There's a bunch of small stuff.
There's some in the corner.
There's a bunch stuck up here.
Looking pretty good. Looking pretty good.
Still have to look and see what's in the fines.
The big stuff.
Really good.
If it stays like this and that moisture river
just dumps a bunch of snow upstream,
I think we'll get a few more days of dredging.
And all that gold will be locked in that plunge pool.
[Kayla] That would be nice.
I gotta get changed.
- 'Cause I'm cold. - [Justin] Yeah, you get warmed up.
- I'm frozen. - You put in a good dive today.
Everybody was expecting this to be flooded today.
But, uh, got some dredging done.
picked up some gold.
And, uh, I think everybody's pretty happy with it.
Tried to clean up as much material
as possible today.
Hopefully, the weather holds out.
The last thing we need right now
is a huge flood.
We're preparing for the worst, but hoping for the best.
Looks like they're getting it ready to
haul it up the hill here.
[Kayla] I think between the three of us
we should be able to walk it over there.
[Fred] Well, it's definitely a good idea
to, uh, do a little preventive maintenance.
Rather than coming out here and doing a rescue mission.
[Justin] That's so much easier without those side pontoons.
[Paul] Oh, my [bleep]. That made a world of difference.
- [Kayla] That should be good. - [Paul] Yup.
- [Fred] Looking good. - [Kayla sighs]
[Paul] Now tie off every rope we got.
Everything's safe and sound now, huh?
[Paul] I think so.
- Good. - [Paul] I think we're in good shape now.
We got both the dredges pulled up and out,
just in case it floods.
Hopefully, in the next day or so
once this storm passes,
we'll be able to get back to work,
get back in the water, and get back on the gold.
[narrator] Up ahead...
- [Dustin groans] - [bleep]
That is some fast moving water, man.
I finally realized
y'all are tougher than I am.
[all chuckling]
[Dustin] Is that all gold?
- [Wes] There's gold. - Whoo-hoo!
[water gurgling]
[Wes] It's definitely cold now. [bleep]
Do we have enough time to get to this point?
That is the question.
I don't know.
It's not that we're not willing to do so,
it's all about what Alaska will let us do.
We're fighting against Alaska right now.
[narrator] Mining 8 feet
beneath a 50-ton boulder,
Dustin is racing to put gold in the box
before a giant storm hits.
[Dustin] I cleaned off 6 feet worth of bedrock
And I got this wall, until about here, completely cleaned.
It just goes down right here.
But I can't get underneath this
big, giant rock right here.
It has to go away.
In order to continue, that rock has to move,
and we don't have time...
there's a storm coming.
It's time for me to get out of here.
[narrator] Dustin will need to blast
the large boulder.
But an explosion this close to the...
to the 50 ton monster could cause it to crash down into their dive hole,
ending their season for good.
[Carlos] Good dive. Good, good, good dive.
Cleaned up under a whole bunch of really big rocks, all on bedrock.
So, if there's going to be gold, it should be there.
Time to clean the dredge, get all the mats out,
clean the box, take it back to camp.
See what we got.
Dustin definitely moved some frickin' big rocks.
So, if we get rid of this big, big one right here,
and we're getting closer and closer to the middle,
which I think is the deepest point of this pool.
We're getting there. We're getting there, actually pretty quicker than I thought.
[Dustin] Oh, look at that. Was that all gold?
[man] That is gold.
[Dustin] Looks like about an ounce or so a day, maybe two,
if we can just continue on with that, that's a great haul.
There's still huge payload down there, but we're running out of time.
We're about to get really hammered with some water apparently.
I think we should prepare for a flood.
- With any luck, it's just snow on top. - [Wes] Yeah.
- But, if it doesn't rain, storm is gonna wipe us out. - Yeah.
- If we leave it in a precarious situation. - Mm-hmm.
- The dredge isn't safe. - Okay.
I'm just trying to secure the dredge as best I can
if we've got a flood comin'.
We don't really have a way to pick it all the way out.
So I'm just trying to secure it, pick it up the best I can
and hope for the best.
[narrator] Both Kayla and Dustin are on the verge of unearthing
Nugget Creek's gold.
Just one more day of mining could be all they need
to have the season of a lifetime.
We got another flood comin', it's supposed to be the biggest one of all of 'em.
So, trying to imagine what's about to happen.
