[Carlos] Look at this, man, I'm walking where no one has walked before.
[laughs]
We're back.
[narrator] Nearly two months into the season at his new Nugget Creek claim,
Dustin Hurt is almost ready to start mining for gold.
[groaning]
[man 1] Here, hold on.
[man 2] Hold on, let me get up here.
[man 1] Yep.
[narrator] But there is just one final piece of the puzzle to drag into place.
[man 1] I think, let me get over here now.
All right, one more pull.
Hold on, this is where gonna get awkward.
[narrator] A 35 foot, 200 pound suction hose...
[groaning]
[James] [bleep] Foot by foot.
-[man 2] Good job you'll. -[man 1] Yeah.
We made it.
-That's it. -Hey, we got a human winch.
[Carlos] Human winch.
Welcome to the Golden Gates, baby.
[laughs]
Everything is done by hand, almost seems like back, willpower
and the pursuit of gold, man.
[Carlos] Ow! [bleep]
Are you stuck right now?
Aw!
[Justin] That's gone.
[Kayla] Be careful.
[Scott] What the hell, look out.
Whoa.
[Paul] Ain't nothing easy about this.
[Kayla] There's nothing easy about anything we're doing.
You're gonna die, might as well die having fun.
Woah!
[Justin] Oh, look out.
Who the [bleep] does this stupid [bleep]. Yeah.
-Uh-huh. -[laughs]
[man] You ready to rock and roll?
[Kayla] No.
Hey gold hound, can you smell the gold down there yet?
Thinking, exactly how far are we willing to go for gold?
It's on now, time to dive.
[narrator] So far this season,
Dustin and his crew have battled set up...
[Dustin] That [bleep] is so strong.
[narrator] ...and setbacks, as they move their entire operation
to the most remote claim they've ever taken on, at Nugget Creek.
-[James] Enough? -[Carlos] Yeah, perfect.
Yeah... [laughs and exclaims]
[man] Hose in place, check.
-You ready? -Pivot that back this way.
Yup, just like that.
Whoo-hoo, she's in, she floats once more.
Wow, dude that looks pretty.
[narrator] Now it's time to find out
if the gold they find here will change their lives forever.
Let me introduce you to my little friend, my moneymaker.
I think I got a nice spot right here
where I think we're gonna get lucky.
I want to know if the rumors were true,
about gold in Nugget Creek.
Hey, let's see if it lives up to its name.
[narrator] The fabled Nugget Creek was first staked in 1899.
Rumor has it the claim was barely mined
by the brave few that survived the 35 mile journey into the frozen wilderness.
But the draw of untold riches lives on
as a small group of prospectors in the '80s found big nuggets
but were forced out by Mother Nature before they struck it rich.
[Dustin] It made it, we just haven't run it for six months,
I'm wondering if the engines are gonna hate us.
[narrator] Now Dustin and his crew hope with their advanced equipment
and heated dive suits...
[Justin] Are we ready?
[Carlos] Let's wake her up and see how she sings.
[narrator] ...they can conquer the creek and return home alive
with a treasure chest full of gold.
Fuel on.
-[Paul] Fuel on. -[Justin] Done. Choke.
Throttle down.
[engine starting]
-Woah! -[Carlos] She's alive.
[laughs]
Carlos, it's dredging.
[Carlos] Whoo-hoo, I'm dredging.
It's a good flow, I like it.
She's hungry, we got a deal.
If I feed her, I get what's left.
Gold, amigo! Gold!
[Dustin] We all good?
[Carlos] That's pretty good.
So, the dredge is ready to go, but outside of that,
I've done the math, we don't have enough fuel
to make more in a couple of days.
So, I'm gonna go try to make a fuel run of some sort
and you guys are gonna be on your own.
-[Justin] Okay. -So, I'm gonna trust y'all,
get in the water and get your dive in.
Okay, copy that, cool, cool.
[narrator] At the start of the season...
[Paul] This water crossing's kind of crazy, y'all.
[narrator] Dustin could drive his fuel supply
up the still passable Tsirku River.
[Carlos] I can't believe we frickin' made it man.
[Dustin] That was something.
