Narrator: in north...
I'm ready for a good season.
Narrator:
...and south america...
Gonna come out of this jungle
with a pile of gold.
...there's a modern-day
gold rush in full swing.
Yeah!
They can always say he died
doing what he wanted to do.
Narrator: down in guyana,
the hoffman crew continues
Their uphill battle
against the jungle...
[Bleep] the most ridiculous soil
I've ever been around.
...and todd heads back
to the states.
I need you to have 20 ounces
while I'm gone.
In the klondike...
...parker schnabel
is firing on all cylinders,
Running more pay dirt
than ever...
The viking even had a bit
of a smile on his face.
Narrator: ...but discovers
he's losing gold.
And in alaska,
father and son butt heads
In the glory hole...
We're gonna fill it up.
Again with this [bleep]?
Fred sees a disaster
waiting to happen.
Fred: a big rock falling
from 50, 75 feet up
Could just annihilate somebody.
Narrator:
...while dustin sees the bedrock
gold they have hunted...
I've spent so much time
looking for this.
...for three long years.
Whoo! This is
a game changer, fred.
-- Captions by vitac --
www.vitac.com
Captions paid for by
discovery communications
In the jungles of guyana,
The hoffman crew is a month and
a half into their mining season,
And they've yet to run
a single yard of dirt.
Dodge:
nothing's ever easy, is it?
Always seem to have
a little bit of a battle.
Narrator: todd hoffman
has just dropped a bombshell.
He's heading home to his family,
Leaving dave turin to run
their struggling operation.
I got to go see my family.
I got to leave.
On his way out,
todd asks the impossible.
I need you to have 20 ounces
while I'm gone.
You know where we're at
money-wise. It's not good.
All right.
This has cost me
a lot more than I thought.
I don't know, todd.
I just don't know what
the ground's gonna give us.
Yeah, dave, you know, that
Okay.
We'll give it our best shot.
Jack, you know we will.
Enjoy the family.
Narrator:
for the last six weeks,
The jungle has fought
the hoffman crew
Every step of the way.
Whoa, whoa!
Probably the hardest, most
scariest thing we've ever done.
Narrator: they struggled just to
get their wash plant assembled.
Todd: we got to get money.
I want that trommel to be
running in three frickin' days.
Narrator: now the crew
is three weeks behind schedule
And losing more money every day.
Dave has to get
the plant running, and fast.
Turin:
todd and jack had to leave,
So now it's up to me
to push these guys,
And I'm gonna push them hard.
Hey!
Jack and todd left.
He wants to see at least
[Bleep]
I don't know, freddy,
if the trommel's gonna run.
This thing has been
drug over the ocean.
We've got a generator
that we've never run.
We've got good water --
I trust that.
We've got to
get this thing running.
Okay, you guys?
Let's just do this.
Narrator: their first task --
Test every part
of the wash plant.
Been down here a long time.
It's about time
to put it all together.
The plant's just turning on
one step at a time.
We'll start the generator,
and then we'll work
From the generator towards
the trommel, one at a time.
Narrator: this deep
in the south american jungle,
If anything fails,
it'll take at least a month
For replacement parts to arrive.
[ Motor sputtering ]
[ Motor turns over ]
Hey!
Step one looks good.
For too long now,
We've been floundering,
waiting for equipment.
There's no waiting now.
There's no more excuses.
It's up to us now.
Turn the breaker on, mitch!
[ Motor turns over ]
Dave, I'm gonna run
the trommel first!
Fire in the hole!
Hey!
We got rotation!
Pay dirt!
Dave!
Good! All right!
Yeah, I'm really happy
right now.
We got our generator
running.
We got all the features
of our plant running,
So we'll flip on the water here.
[ Motor turns over ]
Here it comes, dave!
Turin:
we got water, jimmy!
Happy so far.
We got her going.
Thurber: it feels good.
This is what we came here to do,
and we're doing it, finally.
[ Hissing ]
Hey.
You hear that?
It's sucking air.
Oh, no. [Bleep]
I'm running out of water.
Freddy.
We're out of water, freddy.
We got to shut her down.
Hey, andy,
shut it down.
We're out of water.
[Bleep]
shut it down.
We're shutting it down.
Trommel down.
Narrator: up north in alaska,
The "dakota" boys continue
their hunt for millions in gold
At the bottom of the glory hole.
