Hey, I'm dropping dirt right now.
Drop it like it's hot, baby.
[narrator] With 482 ounces of gold mined so far...
I'm feeling good. This is what it was supposed to be like.
[narrator] ...the Hoffmans are pushing both plants
to hit 1,000 ounces.
[Todd] I need paydirt, I need it right now.
[Hunter] The ancient riverbed pay is almost done.
[narrator] After discovering rich new paydirt...
-[Todd] The narrows are dull. -[man] Oh, my gosh.
We got a lot of ore in it.
[narrator] ...and hitting a jackpot cleanout.
-Yeah, man. Yeah. -Suck it.
This is a lot of gold.
[narrator] The team faces a challenge
that could put their 1,000 ounce gold out of reach.
Uh-oh.
-We have a problem. It's bad. -[Todd over radio] Damn it.
[narrator] With the Holy Roller hemorrhaging money...
[Andy] It's about 5,000 an hour. It could be down.
We need to stay running.
[narrator] And just a few weeks left...
We just don't have a lot of time.
It's a real pain in the ass.
[narrator] The pressure's on Hunter to step up.
[Hunter] If they're not running, it hurts everybody.
[narrator] Can he rise to the challenge?
[Hunter] We need to crank through this as fast as we can.
[Hudson] Pick up the slack.
[narrator] But will the Hoffmans fall short?
This was a mistake.
[dramatic music playing]
So far, the Black Pearl's been crushing it.
Last week, we got more gold than the Holy Roller.
And, uh, we hit our goal for the week.
So, we're coming off a big win
and I'm hoping we do it again.
[Todd] Let's do it, baby.
[Hunter] All the work we put in is finally paying off,
not only for us but for everybody as a team.
I really want to win, but also, I want my dad to win
and I want everybody to win.
These guys deserve a win.
Both plants are going right now
and that's really what we need.
[rock music playing]
[Todd] I'm feeling good about things.
This is really what it was supposed to be like.
We got two plants running head to head,
which is, you know what, actually a really good thing.
The, uh, two plants that are actually one covering for the other.
Hunter beat us last week.
This week, I think it's going to be ours.
We're just gonna run a ton of yardage and figure this out.
[narrator] The goal in mining is to reach your best yard-per-hour ratio.
Running more yards and paydirt each hour leads to more gold.
But there's always a limit depending on the type of paydirt
and what the wash plant can handle.
[Todd] So, right now, I guarantee you
we're actually getting a lot of gold every hour.
Back on track.
I'm watching the sluice box the whole time
and if you overload it, blind it over, you're gonna lose gold.
It's scary because you look in there and you're like,
"Am I losing gold into my sluice box?"
And every time, it's like, "No, I'm not."
So, take it up a notch, Todd.
You're at 120 yards an hour.
Hundred-thirty, 150.
Now I'm at 200 yards an hour.
I'm going way faster than the Black Pearl.
At the end of the year, man, it's the yarder's game.
How many yards are you going to pump through this thing?
[soft guitar music playing]
[wolf howling]
-[bear grunts] -[bleep]
[Todd] That's a big bear.
[Rob] He's coming this way.
[Andy] Boy. [bleep] He's checking us out, dude.
[Todd] He's right [bleep] there.
[Todd] [bleep] He's coming over the hill.
We have our fox den right here
straight across and they have
mom and dad fox and five little, little pups.
It's kind of scary, you know, just out of the blue.
Here comes a grizzly bear out of-- middle of nowhere
to take out our whole little fox family.
Jack ain't having any of that.
There's always things we're running into up here in Alaska,
but, you know, having a bear just rush into camp like that,
it just reminds us
that, uh, Mother Nature really is in charge.
-[radio beeps] -[Todd] Andy, you got a copy?
[Andy over radio] Yeah. It's not safe right now
for guys to be walking around.
-[radio beeps] -[Todd] Stay in your truck.
[Andy over radio] Be tough.
We should probably move everybody back.
[Jack] We've had encounters with a few bears up here
and if they start coming towards you or into your camp,
you better be prepared.
They will attack you.
And you got to be super cautious.
A good bear is a bear that runs away from you.
-[radio beeps] -[Hunter] Hey, Dad.
Be careful.
[Hunter] It's right in that creek bottom.
[Jack] Sometimes, you have to fire a couple of shots in the air...
[gunshots]
...to make it safe for the miners and for the bear.