[narrator] But fed by five rapidly thawing glaciers,
the river is now impassable.
[Dustin exclaiming] Whoo!
[narrator] Three weeks ago, Dustin devised a plan
to use an airboat to access his claim.
[Dustin] No, no, no, no. Oh!
[narrator] But his maiden voyage nearly ended in disaster.
I think it's impossible for me to bring an entire crew of people
up that river without killing everybody.
[narrator] Desperate for a solution,
Dustin spent weeks on a runway.
[Dustin] I know it's a lot of work,
but I think it's gonna be worth it.
[narrator] But the planes capable of landing there
aren't big enough to carry enough fuel
to keep both his sites running.
Now he needs to solve the supply issue for good.
I have to get out of here to get fuel back over here.
I don't want to leave the guys, but they know what to do,
so I'm gonna set them free on the dredge,
they're going to do some dives.
By the time I get back, I'll have enough fuel to run the show.
[narrator] Supported by Scott Allen,
Dustin makes the trip to town in search of a solution to their fuel crisis.
[Paul] Just remember, my steps are like a kid to you.
[laughs]
[narrator] Further up Nugget Creek,
Kayla Johanson and her crew battle the hour-long deadly hike to their dive site.
[Kayla] Because we're so behind in the season having relocated,
we're in a mad dash to get dredging.
[Paul] Oh, come on.
We're losing our walkway.
[Kayla] I know, that's crazy.
[Paul] That's snow bridge is going very quickly, not much of that left.
[Kayla] I wouldn't walk on that.
[Paul] I'm gonna say no, sketchy walking over it
and it's sketchy walking under it.
[narrator] For the last two weeks,
the crew has braved the journey to their dive site,
crossing a 20-foot-thick ice bridge.
But the summer heat and raging torrent has brought it close to collapse.
[Justin] It's not a rock, but it's damn near close
and could cause just as much damage,
sliced you open, pin you,
and then you're in the water stuck.
I think if we try to cross it, it's gonna collapse.
Have one person go out front, tie a rope to have a rope line here, put our waders on.
[Paul] Yeah, that looks like our only option right now.
[Kayla] I'll do it.
It's gotten so thin that,
I don't trust if it's supporting my body weight.
And I'm the smallest person here, so...
If I don't trust it to support me,
I'm not gonna ask anyone else to walk on it.
So right now, we're gonna set up a rope line
just to get across the water under the snow.
It's a little fast, but doesn't seem like it's gonna be really deep.
Whoa!
[Justin] For now, we're on time crunch.
Obviously, the snow has been a huge delay for us,
it's been problematic as it changes
and changes our path to getting to the site for dredging.
[Kayla] Whoa!
And now we've got this overhang, our goal today is to get up,
so I can get the first good dive in it.
[Paul] I don't want to be under it when it comes down, I can tell you that.
[Justin] Yeah, right where we walk,
there's a steady stream right there.
[Paul] Yeah.
[Justin] You know, that's not gonna take very long.
[Paul] No.
[Justin] Yeah, I don't want to be under this ice too long.
She's coming,
she's under over, around the bend right now.
[Kayla] You guys ready?
[Justin] What you thinking, Paul?
[Paul] I'm just trying to find something tie it to.
[Justin] All right.
[Kayla] You wanna pass the gas can?
That's what I'm wanting. I got this part right here. This is the fast part.
[Paul] Yeah.
-[Justin] All, good. -[Kayla] Yeah man.
[Justin] Watch this rock right here, I about... I about slipped.
All right.
I hate to be underneath this thing. Yeah.
[Kayla] Be careful.
That's strong. [bleep]
[Paul] [bleep] Dang it.
[bleep]
[Justin] Oh.
Oh, we made it.
[narrator] Over three hours after leaving camp,
just accessing their site has burned nearly half their dive day.
[Paul] Water's cold this morning.
[Justin] That is crazy.
[Paul] Yep.
[narrator] To make up for lost time, they need a successful dive
from new crew member Justin Peterson.
[Justin] I'm really hoping to get a really good first dive in.
I'll get to be moving some rocks today, it's gonna be a good day.
[Kayla] You look like a sea lion.
[laughing]
[Kayla] Because of the whiskers.