Now 120 feet down,
Fred is convinced it's
too dangerous to go any deeper.
Fred:
we're gonna fill it up.
Again with this [bleep]?
Just cannot dig that thing
anymore.
I'm worried sick
That somebody's gonna get hit
by one of them rocks.
We're not on the same page,
you and i, at all.
Usually, we have a common goal.
We're gonna dig this hole.
A big rock falling
from 50, 75 feet up
Could just
annihilate somebody.
He's not gonna be able
to dig down here.
I disagree, but we usually
disagree on everything,
So there you go.
Do you or do you not want
to dig this?
All right.
You got two days.
Narrator: for three seasons,
the dakota boys have mined
The glory hole
to get to millions on bedrock.
If there's a pot of gold
at the bottom of this
thing, I'll find it.
Last week,
it looked like they were close.
Gold.
It's all over the place.
But digging down, they almost
lost their excavator.
Dustin: look out!
[ Clang ]
Fred:
holy [bleep] [bleep]
Now fred has given dustin
and the crew just two days
To finally reach bedrock and
what could be a massive payday.
Dustin: just in order
to make our goal, 320 ounces,
We're gonna have to find
some really good dirt.
Don't bury me, dustin.
Narrator: just six hours in,
new recruit mike mcgregor
Notices a change at the bottom
of the glory hole.
Hey, dustin, dustin.
Hey, I'm digging into some
different colored rock here.
The rock is changing.
Why don't you come down
and take a look?
All right,
I'll come check it out.
It's not round and smooth
river rock anymore.
It's jagged, hard.
I think I'm right on top
of bedrock right now.
Dustin:
hey, melody.
Dustin thinks he's just hit
bedrock down here.
If this is true,
we've got the hole defeated.
We win.
You see that piece of rock
right next to his track?
Melody: yes.
There's a whole bunch of them
coming up.
Look up here. That's all bedrock
stuff that he's chipping up.
[ Laughs ]
We did it!
That is a chunk of bedrock
right there.
We can't see it.
It's underwater.
But the evidence is clear.
We found bedrock.
Whoo! [ Chuckles ]
Narrator: dustin believes
mike has hit the bottom
Of the plunge pool
And is chipping off
chunks of bedrock.
If they are now at the base
of the ancient waterfall,
Millions in gold could be
lying just feet underwater.
The chances of this being
the bottom of the waterfall
Are phenomenal right now.
Dustin: two years,
I've been searching for this.
[ Laughs ]
What's up?
We found bedrock, fred.
Found bedrock?
The real deal.
How do you know that?
Because he's pulling it up.
He's pulling it up?
Yes.
Yeah, big chunks
of bedrock.
I want to get down there
and see what's going on.
Dustin: pretty disappointed
in fred's reaction.
He's kind of a little negative
about it.
Fred: bedrock, my a*s.
Mike says that he just hit
some bedrock down there.
I think dustin -- he's getting
all excited about it.
I've heard that story before.
He's got some
like this...
Melody: boulders.
...down there
that he's pulling up, but --
Yeah, but that could be
just pieces of stuff.
No, he's pulling up
bedrock, fred.
He's pulling up bedrock.
Maybe that's some of the stuff
that got busted off originally.
There's chunks of it everywhere.
You look -- all bedrock.
You can't dig that stuff.
You can break it.
Narrator: dustin is convinced
that mike is breaking off
Chunks of bedrock
at the bottom of the hole,
But fred thinks the rocks
were deposited there
By an ancient glacier.
If I just pick up
a piece of bedrock out
Along with other stuff,
That doesn't mean
we're on bedrock.
Melody:
wait till you see this.
He was literally
pounding in the machine,
Trying to pull up
that bedrock.
[ Clang ]
Well, you can feel that
all the way up here.
Well, he hit something
right there.
Dustin: that is a chunk
of bedrock right there.
This is a game changer,
fred.
I want to see it
for myself.
I want to see it in place,
underneath the water.
Once I see that,
then I would be convinced then.
Let's get some more material
out of that hole.
I'm gonna see
if it just maintains that
Or if that's just a fluke.
Dustin:
we've got bedrock chunks that
we're ripping off the bottom.
We'll prove it to him.
We hit bedrock at the
bottom of the falls.
Maybe we will find our fortune.
