[eagle screech]
We start running that stuff.
[Paul Christie] In Alaska's Chilkat Mountains,
after over four months,
finding barely an ounce of gold,
Dustin Hurst's crew
has finally hit it big.
Look at that! Some good pieces, dude.
Wow!
More than I expected.
After weird piece of gold. Take it out.
- Ha, ha. - Whoo.
This is what it's suppose to feel like, huh?
It's looking good, man.
That's no all on the interior either.
[man laughing] Yes!
What the hell!
Look at that nonsense. Just from picking out some of the big ones.
- Yeah. - Oh.
It's starting to happen, man. Look at that.
I feel like a nugget surgeon right now.
Open the fillers jar up.
Everybody can go home with gold.
It's just a golden day today, man. Just a golden day.
What do we do all this work for? Oh, that's
right. All this pretty gold stuff sitting right here.
Ah, it's what it's all about.
- You've seen this stuff? - [man laughs]
It's starting to add right the hell up, man.
Oh, man. Look at you.
Like that? [laughs]
That's beautiful.
Holy moly, man!
This really good for us, man. [all laughing]
Our mountain up creek was naked yesterday.
And now, there's snow more than halfway down the damn mountain.
Whoa!
- Okay. I think I broke my arm. - Oh, boy.
Dave, look out.
Whoa! Whoa!
I got a rock up here. We need to get out of the bottom.
Oh! Look out.
Fred's here, everybody.
- Hey, Fred. - Good to see you guys.
Come on. Let's go.
Rock and roll. We will dig.
'Cause I need some gold.
I think I hold the record for the season.
Good done, kid.
The way it's looking now, it looks like
open season on dredging.
[laughs]
Oh, wait. That's be the gold.
Holy [bleep]. Yeah.
This has been a long time coming to get this amount of gold right here.
Here's our reward for the shoot.
Oh.
Good job, guys.
Always stressed out 'cause
both seasons definitely coming to an end.
And we haven't seen bedrock.
But we're running out of time. So we gotta get to work.
All right. All ready.
- All ready? - Yeah.
[Christie] In less than a month,
winter will force the miners out of McKinley Creek.
And Kayla's crew have only dredge
7.5 ounces of gold,
worth just $14,000.
Enough to cover the fuel,
but nowhere near paying the bills.
Winter fast approaching,
she must hit bedrock gold soon to salvage her season.
[Kayla Johanson] Tired today.
I didn't sleep like it last night.
[man] Hey, Kayla.
Our mountain up creek was naked yesterday. There was no snow on it at all.
And now, there's snow more than half way down the damn mountain.
From here on now, it's basically gonna be cross
the cable early and dive late.
- Yeah. - Because I don't know how many days we have left.
- And that's what's happening now. So... - Let's get it done.
[Christie] The first winter storm has now really mist
flooding out McKinley Creek.
If they get a direct hit,
the months of work they've staked
to get to the pile of gold on bedrock
will be for nothing.
[Kayla] There's another storm coming.
At this point, it's just a ticking time bomb.
So, our main objective,
first thing probably we're gonna do,
you all rock pull so I'll hand you two chokers.
This is double rig rock.
And we're gonna hook them up to each skyline and pull you out at a time.
We can get that done really fast.
He's gonna do it from this side, I'll be on that side.
I'm gonna have you to move the rock.
And then after that, bedrock.
- Okay. - All right, let's get it done.
Sounds very good to me.
You ready?
Our gold catch, really, really low.
I gotta get ready. I gotta get in there. I gotta find some gold for everybody.
[Christie] Diving today will be Stamper and Paul.
We're running out of time.
One last push.
We've got a chance to get some bedrock and get some really good gold.
All right. All working. Good to go, brother.
Not bad.
It looks like that rain brought in a lot of
new like, flood debris or is it about the same?
We literally have like, a litter to a... It quite bring in a whole lot.
Gotcha.
That's not too bad.
[breathing] No, it could have been way worse.
Yeah.
[Christie] Last week...
We have a lot of boulders up in the side walls.
That pose a danger on... of falling on us.
[Christie] Kayla's crew, cleared deadly widowmakers from the top of the dive hole.
That's awesome, man. You guys did a great job.
[Christie] Making a site safe for diving.
Getting that rock wall cleared today,
that was what we needed to do,
to get to bedrock.
[Christie] Now, Kayla's crew
can get back to dredging down to bedrock,
thought to be of 20 feet.