[Justin] Okay, I gave you that one.
This will be his first time dredging on our crew.
It's kind of a big day for him,
I'm sure he's pretty excited and probably a bit nervous.
[Paul] I hope you have fun with this hot water unit,
it's gonna spoil you.
Main objective today is not so much to focus on depth
as it is widening the holes.
[Paul] You ready?
[Justin] I was born ready.
[laughs]
[Kayla] So, if we can push forward and push out,
it's just to clear more surface area,
that would be a huge improvement
and give us a lot more working space.
Are you having fun?
[Justin] Okay, all good.
-[Kayla] All good. -[Paul] Yep.
[Justin] All right.
All right, let's get down to business.
Yee-haw. I feel like a penguin.
All right, where are we heading?
[narrator] Nugget Creek legends suggest bedrock
is just eight to 10 feet deep.
If true, Kayla's crew should be dredging bedrock gold in no time.
[Kayla] How's the hot water?
[Justin] Boiling me.
[Kayla] [laughs] Like sitting in a bathtub.
[Justin] Oh, my goodness, I'm where I was meant to be again, finally.
I'm really happy that we're actually dredging now,
it's been a lot of setup to get here,
but it feels really good to actually be making some progress.
[Justin] I want to see those nuggets.
We do this for the love of gold.
[narrator] Up ahead...
I don't understand what's happening.
[man] Is he trapped?
[Scott] What the hell? Look out! Woah!
[Dustin] You're about to get burned, just take his hot water off.
Take his hot water off.
[yells]
It's not easy, ain't nothing easy about this.
[Kayla] I ain't got time for this [bleep].
And I'm gonna get dressed up and rock and roll dude.
[James] All right, rock and roll.
[narrator] At the remote Golden Gates dive site...
[James] This is all more gas that we got.
That's about all he has, a couple of hours, I guess.
[narrator] ... Dustin's crew are desperate to keep their dredge running,
despite being down their leader.
Today marks a good day that we're moving forward,
finally getting on mission,
it's our first dive in the water.
Unfortunately, Dus... Dustin couldn't be here,
he's doing fuel runs, since we have no fuel.
Very little, we're just working on fumes right now.
We need to get in the water now and get the dredging.
I'm hoping that we can dig down pretty deep today.
[narrator] The dredge hasn't caught any gold all winter.
It also suffered the terrible journey up the SACU
and was dragged by winch over the boulder infested nugget creek.
-All right, guys. -Oh, yeah.
Let's do it, man. We're at least about three weeks behind, man.
-[James] Oh, man. -[Carlos] You got to make up for it.
Let's see what we got.
[Carlos] Day one.
[narrator] But it's the only tool that will get them to the riches down deep.
-[Paul] This is exciting. -[James] First dive.
Good? You got air?
[Carlos] Yeah, man.
Wouldn't we be lucky, man,
if we just find gold, right?
Okay Carlos, have a good dive today.
[Carlos] All right, guys, going in.
Diver in the water.
[laughs]
[Carlos] All right, I'm just gonna just find the nozzle and start dredging guys.
Damn, man, its beautiful man, it's beautiful,
even though I can't see it.
I have a feeling, man.
We're gonna make our frickin' [bleep] millions here.
I'm just gonna start right here
and work my way up to that Asteroid Boulder.
[narrator] The massive Asteroid Boulder sits in the middle of their dive site.
For thousands of years, it has slowed the fast-flowing creek,
which should have caused a huge buildup of gold nuggets beneath it.
Now...
[James] Dredging, we're moving material now.
[narrator] ...the crew used advanced gold catching technology
unthinkable to the old timers
who were forced from Nugget Creek by Mother Nature over 100 years ago.
[James] First dive, man.
We got a little bit of work to do,
we'll get down to the bedrock.
Let's get some gold.
Whoo-hoo!
[narrator] 600 feet up creek,
Justin is two hours into his first dive,
fighting water three times faster than he's ever dived before.
[Kayla] Hey Justin.
-[Justin] What's up? -[Kayla] How's your air?
[Justin] It's pretty good, are you able to hear me?
Yeah, just making sure that you didn't need more airflow.