Narrator: in the klondike,
Teenage mine boss
parker schnabel
Has shut down his operation.
He suspects that his wash plant,
little blue, is losing gold.
This dirt is at the bottom
of our sluice.
I see the mats just stick out
past our riffles a little bit,
And I'm just looking to see
if we're losing any of the gold
That we really
should be catching.
Narrator: parker set a goal of
over a million dollars in gold
For his first
klondike mining season.
This isn't a little
mom-and-pop show anymore.
Narrator: his first cleanup
brought him 15.5 ounces,
Worth over $21,000...
Parker: 15.5.
Narrator: ...but now parker
needs to up his game.
Parker: in order to hit
our goals for the season,
We need better gold
than what we got last week.
It just -- that doesn't cut it.
We want our gold dropping way
up there in the first 3 feet.
We shouldn't have gold
coming down this far.
We need to figure out
what's going on
And what we're doing wrong
and how to fix it.
Narrator:
parker's sluice box is designed
To catch gold
in the first 3 feet,
But for safety,
it has an extra 20 feet
To catch any gold that may get
washed further down.
If parker finds a lot of gold
in the bottom 20 feet,
He'll know for sure
that there's a problem,
And he'll be losing gold
out the end of the sluice.
Gold.
We've got some problems.
[Bleep]
Last thing you want to do
is piss gold out.
The ground around here
has a lot of garnets,
And that's all this red stuff.
And what it looks like
is happening
Is the garnets are packing
these riffles up,
And there's no spot
for the gold to drop.
Narrator:
on the scribner creek claim,
Garnets are found
among the gold deposits.
These small stones
are causing gold
To flow right out
of the sluice box.
I don't know what to do.
[ Clang ]
[Bleep]
Maybe I'll talk to tony
and see what he thinks.
Narrator: parker calls
tony beets over to take a look.
Parker:
a lot of garnets, huh?
As owner of scribner creek,
Tony gets a 15% cut
of parker's gold.
Yeah, today
they got way worse.
See that?
If parker's losing gold,
so is tony.
Garnets.
What do you think
we're doing wrong here?
Because garnets
are almost as dense as gold,
They're settling
in the sluice box
And clogging up
parker's riffles,
Causing gold to get washed out.
The new hydraulic riffles
create vortices
That agitate both the gold
and the garnets
So that the heavier gold
will settle on the bottom
While the garnets collect
on top.
These hydraulic riffles
are kind of a gamble.
To be perfectly honest,
I'm not real excited.
Narrator:
The hoffmans' wash plant has run
out of water only 10 minutes
After running
for the first time this season.
Turin: you've got to be
kidding me. Look at this, andy.
Spinks:
you got to be kidding.
...the heck
did all of our water go?
I cannot believe
we sucked that dry.
We're in the middle
of a stinkin' rainforest,
And I don't have water.
I pray for no rain
so we can build roads
And then we don't get any rain
and I can't get enough water.
It's just the way
our year is going so far.
Narrator: to keep
their wash plant running,
The hoffmans need over 60,000
gallons of water per hour.
The small stream feeding their
wash plant just can't keep up.
I made a calculation mistake.
This ground absorbs the water
so quickly
That your streams
just don't stay up,
So it's really dependant
on the rainwater.
I'll run upstream,
see if there's any way
We can get more
water into this stream.
Narrator:
the ground around here
Is worth a staggering
$30 a yard,
But if dave can't get
a constant water supply,
They won't be able
to get to the gold.
Turin: if I don't get this
water situation resolved,
Find some water, I'm screwed.
Aha! Found it.
Perfect.
Well, the main creek
makes a big bend right here.
I could real easily
bring a excavator down here,
Three or four buckets
out of here,
And I got all the water
I could possibly handle.
Narrator:
mitch jumps in the 290 excavator
And heads into the jungle
to reroute the water.
Okay, come towards me.
Keep coming.
Good. Right there. Take a scoop.
Just pull it back there.
And then work your way
up to your left.
Keep going left,
keep going left.
There you go. That'll do it.
Good. That should take care
of our problem.
Okay, you can work your way
out of here. Okay.
Yeah, that should
double the flow.
I think we'll be okay now, fred.
Looks like I'm starting
to get some of that water.
It's gone up
about that much.
We have more water now.
Now all we got to do is let
this pond fill back up,
Start our pump,
get mining.