But 18 feet deep.
A layer of large rocks stand in their way.
Paul and Stemper's mission,
use both winches to quickly remove the boulder field.
And get them onto a life changing amount of gold.
There is a thing at boulder field.
That's gonna be a long day.
All right. I got the rock hooked up.
- Ready? - Yes.
All right. Nice rock. Nice rock.
[speaking indistinctly]
Pull the rock. That's firstly fine as a bedrock.
- [machine whirring] - [man laughs]
This big as white rock right here. We're gonna have to blast it.
- You can see this line right here. - Yes...
I think if we can drill that,
we can pop this right half off.
[Christie] Four months of removing boulders,
had made Kayla's crew rock blasting experts.
- Got it? - Yeah.
[machine drilling]
How's that drill working?
Yeah, it's working really good.
Good.
All right. Try that.
Oh, yeah.
Uh, is the powerheads ready?
Somebody...
[machine whirs] It's here.
Thank you.
All right.
Powerheads reared.
Mark is hooked up.
- You guys ready? - Yep.
All right. We're hot.
Three, two, one.
[blast] Blow me!
What's the verdict call?
Holy, [bleep].
It's rocking away. I never, ever expect to split that rock.
[Kayla] In a good way?
Yeah. It's in three pieces now.
Incoming.
[Christie] Winching the last of the boulder layer from the dive hole,
Kayla's crew can get back to dredging for bedrock gold
before the winter storms hit.
I'm so proud of you boy. You make me smile.
Hell, yeah.
This has been a long time coming to get this amount of gold right here.
These guy's gonna be pretty happy with what we got. I do believe.
I think I'm gonna take this out there and see how much we gotten.
[Christie] At McKinley camp...
Hey, you guys got the skewer ready?
[Christie] ...after a disastrous start to the season,
Dustin and his crew are back on the go.
Got the gold, boys.
Nice.
Here's our rewards for the shoot, right here.
[Christie] Dustin's crew spent the first half of their season
mining at House Rock.
Nothing!
What are we doing here?
It's a disaster.
There's no gold to pay for the season or next season. So we have to do something.
[Christie] But when it fails to pay out,
they risked everything,
moving a 1,000 feet down the creek to the shoot.
Holy [bleep].
Is that gold?
We have got a sluice box full of gold.
It's nuggets everywhere.
[cackles]
Yeah!
I am so excited to find out how much it is.
Whoo!
Good job!
Holy [bleep].
Look at that!
[Christie] Dustin costs, so far this season,
are over 20 ounces worth of gold.
One out.
Five ounces.
10 ounces. 15 ounces.
20 ounces. All right.
25 ounces.
Wow! That's...
27 ounces.
That two weeks?
- It's three weeks. - Three weeks.
That looks like more than 27 ounces. Doesn't it?
[bleep]
I'm a little disappointed.
Right. [bleep]. I was... I thought for sure
it was 35.
We're suppose to be celebrating.
[Christie] 27 ounces, worth $50,000.
A sizeable payday.
But not enough to hold them over through the winter.
So, I think what happened was
they dug that hole a 100 years ago.
- I think they cleaned it out. - Yeah.
[Christie] A 120 years ago,
prospectors mined the creeks in the Chilkat Mountains.
And recovered nearly 80,000 ounces of gold,
worth over $1.4 million today.
Dustin, staked his season,
on the belief that the shoot was untouched by the old timers
and still held hundreds of ounces of gold.
Had they not dug this hole,
I think there would have been
400, 500 ounces in it 'cause it's the perfect catch.
Looking at that plate,
does not represent how much work we put in.
You guys have been working your ass off, man.
We make a little bit of money off of it,
but not enough to really succeed.
Well, one thing about it,
now we know for sure exactly what was in the bottom of the sluice.
We got what was there and now it's time to move on.
Okay.
I think we're all heavily disappointed that somebody got to it before us.
We still come away with,
I don't know, $50,000 worth of gold. But...
[sighs] it's not the end of the season.
We're gonna keep going.
I believe that McKinley Creek
still has a huge payload somewhere.
I just don't know where it is yet and I'm gonna keep digging until I find it.
Next step, where you do not give weight to this rock.
It's right on the edge of going all the way down.
[narrator] At House Rock,
Paul clears the last pieces
of the boulder layer from the edge of the dive hole.
[Stamper] I'm switching over to dredging now.
