Original subtitles

[breathing heavily]

[panting]

[Dustin] Ain't it beautiful up here.

I've been at this for 14 years now.

-[Dustin] A lot of snow melt. -[man] And we're getting in it.

Are we crazy or what?

[Dustin] Pile of gold is what I'm looking for.

We found some here and there.

Big nugget. Great.

[man] Look what you just found, buddy.

-[Carlos shouting] Oh my God! -[men cheering]

[all laughing]

-[Paul] Let me see that. -[Carlos laughs]

[Paul] That's the biggest nugget in gold rush history.

[Dustin] But it's not enough.

I have not succeeded yet.

This has to be the year.

I mean, another season not hitting the jackpot.

I'm gonna have to think seriously.

What do I do with these claims?

Then somebody else is gonna come here,

they'll get all those nuggets. We proved it down there.

So the thing that pushes me

to go into this stupid ass snow

and risk it all.

We know there's gold. [exhales]

I'm here to hit a jackpot.

I need to succeed at this

I'm getting to a weird place to where,

I'm ready to risk everything.

One thing is absolutely clear that there's been a glacier

over the top of all this stuff right here,

and that glacier was stopping everyone

from coming up here and digging.

No one has been here.

There are a bunch of waterfalls

all the way up at the top section up here.

If we found a six ounce nugget

on somewhere that wasn't that hard to dig.

If I go to a waterfall and the water's moving fast

and there's a collection of them,

they could have piles and piles and piles of gold.

There's always a chance of getting hurt or dying here.

-[rock crashing] -[men shouting]

-[bleep] -[man] Move, move, move!

Oh! [bleep]

Boom! Get up here, guys. Get up here!

[Dustin] But you know what fear does.

Fear stops you.

Fear makes you quit.

Fear makes you back down.

Throw the dice, see what happens.

Worth the risk.

I'll let you know at the end of the season.

[narrator] On the all new season of Gold Rush: White Water

[man whoops] Look at that man.

This is the most dangerous place we've ever been.

[indistinct shouting]

This is what just came down.

-[growling] -[man] Bears!

-I'm the guy that keeps everybody safe. -[gun clocks]

-Whoa! Whoa! [bleep] Carlos! -[indistinct shouting]

I got a new plan for the guys.

Flame on, brother.

-[whoops] -[James laughs]

[Carlos] Getting hot!

[man 1] Three two one.

-[splashing] -[whooping]

[laughing]

They're not gonna like it.

I need the double dredge done today.

[bleep] Tell you I have to build every [bleep]

thing for this [bleep] piece of [bleep]

[Dustin] There are big nuggets here.

We're too incompetent to actually get to them.

[Carlos] Are you [bleep] serious?

Nobody's keeping you here.

You're a world class prick, Dude.

[Dustin] I invited my girlfriend to come help us.

Hey, y'all.

If you cross me, I will cut you loose.

I can't believe you guys work here.

This is absolutely crazy.

[Dustin] This year is gonna be the make it or break it.

-[men] Fire it up! -[whooping]

[Dustin] If we don't get a bunch of gold--

[man] Back to classic Whitewater. Yeah!

There's just no way we could do this again.

[indistinct shouting]

Daddy.

Is it worth it?

[James] When you hit it, it's like hitting the jackpot.

Chung-cha-ching.

-Got it! -[men cheering]

[woman] Do you see this?

[men cheering]

-[whooping] -We have success!

[Dustin] We had a really long winter,

and I've had a lot of time

to think about what we're doing.

Picking the right dig spot

is going to be key this year.

We're moving upstream.

There might be a ton of gold.

[narrator] The new dive site Dustin has chosen

is thirty miles from Haines.

And another mile up the legendary Nugget Creek,

where in an unmanned area threatened by falling rocks

and steep valley sides lies a waterfall.

The deep plunge pool is a miner's dream

as the natural gold catch traps nuggets

carried down by the creek.

Creating what could be a life changing payday.

[Dustin] The reason this place has not been dug

is because it is too dangerous.

Death looms into this creek.

Where we're going is terrifying for even me.

We have to get a jackpot of some sort.

It has to happen.

If we don't get a bunch of gold,

there's just no way we can do this again.

If we fail, I could lose the claim.

[narrator] Dustin has one final shot

at unearthing the monster nuggets

at the claim he's invested

his life savings in.

But its deadly location

means taking on risk like never before.

How's it going, man?

Good seeing y'all again.

[man] Hell, yeah.

Welcome back to Haines, everybody.

[man chuckles] Yeah.

Everybody's healthy

and all your fingers and toes working.

-Well so far. -For most part.

[all chuckling]

[Paul] I'm ready to get back at it.

[Carlos] We've got everything set up

so we can just, like, hit the ground running.

-[Paul] Yup. -[Dustin] So.

Here's the deal man. We've been making just enough gold

to even just barely get by,

and we've got to go big.

I think we need to go upstream.

What I'm looking for is more of a big payoff for all of us.

Paul and I went up there and we saw the waterfall.

[Paul] Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I truly believe whatever gold is there, it's going to be huge.

Huge, it will be huge. It will be huge, It will be huge.

[man] Hey.

[narrator] Last season...

[Dustin] I love you.

[narrator] Despite the monumental loss

of his father and mentor. Fred Hurt.

[Dustin] Fred's gone, and...

[Paul] I'm so sorry, man.

-Yeah. -[man 2] I'm sorry. Sorry.

[narrator] Dustin proved that Nugget Creek

lives up to its name.

Hey, I found nugget!

[bleep]

[shouting] Found nugget!

[all cheering]

[Paul] It just seems like we're going to be

big nuggets from here on out, man.

[Paul] No. I heard something rumbling big up here

[narrator] And set out to explore remote parts of his claims.

[man] Whoa!

[narrator] Where he discovered the waterfall,

he staked his season on.