Having a new person and it's being their first dive,
it's always a little tricky, because they're getting used to new gear,
they're getting used to the way that we do things,
they're getting used to a lot of different things.
[Justin] Little cloudy down here.
[Kayla] Yeah, the water's a little bit murky.
[Justin] Yeah, no kidding, lot of hill side wash in here.
[Kayla] Yeah.
The water definitely came up a little bit.
[Paul] Is it raining up top?
[Kayla] Oh, yeah.
[narrator] Nugget Creek is boxed in by 500 foot sheer cliffs.
The geographical funnel means any rain higher up the mountain
could result in flash floods below.
[Kayla] Hey Justin I think we're gonna wrap it up here pretty soon
if you want to go ahead, come up.
[Justin] All right.
If the water gets too bad, then I can't have a diver in the water
and I can't be the diver in the water.
We've got to keep everybody safe, it's... there's no gold worth getting killed for,
our protocol is to pull out, tie everything off, get out of here.
Because if we get trapped in here, there's no way to go,
we got to get out of here.
[narrator] Their only way out is by waiting under the collapsing ice bridge,
any surge in the creek could either trap or kill them.
[Paul] [bleep] [bleep] Dang it.
[bleep] [bleep]
[Justin] You want me to pull this tight for you?
-[Kayla] Pull it tight. -[Justin] Okay.
-[Kayla] That rope's way too loose. -[Justin] It is.
[Paul] Yeah, once you catch that little leg of current,
that's where you're getting [bleep].
All right, he's just about here into the corner.
I'm glad I came through first with the lightest one.
I'll let you go, I'll keep the tension while you get up there.
[Kayla] The water is just too crazy.
We just start changing our focus to start looking at making our walkways.
[narrator] To collect the riches on bedrock,
Kayla's crew must dive all day, every day.
[Kayla] We know that our walkway needs to extend all the way up high.
We'll come up with a plan and then figure that out.
[narrator] Pulling out every time the creek rises will cripple her operation.
Their only option is to extend the walkway.
Can have two people working on the walkway
and then two people making some board.
-Okay. -That would be nice.
All right.
I can start on the walkways with the core drill,
I could probably use Justin over here.
-Okay. -[Paul] We can do it like that for the start.
But I think if we can get the pipe in just for the each end,
in the middle of each board, I think we can get a walkway fairly quick.
[Kayla] That sounds good, I think I like that plan.
[Dustin] All right, you ready for this?
[narrator] Nine miles down the Tsirku River
with no other affordable way into Nugget Creek,
Dustin and Scott are about to attempt the impossible.
It's the most nervous I've been in probably 20 years.
I am about to do the craziest thing I've done in a very, very long time,
trying to take a Florida Airboat up to Tsirku,
which is a crazy river.
I have to find an alternative way to get to the claim,
otherwise, this is done.
This is the only way to get fuel out there
that doesn't cost an immense amount of money,
the airboat is basically my only solution.
[Scott] Let's go for a ride.
[Dustin] Let's take a ride, see if this works.
Well, it'll either work or it won't.
[laughs]
Pass, fail.
[narrator] Nothing beneath its flat hull,
Dustin's airboat is the only craft capable of navigating the wild Tsirku River.
[Scott] Hope it's ready.
Mission control, we are go for launch.
If we're gonna die, might as well die having fun.
[Scott] Ready, rock and roll.
[narrator] Driven by a 450 horsepower aircraft propeller...
[laughs]
[Scott] Whoo! [laughs]
[Scott] Yeah.
[narrator] ...novice skipper Dustin will skillfully navigate at 30 miles an hour,
to keep the bow out of the water...
[Scott] I don't know about you, but I can't feel my hands.
[Dustin] [laughs]
[narrator] ...while avoiding an endless stream of sandbanks and logs.
[Dustin] It's a lot of water.
It's a little hard to see.
Oh [bleep]!
-[Scott] Look out! -[Dustin] Whoa.
[Scott] Whoo! Yeah!
I don't know about you, but I can't feel my hands.
[laughs]
[narrator] In a desperate attempt to fuel his operation,
Dustin Hurt has thrown caution to the wind.