[narrator] Just below, Stamper dredges continuing
the hunt for bedrock gold.
[Scott] Okay, Stamper, get out of the bottom. This rock looks like it's time to go.
Okay. Get out of the way, Stamper.
I've got a rock up here way above you.
This is barely[bleep] hanging on. You need to get out of the bottom.
- [explosion] - Oh! [bleep]
[Kayla] You okay?
[Scott] Stamper?
Are you okay?
[Kayla] Stamper? What is going on?
Just tell me that. Are you okay?
[Kayla] The[bleep] comms are down.
Get them up.
[Scott] Okay, Stamper. Get out of the bottom.
This rock looks like it's starting to go.
- [explosion] - Oh! [bleep]
[Kayla] You okay?
[Scott] Stamper?
Are you okay?
[Kayla] Stamper? What is going on?
The[bleep] comms are down.
Get them up.
[screeching]
- [Scott] Can you hear it? - [Stamper] I'm okay.
Clearly, everything just fell right beside me.
[Scott] That actually was really scary.
[narrator] While removing the last rock from the boulder layer,
an underwater avalanche nearly hits Stamper,
trapping the Dredge Hose under 4,000 pounds of rock.
They are underneath all this.
Oh, my [bleep] God. That rock's giant.
Well, the main thing is nobody is hurt.
[Kayla] Are you able to dredge around that big rock
with the other dredge and free it?
I don't know.
Okay. Is that rock too big to pull?
Yeah, I can't move the rock, so.
Yeah, that hose is not coming out.
I know I've been pushing this crew to work really hard and work
really long days lately.
But when you're in charge of a team,
you have three other people that you have to worry about, too, and their safety.
We all have to get to the bed rock, so we need to out in those long hours.
But the main thing is just making sure everybody is safe.
We can't do our job if somebody gets hurt.
[inhaling heavily] Okay, drill it. We can split it.
[narrator] At nearly four tons, the boulder is too large
for the winches to lift.
Paul and Stamper will have to blast the rock into smaller sections.
So it can be removed without damaging the hose.
[breathing heavily]
- [Kayla] Ready? - [man] Yeah, I'm ready.
- All right. Fire in the hole. Three, two, one. - [clicks]
[loud bang]
- Clear? - Clear.
All right. Let's go see if we can get our dredge nozzle back.
[inhaling sharply]
That's definitely cracking.
- Paul, what is this? - It must have been a pump.
Yeah, they cracked the[bleep] out of it. Look at that.
[narrator] The boulder is successfully split.
Paul and Stamper can now break it into smaller pieces
to be lifted clear.
Whoo! Look at that big guy.
That's a big chunk right there, dude.
[grunts]
Get in there. [grunts]
[inhales]
- Here goes that top base. - Yup, there it is.
- Ooh! [laughing] - Let's bring it.
Okay. That's gonna come apart now.
Give it a little push.
- Oh, yeah. - Yeah.
- Good job, man. - Ha-Ha.
Oh! [laughing]
We have a freed nozzle.
[Kayla] Aye! Are there any damage?
Nope.
All right. Are you guys waiting for me to pull something up?
- Yes. - Yes.
- [narrator] Four hours after it fell, - [whirring]
Kayla winches out the last piece of blasted rock.
Wow!
[Kayla] That's a good rock.
- Hey, guess what? - What?
You just crossed six hours on your dive time.
Is it really that late already?
It's 4:30 right now, boys.
Are you serious? Where'd the day go?
[Kayla] We're gonna call it.
Yeah, call it. I'm done.
I'm coming up.
[narrator] Despite an epic dive,
Paul and Stamper have made almost no progress dredging.
You coming out, Paul?
- Yeah, I'm gonna get out. - [grunts]
[narrator] But with the boulder layer finally removed,
the crew are now just one foot from where they believe lies bedrock gold.
I didn't even touch a nozzle today. I did nothing, but pull rocks, but
what we got done today, is gonna allow
Kayla and Scott to get in tomorrow.
The way it's looking now, it looks like, tomorrow is just...
open season I'm dreading.
- Morning, guys. - Morning, fellas.
[narrator] It's decision time for Dustin and his crew.
After a poor clean out at the shoot.
they must now decide how to rescue the final weeks of their season...
before winter storms hit.
I was thinking, I know you all are disappointed
with what we got in the shoot, but...
You know what, we were only there for a few weeks.