[Dustin] Now that's a waterfall, man.

[Paul] I hear it.

[Dustin] It looks like a vertical drop,

which is what you want in the plunge pool.

It's a natural gold catch.

[narrator] This untouched plunge pool

collects the heavy gold as it's washed down creek.

And in a region that delivered more than 80,000 ounces.

could hold the millions in gold

they've been chasing.

There's no escape out of here.

Nope.

[narrator] But this narrow section

means the constant threat of falling rocks.

[woman] Whoa! Whoa! Watch out!

-[indistinct shouting] -[man] Run! Run!

-Run, run, run! -[Dustin] Get up here guy's. Get up here.

[woman] Go!

[narrator] And massive flash floods.

-[bleep] -[man] That's insane.

This is a freaking nightmare.

[narrator] Make this site the most deadly location they have ever faced.

You're talking about further than your old dive site.

-Right? -[Dustin] Yes, yes.

-Ho! -It's about a half mile up...

-[Paul] Yeah. -...past where we're at.

See going up stream ain't our risk going to get greater

because those canyons are just they're so...

so tight, there's no way out.

[Dustin] The truth is, this is going to be

the most dangerous place we've ever been ever.

Some of the shell boulders you're gonna see in the creek.

Well, they're bigger than this whole dance floor right here.

They came off the mountain.

That's it.

The risk is going to go up big time.

[Dustin] Sorry, but I think this is how it's gonna be, man.

I can't keep you 100% safe.

You have to make this decision for yourself,

so think about it.

Tomorrow we're going to be over at the boat launch.

Totally understand if you don't want to come out there.

I got a lot invested in this,

so I don't have the right to back out.

But you do.

-You know? -[man] Mmm-hmm.

[Dustin] You got to stay alive, and I understand so.

-All right. -All right.

-All right. Later. -See ya.

You know, every year it's danger,

more and more danger.

That's my concern.

Makes me nervous.

I wouldn't want to leave behind family.

Sometimes you gotta decide is it worth it or not?

[narrator] For Marine veteran Carlos Minor,

the risk may not be worth the reward.

[girl] Daddy.

[speaking Spanish]

Show him what do you have from school?

[Carlos] What you got, Mommy's?

[grunts] Okay. Artwork.

She was so excited waiting for you just to show you.

Oh, [chuckles] My gosh, lollies!

Directed drawings.

Wow! Mummies.

[girl] It's you and me.

-[Carlos] Oh, pot of gold. -[girl] Mmm-hmm

You got gold fever, too. Do you want to go get gold?

-No. -No. [chuckles]

-[chuckles] -[Carlos] Not in my lifetime. You won't.

Talked to all the guys,

you know, it was "We're ' back at it again." You know.

'How was your winter?

Blah, blah, blah.

'Oh, by the way, What we're going to do

is totally different from what we've done last year.

And it's going to be 10 times as dangerous.

[girl] That's Daddy.

-[Carlos] Oh. -[woman chuckles] Daddy with wings.

Why?

-[girl speaks indistinctively] -[woman] He's always doing crazy stuff.

[Carlos] Family always comes first for me.

That's why I was letting the guys down.

I feel bad about it.

But in the long run, My family trumps that.

Am I going to show up tomorrow?

I don't know.

I kind of thought they were going to be here already.

But we'll see what happens.

[sighs]

Wouldn't be surprised if people backed out this year.

I would be disappointed.

But I wouldn't be surprised.

[honking]

All right,

Well, that's Paul here.

That's good news.

We got two down, two to go

[Paul] What's going on?

-[Dustin] All right, James too. -We found James.

[Dustin chuckles] All right. That's three.

We got one left.

-Thank y'all for showing up. That's awesome. -[James] Ah, man.

I'm gonna take you showing up as a full commitment,

and you're gonna come out here [chuckles] and risk your life with me.

-I'm ready. -Yeah, ready.

Well, good.

-Because-- -You can't run us off, man.

-[all laughing] -Not that easy.

You gotta protect us. We gotta protect you.

And we-- That's the way it is.

[Dustin] No sign of Carlos, huh?

I have not seen him anywhere.

-I don't know. -He was the one I was worried about.

-Yeah. -[Dustin] Well, let's gear up.

Let's get everything ready.

-[man] Okay. -Hopefully Carlos will show up.

[man] Let's go.

[Dustin] You ready for some noise?

Now we're talking.

[James] You know, I thought about it.

I was a little bit nervous.

I don't know. I just got to look at the big picture

and pull up my big boy britches.

[Paul] We finally made the decision just to go all in.

We do have a lot riding on all this.

We know there's good gold there

and just to turn and walk away,

I don't know if I can live with that.

Uh, let's start looking for a place to launch.

-All right. -[Dustin] Because uh...

-[car honks] -Oh!

-There he is. -[men cheering]

[whooping]

-[Dustin] All right. -[man shouts]

-Okay. -[Dustin] That's a relief.

[man] Yeah, it is.

Okay, that helps.

[laughing]

Hey, man!

I thought that was going the wrong way.

Am I late for the party or what?

We were worried You weren't gonna show up, man.

[laughing]

[Carlos] I had a lot to think about.

-Let me tell you, man. -I hear you.

All those freaking gold stories you told me.

-[grunts] -[chuckles]

[Carlos] Let's ' go do this.

-All right. -[Carlos] This is the year, right?

-Yup. -[Carlos] This is the year.

This is the year.

I think so too, man.

-Are you good to go? -Yeah, man.

-All right. -All right, Bro. I'm all ready to rock, man.

[Dustin] I am so happy.

That everybody showed up.

Holy cow. I was worried.

[Carlos] Yeah, I showed up.

uh, believe it or not, this decision wasn't really up to me.

Me and the wife.

Extensively talked about my decision

of if I'm going to do this season,

we all got to make sure to get good gold.