[cheers loudly]
[Dustin] It's a lot of water. It's a little hard to see.
Holy [bleep].
[Scott] Look out!
[Dustin] Woah.
[Scott] That was a nice parking job.
[laughs]
Whoo!
[Scott] We did it.
[indistinct shouting]
[Dustin] Hot rod, that's what this is, man.
-[Scott] This is. -[Dustin] It's just a nice hot rod.
[Scott] That is what I call a success.
[Dustin] I would agree.
How long did that take, by the way, did you get it timed?
Less than an hour.
So right now, the airboats are gonna be the answer to our fuel problem.
Ah, we're about $30 per ride right now.
I can get three barrels here with one helicopter for $1,700
or two fuel barrels for 30 bucks.
So, it's worth the extra hour of driving, or two hours of driving.
And if I keep doing that, we'll always have fuel,
and I... and it's just my time and effort.
All right, let's get out of here. [exhales]
[Carlos on radio] Hey, Wes, can you hear me?
[Wes] Yeah, I can hear you.
[narrator] Up at the Golden Gates dive site,
Carlos is four hours into the first dive of the season,
stretching their limited gas supplies.
[Carlos] I'm just gonna start right here and worked my way up to the Asteroid Boulder.
[narrator] His target, the behemoth Asteroid Boulder,
hopeful big boulders mean big gold.
Oh, [bleep].
We're out of gas.
[Wes] What's going on?
[James] He's on fumes.
Damn it.
[Wes] Hey Carlos, Carlos come up, because your air...
your engine just ran out of gas.
[Carlos] You got to be kidding me.
[Wes] We need to go get some more fuel.
[James] Not quite fast enough.
[Carlos] Damn it.
[narrator] But less than five minutes after one of their motors shut down,
the crew catch a break, crossing Dustin on the trail, back to camp.
[Dustin] Uh [bleep].
[narrator] James has returned...
[indistinct shouting]
[narrator] ...loaded with vital gas, to keep the operation alive.
[Wes] It just went out of gas right now, that's perfect.
So, luckily, we're getting right back in, no downtime.
Start it up now, let's fill it up.
[laughs]
That was awesome.
[Carlos] Got air, I'm breathing good guys.
[laughs]
Perfect timing.
[Wes] You're good to go.
[Carlos] Right here, this is that nose of that Asteroid Boulder.
[Dustin] I'd really like to know if it's sitting on bedrock.
[Carlos] I've... me too, I'm trying to figure that out.
All right, going in.
Right here, man, I got pieces of frickin' asteroid rock.
[Dustin] Hey, man, they can give you a basket if you want it.
[Carlos] Yeah, that'll be good.
I'll take this basket.
Thank you, guys.
Check this out, I'm underneath the sluice
of this Asteroid Boulder.
[Dustin] That makes me happy.
Yo, those tubes are getting hot and starting to smoke.
Carlos, it's getting real hot on the [bleep] hoses back here,
so you're about to get burnt, is what I'm guessing.
[narrator] Five years ago...
[indistinct shouting]
[Dustin] Get it off, get it off, get it off,
get it off, get it off, get it off...
[narrator] ...Carlos's hot water system overheated...
[Dustin] Get it off, come on. Get it off.
[Carlos] It's not coming off.
[Dustin] Oh my [bleep].
[narrator] ...giving him third degree burns.
[Carlos] That pain was so un-describable,
I had white light just shooting through my whole body.
[indistinct shouting]
[Dustin] Take his hot water off, take his hot water off.
[James] Let's go. [bleep]
-[Carlos] What happened. -[bleep]
-[James] Pull it. -[Carlos] What?
-[James] It's steaming. -[bleep]
It's steaming.
[Dustin] It's that second filter so stopped up,
it's not gonna work at all.
Holy moly, man.
Wow.
Hey, you know, it's all right though,
you guys did a good job, thank you.
Is there always a concern about danger,
death and destruction because of frickin' hot water filters getting all clogged up?
Yes.
But since we've been doing this for quite a while,
we have learned from our mistakes, and that's why we're calm and collected.
[Dustin] What we didn't count on today
was the water turning so dirty
that it caused one of the hoses to start melting.