Narrator: up north in alaska,
Fred and dustin
are about to find out
If they're at the end
of a three-year hunt
For bedrock and glory-hole gold.
Fred:
problem is, right now, we've
got so much water coming in.
We're at the limit of our pump.
Narrator: to determine
if they are on bedrock,
Fred needs to drain the water
at the bottom of the hole.
But to do that,
he needs to lower the pump.
We could have the excavator
sitting right down there
Where the pump
is sitting.
Dustin:
it's a long way down.
Fred: with that amount of water
coming in there
And the logistics of trying
To get the water
from 100 feet down there
Up over the top
of this levee here,
That's a daunting task.
Narrator: water is pouring
into the glory hole,
Making the 120-foot-high walls
unstable,
And digging anywhere in the hole
Only the increases the risk
of a catastrophic cave-in.
Decides to roll the dice.
He'll move the pump
to see for himself
If they're finally on bedrock.
Fred:
the clock is ticking right now.
We got about three hours
before we really --
We've got to have our pump
going again,
Or this water is gonna
get out of control again.
I plan on being --
just sitting right there.
Pretty damn low.
Y'all go eat lunch
and don't watch this disaster.
All this water -- you just have
no idea what's about to happen.
Well...
Every hole you make,
Is gonna fill up
and turn into soup.
Narrator:
Flowing into the glory hole
every minute.
The walls could collapse
without warning.
Fred: scary-looking!
[Bleep] [bleep]
Yeah! Oh, well.
They can always say he died
doing what he wanted to do!
That whole area there may
just turn to nothing but mush.
Narrator:
with every bucket load,
Fred's situation
gets more precarious.
Point of no return here, folks.
I'm going very slow
to get myself --
Holy [bleep]
All right, bucket, you better
do your job and hold me up.
[Bleep] [bleep]
See if there's anything hard
down there to hold on to.
Dustin: look out!
Whoa! [Bleep]
Narrator: in alaska,
dakota fred risks catastrophe.
He needs to move the pump
deeper into the glory hole
To find out, once and for all,
if they're on bedrock gold.
I think that drop-off
is about...
From where I'm sitting.
A little slippery down here.
Narrator:
with 800 gallons of water
Pouring into the hole
every minute,
The ground under fred
could give way at any time.
Fred: got nothing to grab to.
That is some mushy [bleep]
Dustin: holy [bleep]
oh, my.
How the hell
you got down here?
Damned if I know.
What the [bleep]
are you doing?
Kind of sliding off my path here
a little bit.
I think fred's a little too
excited right now about this.
He's going for a little more
than he should.
See this [bleep]?
Oh, I don't like this.
It's not worth this.
He almost slid off
that damn hill just now.
I walked up, and he had
slid over off his pad.
Fred: dustin, I need
a little information
As to whether we could set
a pump on that or not.
You think you could lift it
sideways like that?
Yeah.
I need this to go smooth.
The water's coming up
pretty damn quick.
Fred:
dustin, when I kind of lift up,
You'd be able to push on that --
pull it out maybe?
I don't think you're
gonna be able to lift up,
to tell you the truth.
I think you're gonna come
right over.
Narrator: fred is extended out
over the hole.
The 2,000-pound water pump
could easily
Pull him and his excavator
Gold is important but not as
important as someone's life.
Gentle, fred.
Everything's gentle.
No thumps, no bumps.
I don't want you going out
any farther than that.
Fred: I don't want to move out.
I just want to go sideways.
Keep it low, low, low
so if you still have to go,
Drop this [bleep] [bleep]
if you have to.
Just real slow, man.
All right, fred,
hold up right there.
Hold up right there.
I hope that wall holds up.
Slow and steady, fred.
Come up a little bit.
Curl out.
This is the last move
of the pump, for sure.
Okay. Come on down.
It's better.
Is that gonna do it?
How does it look to you?
All right?
Fred: as long as it's close.
Yeah, it looks good here.
It's solid?
Yeah.
All right.
Pump's down another 10 feet.
I'm happy about that.
Foster:
I'm looking to, how the hell
Am I getting
back up out of here?
Narrator: the pump is finally
in place, but now fred is stuck.
To avoid disaster,
He needs to get off
the unstable ground fast.
Not good.
Fred:
bring that 330 down here
And get the bucket down here.