What is this place gonna look like after the biggest flood I've ever seen
comes through here?
Getting ready for the worst, wrapping up my winches.
We can't afford to lose any of the equipment.
It's [bleep]. It's... it's all the gears, man...
- [Wes] Yeah. - ...that has to get [bleep] wrapped up, man.
[Dustin] That's good right there, man.
That looks great. I like the way it looks.
Okay, sounds good.
Are you ready?
Well, it looks like our site's buttoned up, ready for the worst,
the storm. Hopefully, they are wrong about what's coming in.
The weather, we don't need it right now.
We do not need another flood taking away all of our stuff.
It's all buttoned up, so hopefully we're good
I'll make a toast to you guys. It has been a good time. And I finally realized
- y'all are tougher than I am. - [all laughing]
Now, if you take my direction you're gonna get a lot of gold.
- It's about 20 feet from where you're working. - Wherever I'm digging.
- 20 feet away. Got it. - [crew laughing]
[Wes] Appreciate your help, Fred.
Y'all got one hell of a storm coming in here, soon.
There's a big storm comin' right now.
- Huge. - It's either gonna drop snow or a ton of rain.
We'll see what happens.
[Fred] Well, I got to catch a plane.
This is not the best weather for this, but we got to get you back to town, Fred.
Again, thanks everybody. I appreciate it.
All right, let's get down to the boat, get it ready to go.
[Carlos] Dustin, we're about ready to go.
I think we're ready to rock.
You gotta get the hell out of here.
That river don't look friendly out there at all.
Have a safe trip, Fred.
[engine whirring]
[man over radio] We're waking up to reports of flash flooding
and mudslides, as the effects of Typhoon Merbok continue to hammer parts of Alaska.
The highest rainfall for 50 years has been recorded
and a red weather warning remains in place for many parts of the state.
Officials are recommending all residents remain indoors until the storm passes
It's been raining since midnight, that's a lot of rain in a short amount of time.
All that snow that was up there is...
...is now melted too, so that three inches of rain plus all that snow melt.
[narrator] A series of storms has made the past six months the wettest
in Alaska's recorded history.
Now, just as both crews are back on the gold,
a monster typhoon has devastated Nugget Creek.
We've had multiple instances of rain overnight,
so we're fixing to head up to our site.
Only Paul, Kayla and myself are here,
the rest of the guys, we kind of split up
so they would only have to make one boat ride into town get supplies.
I'm not sure if they can get back today.
So we're stuck out here with just the three of us to go to our site
and see what's going on.
All those boulders get in our hole, there's just...
- There's nothing-- - There's no time to get them back out.
No, that would just be stupidity to try to start over again.
- [Wes] Insanity. - Stupidity at this point.
All right, let's get out of here.
[Paul] We're gotta go up there and see what that boulder we've got...
that Fred tied off for us did.
[Wes] Yup.
[Paul] With this kind of [bleep], I could see it washing that out.
[Kayla] We thought that last flood was bad.
[Paul] I think this season's over. Holy [bleeping].
And that [bleep] is hauling ass.
Hear the boulders? [bleep]
[Kayla] That's so [bleep] loud.
[boulders crashing]
Holy crap. That's [bleep].
[gushing]
[Wes] [bleep] That's insane.
[Kayla] This is way worse than that other flood.
Way worse.
[narrator] In southeast Alaska, the remains of a coastal typhoon
have slammed into Nugget Creek,
dropping over three inches of rain in under 12 hours.
[Kayla] The first one was bad but this one's terrible.
[Paul] When we finally started getting on some gold, now this.
I mean, you could hear the boulders rolling down the creek,
sounds like thunder, sounds like I'm in a Texas thunderstorm right now.
See all that [bleep] falling.
[Paul] Rock slide over there, [bleep] see it coming down.
That's crazy. Damn.
For 10 years I've been up there I've never seen this.
No, no, no. There's not a [bleep] thing we can do here.
The power of this water is just insane,
It'd be suicide to be in the water right now. You'd just get...
You'd get pulverized.
It'd eat you alive.
The thought of getting in that water doesn't even cross my mind.
No. I know, one wrong step right now and you end up in there, you're done.
[Wes] This is a freaking nightmare.
So I wonder what we can see if we can at least get around the corner and look
- up to where's your site, - [Kayla] We can go look.
- Wanna look around the corner? - Yeah.
I'm going down.