Another 45 minutes and Carlos would have been cooked again.
[narrator] In the unforgiving wilderness of Nugget Creek...
[Carlos] Not one speck.
[narrator] ...your luck can turn on a dime.
[James] How far down do you think you dug?
[Carlos] Ahh, about four and a half, five feet, maybe.
[James] Wow.
We still have a ways to go, it's not on bedrock.
[Dustin] We picked an area that's great for gold,
but really hard to work in.
We'll find out exactly how much gold is under all those giant rocks,
but it's gonna be a hell of a process.
[Paul] Oh look, we have got much further to go.
[Justin] Behave.
All right, I got to get it to you.
[narrator] Overnight, the ice bridge to Kayla's dive site has completely collapsed.
-[Justin] Ready? -[Paul] Yeah.
Yep, we're on the pipe.
[narrator] To carve out a new route,
Paul and Justin are forced to risk their lives,
suspended 20 feet above the raging creek below.
[Paul] Still not there, we're almost around the corner.
[Justin] Well, we got one more you think?
[Paul] Yeah.
[Justin] That's gonna be a weird spot, too.
[Paul] Yeah, I might be right out on that bend.
But now that we're going up on a steep incline, it's a lot harder.
Right now, I'll be glad to get this done,
I'm tired of hanging off that rope.
It's a lot of work trying to get this to our dive site so we can work.
The only good thing about that is if it's this hard to get to,
not too many people have done this.
I'm wondering,
if I can go snag that extension ladder.
[narrator] Veteran miner Paul knows that to succeed in this environment,
working smarter, not harder is key.
[Paul] I know I don't have much of a choice to do this,
but hopefully I can get this to work.
This fin is sticking out right here, we got to get around,
it's probably the worst part of this whole entire rock wall.
I'm gonna find some secure rock somewhere.
My best bet is gonna be right in there.
[Justin] This is not the easiest conditions to be working in right here.
[Paul] No, you're not supposed to do this on the ladder.
[Justin] Yeah, it's so far out there, you're doing it with one arm
while you hold on to the ladder, that's asking for a lot of danger.
[Paul] Wow.
[Justin] I appreciate you doing this.
[Paul] I hope everybody else does, too.
I'm definitely in the mood for any criticism.
And I'd like to see those two come hang off this and do this.
[narrator] Back at camp, Kayla and Scott have milled their own boards
to complete the walkway.
[Scott] Hi, Paul.
Nice to see you, too.
Hey Paul, we got one eight-footer,
one nine-footer and four six-footers.
[Paul] I don't want the six-footers.
[Justin] That means more holes.
[Paul] That means more holes.
[bleep]
[Justin] I don't know why they cut them six-foot,
I told him eight-foot for a reason.
[Paul] Oh, yeah, six-foot board is easy to carry,
more [bleep] holes to drill.
They think they're doing themselves a favor by making that [bleep] lighter,
but it just creates more work elsewhere.
[Kayla] You can't use six.
[Paul] It's gonna take everything I got just to do
a run that we have at eight feet.
You can gladly come hang off the side and drill them.
Everybody needs experience hanging off this [bleep]
and drilling these holes.
Both of you'll.
You want to hang off and drill these, this is not easy,
ain't nothing easy about this.
[Kayla] There's nothing easy about anything we're doing.
This... you'll are more than welcome
all to try and to get a feel for it.
[Kayla] I ain't got time for the [bleep].
It's real hard keeping this pace,
we've been really getting after it.
[narrator] Dustin's mining operation is weeks behind schedule
and slipping further by the day.
Urgh! Where do we go from here?
[narrator] The Nugget Creek dream is fast becoming a nightmare.
I mean, this is our first season here.
I mean, this expected that we're not gonna have everything dialed in.
[Dustin] I know it's been a long road,
but we got to start seeing some gold.
We have to stop paying for some of this stuff.
Man, we start seeing color, man.
We're gonna get our second win, man.
Then we're gonna have to make up for the time that we lost.
I mean, we didn't squander it, man.
We built the whole civilization in one frickin' month.
[Dustin] Yeah, that ain't no lie,
let's stay focused and we need to get in the water
and find some gold.
Here on out, its gold time.