Sometimes, the bear is smart enough to take off.
[Todd] Stay in your truck.
We need to get this bear out of here so we can get to work.
He doesn't want to leave. He's hungry.
The bear was right here.
Seen it right here. Well, it crossed the ridgetop
and it came down across where the rock trucks...
It's probably 75, 50 yards from the trucks
and then it went chased it, came back up the hill.
Now, it's coming back towards camp across the road.
He probably smells kitchen grease and all of our breakfast
and everything else. The suckers can smell two miles away.
[Todd] It's kinda scary right now.
It brings it back to reality. We're in the middle of nowhere.
And, uh, these bears are serious and they're very, very hungry.
[gunshot]
[Todd] There he goes.
We got a job to do, they got a job to do,
and hopefully, we can all get along.
It looks like the bear's safely gotten away
and we can get back to work.
Okay, let's get them going.
[dramatic music playing]
[Andy] Fire up the Black Pearl.
[motor starts]
[Todd] Last week, we finally got over 100 ounces for the first time.
And now, we're seeing some great goals.
Okay, let's fire this thing up.
[engine starts]
Randy, fire up the pump.
These new cuts that we're getting
the gold out of, from Dahl and Northport.
Right now, it's super encouraging.
It looks like our goal is actually reachable.
[Jack] Right now, we are running good.
The name of the game in mining is yardage.
Yeah, and so if we want to get to our gold,
we just gotta keep running.
And Todd's even dragged me down to run the plant.
By the end of the season,
we have to have the gold.
[dramatic music playing]
[bleep]
We have a problem.
Splitter's leaking.
There's a bunch of gold underneath the, uh, sluice box right now.
A lot of it.
We're gonna have to shut the trommel off.
Idle the generator down.
Hey, Randy?
-Do you have a copy? -[radio beeping]
Tater, you on this channel?
Do you want to come up here for a second? We have a problem.
[radio beeping]
[engine whirring]
[engine stops whirring]
Uh-oh.
[Hunter] What's going on?
That's looking like, uh...
They're having some sort of a problem with their sluice or their shoot
or something like that,
which is not good.
Hopefully, it's not something that's been going on all day,
'cause that can be catastrophic.
Come over and look at this.
Now, look over here.
-[Andy] Oh. -[Rob] What do you see?
[bleep]
[Rob] Bunch of gold underneath it?
Starts up here.
You see it underneath the splitter right here.
[Andy] It's hitting the back of the hydraulics and coming down.
So, there might be a hole.
[Rob] Yup, there's a hole right there.
-[Andy] It's a hole? -[Rob] Inside... Yeah, there's a hole.
[Andy] Son of a gun.
We got a leak, Jack.
Is that what went wrong?
[Rob] Duck down. Watch your feet.
We've been washing gold down the hole all day.
[Jack] Oh, no.
[Rob] We're trying to get the lid off.
Step number one, don't get fingers caught in it.
[Rob] We're going to need the 360 and a chain and a shackle.
Pull this off.
We are shut down, not catching any more gold.
The splitter's got a hole in it and is leaking
behind the sluice box and down on the ground.
So, we got to get it fixed 'cause we can't run it like that.
You're just throwing away gold.
We're not running till it's fixed
and we're not making any money.
So, we need to get her done now.
[dramatic music playing]
[engine starts]
Turn ends right there.
It's right exactly where you'd expect it to,
where all the material goes.
[narrator] The Holy Roller trommel connects to the splitter,
which connects to the sluice box.
The purpose of the splitter is to evenly spread out the water flow
that travels into the sluice box
so as to avoid paydirt bunching up and collecting in pockets.
But a hole has developed at the bottom of the splitter on the right side
causing gold-bearing material to leak out onto the ground
instead of being caught in the sluice box.
When the trommel's running and we're putting material through it,
all the larger material comes out the end.
Everything half inch and smaller
comes down through this splitter,
the water and sand, and small rocks like this.
And it comes around here, and as you can see,
it wears really heavily right here.
It comes around and goes through there.
Yeah, um, looks like there's something wrong with the Holy Roller,
with the shoot or sluice or something.
[Todd over radio] What happened?
I don't know. The Holy Roller's got an issue.
Their pump's not on. Damn it.
They shut down. There's some sort of a leak going on.
I think they have a hole in the splitter or something.