Life changing gold.

All right. You're good to go.

[Paul] Clear everybody. Clear.

[Dustin] All right, everybody,

Let's get in the water and see if this thing floats.

[Carlos] There you go.

Perfect.

[engine whirring]

[Carlos] Yeah, no problem.

Good to go.

[Dustin] You guys don't judge me

by my first run because I'm a little rusty.

-[Carlos] We good? -[Paul] Yep.

[Dustin] Taking off.

[Carlos] Whoo!

[man] Oh yeah!

[narrator] This journey upriver is the first step

in what will be the most difficult

and dangerous whitewater mining

they have ever attempted.

[man] This is [bleep] bad ass!

And with a season that could last just five months,

it's now a race to get a diver in the water.

[Dustin] Whoa! That's what I'm talking about.

[narrator] To reach their remote camp.

The crew must travel 13 miles

up the treacherous and unpredictable Tsirku River.

To Nugget Creek.

Where they believe untouched waterfalls high in the mountains

have trapped the piles of nuggets

to make all this effort worth it.

[Carlos] That sure looks deep right there.

[Dustin] That pitch is strong, man.

We're going through the ice.

[whooping]

[laughing]

[whooping]

[Dustin] I love this boat.

This boat is badass.

Whoo!

Oh! We made it, boys.

-[laughs] -Yeah.

[Dustin] All right. [grunts]

This is the most ground I've seen.

First thing.

[James] Yeah.

-[Dustin] Whoa! -[Paul] What do you see?

[Dustin] There's a bear right there.

[Paul] Holy you [bleep]

[Carlos] Oh, you see it?

[Dustin] Big old black bear, man.

-Oh, yeah. -[Paul] Holy. [bleep] He's right beside camp.

[Dustin] He's walking right now.

[James] He's just behind those trees

-from where we are. -[Dustin] Yeah.

Get us a bear.

[Dustin] He's huge, is what he is.

[Paul] He's [bleep] huge.

[Dustin] Oh, yeah, that's a big one.

I'm gonna get my gun.

[gunshots]

[Dustin] Just for the bang?

Well, it scares the hell out of them.

[gunshots]

Man, I just hope there's not a whole [bleep]

families and things up here.

-[gunshots] -[Dustin yells] Get out of there!

[Carlos] Man. I really hope that freaking bear didn't destroy our camp.

[Dustin] That's a bear.

That's a big one.

[Paul] That bear needs to get the hell out of here.

[gunshots]

[narrator] As winter's grip eases on Nugget Creek camp,

bears, hungry from a winter of hibernation,

pose a constant threat.

[Dustin] Hopefully, mama bear is not up there.

I'd hate to have a whole family these damn things over here.

[narrator] These apex predators can weigh up to 700 pounds.

and frequently target wilderness camps in search of food.

[Dustin shouts] Get out of there!

Hey!

[gun clocks]

We saw that large black bear.

I mean, just right up the hill right here behind camp.

So I know he's been in the camp.

I'm not here to kill a bear.

But if they come messing with us,

I do want to be able to defend myself.

And this right here does give me a peace of mind

that nobody's gonna get mauled by a bear.

[Dustin] Yeah, he's moving on now,

but keep your eyes open.

[Carlos] You see, that's our shanty.

Freaking bear tried to get in there.

I've got my gun on me.

I figure if I shoot James in the leg

and I can make a run for it.

Let him deal with it.

[Dustin] Let's go

[Carlos] Here we go.

Come on! Come on!

Come on. Whoo!

Whoo!

Yeah! [laughs]

Right now, we're trying to get camps set up

so we can move in.

And then move on to get up the creek.

[Paul] Oh, yeah,

the smell of gasoline.

[Carlos in sing-song voice] I'm home.

Yes.

[James] We've got to build shelters.

[Dustin] There's not as much snow as there usually is.

Usually is over my head, and this is awesome.

[exhales] Home sweet home.

I can't wait to get up and get these huge Nugz.

[Paul] Don't mind me.

I'm just trying to set up a tent.

[all laughing]

[Dustin] Everybody's excited to start.

and this is really quick for us.

We've had a lot of bad starts in the past

and this year,

It looks like we've learned

from some of our mistakes,

which isn't, you know, not a common thing for us.

[fire cracking]

All right, let's see what you got.

[Carlos] Perfect man.

-[James grunts] -[Paul] This actually look good.

-Rest. -[Wes] All rest. Thank you, sir.

-[James] Which one? -[Carlos] Oh my gosh!

That's pretty good, man.

-[Paul] Smells good. -[Carlos] That smells really good.

[James] You want one?

[sighs] The sun's going down.

[Wes] Yeah.

[laughs] Yeah, they're going around.

[Paul] It's going around.

I'll never forget my first year here.

Fred and I were panning

and we had been at it for about 12-15 hour, right?

And we're almost done.

And he's like "God one more pan."

And I looked down at my watch and I said,

"Fred, It's 04:30 in the morning."

-And it's just as bright as it is right now. -[men laugh]

And he was like,

"Get the hell out of here."

[Carlos laughs]

"Fred, we have to be up in two and a half hours."

[James] Definitely feels good. Having camp set up now.

Man, we're way ahead right now.

We're so far ahead.

Pretty much got the place set up, man.

[Paul] Yeah, we do.

[Dustin] Dying to know what's up that creek, though.

[Wes] I'm here to see it too.

[Dustin] I've been thinking about it for the entire winter, man.

[Wes] Man, as far along as we are now,

we need to go do a recon tomorrow and see what we can--

how far up the creek we can get.

[Dustin] I couldn't see really well,

down when I was on top

But I'll know as soon as I get eyes on it.

I know exactly what we're dealing with.

We've got to go for it big.

It's either big or bro. That's it.

See some more of those six ounce nuggets?