[Wes] Our [bleep] walk way is washed out.
I think it's safe to say we are going to our site,
[Wes] No.
So, either way, Mother Nature always gives us an end,
she either gives us gold, or gives us [bleep].
This year, it's just a lot of hard work and [bleep].
[Kayla] We can't even get out to the dredge,
I hate to say it but I think this is it.
I think this is the end.
I don't think there's any coming back from this one.
Not this one.
I mean, all we can do is just sit back and wait.
[Paul] That sounds like that just picked up in intensity.
Let's get out here.
- Yeah, let's get off this walk way. - Yeah, let's go.
Let's get out of here.
[Wes] This is tragic right now. I mean, we are so close to this large gold.
We thought we had figured out how to mine this,
this creek, but Mother Nature has shown us a different story this year.
We can't even get to our site.
Right now it's a waiting game.
We just gotta let it run its course and then check the carnage afterwards.
- Let's get the hell outta here. - Get outta here.
All that [bleep] washing away, there's nothing we can do.
Well, that's depressing as [bleep].
[Kayla] Seems like a good day to just start drinking.
[Dustin] Holy [bleep].
- [indistinct] - [Carlos] That's scary, wild man.
Woah!
[Dustin] That is some fast moving water, man.
- Is he gonna make it? - [Carlos] [bleep] man, I hope so.
[Dustin] Holy crap.
[Carlos] Almost there.
- Yeah, buddy, - That's what I'm talkin' about.
- [Carlos] We made it. - [Dustin] How many times did you think you were gonna die?
Holy [bleep]
[laughs] Yeah, that just happened.
Did all that just happen?
Are we still alive? Am I dead?
I was hoping this thing wouldn't freakin' lose power, man.
Good driving, dude.
I just felt like a point where I wasn't moving anymore.
Thank god that's over man. [laughs]
Dude, that's scary water, man.
[Dustin] I took it as easy as I could now.
That is some scary water, man.
That's going there, what's happening here?
[Dustin] Ah, I'd agree.
Let's get to the site, see what we got.
The current is ripping.
Gonna chew it out, bud.
Okay. [laughs]
[narrator] Torrential rains have rerouted Nugget Creek
and washed out the ATV trail stranding the Whitewater film crew.
- What are you doing, [indistinct]. - A little bump in the middle.
Yeah.
You wanna try and wheel it?
Yeah, as long as you have two wheels on the dirt.
All right, you guys ready? Hang on tight.
Woo-hoo. Hello country.
All right. [laughs]
Let's see what those minors are up to.
About time you showed up.
[Dustin] You guys go look at the site? How's it look?
[Wes] It's [bleep].
The dredges, got rocks in front of it, it's got rocks behind it,
the waters by shooting six feet over the bridge.
I don't even think the upstream winch is there.
That [bleep] is devastated, dude, I think this is going to be the end of our season.
I don't think we're coming back from this
[Carlos] Did your equipment make it?
We can't even get to our site right now, that water's raging so much,
it's over our walkway, it doesn't look good.
Our dredges should be safe. We got them up and out of the water
but I don't think anything else is gonna survive that.
[Dustin] So what you're saying is we're done.
I don't see a recovery from this.
[narrator] Dustin's invested everything he owns to buy the claims at Nugget Creek.
Now, the worst typhoon to hit Alaska in over 50 years
threatens to bankrupt him.
[Wes] I've been coming up for almost 10 years
and I've never seen anything like this.
- I have to wrap my head around this. - Yeah.
- I just, I, uh... - It's devastating.
I'm freaking out a little bit right now, yo.
Freakin' out.
[exhales]
All right, let's get up the hill, I'll start assessing what the problem is.
[Wes] All right.
- [exhales] - Dammit.
[bleeping]
Did we lose all that damn gear?
Let's hope not, man.
I feel like I failed y'all.
[Carlos] No one can prepare for something like this, dude, no one can.
[exhales]
Freakin' out a little bit.
We only literally have a couple of weeks at the most left,
all this pain and crazy rain is just frickin' unbelievable, man.
I took Fred back so he can catch his flight, and overnight
it rained three or four inches apparently.
And it sounds like everything is devastated.
The site's gone. The roads are gone.
The creek is over its...
...[sighs] sides.
Sounds like we lost everything and everything's over.
- I'm freaking out right now. - [Carlos] I know, I know you are.