We've still got a little bit of time left in the season. Let's, uh,
go back and re-put up
our boardwalk we had last year,
so we can get back up there and look at Dog lake,
maybe get more ounces of Dog lake before it freezes.
- It's a possibility. - I agree.
Well, the hope is that there's another ton of gold that's sitting
in Dog lake just upstream because it's coming from somewhere.
- Sounds like a good idea. - Yeah.
I'm gonna set my goals to hit out.
It's time for something new.
- Everybody up for it? - I agree. Yeah.
- [Wes] Let's do it. - [Dustin] All right. Let's stop playing around.
So what we'll do is go up creek from the shoot.
We're going to Dog lake.
First things first, let's get access to it.
Let's get some walkways over there.
Let's try to beat the weather.
Let's dig Dog lake. Cross your fingers.
Hell yeah.
[narrator] Upstream from the shoot lies the Dog lake,
a plunge pool located on a 90 degree bend.
As gold is 19 times heavier than water,
Dustin believes the sharp turn
slows the current enough for the nuggets to drop down to the bedrock.
[Carlos] Hey, what do you need, man?
[James] I just need the drill.
- The drill? Okay, you're tied in? - Yup.
- Tied into existing ropes. - [drilling]
- [James] Hopefully, they don't break.
[narrator] To reach the Dog lake,
Carlos and James must extend their existing walkway
one board at a time
using brackets to fix in to the creek wall.
[James] It's been a while since I've done this [bleep].
[bleep]
I have to trust these rotten ropes.
[drilling]
You've got a crazy job, James.
There's some... [grunts] [bleep]
- Oh, it's slippery? - Yeah.
All right. Rock and roll.
[James grunting] There you go.
[Carlos drilling] All right. We're good.
[drilling]
[James] Building walkways.
This takes me back.
These guys are getting good enough to where I can pretty much leave them alone.
And they will build walkways all day.
I think it's beautiful.
[drilling]
[hammering]
That's as far as it's gonna go.
Those bolt ain't coming out. [laughing]
Oh [bleep].
I just put all weight on this tree
and it moved.
You know your life is dependent on this thing, right?
Hold on. Hold on. Hold on.
If you fall into that, it's gonna mash you up, man.
- Hey! Look out. - [rocks crumbling]
- Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! - [water splashing]
- Hey! Look out. - [rocks crumbling]
- Whoa! Whoa! Whoa! - [water splashing]
[narrator] At the Dog lake, unstable rocks
are challenging James's attempt to reach the new dive site.
Anything to get the job done, man, all in one. Good job, James.
- Things we do to get gold. - [drums beating]
[narrator] Winter closing in. Dustin's crew is an race against time
to thick the boardwalks.
- That'll do. - Sweet.
[narrator] And get on to Dog lake gold.
[Carlos] James is getting it done.
As usual, we're trying to beat mother nature.
Carlos, you want these?
Yup!
[Carlos] I think, we have a pretty good dang good chance
of dredging that Dog lake right before winter starts on us.
[James] Oh! By the way, that's the last two boards.
- [drilling] - So we've almost got a walkway
all the way to the Dog lake and it's looking good.
Coming together.
[drilling]
[Carlos] Well, we made it to Dog lake.
Good job, guys.
[James] It's freaking awesome.
We got access to places that are inaccessible.
That looks like a big sluice box.
It's really slicked off, so,
if any gold came rolling down it would slip right into that.
[Carlos] There's no reason why there shouldn't be gold right here, dude.
We'll get a good clean spot. Bang the dredge right here.
It looks like one hell of a dig.
For us to dig here, this is the time of the season.
We can only do it at this time of the season.
When the water's low. When the water's slow.
It's beautiful man. I can guarantee there's gold here.
[narrator] The diving conditions are the best they'll ever be.
Dustin still has a narrow window to dredge
and add some real profit to his $50,000 gold haul.
Can gold exist in the Dogeleg? Abso-frickin'-lutely.
It's a Dog Legged sport.
I can say that there's more anomalies and cracks and holes
and all kind of stuff going in that hole. More than we've ever dug.
And, hopefully, it just acts like a ripple and it grabs all that gold.
Right now, we are in a race against time because if we get snowed in here,
or we get frozen in here, we're not getting anything out.
[narrator] At House Rock, with winter storms approaching,
Kayla's crew believe they are just one foot from hitting bedrock gold.
- [On radio] One, two, three. - [Kayla on radio] I got you.