So that means at the end of the day,
somebody is coming out of the water
the next morning, somebody's going in the water...
-Yeah. -...so that's rinse and repeat, man.
Dredge, dredge, dredge, gold, gold, gold.
Everybody, we're getting tired right now.
Two rules, don't get hurt, don't die.
-You guys ready again? -[man] Yeah.
[Dustin] Let's go round up the rest of the stuff we need
for the dredge and get at it.
[narrator] To get the gold they came for,
the crew must work together to overcome every barrier brought on by the creek.
[Justin] Paul, I love you.
I love you guys, too, I'm sorry I get mad, but it's frustrating.
We're just... I mean, we're... it's like brothers and sisters,
they fight,
that's kind of where we are right now.
It's just pushing everybody to their limits,
but it's all good, we worked everything out.
Hey, guess what, this isn't the last section of walkway.
We're about to have a walkway.
[Justin] Don't jinx it.
[Paul] One board away.
Shut up.
[laughs]
[Paul] Be smart. Stand with it.
Take it all the way to the dirt.
You come away from that edge right there, yeah.
[bleep] Yeah.
That's it, dude, we got to walk away.
We got a [bleep] bad ass walkway.
Good job, man.
Dude, you and I put in some [bleep] on this walkway.
We're finally at the point where it's time
to just go balls to the walls, dredge and finally get some gold.
[narrator] Over a month of setup,
Kayla's crew now have a clear route to their dive site
and a clear run at the bedrock goal.
I feel like things are gonna start getting in a... into a better rhythm now.
We're here to mine gold, we're here to dredge, that's what we came here to do.
I'm really hoping that there's good gold today.
Here we are, we're dredging. We're back at it.
[Kayla] Now, I got great suction.
Hopefully we start seeing something soon and that would be gold.
[James] So, it'll be three filters.
[narrator] 600 feet down creek...
All right, start it up.
[narrator] ...Dustin's crew take every measure to ensure diver James's safety.
[James] I just want to be in the right mentally prepared for a dangerous dive job.
When you don't have everything set up properly,
it causes problems.
[Wes] The water line should be clear
because we've run water through all of them, so it flows good.
[narrator] After narrowly avoiding burning Carlos with scalding water,
Wes was forced to completely overhaul their filter system.
Hope that this works.
Hope that nobody has to come close to a tragedy.
Thinking exactly how far are we willing to go for gold?
[Wes] How's that?
[James] That feels good.
[Wes] All right, you ready to rock and roll.
[James] Ready to rock and roll.
[Wes] Okay, James, gonna have fun on your first dive, have a great dive, buddy.
[James] I hope so, man.
First dive at nugget.
My goal is to get nuggets,
otherwise I wouldn't want to be in the water.
That's a rough spot to dig.
Hey gold hound can you smell the gold down there yet?
[James] [laughs] It's going down, the heat's going down, down, down.
[indistinct shouting] [bleep]
[Dustin] I don't understand what's happening.
Are you stuck right now?
[James] [indistinct shouting]
[Carlos] Is he trapped?
[Paul] James, can you hear me?
[narrator] In the wilds of southeast Alaska,
even the commute to work...
Whoa, whoa, whoa. [bleep].
[narrator] ...is an adventure.
[Paul] That's cold, that wave just got me.
I needed a bath.
[indistinct shouting] [laughs]
-[Justin] You, all right. -[Paul] Yeah.
Oh, yeah.
[Justin] [bleep]
Who the [bleep] does this stupid [bleep] man.
[laughing]
A good moment.
[James] [indistinct shouting]
[Dustin] [bleep] I don't understand what's happening.
Are you stuck right now?
James, can you hear me?
[narrator] James Hamm is at the bottom of Nugget Creek...
[Dustin] James.
[narrator] ...and not responding.
[Carlos] He's still in there.
[Wes] That was really close. [bleep]
[James] I got a rock stuck on the nozzle.
So, the nose of an Asteroid Boulder fell in the hole
and it pinched the nozzle against the bottom.
[Dustin] Copy that, so you got to try to yank it out
from underneath a gigantic boulder.
[James] I just need to pull this boulder out with a sling.