[Wes] I agree with you.

Or maybe a half a dozen of them.

That would be even better.

[Wes] Yeah, I agree.

[Dustin] Good thing it's not raining.

[Paul] That's a good point.

Well, the sun's not glaring, either so.

[Dustin] Yeah. [chuckles] it's great.

Yeah, look bare.

-That's a bear track. -[Paul] That's a bear track.

[Dustin] Oh, my God, we got a big one.

-[Wes] Holy [bleep] -[Dustin] Look at that sucker.

Bigfoot.

[narrator] To reach the waterfall

Dustin discovered last season

the crew must hike a mile up Nugget Creek,

braving river rapids

and falling rocks.

Once there, they must establish

their remote mining outpost

in the shadow of the cliffs above

in the belief that this untouched site

could contain a huge deposit of monster nuggets.

This is our drop off point right here.

If I blow through

just don't even come check on me, you know,

just back up and lock over-

lock every-- everybody even just digs heels,

I'm fine with that, too.

I don't care. Just make it stop.

[Paul] As long as we've got climbing ropes and harnesses,

I think we'll get anybody out that falls there.

[Dustin] I was-- I was wondering.

Should we suit up?

Harnesses rope just in case you go through.

This is where this gets dangerous.

-Yeah, he needs the heat. -[Dustin] All right.

Put your [bleep] harnesses on if you're coming with me.

What am [bleep] with here?

[Dustin] All right. I'm just gonna go out front run

and stomp on a bunch of [bleep] if I go through.

Everybody anchor the rope, and I'll climb up the rope.

-All right. -[Carlos] Copy that.

[sighs]

[Dustin] Hey, give me some space.

-[Paul] All right? -[Dustin] Just in case I blow through

Back up off me.

The whole section goes--

If both of us go down, it's stupid.

[Paul] Copy that.

Dude, I looked in the hole right there.

We're like ten feet above big ass boulders.

[narrator] The snow makes access

further up creek possible.

[Dustin] This is awesome.

[narrator] But if any of these

suspended sections give way, it's a free fall.

Into the raging white water below.

[Carlos] So from here, down to the bottom,

where it's running, how far is that?

[Paul] About 25 feet.

[grunts, sighs]

-[bleep] -[Paul] Holy crap.

It [bleep] got soft y'all.

[Dustin] Rock, rocks.

[Carlos] Whoa, whoa, whoa! Watch out!

[Paul] Be careful right here, guys.

Whoo!

[Dustin] I'm loving this, y'all.

[Wes] This is nice.

-I'm loving this. -[Wes] I like this.

This is good news is what this is. Right here.

There's a lot less snow than we had.

And from up there it looked way up there.

But it must have been a trick on the eyes

-because this looks good. -[Wes] I love it.

[Dustin] So we're going to continue up

[Carlos] This is it?

Holy! [bleep]

Oh, oh, oh [chuckles] This is not what I wanted.

[Wes] Uh-oh.

There's no waterfall right now.

-[Dustin] Uh... -[Carlos] Oh [bleep]

This is not good.

[Dustin] This is-- This is what I was worried about.

[Carlos] Oh, that sucks.

[Paul] Oh, yeah, this is not good.

[Dustin] We're standing on probably 80 or 100 feet of snow, right last year.

[narrator] Last year...

[Paul] I hear something rumbling big up here.

[narrator] Dustin and Paul discovered the waterfall

that they pinned their season on.

But now it is covered with over 80 feet of solid snow and ice.

Creating a frozen barrier

between them and the gold.

[Paul] It's not melting anytime soon.

[exhales]

I mean, if we have to wait four or five months for this to to melt

That gives us no time to come in here and have an operation.

It's going to fil l right back up with snow almost instantly.

Yeah, I just lost a whole bunch of hope.

[Carlos] Man. Son of a bitch, Dude.

I just-- I don't know what to do.

My brain's telling me to abandon ship.

Your hopes and dreams are dead right here.

[Dustin] I just couldn't sleep last night.

I just didn't have it.

My brain wouldn't turn off.

I'm kind of getting stumped on what to do.

The snow, so much bigger than I thought it was going to be.

Months from now it will be completely snow less

and we can attack it then, but not right now.

It's not a viable dig site right now.

[Wes] Tons of snow. It essentially seems like, yeah,

it almost looks overwhelming.

If we get the chunks to break off

and go in the water, they'll dissolve.

Yeah.

I didn't see any water up there, though.

Well, it's underneath the snow.

It's still there. Just got to cut through the snow and get to it.

It is still flowing?

Yeah, that's true.

I mean, it's amazing. We couldn't even hear that waterfall.

-Mmm-mmm. -It's so deep underneath there

[narrator] With over 80 feet blanketing Dustin's

waterfall dive site

to keep the dream of uncovering Nugget Creek's riches alive.

He needs a Plan B.

And quick.

I've been thinking about this whole situation.

I think I'm starting to come up with a plan.

I have a sight in mind.

So, James, Carlos, let's go do an assessment

on the site and let's go find out.

What we're getting into.

But one thing I do need is the dredge

to work perfect this year

because we had a lot of problems last year,

I need that dredge to be reliable.

-Okay. -[Wes] Okay.

-[Dustin] We're good? -We got a plan.

-Should we drag it over here? -We could.

[Wes] Well, let's get in and look at it

and start scrounging everything we can find.

[Paul] That's not good.

That's where our pontoons go.

Wes has gonna have to do some welding of this thing for sure.

Kind of sucks that there's so much snow,

but that does give us time.

To work on the dredge, get the dredge dolled up.

It definitely needs it.

So whatever we can do now

to beef it up, make it stronger.

Now is the perfect time to do it.

This dredge is our moneymaker.

Without this, there's no mining.

This is the most important piece

of equipment that we have.

[Wes] Okay. That's good.