[Hudson] Now, they've made a lot of snarky little comments
to us about our issues,
but I'm not going to say anything to them, though.
So, I want to treat them how I'd like to be treated.
We have a common goal, it's to get gold.
And it's never good when anybody breaks down.
[Hunter] It hurts everybody.
So, we'll just, uh, we'll figure out what the problem is,
hopefully get it fixed.
See if we can get some more pay
and I'll help relieve their workload a little bit
and, uh, we'll just go out until we get it done.
Right now, literally, we can't even afford to shut down for an hour
if we can help it.
Even though we're in competition with the Holy Roller.
I'm going to step up and try to fill that gap a little bit
because if we don't get to 1,000 ounces, it screws all of us.
So, uh, we're going to keep hammering away
and just make sure that our plant doesn't break down.
[Jack sighs] I wish I would've caught this earlier. Well...
Who would know?
[radio beeping]
Can you tell Todd and Andy we need to see them down at the trommel
at the Holy Roller, please?
[radio beeps]
[Todd over radio] You want me down there? What's going on?
I need you at the trommel, the Holy Roller, right now. It's bad.
[Todd over radio] Damn it. Um, okay.
So, I guess we got some work to do.
[Jack] Son of a biscuit.
[Rob over radio] Hey, Todd, I need you at the trommel,
the Holy Roller, right now. It's bad.
So, something bad happened to the plant.
Either something blew up or something broke. I don't know.
Problem is, Tater sounded actually a little freaked out.
That's never good.
[Hunter] The Holy Roller's got an issue.
If they're not running, it hurts everybody.
Hopefully, they get it fixed,
and in the meantime, we'll see if we can get some more pay
and I'll help relieve the work load a little bit
and we'll just go at it.
You know, I just hope that my dad sees that
even though, you know, things aren't going well,
that uh, he can depend on me.
That's a little... watch out.
[Todd clears throat]
-[Andy] We got two holes. -[groans]
[Rob] And it's dumping it on the ground.
Bunch of gold underneath the sluice box right now.
[Todd] That was some of the best paydirt we had.
How long do you think it's been leaking?
Uh, I'd probably say, by the looks of it, five-six hours?
-God! -[Rob] The problem is, that's our good one.
This is the side that catches most of the gold.
And then there's a great big hole on the other side now, too.
[Todd] Look at this.
-[Rob] Really bad. -[Todd] God dang it.
If you look at the total,
we're only out about 500 ounces.
It's gonna take another 500 ounces
to reach our goal, and, uh...
Luckily the Black Pearl is running,
or we wouldn't even have any chance of-of reaching that goal at all.
[Rob] We need to get all that we can, pick back up,
-and regroup. -We-- we do not have half a day,
this was a mistake.
A big hit, right there. Big hit.
All right, here's the deal,
the potential loss here is probably between 20 and 25,000 bucks.
And to be honest with you, we did not catch it fast enough.
Could've caught it when it just happened.
So, yes, we are very confident
in this plant and in this box,
but these shoots are used.
Somebody in Colorado ran these things
and you can't always tell how thin the metal is.
We're running so much sand
it just eats away at the steel.
That's like sand paper, we're sand paper-ing all this metal.
-[Todd] So... -[Rob] Yeah.
You think we could patch it?
[Rob] Hopefully.
How about just weld it over the top for now?
The right fix would be to cut the bottom section where it's worn out
-help welding it lower. -We don't have time for that.
-We're gonna have to... -[Rob] We don't have time for that.
-...band-aid this thing-- -[Rob] We're gonna do that and then silicon around it.
[Todd] Guys, we cannot have this happen again.
Somebody get out and look around,
because if this happens again,
it could just be the difference, right?
But it might not be 20-25,000 it could be a lot worse.
It's a lesson that...
Just gotta walk around the sucker every once in a while.
[Todd] This needs to be a wake-up call for everybody.
We cannot lose our train of thought on this.
Yeah.
[Andy] We've obviously leaked material out on the ground,
and uh, it's frustrating, you know, you...
[scoffs]
It just seems like every time we turn around, there's another problem.
It's easy to get complacent when everything's working right.
And it was a little bitty hole,
but a little bitty hole, gold goes right through it.
So, what do you do?
You fix it and you move on.
Okay, you guys grab the steel,
we're gonna get all the clean-up stuff in here,
we'll pull these out, we'll get that welded up,
and hopefully, we can hit it again in the morning.