Yep, you come in loud and clear.
[narrator] But with such a wide dive hole,
they still have tons of material to remove
before their chance to strike it rich.
All right, Scott, you better get to work, the queen's coming in.
[man on radio] Scott, diver in the water.
Scott, where do you want the baskets?
[Scott on radio] Send her down. Bring it on down to me.
Done it.
[Kayla] Well, when you're done with the basket,
I could use it a couple times up here.
[Scott] Gotcha.
Oh [bleep], that's not good.
With our hole, as light as it's getting, one basket for two divers
is not gonna be enough.
We'll be able to use this thing.
[narrator] Paul brings in a second basket.
[Paul] Bush fix!
[narrator] Allowing the divers to move twice as many rocks
and hit gold twice as fast.
[Kayla] Any luck bringing that basket up this way?
- [Paul] Yep, we're bringing it up right now, - [Kayla] Cool deal.
[Paul] All right, Scott, I got a basket coming back to you.
We'll get the other one hooked up and then Kayla will have a basket as well.
All right, Scott, basket is, almost, directly above you.
[Scott] Go ahead and bring it down, I got eyes on it.
- [Paul] You got eyes on it, coming down. - [Scott] Yep.
I got it.
[Paul] Kayla, basket's above you.
I'm just gonna dip it in the water a little bit.
[Kayla] Bring it on down. Stop.
[Paul to camera] These guys are gonna have to work, I'd say,
two baskets, two divers.
We need to make a hard push and get as much of this material out
and get down to bedrock if we can.
Having this second basket is, it's, oh man, it's a lifesaver.
- [Scott on radio] You ready for a basket up? - [Paul on radio] Yes, sir.
[Scott] Copy that. Basket's coming up.
[Kayla] My basket is full. Up and out, please.
We're moving forwards and it's at a remarkable pace.
Pulling rocks and, hopefully, finding some bedrock.
[Paul on radio] Kayla, basket's over you.
[Kayla on radio] Bring it on down.
- [Scott on radio] Basket's full. I am clear. - [Paul on radio] Copy that.
[Paul on radio] We are gonna get so many rocks moved out of two baskets.
This is crazy.
[narrator] After five hours of grueling work,
Kayla and Scott have cleared 6,000 pounds of rock.
[Scott] There's so much area opened up down here. It's unreal.
[Kayla] Let's get dredging.
[narrator] Kayla pushes on, believing she is finally approaching bedrock.
[Scott] My head's killing me, man.
[Paul] If your head's killing you, come on up, man.
Don't worry about it.
Good dive, man.
[Scott] That's a lot of [bleep] rocks.
[Paul] [bleep] that's a lot of rocks. [chuckles]
Mission accomplished.
I got the bottom of the hole completely cleared of rocks.
Kayla can dredge to her heart's content now.
I'm getting dressed.
[Kayla on radio] I think everybody would be real upset
if we ended the season and went home with no gold.
But I am not about to let that happen.
Hey, Kayla, what would your, your guesstimation be on the depth right now?
[Kayla] Looks about 20 feet.
[Paul on radio] Are you kidding me?
This is crazy.
[narrator] Kayla's hard work has, finally, got her down to 20 feet.
Where, she believes, lies bedrock gold.
You've been in the water for over six and a half hours now.
[Kayla] How is it that late already?
[Paul] Time flies when you've been down there working your ass off.
[Kayla] I think, uh, probably gonna call it.
[Paul] I got you.
Good dive, kid. Great dive!
You got over six and a half hours.
- I think I hold the record, for this season. - [Paul] I think you do, too.
[Kayla] Hopefully, there's gold in the box.
[machinery whirring]
[Kayla] Turn it off.
Is that... Oh wait, that's a piece of gold.
[Paul] Holy [bleep].
- [Kayla] Nice, that looks good. - [Paul] Yeah!
[narrator] This could be the start of bedrock gold.
[Paul] Amazing jobs.
[Kayla] All right, I got to get out of this.
- I'm getting cold. - [Paul] Yeah.
It's letting us know that it's still there.
A lot of rocks came out. She dredged a lot of material.
Somewhere, one of those layers, has got some...
It's got gold in it and she found some of it today.
So that's, definitely, gonna spark everybody to, to wanna come and dredge some more.
[Kayla] It was nice to see gold in the box.
Um, I'm really excited to see how much gold has, actually, settled on the bedrock
because I think it's gonna be really good.