Melody:
the water is coming up,
We guessed, about one inch
every five minutes.
Dustin:
come on! Let's go!
Wait. Bring some more.
Bring some more.
All right.
Turn your bucket in.
A little higher.
Okay. You got a tooth
in my bucket.
All right.
You're locked good.
Narrator: with the two buckets
locked together,
Fred finally has enough traction
To pull himself
out of harm's way.
Dustin:
ohp! Ohp! Ohp!
Good job, guys.
Good job, fred.
Fred: all right!
Narrator: in the klondike,
parker schnabel is losing gold.
Tony beets suggested
he install new hydraulic riffles
To stop garnets
from clogging up his sluice box.
Parker:
it's the magical cure.
Remsburg:
what do you think, man?
I think that should
drop right in.
You know
how to set these up?
It can't be
too complicated.
Water goes in there
and comes out --
I don't know --
everywhere.
To be perfectly honest,
We had something
that was working.
We know it wasn't working 100%,
But now we have something
that we have no clue,
And I don't like not knowing
what's going on with my money.
Narrator: greg remsburg,
a former hoffman crew member,
Has used hydraulic riffles
before.
Remsburg: we used them
real briefly, but nobody knew
How to set them up right
and tune them in just so,
So we got rid of them.
Well, I talked to tony a bit
about it.
I mean, I think
You kind of just set it
so that they're fluid.
You know, it's to
get those garnets out.
Narrator:
with hydraulic riffles,
Dialing in the water pressure
is critical.
If parker and greg
don't get it just right,
They'll wash gold
right out the sluice.
Hydraulic riffles work great
when they're dialed in properly.
I don't really want to
go through a learning curve
Of losing a bunch of money
to dial these things in.
The first thing we're gonna
have to do is clean them out.
Narrator: greg blows air
through the riffles
To get rid of any debris.
I don't know
about shale and stuff.
We're gonna have to pump
a little water through them
And check them out.
Yeah.
I'm getting
the big stuff out.
Narrator:
next, clean water.
Robbins: we're gonna put in
4-inch dirty water here.
It's gonna get filtered right
through the center of this.
It'll come out clean water here.
And then we've added
a secondary filter right here
For fine particles.
We don't want to plug them up
And constantly
be disturbing our gold.
Parker: I gotcha.
Narrator: then parker and greg
fit the new hydraulic riffles
Into the top 6 feet
of the sluice box.
It's time to put them
to the test.
Get ready
for water, boys!
Remsburg:
that's a lot of water.
Robbins: yeah, I like it.
I like it so far.
You got to close
one of those big valves
If you want
to keep pressure.
That one, yes.
Parker:
How many? 7?
7 Right there.
We won't know
till we run some dirt on it,
So let's throw
a few buckets in, huh?
Parker: if we run it
and find out we're losing gold,
It's just a big cluster [bleep]
Narrator:
little blue is back in business.
Robbins:
the water looks really nice
Flying across
these hydraulic riffles.
Hoping for a good cleanup
at the end of this week.
Yeah, hopefully, this system
with the hydraulic riffles
Is gonna keep the gold
in the top few feet of the box,
Where it's supposed to be.
Thanks, gene.
Okay.
Let's get back
to haulin', huh?
It looks like the hydraulic
riffles are working pretty well,
But we won't really know
until our next cleanout.
Narrator:
in guyana, the hoffman crew
Finally has a new water supply.
Freddy dodge gets ready
to fire up the wash plant
For only the second time
this season.
Turin:
go ahead and turn it on.
But before
they get it running...
Blaschke: freddy, I need some
help down here right away.
I got the 290 stuck.
10-4.
...mitch calls in
with a problem.
He's gotten his excavator
stranded in jungle mud.
What the frick?
This jungle's
a pain in the a*s.
The soil's a pain in the a*s.
Everything we do
just gets stuck.
Narrator:
no matter what mitch does,
The 290 sinks deeper
into the mud.
Blaschke:
that ain't going nowhere.
You're really digging
in the back.
Blaschke: the excavator
sunk down. It won't get out.
The more we move it around,
The longer it sits here,
the deeper it's getting.
We got to try
and break the suction
So we can get this thing
to get itself out.
Not a good sign
when your excavator's buried
All the way to the house.
Spinks: it's just the jungle,
in a nutshell.
There's just always something.
Not what we need to be
screwing with right now,
Is a struck excavator.