I'm trying to calm myself down.
And the only way I know how to do that is to go get my eyes on everything,
and go find out what is the deal.
[Dustin grunts]
[bleep] you. Let me go.
No frickin' way.
Wow. Dude, you see that road?
- [Wes] [bleep] yeah, I do. - [Kayla] It's a [bleep] river now.
- This looks pretty bad. - I don't know what to think, I don't know what to do.
[Wes laughs]
[Dustin] I'm doing the only think I know what to know,
charge at it and see what happens.
[Wes] Holy cow!
[Dustin] That's not a creek anymore.
That's a river.
[Wes] Holy [bleep].
Get the [bleep] outta here.
[breathing heavily]
[gushing]
[Carlos] Holy [bleep]. This is scary.
Lotta hate, lotta destruction.
[Dustin] You'd not have known that yesterday we were diving in his water.
This is a nightmare.
It's beyond anything I thought was possible here.
[narrator] Surging at speeds of over nine feet per second,
Nugget Creek is capable of hurling 100 pound boulders into the dive holes
they've spent weeks digging out.
All our hard work just flushed down the toilet,
just when we're starting to see frickin' gold in the box.
This is crazy.
I've never seen a flood this bad.
I don't know how we're gonna come back on this one.
How is that board sitting there like that?
- The walkway-- Yeah. - The walkway got ripped apart.
Looks like the winch is half gone.
[Wes] I hope everything didn't get destroyed.
[Dustin] All right guys, let's see what we can salvage.
Carlos, see if you can find another rope.
and figure out how to tie that thing off.
- Okay, uh... - Figure something out.
Right now it's kind of a rescue mission. We need to just try to save
everything that we can, obviously, we won't be able to save everything,
but we need to really salvage what we can so that next year
we still have equipment to use.
- Can you clean that up, collect the electronics... - Yeah.
- and all that [bleep]. - Yeah. Yeah.
I gotcha.
[Dustin] James, we should bring that and tie that up here,
and that'll keep that going forward.
Right now, the dredge is flowin' down the river so I'm just doing what I can
to try to save our dredge.
[Dustin] Uh, we prepared for the worst, and this is it.
Think we'll be able to dredge again?
[Wes] I don't know.
This is the hardest place we've ever dug,
this is more than I ever thought could happen here.
And we thought we were prepared.
Yeah.
This makes me very sad.
I'm having a hard time trying to figure out if I can salvage this.
[narrator] After months of backbreaking work,
Dustin and his crew are on their best gold of the season.
Now, he faces his toughest decision, cut his losses, or attempt a fight back.
[Carlos] All right, now we've got our dredge secured.
Let's say we get the [bleep] outta here before the side come down on us.
[Dustin] I still wanna dig this, I think we can.
[Wes] I think the dredge is all right.
The mechanical stuff looks in good shape.
[Kayla] I don't think we should hang out here.
I'd agree.
Let's just get out of here before it's too dangerous and we die.
Come back up and find out what the devastation is tomorrow.
What we can salvage.
We are so close to this large gold, we don't want to leave it till next year.
I think we can make it work.
There's a lot of devastation.
It's a huge flood, but I think the water will be down tomorrow.
We can find out what the actual damage is.
Just caught me completely off guard.
I thought we'd have us a flood, we dig out the kitty litter
and that'd be the end of it.
We thought we were prepared.
I've invested a lot, this has to pay off.
It has to pay or else I'm gonna going broke.
We'll find out tomorrow.
[narrator] On the season finale ofGold Rush: White Water...
I need one of you [bleep] to tell me that we can dig this.
Yeah, we can dig this.
Our walk way is completely gone.
I'm gonna get my waders on and see if I can find a way across.
[crew exclaiming]
[Carlos] Let's go, cowboy.
So you guys are done? You're not gonna dig there anymore?
It'll take us a week to get setup.
We'll work for you and give you guys a hand.
It's all hands of deck...
When in doubt, blow [bleep] up.
[Kayla] Fire in the hole!
[exploding]
[crew member whoops]
That could be where those big four ounce nuggets
can be lurking out.
This is just the chunky stuff. It's not all of it.
[crew cheering]
[Dustin] Holy, that's good stuff.
- Dig a hole, man. - You can do it,
[Paul] Look out!
- [Dustin] Rock... - Rock, rock, rock...
Move, move, move, move...