-Huh? -[Andy] Yeah.
-All right? -Yup.
The sun was out,
we're running, our flags are flying, we're both getting gold,
really good paydirt today,
we ran on, probably 3,000 yards between the two of us and...
It's one of those days where you just think,
"Man, this-this day couldn't be any more perfect",
and then...
You remember, it's gold mining
and something's gonna freaking happen,
and yeah, sure enough, it did to us.
It's up to Hunter to keep us in the game
while we make this fix.
[radio beeping]
[Hunter] We need to crank through this pay as fast as we can.
You know...
[Todd speaking over radio]
10-4, thank you.
[Rob] [bleep] Todd.
-[Todd] What? -[Rob] Have another hole right here.
[Rob groans]
[Todd] We need to do that whole front edge.
We need to cut a bunch of that flat bar.
Our sluice box has three totally different holes in it.
Three spots that have holes.
This problem with this plant isn't any one person's fault.
We just need to check this thing more often.
Maybe make some time in the day to stop and look at it.
But, uh we do need to catch problems like that a lot sooner,
'cause you blow gold down the ground,
I mean, why even bother mining it?
I'm gonna take that first patch I did off.
And we'll just run a flat bar.
-Flat bar, flat bar and flat bar. -Flat bar everything.
Well, I'm gonna get what we have to do tonight, tonight.
-Okay. -Ron's on his way.
Good.
[beeping]
[machine whirring]
[Ron] We are fabricating some reinforcement plates
to take up this worn area.
We're going to blend them in real nice
so they don't affect the flow.
We got a little bit of mess going here.
The whole site shut down.
We'll deal with it properly, take our time.
We're planning to work until we're done.
It's gonna be a late night.
What'd you find, Mr. Ron?
It's a 5-inch.
-[Rob] Oh, that's perfect. -Got a choice...
-One eighth to quarter inch. -[Rob] Quarter inch.
All right, I'll chisel this piece off.
Fire in the hole.
[narrator] To repair the multiple holes,
in the Holy Roller splitter
the crew will use leftover steel plates
and weld them to the splitter to plug the leak.
We should weld this first, right off the hot.
And then weld the face into it and blend it in.
[Todd] We're uh, between a rock and a hard place.
We can't just run down to the store and go grab these kinda parts,
everything's custom.
We gotta actually just take pieces of steel,
try to band-aid this together.
If these plates aren't welded on
and put in place just right,
it could cause more problems.
Last year, we were just putting band-aids on band-aids,
but what worries me is that we're here again.
So hopefully, these band-aids work and these welds hold,
because more time we're down, more money we lose.
[Todd] How we looking Tater-tot?
[Rob] Good, what do you think?
Armor plating.
Good job.
Stay with it.
Yo, I don't care how long it takes,
we gotta run in the morning.
[Rob] Will do, buddy...
It's a real pain in the ass.
But if we have to stay up all night, we'll get her done.
We'll get her running tomorrow.
Can't afford to not run.
It really is a pain in my ass.
[Hunter] All right.
Clear!
Fire in the Black Pearl. Everybody clear.
[man] Yeah, Rob.
[exhales sharply]
So it's the next day after the Holy Rollers issue.
They're still, uh, getting everything wrapped up, but...
right now, the Black Pearl crew is killing it, man.
Knock on wood, uh,
we have another good day of running.
That's an advantage of us having two plants.
So far, this thing is, uh,
been pretty reliable for us.
[Ron grunts]
[Rob] We got the splitter last night.
Welded back together,
piece is welded in.
So it doesn't leak anymore.
And so, we can, uh, go back to business as usual.
[Randy] Todd said that it was about 5000 an hour to be down.
Unfortunate for us, we just don't have that downtime.
We need to stay running.
All right.
Think we've got her.
-Clear? -[man 2] All clear.
[machines whirring]
[Todd] We're back in business and that's what we need.
We'll be running pay dirt here in about two minutes.
So it took all night,
but we got the Holy Roller back up and running
the splitter is fixed for now.
But I'm actually worried about our weigh in,
with all these shutdowns and breakdowns.
But you know what, we're just gonna have to see.
[Andy] Get everybody in, uh?
This is gonna really slow things down, so,
but yeah, we gotta do it.
[Todd] It's gonna cost us time and money, but...
we really don't have a choice.
I'm gonna call everybody.
Everybody meet at the dome, we got something...
we gotta shift gears.