There's only one thing
I can do, is dig it out.
That's kind of
our last chance.
We've already
got this one stuck.
If we get that one stuck,
Then we don't have anything
to pull them out.
Trying to get this one out,
And I got to be very careful
that I don't get too stuck.
And now it's gonna rain on us.
It just keeps sinking
deeper and deeper.
Narrator: the hoffman crew
arrived in guyana
With advanced mining machinery,
But it's proving no match
for the jungle.
Turin: hang on. Hang on.
h*, h*. Whoa, whoa. Stop.
Blaschke:
the suction that this mud has
Is just too much
for the hydraulics
On this excavator to overcome,
So right now we just got to try
and dig it out a little bit.
The problem is,
every time we move around,
It just keeps digging us
a little deeper and deeper.
I got them bringing
a shovel down.
Narrator:
brian arrives with cables
to try and pull mitch out.
Just the most ridiculous soil
I've ever been around.
Stay there.
I'm gonna try to work my way up.
Blaschke:
he's gonna get in line.
We're gonna give it all we got
with this one,
And he's gonna pull
with the other.
And hopefully it's enough
to get this out of here.
Yeah, here we go.
Come on, girl.
Come on.
Narrator:
after two hours...
Whoo-hoo!
...dave starts to get traction
in the jungle mud.
Spinks: hell, yeah.
[ Clang ]
[bleep]
Narrator: dave's bucket
hits the arm of mitch's 290.
I smacked that hose.
We got a [bleep]
hydraulic leak now.
Right there.
Blaschke:
oh, he hit me.
Tearing [bleep] up
today, boys!
Narrator: if they can't get
mitch's excavator out
Before the fluid runs dry,
The leaky arm will go limp,
Making a rescue
next to impossible.
[ Creaking ]
Then...
[ Creaking, clang ]
[Bleep]
Blaschke:
we just snapped a cable.
Narrator:
...things go from bad...
Pull yourself up.
You're really burning up.
Something's burning up
in the back.
Pull up,
pull up, pull up.
...to worse.
[Bleep] stop!
Up north in the klondike,
Parker schnabel's crew
preps for their first cleanup
After installing
new hydraulic riffles.
Greg, shut her down!
You seeing any color
in there?
Look at all the garnets.
That's a [bleep] pile
of garnets, huh?
Yeah.
It's not really clearing them.
Parker is more than a quarter
of the way through his season
And still has to find over
a million dollars in gold.
He can't afford
for his new riffles to fail.
The gold should be sinking
to the carpet
Right here now, right?
Right.
Tony beets arrives
to inspect the new riffles.
Garnets.
Garnet city.
I thought it was supposed to
take care of all that.
Yeah,
there's a lot of them.
That's a nice chunk
of gold.
[ Chuckles ]
That's pretty nice.
Yeah.
Huh?
At first, we didn't see gold,
just the garnets on top,
But it looks like the hydraulic
riffles are working.
...nice gold than that?
Let's get this [bleep]
out of here.
I appreciate it.
The box looks good, you know?
The viking even had a bit
of a smile on his face.
Give me some water.
[ Engine turns over ]
We have water.
Narrator: at porcupine creek,
the dakota boys
Have repositioned the pump
We worked really hard for this.
I want to see the bedrock.
I spent so much time
looking for this,
Thinking, "the next 5 feet,
the next 5 feet,
The next 5 feet, the next
Narrator: they've been searching
for bedrock at the base
Of the ancient waterfall
for three backbreaking seasons.
I thought it was bedrock
so many times that --
Hmm. I just keep
getting disappointed.
So until I can see it,
I'm probably
not gonna believe it.
Narrator: now, with digging
in the glory hole so dangerous,
If they don't hit bedrock soon,
Fred will fill in the hole
once and for all
And give up on their dreams
of bedrock gold.
Fred: look right there
on the right-hand side,
Just coming out of the water
right now.
Those are not rocks.
There's bedrock right there.
Right there on that right side,
That white stuff
underneath those rocks --
That is the bedrock right there.
Whoo!
[ Laughter ]
Fred:
all right, I concede.
I'm a doubting thomas.
I see the bedrock.
Dustin: we're all loving life.
The energy's come up.
Now we need to find a plunge
pool and a whole bunch of gold.