Man, this thing's in sad shape, isn't it?

This thing is in horrible shape, man.

Golly.

Yeah, I'll just build a whole new frame.

[Carlos] Slopes get sloppy, huh?

[Dustin] It's really [bleep]

[Carlos] Definitely on the melt.

That's from yesterday. That's pretty quick.

[Dustin] You guys. What do you think?

[Carlos] You think right here.

[Dustin] I really like it.

[James] I like it.

I've been looking at this spot for a long damn time.

Every time we walk by it,

I think it'll be a better spot.

More accessibility, less dangerous.

This is good news right here.

So here we're looking at about 15-20 ft of snow.

Where I wanted to go.

We're not gonna get through that.

This is hard enough.

We'll get through it.

But this will melt out long, long, long before that stuff's done.

We'll be finished this hole before that snow melts by itself.

[Carlos] That's real good.

The water literally runs into a wall,

a big giant cliff right here

that goes up probably about 60-70 feet

and takes a 90 degree turn.

I think this is the best spot to dig.

The water comes through and it feels like the water

just rams into this wall, does a circle and shoots

out of that little spot right there.

What are you thinking?

-[James] Yeah. -Yeah. That what happens,

-that's exactly what happened, man. -Yeah.

Water passes, against this wall,

and then it just trickles them through, you know what I mean

The wall.

[Dustin] Is that what you gonna call it?

[Carlos] Yeah, we can call it the wall.

-[Dustin] All right. -We're here at the wall.

[narrator] The new dive site

Dustin has chosen is just 300 feet up

from where they found their biggest nugget ever.

As the fast flowing creek slams into the huge wall of solid rock at this site,

the water redirects and slows.

Causing the heavy nuggets to drop,

which could create monster piles on bedrock.

[Dustin] All right, so we're digging the wall.

-[Carlos] Digging the wall. -[James] Dig the wall. Hell, yeah.

Where's the gold gonna be, man?

-Come on. -[James] Gold's gonna be right here.

[Dustin] Down this line?

Right down the center.

[Carlos] It's gonna be Kaboom! Right here. Kaboom!

Kaboom, Kaboom, Kaboom, kaboom!

Okay, we've got a plan.

So, let's work on trying to get this place uh,

-Dredge-able. -[Carlos] Okay.

[Dustin] This is a great spot to dig

because of how wide it is,

hopefully it's not 20-plus feet deep.

That's my real hope.

But I think we're gonna find a ton of gold

right here where I'm staying.

Good morning.

[Paul] Nothing like laying in bed,

thinking about what we gotta do.

So there's one really, really big snow bridge

that's in our way.

Got some ideas on what to do.

[narrator] Their new dive site.

The wall is still covered in 20 feet of snow,

but with the right tools, they could be mining within a week.

So How far along were you with that thing?

-Ready? -[Dustin] Completely.

-Mmm-hmm. -[laughs]

So, guys, we've got a new tool.

It's completely experimental on my part.

I thought, Carlos, you'd enjoy this quite a bit actually.

[Wes] It's like Christmas, dude.

What is that?

What the-- No.

What is this, bro?

[James] It's a laser.

It's a flamethrower!

Oh, my God! Oh, my God!

[all laughing]

It's a flamethrower.

That's your button.

[all laughing]

Oh, my God! I got tingly!

-You got-- -Oh, my God!

So that's how it feels.

[all laughing]

Oh, my God!

[Dustin] You want to see how it works?

Let's go give it a test run.

It's gonna be fun.

-[Dustin] You ready for this? -[Carlos] Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Dustin] Treat it like a gun.

[Carlos] Okay? Treat it like a gun.

[Dustin] All right, so there's a snowman there,

and he's mocking you.

He just said something about your mom or something.

[all hoot]

-[Carlos] Flame on! -[Dustin] Flame on!

Nothing?

[Carlos] No, I just haven't done it yet because I'm freaking scared.

[all laughing]

[Carlos] Flame on!

-[Dustin] Oh yeah. -[Carlos] Oh, my God!

[all laughing]

[Dustin] Holy crap!

Way to go, man?

[Paul] That's so bad.

Ha-ha!

[Paul] Whoa! Dude. Look at that.

That is awesome.

I can feel the heat all the way back here.

Flame off! Power off!

Dude, this is a little bit too.

Wow., man!

There is so much things we can do.

[Dustin] So you're sold?

Yeah, man, I need to go to church after this.

[all laughing]

Seriously, man.

[Dustin] So I don't know if it's actually gonna work.

Worth a shot.

[Dustin] Yeah. I think the three of us

should go try to melt some snow.

You're gonna work on the dredge for a little bit.

-[Paul] All right. -Uh, everybody know what they're doing?

-[Paul] Yup -All right, Let's go.

[narrator] Desperate to make his huge investment

at Nugget Creek turn a profit.

Dustin has tasked the Richardson brothers,

with rebuilding their dredge.

So it's ready to launch

as soon as their dive site is open.

[Wes] First thing we gotta do is start with sluices and then go from there.

[Paul] This thing is in bad shape, man.

[Wes] Man, sure is.

[whirring]

I like that, though, 'cause now, that'll fit.

We can get that tight, tight, tight,

You know, we've got three other dredges

that we can scrounge e parts off of.

We always want to get two divers in.

We've got enough parts. We should see if we can make a double dredge.

[narrator] Wes's big idea.

Harvest parts from their three broken dredges.

To combine and create a double dredge.

Two sluices and two separate heating and suction systems.

It means two divers can operate in the water at the same time.

And dredge doubled the gold.

Let's just go scrounge up stuff

and we can lay [bleep] out and

do some mock up

and just see what we can come up with.

I mean, normally we've tried to do it with two dredges before,

but you've got to have such a large area,

you just can't make it work.

So we came up with the idea.

Let's make a smaller dredge.