[man 3 over radio] 10-4.
[man 4] What do you think this is about?
[Hunter] I don't know.
Probably... something not good.
[man 4] Add it to the list.
Per usual.
Little tired to come up for a meeting, and...
We'll see-- we'll see what's going on.
[Todd] Hey, guys.
Bad news.
From the Army Corp of Engineers
it seems that pretty much no reclamation has been done
on this creek.
And the Army Corp has say on every mine
up here in Alaska.
They have the power to shut us down if we don't do it.
Everybody previous to us,
has never done any reclamation on this creek.
So we gotta stop everything.
It's all hands on deck.
[narrator] Mine reclamation reverses the impact of surface mining
by restoring the area to its natural state.
In order to accomplish this,
the team will move tons of top soil,
and grade the area,
and return vegetation
that will restore the area to its native habitat.
[man 5] How much reclamation?
[Todd] Almost 14 acres.
Which is the-- a pretty big chunk.
[Andy] Everything that's been open,
needs to be reclamated.
And to put organics back on top.
It's like, basically doing it twice.
That's a lot of work.
And it's gonna cost us a lot of money.
And I know it's a step back and we're already behind,
but if we wanna be in good standing with Army Corp,
we're gonna have to do it.
How many days are we down doing this?
[Todd] Maybe a week? I don't know.
-A week? -[man 6] That's not--
We don't have a lot of weeks left
and if it's gonna take a week,
it's gonna put us even farther behind.
I don't think we can stop what we're doing for a full week.
[Todd] Hey, guys.
Bad news.
From the Army Corp of Engineers,
it seems that pretty much no reclamation has been done
on this creek.
And the Army Corp has say on every mine
up here in Alaska.
They have the power to shut us down if we don't do it.
I don't think we can stop what we're doing for a full week.
That's a lot of time and a lot of money to do that.
If both crews stop to do the reclamation,
it's just gonna put us way behind.
We're never gonna make it to a 1000 ounces, so.
The young guys, uh,
we're gonna have to take it on the chin,
and just try to bust this stuff out as fast we can
and get it reclamated.
Right now, this is the only way we can stay on target, so.
It is what it is.
You guys wanna bust-- bust butt
and get it done in three, four days?
Hey, I'm with you.
But you use Andy and follow his lead.
Andy's done reclamation before,
and his experience is gonna be a big help for Hunter's team.
This is where we're at.
[Andy] Just gotta put everybody in machines,
let's, uh, start hauling some dirt.
Get the organics back on there.
Get this done as quick as we can.
[Andy] All right, let's get to work.
[Todd] For us to continue with the dream,
we had to finish this.
And right now I feel like, we got a really good plan.
I am super proud of these guys.
Everybody, Hudson,
start going through your checklists on the truck.
[Hunter grunts] Oh, God.
[Todd] You know, this is what being a leader is all about.
Step up, figure out what that problem is and solve it.
That's part of his development as a leader.
He needs to do this.
[Hunter] I'm trying to do what's best for our team,
not just for myself and so,
I'm learning a lot about being a leader and...
I gotta put my pride to the side and...
It is what it is.
We just gotta get her done now.
[narrator] To complete the reclamation requirements,
Hunter and his team need to reclaim 14 acres across the mine.
Hunter will take the six acres at Quartz Creek
while Cub will restore the three acres over lower Dahl Creek.
And Dakota will replenish five acres of upper Dahl.
But the first step of the reclamation process
begins with the loading of organic materials into the rock trucks.
[Andy speaking]
[Dakota speaking]
[Andy speaking]
[Dakota] It's getting tougher and tougher.
Just little setbacks like these reclamation deals,
with being so late in the year,
it's just more of a hurdle for us.
It seems like, kind of the goal's getting out of reach, but...
we'll just keep pushing through it.
It's all we can do.
[Todd] I just gotta hand it to the guys.
This has been very, very difficult, but...
at the end of the day, we wanna get a 1000 ounces.
So if we can keep the Holy Roller running,
there's a possibility that we can hit that goal.
I don't know if we have any other choice.
So I think it's actually...
pretty admirable of my son
and hopefully we can...
you know, make up some of that--
some of that ground that we've lost.
[Andy] Nico and Dakota are just loading this place up.
They're knocking it out of the ball park.
It's time for the rock truckers
and dirt can't get where it needs to go.