[Dustin] Today you got Fred coming in.
The crew doesn't know it yet but they're gonna get some help.
And I got to come up with a new plan.
[narrator] With winter fast approaching, Dustin has called in
some, much needed, backup.
- [Dustin] Hey, Fred. - [Fred] Hey, what's happening?
[Dustin] Oh, nothing much, man.
[Fred] Hey, the weather, kind of, cooled off since I left.
Well, I don't know if you noticed, but there's snow in the mountains.
I'm looking up there I said, "Oh [bleep], here comes that termination dust."
- How you doing? Damn. - I'm pretty [bleep] good, man.
- Good to see you. - [Dustin] Yeah, good to see you too, man.
I'll tell you what...
How's it going?
Uh, it's okay. We just finished The Chute
and we pulled 27 ounces out of it
- in one dig, basically. - Holy [bleep].
Uh, and House Rock, right now, they are trying with all their might to get down
- but I, but they did get to about 20 feet so. - Whoo!
But here's the problem, uh, the reason I called you to come help out is because
I'm taking Kayla and Wes.
I've got prospects for a new claim next season in a better gold bearing area
and I might miss out on it if I don't go up right now.
So, I'm gonna take those two and I need somebody to,
kind of, help out, watch, you know.
- Well, let me get my stuff. I'll go ahead and, uh-- - This you?
Yeah, that's gotta go.
[Fred] Let me get my backpack and gloves.
[Dustin grunts]
[narrator] Disappointed by his gold haul from The Chute,
Dustin is using the remaining days before winter hits
to maximize his future mining options.
- [Dustin shouts] Fred's here, everybody! - [Fred laughs]
- Hey, Fred. - [man] How's it going, Fred?
Good to see you guys, yep. [sighs]
[Carlos] Good to see you too.
- [Fred] Oh, man, that thing's roaring good. - [Dustin] Oh, yeah.
So what have you been doing while we've been up here trying to find all this gold?
Oh, let's see. I've been watching TV and sitting in my lounge chair--
[man] You're not getting soft, are you?
- Thinking about how tough it is up here. - [man laughs]
What all's going on here?
One of the things that's been going on is
I, uh, I been trying to get some claims in other places.
And I heard there was some claims up in Valdez that are really hard to get to
and nobody's touched them.
I think that's the place to go.
Uh, I'm not done with this place by any means,
but I'm trying to branch out, a little bit.
[narrator] Located 400 miles northwest,
gold was first discovered in Valdez in 1903.
And for the past 120 years, it's been a mining hub.
With one operation producing 52,000 ounces of gold.
Worth, almost, $100 million today.
What I'm trying to do is find places with more gold for next year.
And I am trying to get these locked down and tested.
If they get covered in snow, you can't test them.
It's now or never and I know it's a bad time to do this.
Uh, Wes and Kayla will be coming with me.
Thanks for coming up, Fred. Uh, we're gonna need your help.
My crew will be down two people, Wes and I.
And she'll be down one person.
I mean, since we got two dredges and two divers we'd definitely need
one more person if we're gonna be short one person.
Because we need two tenders, two divers. So that's--
Yeah, for safety purposes you've got to have that situation.
The only bad thing is, with us leaving right now, is our hole's not finished
and the season's ending.
We are trying to get long hours in every day
and I'm supposed to be diving today.
But as long as these guys just keep putting in long hours
and diving while I'm gone...
You know I'll keep moving rocks for you.
- [Kayla] That's what needs to happen. - Yeah.
- Well, get to diving then. - [Kayla] Yeah.
- Let's get rocking. - [Kayla] We gotta go.
[Dustin] Yeah.
- Rock and roll. - Let's do it.
[narrator] Dustin will leave in just 24 hours.
The decision to take three crew out at such a crucial point in the season
is a massive gamble.
[Dustin] It's time for something new.
I'm not abandoning this place because there is tons of gold here.
I just need to see if there's better, easier, gold bearing areas.
And if I don't go now, I will see it under a huge blanket of snow.
It's, kind of, terrible timing because, uh, we have hit bedrock
at my site, so.
It's really hard pill to swallow
to walk away from it at this point.
But I think it would be even harder
to swallow the fact that,
if that hole doesn't get done,
we aren't gonna hit better out this year.
So those guys really need keep pushing.
I just fill in wherever I need to be filling in.
They need another diver
or if they need a just a tender.
I'm happy to be back,
this is like old home to me.