With two sluices, four engines,

take up a lot less space

and get twice the amount of work done.

[Paul] You know, we've got that long sluice box from the small dredge.

Use the small motors, and whoever's on this one

could be the one moving rocks.

That's a good idea. We might as well suit this thing up.

[narrator] Up at the wall dive site...

So right now we're going pyro on the snow.

[narrator] Carlos attempts to break through

the 20 feet of snow, keeping them from gold.

That's your proton pack.

Proton pack. [chuckles]

Okay. Let's burn some snow.

You guys ready?

Flaming on! [yelling]

Whoo!

I did that. [laughs]

Oh, my gosh!

-The hottie looks pretty bad, Dude. -[laughs]

[Carlos] You know what, man?

It doesn't look like that's helping at all.

Snow doesn't burn, bro. It just doesn't work.

[Dustin] All right, we gotta come up with a better technique.

[Carlos] How about we make a bonfire with wood,

on top of the snow, we can hold hands,

"Kumbaya," each other,

So just find some debris.

Yeah. Let's just find some wood.

I think it's gonna work better if we had something to burn.

Okay, well, let's get some wood in here I guess.

You guys just keep going

I'm gonna take a walk all the way up.

to the creek and find out if there's any place

that the snow is melted and we can start dredging faster.

Okay. Gotcha, man.

Be careful, dude, be careful.

Camp fire time.

All right. Let's go get some wood, man.

[James] All right.

[Carlos] Let's get in there.

Hey, James. I think we're good, bro.

All right, man. Get your marshmallows ready.

We're gonna have a campfire.

Fame on brother! Fame on.

[laughs]

-Wow! Dude. -[Carlos] Yeah!

I make fire.

That's badass.

It should do his job.

Just grab some more wood.

Beat it. And leave it.

Hopefully we'll come back with a big hole.

[Dustin] I want to walk to the top of my claims

All the way up this creek.

I want to see if there's any melted ice

where we can get a dredge in

and get the dredge in fast.

[narrator] Desperate to make the most of their short season,

Dustin heads another mile up from their waterfall site.

[Dustin] Hell of a hike.

We're almost 2000 feet up.

This is the upper limits of my claim.

Wow!

Look at this.

Okay, that goes right through.

That's hollow.

Don't go through there.

[laughs]

I came all the way up here.

I was hoping there'd be some melted snow we can get in.

But everything was completely snowed in all the way to the top.

There's probably 50-80 ft of snow right here.

I bet underneath that is another 80 feet of scree and debris.

So this is absolutely impossible.

This would take months of heavy, heavy equipment

just to get through the top stuff.

It is dangerous.

I don't like it.

If Fred was still here, Fred would love it up here.

But he's not much of a snow hiker.

Big Old Boot didn't help with that. [bleep]

Yeah, he would tell me. It's not worth it.

And I know that's exactly what he would be whispering in my ear right now.

I'm a little let down that it's not a dig site.

Oh... [bleep]

[narrator] Up ahead.

You can do whatever the [bleep] you want. I don't care.

[Dustin] Why are you so upset?

-[crashing] -Oh!

[bleep]

God! [bleep]

I think it broke up in my hands.

Oh yeah. Look at that.

We know the gold.

We absolutely know there's gold.

[bleep]

[Carlos] Is this a success?

Well, you would think fire would do a little bit more than that.

[Carlos] So, you think, Dude.

[narrator] After Dustin's failed mission to find a dive site

that might get them in the water faster.

Their only hope is to clear the snow at the wall.

We tried fire trying to melt the ice,

trying to get into water faster.

But none of it's working, and I think we need to go back to what we know.

With just two inch pumps, and just get after it

and stop playing with fire because this is not working.

[Paul] How'd it go, guys?

We got beat.

What you got, man?

Wes got a pretty good idea, man.

Well, so I mean, look at our big dredge.

-That thing is so annihilated, we're pretty much gonna have -[Paul] It's in bad shape.

[Wes]...to completely rebuild the frame.

Yeah, I mean, we've used the hell out of it over the years.

-[Carlos] Wait, that's the one that we used last year? -[Paul] Yeah.

The the snow, I think, did some more damage to it.

[Wes] But so here's what we're thinking.

If we've got to build the frame, we've got all of those small dredges.

And we brought the small sluices out.

What if we put two of those sluices

together and make like a double dredge?

Say that again.

-What do-- -A longer sluice or a double dredge

-No. -No. Like side by side on one frame.

Instead of having to dredge frames,

one dredge frame, 2two sluices.

So we'll have two engines for the one dredge,

two engines for the other.

Exactly. If we could do this and get two divers in,

we're going to be miles ahead.

You just got me off guard. I thought you were just cleaning the sucker up.

So give me a second.

Give me a second goddamn, man.

So, a double sluice with four engines on it?

Yeah, that's gonna be heavy now.

-That's heavy. -We'd have to double the pontoons

up on the middle or something to...

-You put them in the middle? -[yeah]

-What we were thinking, -I mean...

[exhales]

Timeline wise, like, for full fabrication.

I mean, we're not talking like weeks.

I don't have weeks.

It doesn't get dark till after midnight,

we can put in some long hours.

That's not gonna be an issue.

I like the idea of having a double sluice dredge/one boat.

-Time. That's what I'm looking at... -[Paul] Mmm-hmmm.

[Dustin] A week.

That's all. We've got to build it.

What do you think?

[Wes] I don't see why not. Because I'm working on framing stuff.

Paul can be working on the engines.

We'll just push it and get it done.

-Okay. -We can do it. Yeah.

[Dustin] I'm gonna hold you to that.

-All right. -[Wes] We can make it happen.

[Paul] These will definitely be stronger.

If you get that height, figured we can put a bar across.

That's what I'm thinking.

We should be able to-- I mean, this is kind of messed up, but we can redo it.