[Dakota] You got it.
[Todd speaking]
[Andy speaking]
Everyday we're not running is really bad.
We have to be running like, at least 12 hours a day.
Because every hour matters.
So, one little hiccup is gonna...
cost us a lot.
[Hudson speaking]
[Andy] Hey, you need to put a few more loads up on your right.
That hill there.
Like, about six loads.
I can already see 'em.
Yeah.
[narrator] As the rock trucks deliver their loads to all three sites...
-[Andy] Straight back. -[beeping]
Keep coming, keep coming.
[narrator] Andy is hard at work
on the second stage of the reclamation process.
Prepping the ground for the incoming ridge top soil.
[Andy] Stop.
Perfecto.
[Andy] We're actually doing a lot of reclamation here today
on ground that previous miners have mined.
They left, went bankrupt, and never did it.
[Andy] Hey, Mike.
[Mike over radio] Yes, sir.
See that little glass bottle on the side of the road there?
Put a few piles in there and then you're good.
[Mike over radio] 10-4, I'll do that.
We've always done reclamation.
We like putting the ground back.
Not just, uh, stripping it and leaving it a mess.
What it does is just you take and you strip off
all of the top soils,
getting down to the pay dirt,
and-- and then, you stock pile it.
You leave it out to the edges.
But you come back and you just spread that back over the vegetation.
And because this ground is frozen,
once it becomes spot out,
um, it comes to life.
The seeds germinate.
And they re-vegetate all the area that's been disturbed, so.
That's what we're here to do.
[man 7] It's now up to the Holy Roller and the old guys
to get us to our goal.
[man 8] Nice work.
[Todd] The Holy Roller, she's really running good.
We got lucky. There's no leak.
And thanks to Hunter, we're gonna keep running.
[narrator] At Upper Dahl Creek,
Hunter is beginning the third step of the reclamation process.
[engine starts]
Spreading the organic top soil.
[Hunter] All of us are down here today, reclamating.
We got Hudson and Sparky hauling top soil to me
with, uh, organic material in it.
And we're spreading that all over the top
to make sure that all this stuff grows back.
It's a little frustrating to have to do this right now,
because we're already really behind.
None of us wanna be reclamating today.
We wanna all be, you know,
working toward getting more pay.
It's really time-consuming and-- and, uh,
it's not easy, but, uh,
it's the right thing to do.
It's slowing us down, it's costing us money,
it's costing us a lot of time, but...
this is how it goes, man.
It's another--
another roadblock that we're having to deal with, but...
you just have to like,
keep a good out look and-- and---
keep pushing.
We just gotta get it done.
If gold mining was easy, everybody'd be doing it.
[narrator] Three days into the reclamation.
[Todd speaking over radio]
[Andy speaking]
[Todd speaking over radio]
[Andy] We're doing great.
That looks good, in my opinion.
We're close.
[Todd speaking over radio] 10-4.
[narrator] Hunter and his team have almost completed the job.
[Todd] It's pretty exciting.
We got gold in the box, I guarantee you.
And with Andy helping these young guys,
they've got the reclamation put to bed.
It's actually a really, really good feeling
when you all work as a team and get stuff done.
[Hunter speaking]
At the end of the day,
we're all supposed to be on the same team, you know?
So, we're just gonna keep doing our thing,
get back to it and keep the vision
and keep pressing forward.
[Andy speaking]
[Todd speaking over radio]
That's it. Think we got reclamation done.
That looks good.
This time next year, this should all be lush green.
[Todd] We're gonna pull the box,
get it up to Jack and Jim and, uh,
we'll see what we got.
-[Todd] See this edge? -[man 9] Mmm-hmm?
[Todd] Straight that out.
[Todd] Hopefully we can make up some of that ground that we've lost
with the reclamation.
[man 10] That's where the gold is.
If it isn't good, we're screwed.
[man 11] Guys, look at that nugget!
-Hi. -[man 12 laughs]
[Todd] So my team has a lot of issues [laughs] out here,
in the wilds of Alaska.
But guess what?
So does our camera crew.
[man 13] Oh!
See that camera guy?
Yeah, well, you're not supposed to, okay?
-[Todd] See the angles on 'em? -[man 14] Yep.
[Todd] Weird.
[man 15] Woah, [bleep].
-[man 16] You all right? -[man 17 speaking]
-[man 16] Yeah? -[man 17] Yep.