[narrator] James narrowly missed being crushed
by a falling 1,000 pound boulder,
but it has trapped his suction hose at the bottom of the dive hole.
He must lasso a choker around the boulder to winch it clear,
before he can get back to diving for bedrock gold.
[Dustin] Thankfully, we're not in a rescue mission right now.
We're not set up for that.
If it was his leg, I'd have to go down there and just hold my breath.
[James] See if I don't pull it out.
[Dustin] What do you need downstream?
-[James] Downstream. -[Dustin] Downstream.
Would you like him to stay low or high. Low or high?
[James] Try to keep it up high.
Don't get caught in that cable, stay away from that cable.
That [bleep] is heavy.
[Dustin] Why don't you have a seat, take a break.
[James] I could talk water.
[Dustin] Let's get some oxygen in you man.
[James] Ones we got a nice haul there, that's starting to get a little calm out here.
[Dustin] Catch your breath, catch your breath, catch your breath.
[narrator] Dive hose free,
James pushes on for the nuggets the old timers couldn't reach.
[Dustin] You ready for that basket or what man.
[James] Yeah, we might as well put on a basket.
Boy, that sucker is sucking it.
[Dustin] Got good suction power, do you? Awesome.
[James] Yeah,
Hopefully I can damage the hole,
so I can see what I'm doing, below the water down.
Ah, I feel confident about digging here,
but I'd... I'd say so far,
I made a pretty good haul.
I've already opened up probably a six-foot by five-foot hole,
there's a lot of progress going on here.
[Dustin] Copy that, I understand.
Hey, fill this basket up and let's call it a day.
[James] All right, sounds good.
Yeah.
Whoa.
[laughs]
Good job man, how are you feeling?
A little dredge drunk?
[Dustin] Yeah, I bet. That was tough.
But guess what, started to get easier towards...
-[Dustin] Did it? -...towards the end of the day.
I managed to get somewhere,
we got a hole and it's probably be about six-foot.
Every scenario about what... what a dredger does,
especially in extreme places like this.
It's very, very dangerous,
it's like the gold gods who dug a creek don't want us to get the gold,
they're making us work for it.
It's going to take some getting used to here.
[Dustin] Now it's time to do what we do, find some real gold.
[Justin] How's it going?
[Kayla] I'm standing up on some big rocks right here.
Yeah, once we get the winches and it's gonna be,
it's gonna be game on.
[narrator] Up at Kayla's dive site...
Well, you're killing it.
[narrator] ...she's three hours into her dive,
but unlike Dustin, she hasn't yet installed a winch system,
so it makes slow progress to bedrock gold.
[Kayla] Problem I'm running into is all the rocks just kind of locked in,
and until I can pull some of the bigger ones out to unlock everything,
it's hard to go down.
It's getting frustrating, it's getting to the point
where I'm limited in what I can do.
[Justin] How deep do you think you are?
[Kayla] You can tell the difference in depth,
I'm standing here and I'm standing...
[Justin] Yeah.
[Kayla] And this is a shallow spot, it gets deeper over there.
[Justin] I can't wait to see what's under those big rocks.
[narrator] In a race to get a diver in the water,
Kayla skipped a critical stage of setup.
[Kayla] There are some big rocks that I can't get out until we get a winch.
[narrator] They will need to install the heavy lift gear
before their next dive to get any deeper.
[Kayla] [bleep] tone of pyrite.
Throw that iron.
[James] Tons and tons of pyrite.
Now, we'd be rich if we were mining pyrite.
[Justin] I know, right?
We didn't see any gold today,
but we're still in the process of opening up an area.
I wasn't quite expecting to encounter large boulders this soon into our dig.
We're going to have to figure out
how we're going to get them moved
so that we can get down to bedrock.
We're ready to see what we came here for, and that's to see gold.
[narrator] On the next Gold Rush: White Water.
[bleep] Airboats rule! [cheering]
Holy [bleep], the battle's on, man,
it's always been on.
[Justin] I'm getting my ass kicked.
It's a war, man.
-[Carlos] Look there, buddy, I knew there was gold here. -[laughs]
We're gonna get more gold than we ever thought,
and this is gonna be amazing.