We got this height.

Yeah, that'll be easy if we just make this where it sits here.

-All the way across. -We've got this.

Look at that.

-Look at that. -[Paul] Yeah.

I think we just chop it here and chop it here.

Get rid of that the middle section.

That gives you all that to weld.

And that gives you breaks going down to these middle pontoons.

[Wes] So that's the first thing,

-we'll extend these first. -[Paul] Yeah.

And then we'll make the structure

-to make it strong. -Yeah

[narrator] To hit Dustin's ambitious one week deadline.

The Richardson brothers work into the night.

And start the first stage in Wes's

double dredge build.

[Paul] Oh, man. That's gonna be sweet.

[narrator] Construct a new reinforced frame

to support the extra weight.

[Paul] That'll be easy.

Six foot 60-- 63 to the inside?

[Paul] Something like that.

[Paul] A little bit of bit of hurry here.

I'll get all these pieces fitted.

Get them cut! Get them ready.

Wes will weld them up before we know it.

We'll have this dredge together.

[Wes] Check this out.

If we have to we can make those right there.

[Paul] That will be strong.

Yep. I like that.

[Wes] It's gonna be a new dredge

by the time we get through with it.

[Dustin] Quick tip.

If you're ever going to carry a pump on your backpack, don't top it off.

My back's starting to burn.

I think I got gasoline. So...

[narrator] Back at the wall dive site,

after they failed to melt the 20 ft of snow with fire.

Dustin, Carlos and James

Resort to tried and tested methods.

[Dustin] Firing up.

[motor sputters]

[Carlos] Ready. Go.

[James] Now we're talking.

[narrator] The creek. water is just two degrees warmer than the snow.

But it's still a highly effective cutting tool.

[James] Ah! Yeah.

[Dustin] Is this gonna work?

Yeah.

[James] Melt the crap out of it.

It's gonna get so heavy it's gonna collapse.

[Dustin] It's cutting real quick.

[James] It's a lot of water.

It's a lot of water.

We're gonna start melting a ton of snow,

and it's time to get the dredge out here and start dredging.

I'm ready.

I'm actually really excited for this site.

[James] It's getting there.

That's the thickest part.

Try that.

The two inch pump is working.

It's working awesomely, but the thing is,

We've got to speed up the process.

So we're going to give it a hand by chipping away at the snow.

You know, any little thing helps, man.

We got to get the dredge in here.

[Carlos laughs]

[Carlos] I can't believe that there are

three works of the shovel. [laughs]

[narrator] Over the next two days...

[Carlos] Boom!

[narrator] ...using their water pump

and the pressure washer for more precise cuts.

[Dustin] We need to make lines

and then cut it open with this.

Yeah, look at that.

Look at it.

[Carlos] Dude, that's working really good.

[narrator] The crew starts to win their battle

against the snow,

Holy! [bleep] It's eating it all up, dude.

-[crashing] -[James] Whoa! [bleep]

[Carlos grunts]

[bleep]

[bleep]

-[Dustin] You all right? -[Carlos] Holy moly.

-[crashing] -[Carlos] Whoa, whoa. [bleep]

-[bleep] -[laughing]

[whooping]

Yeah! Piece by piece,

This place is awesome, Dude,

Hey, Carlos.

Hey, do you got a pan?

[Carlos] Yeah, bro.

-Here. -Thanks.

I'm gonna do a quick pan, See if I can't find any gold.

You never know.

Yeah. This is a good looking material.

I mean...

lots of pirate crap that's stuck in here

that are all good indicators of gold.

[snickers]

No way.

Oh, yeah. Look at that.

Hey, guys, I found some gold over there.

Look at that.

[Dustin] Oh, man!

Yeah. Those are pieces.

-[Carlos] Yeah. -[James] Yeah.

You've got pieces out of that.

Look at that. That's like a little picker almost.

[James] We all know there's gold here.

-Where is gold? -It's here.

There's gold. We just--

Got to get to the bottom of it, man.

Well, the dredge will fit now.

This is enough snow to get started.

Using the snow we'll start our walkway

and we'll start moving these rocks.

So you know what time it is, right?

-Dredge time. -[James chuckles]

This looks good, man.

This looks real good.

This is really good work.

[Carlos] Today was a good day.

We made enough freaking area for the dredge.

It was awesome. Awesome fricking day.

[Dustin] James found some tiny little pickers in some dirt over here.

We know there's gold.

We absolutely know there's gold.

Now we just gotta go pull it up.

So I've decided we're going on an adventure.

Um, need to have lumber for walkways.

Let's use this opportunity

to get a couple of barrels of fuel

because my boat hates it.

[narrator] A week into their mining season,

the crew have cleared enough snow

at the wall and found gold.

But before they can move the dredge up to the site,

they need supplies like fuel and lumber.

Critical to getting the operation up and running.

There was going to be a helicopter flight.

I was thinking about it, but I looked into it.

And it was $11,000

to get all the stuff up here that I need.

So we're gonna drive the 5-ton

and I'm gonna get you to drive.

It froze again last night,

so the water's low.

So we're up early to really take advantage

of the low water.

[narrator] Dustin's money saving supply run

is an 18-mile mission to Devil's elbow and back.

The risk of sinking sands,

river boulders and deep water crossings litter the routes.

And it's a race against time to get down and back

before the glaciers that feed the mighty Tsirku River melt.

And wipe out the access

[Dustin] The only thing we have to rescue that truck is the dozer,

and it does not want to make it that long distance.

So much can go wrong.

So many things can break.

[Carlos] Yeah. Let's do it anyway.

We got a lot in this, bro.

Calm, slow.

I know you got it, man.

You're the best technical driver out here for us,

-So -All right.

-You got it? -Yep.

Be confident.

Don't take too big a chances.

Do it.

Wish me luck.