[Todd] Now I know why he wears all the gear.
[man 15 speaking]
[Jim] Dude, grabbing two nuggets at a time back here.
[Jack] Oh, yeah, there you go.
[Jim] Crazy.
[narrator] After numerous delays and shutdowns
due to reclamating the land,
a troublesome bear sighting,
and major repairs on Holy Roller's sluice box,
[Jack] Whoo!
[narrator] Jack and Thurber do the cleanup for both wash plants,
hoping they made their 104 ounce weekly goal.
[Jim] This is from the narrows of Dahl Creek.
And, uh, we're seeing a lot more nuggets.
We got all day to do this cleanup.
We'll take whatever time we can
to do the best job that can be possibly done.
This gold room is pretty famous for not losing gold.
We're really sure we're close to a source.
Just 'cause of the condition of the nuggets.
[narrator] Smooth gold nuggets with rounded edges
indicate the gold has travelled and eroded over time.
By contrast,
jagged gold nuggets indicate a closer proximity
to their lucrative source
where the gold hasn't travelled
and had an opportunity to erode.
[Jim] Someday, we'll get to the source, and [laughs]
That's what we're always hoping for.
I guess, [laughs] that's all that keeps you going sometimes,
is hope.
But, uh, we'll see.
[laughs] That little scale over there does not lie.
You can dream, you can predict.
It's gonna tell you the truth.
So, we'll see how it goes.
[Todd] Tough week for everybody.
We needed to switch gears and do reclamation.
Not something that I saw coming at all.
In order to keep the good rapport with the Army Corp of Engineers,
which is really important,
we had to do it.
And we wanna do the right thing,
and we cleaned up a lot of other people's mess.
Let's be honest, the can got kicked down the road.
And if we tried to kick it one more time,
we would not have a future on this mine.
And so I feel like,
that was the best move,
even though it didn't make anybody happy.
[Hunter] I mean, we just weren't left with any other choice.
It's what we had to do.
And we've always done everything by the book.
So, it is what it is.
[Todd] If you hadn't stepped up on the reclamation,
and got that done,
we probably wouldn't have anything to weigh.
So, thank you.
I'm proud of you for that.
Way to go. Good job, everybody.
And hopefully, we can get little bit of gold this week, [laughs] but...
-Yeah. -My clean up did not look very good
coming out of the box.
[Todd] Especially since we were down because of the sluice box.
[man 18] Yeah.
Alright, let's call it.
Alright, you guys.
-[man 19 coughs] -Who's going first?
Winners go first.
[Jack laughs]
Just wanted to get that again that we won last week.
Yeah, that's fine.
-[Hunter] That's why we're going first. -That's good...
-[Todd] Don't get used to it. -Black Pearl won.
Don't get used to it, you guys.
[Todd] Okay. Someone count it off?
Five...
-[Sparky] Ten... -[Jack] Oh, it's getting really light.
-I'll probably win this one. -Twenty...
Thirty...
[Jim] 30.15.
[Todd sighs] Oh, well.
Well, I guarantee you
we're not gonna make up the difference
to 100 and something. [laughs]
There's no way, but 30's weak.
Okay. Here we go.
[Sparky] It's looking a little bit lightweight.
Twenty.
[Jack] Not quiet, there's 20.
Twenty...
[Jim] Oh.
-[Jack] All right. -[Todd] Thirty...
-[Todd] Thirty-five, 36... -[Jack] That's 34, that's 35.
[Todd] Thirty-seven.
[Jack] Wow.
You know what, we beat you guys,
but it's still a bad week for everybody.
[Jack] You're still both losers.
Now what's our weekly average?
Now we have to get 112.
112 ounces.
So it's stepping up,
but you know, we had some work we had to get done, so.
[narrator] This week, the Hoffman's produced a total of 67 ounces of gold.
Bringing their running tally up to 549.
The Hoffman's now need 451 more ounces of gold,
to reach their season goal of 1000 ounces.
This would've been a great week.
I mean, after we broke a 100 last week,
I was thinking, "Okay.
We're gonna start picking up the pace."
Obviously, we lost multiple days.
I didn't expect it to be great.
[Jack] Don't feel bad, you know,
we're all in the same soup together.
Don't get discouraged.
You got a lot to look forward to.
[Todd] Thank you, Dad.
We got a huge week.
Let's get some rest and let's head out in the morning, okay?
All right, let's go.