[laughs heartily]
Crushing it, man. [grunts]
[narrator] Up ahead...
[exclaims]
[bleep]
Camper down. Camper down.
- [Kayla] Are you okay? - Yeah, I think I broke my arm.
Oh, boy.
I need a about 40 feet of that cable.
[narrator] At their new dive site,
The Dogeleg,
Dustin is preparing to leave
in search of additional gold claims
in Valdez.
Everything's looking great,
the guys are putting up kind of a skyline.
[Wes] We're not gonna pull rock through this skyline,
it's strictly to pick our dredge up.
This particular area right here is the Dogeleg.
The water can come up so fast on this,
if we didn't pick our dredge out of the water everyday,
it could come up overnight
and we would seriously lose our dredge for sure.
[Dustin] Come on, let's go!
[narrator] Winter fast approaching.
Dustin's crew need to get all the equipment
up and running.
If they are to increase their fifty-thousand dollar gold haul.
We are in a hurry.
We need to get in this water.
We're trying to beat out mother nature.
Right now the water is as low as ever it will be.
And this water will come up.
This place floods.
This is a waterfall right there.
Another waterfall right here.
If you go out...
I don't know if you would survive that
fall right here.
[Carlos] Right thing to go on this, believe it or not.
I think the gold is on the surface.
I see all these little boulders.
I guarantee, they're just hiding right underneath them.
[Wes] Yeah, this makes a pretty good hitch.
This looks pretty good,
I mean this is gonna be a tough dig, but,
man, could it be fruitful.
[Carlos] All right. She's all yours.
[Wes] As long as we can get ten feet over the water,
I think we'll be all right.
I'm pretty sure we're gonna have good height there, dude.
- That's gonna work out. - Oh, yeah.
- That's pretty high, dude. - It is, that's gonna work.
[narrator] Now, Carlos needs to test the cable.
- [Wes] You want to hook on to this? - [Carlos] Yeah.
[narrator] And safely return to the other side of the creek.
[Carlos grunts]
[James shouting] Wait! Wait! Wait! No! No! No!
[Carlos] Oh! What are you talking about?
[all laughing]
[continues laughing]
[James] I'm sorry!
Sorry!
I'm just playing!
He needs to turn around this way.
[Wes] No, I think that will work. That's what I'd do.
There you go.
[Wes cheering]
[Dustin] So, fellas, skyline's up.
- Wes and I are out tomorrow. - [Carlos] Sure.
What I need to be done by the time I get back,
is I need that dredge hanging off of this line.
No problem.
- Fully ready to go. - Yeah.
- All right. - Got it?
- Got it. - Got it.
We'll be done when you get back.
[Dustin] I trust you guys.
I gotta pack up.
[Carlos] Skyline's up.
Only thing we gotta do now is
get the dredge up there.
While Wes and Dustin is gone,
me and James gonna make sure
Dogeleg is ready to dive
as soon as they come back.
[Dustin] It's obviously snowing on the top of the mountains right now.
Once this place is frozen,
we have to bail, 'cause it's too dangerous.
We will dig in this hole,
'cause I need some gold.
[Scott] Kayla and I are back in the water today.
I'm not coming out for a very, very long time.
[Kayla] The pressure is on, we need to get this hole finished.
And with me leaving
to go sample those new claims,
we're trying to get as much done as possible today
before I have to go.
[narrator] Kayla's now down to twenty feet.
And could hit bed rock gold at any minute.
Alongside Scott, she has one day to dredge
before leaving to prospect Valdez.
- Divers hear each other right now? - [Kayla] Yes.
- [Mark] You gotta copy, Scott? - [Scott] Copy.
All right, if your water's good, you're all hooked up,
your ready to get in.
[heavy breathing]
[Scott] Into work.
[water sloshing]
[narrator] Kayla's dive hole is massive.
Approaching twenty by twenty feet on the bottom.
It's the same footprint as a two car garage.
- [Kayla] Go? - [Mark] Yep. You're good to go.
[narrator] The water running clear,
conditions are perfect to dredge all day
for bed rock gold.
[Kayla] Gonna start dredging now.
Hopefully there's a nice gold in the box at the end of the day.
The more material we can move in a day, the better.
Mr. Fred Hurt has arrived.
[Fred] How's it going?
Running like crazy.
Kayla's over there, we need dredging that side.
Scott's over here dredging.
So, we've got a blue lagoon going.