Fred: it's a good chance we got
some gold trapped up in there --
Right in here,
right here.
Now that we've found
out that there is some
bedrock down there,
The waterfall's got
a little plunge pool,
And it carved out
the bedrock for us
And left some nice, little
depressions full of gold.
Narrator: at scribner creek,
Parker schnabel
and his foreman, gene cheeseman,
Are cleaning up the concentrate
from their first run
After installing
hydraulic riffles.
There's still a lot of garnets,
but it caught the gold, right?
Cheeseman: yep.
Here's the nuggets
so far.
That's a cool one there,
huh?
Yeah.
Nice stuff in there.
Parker: I haven't seen
a whole lot of different gold
From a lot of different creeks,
but this gold is way more --
It has way more character
Than the stuff that we've been
finding at big nugget.
♪ We got g-o-o-old
underneath the ground ♪
Narrator: at scribner creek
in the klondike,
Parker schnabel discovered
that he was losing gold.
He shut down his plant
for three days
To install
new hydraulic riffles.
He's been running dirt now
for a week
And is about to find out
if his bold move has paid off.
Yeah. This is our first cleanout
since the hydraulic riffles.
Pretty good.
In his first cleanup
as a klondike miner,
Parker got 15.5 ounces,
worth $21,000.
There's a couple chunks.
To stand any chance of hitting
his 800-ounce season goal,
He'll need much bigger paydays.
Yeah.
15.
So, that's 35.68.
Parker has doubled
his first cleanup
In one week of running
with new hydraulic riffles --
If we can do that for a couple
weeks and maintain it,
We'll be doing
pretty good, huh?
That's more than I got
in a season.
Yeah.
Yeah, for sure.
[ Both laugh ]
thanks, tony.
All right,
there you go, man.
Make a good season
out of this thing.
Narrator:
in guyana, the hoffman crew
Should've been mining
jungle gold for three weeks.
Instead, they're struggling
To get a 290 excavator
out of the mud.
Dave's excavator
hit the arm on mitch's 290,
And it's leaking hydraulic oil.
Blaschke:
when you get reset,
I'm gonna take another grab
with my bucket here,
But you can hold me from
sliding back down into this.
Okay. I gotcha.
If dave gets caught
in the mud,
Both excavators
will be stranded.
If I get two excavators stuck,
Todd hoffman's
gonna come back here
And wonder what in the world
have we been doing.
Come on.
Come on, girl.
There we go.
That's what we're looking for.
Come on.
There's some solid ground.
That's what we're looking for.
Yeah. There we go.
Narrator: four hours
of battling the thick mud,
And both excavators
are finally free.
[ Cheers ]
After dealing
with yet another setback,
The crew is finally ready to run
their first dirt of the season.
Dodge:
fire in the hole!
Turin: all right, you guys,
we've overcome a lot.
Here we go.
Mitch, will you do the honors?
Put some dirt in there,
boys.
[ Cheers ]
We're ready
to put some dirt in it.
It's been a long time coming.
First dirt in the jungle
through our new trommel.
Dodge:
first bucket, dave!
First bucket, freddy!
There she goes, boys!
[ Cheers ]
[ Indistinct conversation ]
Blaschke: it's going good.
We got some dirt
running into the plant here.
Everything seems
to be working right.
Dodge: from here on out,
let's keep our fingers crossed
And, you know, just keep
plugging away. It feels good.
A good day. It's the best day
we've had since we've been here.
Hopefully, there's gold in it.
[ Cheers ]
It's been an amazing,
like, six months.
Getting this stuff here
is just an amazing feat,
And now to actually see it run,
it's pretty phenomenal.
I feel really good.
Narrator: as their 50th day
in the jungle comes to an end,
Things are finally starting to
look up for the hoffman crew.
The next thing is, there's
got to be gold in the sluice,
And that's -- the gold
is what god gives us now.
Dear lord,
we just thank you for this day.
Lord, thanks
for keeping us all safe
And thanks
for making everything run.
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04x05 - Garnets or Gold
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Reality based series follows the placer gold mining efforts of various family-run mining companies, mostly in the Klondike region of Dawson City, Yukon, Canada, as well as in the U.S. state of Alaska.
Reality based series follows the placer gold mining efforts of various family-run mining companies, mostly in the Klondike region of Dawson City, Yukon, Canada, as well as in the U.S. state of Alaska.