Hey, the site looks a whole lot different than when I was here.
[Mark] It looks like the chocolate river on Willy Wonka.
I love it!
[Kayla] The McKinley fondue.
[Mark laughs]
[Fred] They got a great hole dug and everything.
Moving a lot of rocks.
In the short time my boy watching their operation,
they doing great.
[machine whirring]
[Mark] Crushing it, man.
[grunts]
[exclaims]
[groans]
Oh, [bleep]. You all right?
Camper down. Camper down.
- [Kayla] Are you okay? - [Mark groans]
[Mark] Yeah, I think I broke my arm.
[exhales]
[Fred] Oh, boy.
[Kayla] We're finally dredging.
I'm excited to see what's in the box.
[Mark] It looks like the chocolate river on Willy Wonka.
[Kayla] The McKinley fondue.
[laughs heartily]
[narrator] At House Rock,
after over four months of back breaking work.
Kayla and Scott are finally nearing bed rock gold.
[Mark] Crushing it, man.
[grunting]
[exclaims] Oh! Oh!
[groans]
Oh, [bleep]. You all right?
Camper down. Camper down.
[Kayla] Are you okay?
[Mark groans] My elbow's crushed.
I can't feel my hand.
[grunts]
Go get dried off, man. Here, let me have the controller.
[Mark] That is not how I wanted to end my day.
[Kayla] You okay?
[Mark] Yeah, I think I broke my arm.
[narrator] In need of urgent care,
Stamper is forced to leave his diver
unattended.
[Fred] What's up, Mark?
You can't move it?
I can't lift my arm up.
[Fred] Oh, boy.
Hang in there. It's gonna be all right.
Just-- if you can sit down.
- Leave it immob-- leave your arm immobile. - [Mark groans]
Now, tell me where it hurts the most.
- Right in your elbow or your arm? - My elbow.
- You all right? - I [bleep] hurt my arm bad.
- [Fred] He thinks he's gotta broken bone. - All right.
We know we're going to the clinic, we know that.
All we're trying do is get you
- in condition to be able to get you out of here. - [Mark groans]
Just a heads up, guys.
Stamper smashed his arm pretty bad,
so, I have to pull ya'll out of the water.
[Kayla] Diver coming up.
[narrator] Both divers exit the water.
Halting all progress.
[Mark exclaims] Ah!
Its right on the edge of the bone there.
Yeah, hopefully Stamper's all right.
I'm hoping maybe he just dislocated it.
They can get it back in place, but if he cracked it...
- Crazy. - I don't know what that's gonna mean.
Cool.
That's where it hurts.
[narrator] The film crew's medic takes over.
Can I get you to make a fist?
Cool.
[Fred] Stamper is being treated by confident medical personnel.
I've turned his care, totally over him
with his consent and with his knowledge.
[narrator] Stamper needs proper medical attention.
[Fred] Yeah, I'm coming up with you.
[narrator] But the nearest ER is forty miles away in Haines.
[Mark] This is absolutely not what I wanted.
[narrator] Kayla's goal of hitting bed rock gold
before winter hits is slipping away.
[Mark] Oh, God, I can't push up with my leg.
[Kayla] Hopefully, it's not too serious,
because if he broke something in his elbow,
he's not gonna be able to dive the rest of the season.
Whether or not he's even gonna be able to come back and work,
that's gonna be up to him.
[Mark] Oh, boy...
[Kayla] That couldn't have happened at a worse time.
With me going out of town to sample new claims,
my crew's gonna be down one crew member.
It's really frustrating to be at this point.
We've put so much work into this site.
We've gotten very little gold out of it.
If we're not finding gold, I can't keep it up,
because I gotta pay my bills
and no gold, no bills.
[Mark] I hope that's not the last time I see that mountain.
[Wes] Valdez! We made it, guys.
[narrator] On the next Gold Rush White Water.
[Dustin] The possibility of gold is huge.
[Kayla] Most people would think it's difficult.
- But we're crazy. - [exclaims] [bleep]
[bleep]
Move! Move! Move! Move!
[Fred] I'm rooting 'em to get to the bottom.
So we can get some gold.
Holy [bleep].
[Wes] She's a [bleep] beast, man.
- [Dustin] I know, dude. - [Wes] That's all I can say.
[Kayla] I got gold already.
[man] Can I see a piece of gold?
- Now if that don't get you [bleep] excited. - That does!
[cheers]