-[James] Oh, God. -[honking]

[Carlos] You can do it, James

[narrator] It will take all of James, 25 years

experience and off road driving.

To get this 50-year-old piece of military

history down the river and back.

Let the journey begin.

Yeah, buddy.

Big rigs, big [bleep] rigs.

[clattering]

I mean, to start off right now,

take that right there.

But we've got that whole busted tent that we had last year.

[Wes] We've got plenty of material.

We've got tons of this stuff.

[narrator] At the start of last season...

[Dustin] Huh.

-That's destroyed. -[crew speaks indistinctly]

[Dustin] Oh, [bleep]!

[narrator] The crew arrived to find their camp

completely crushed by heavy snow.

[Dustin] This [bleep] was supposed to be snow proof.

[narrator] Now to avoid falling behind on the build,

Wes plans on using their old tent

for bush built supports for their dredge frame.

Check this out.

Even with these curved pieces,

they'll still work just like this.

-This is so strong. -[Paul] Yeah.

I like your curved pieces

-for making the bridge across the top. -[Wes] Yeah.

What I'm thinking about this

is this thing always wanted to do this,

that other dredge before.

We've got them going there.

Fasten here. And we could do a couple of legs right here.

-Mm-hmm. -[Wes] Fasten here and there.

And ones on the bottom.

And the thing of it is, once we get it set up

and the bridge across is going to be strong enough,

like you said, you'll be able to step

-just right across. -Yeah.

One person can take care of two dredges like it was one.

Yeah, I'll finish scrounging some parts.

See if we can get enough stuff to make this work.

[electrical buzzing]

[James] All right, all right, all right, all right.

All right, all right, all right, all right, all right.

Here we go.

[bleep] monster truck.

This thing, it's got balls.

Come on, baby.

Oh, [bleep]!

Okay. That's not too bad.

[grunting]

[grunting]

Whoo!

Oh, wow!

Whoo!

Dustin wasn't lying. It's a bumpy ride.

[Dustin] How close are you with the dredge?

-[Wes] I'm married to this [bleep] dredge. -I understand.

How close are they? How's it...

-Pretty close. -[Dustin] Yeah? Because--

I mean, if I didn't have issues, I would already be finished.

[Dustin] All right. Here's my question.

Can we start carrying stuff out after today?

Yeah, should be able to.

-[Dustin] We can? -Mm-hmm.

[Dustin] So we can take the floats and just start-- Like...

I'd start with the engines.

I'd start taking [bleep] off the top, so, because--

[Dustin] Well, if you need to work on the engines,

you can keep those till last, is what I'm getting at.

[Wes] No, what I need

is all that [bleep] out there, so I can do a few last things to the frame.

[Dustin] I want it done by today.

There's no reason why we can't get that done today

unless we break something.

So let's not break anything.

Um, yeah. I'll get done everything I can today,

and we'll start hauling it.

I mean I can only get so much done, you know.

[narrator] Wes is almost a week into his build

of the new double dredge,

and the desperation to get a diver in the water

is getting to Dustin.

[Dustin] You're not working on the whole thing still right now, are you?

The entire thing?

Just little bits and pieces of it. Yes.

-[Dustin] Like the entire thing? -Because-- Yeah.

Great. Paul, you want to just stay down here

and you guys can have another couple of weeks.

We'll just [bleep]... We'll just wait.

If that's what you want, we'll make sure it's perfect.

And we can take as long as you like, man.

[Wes] I'm just telling you what I had in my head.

I mean, you can do whatever the [bleep] you want.

I don't care. I'll take all the [bleep] stuff

and I'll get the frame ready and y'all can take the frame.

-[Dustin] Why are you so upset? -I'm not upset.

There's just some--

All right. Well, it's fine.

It'll all work out just fine.

[Wes] He just don't appreciate the engineering in this.

I think I've done a pretty good job

in a pretty decent amount of time

for not having any [bleep] to work with.

As long as it floats.

Things have gotten really weird.

I have to build every [bleep] thing for this dredge.

[Dustin] It better be worth it in the end

because it's taking too long to build,

and it looks too heavy.

I don't even think the damn thing will float.

[grunting]

[narrator] While Wes races to meet Dustin's new deadline,

the rest of the crew load up

to support James on his mission.

[engine starting]

[Dustin] All systems go!

All right, let's head down to Devil's Elbow.

[Dustin] If it starts to rain,

that truck will never make it back up here.

[horn tooting]

[James] Time to go.

It's a little bumpy.

Hold on to your butts.

[narrator] Four miles down the mighty Tsirku River...

[James] That looks pretty deep.

...James has completed eight miles of his journey,

but his toughest obstacle is dead ahead.

I'm not gonna lie. This makes me a little nervous.

This is the deepest, right here.

If I could just stay to that side,

it might be shallow enough.

Oh, boy, here we go.

Ah. No guts, no glory, right? [sighs]

[bleep]

All right.

Come on, baby.

Whoa.

Holy [bleep]!

Oh!

[water gurgling]

Oh, boy, here we go.

Whoa!

Oh, [bleep]!

Oh!

Holy [bleep]! That's [bleep] deep!

[bleep] me running!

That was the deepest spot I've ever gone through.

Holy [bleep]!

This thing's a tank, dude.

[grunts]

I think I got about half a mile or so,

and then I might be able to get a glimpse of Devil's Elbow.

-There's Dustin. -[horn tooting]

[laughing]

[Dustin] That's about the smoothest I've ever driven.

[Paul] That was good.

[James] That was a hell of a drive.

[Dustin] Hell yeah, man.

You made it! [exclaims]

Oh! It was rough, dude.

-[Dustin] Damn good job! -[grunts]

Hell yeah!

I'm sore from that. [grunts]

Thing's a beast, ain't it? Yeah.

-Good job, man. -[laughs]

Long journey back.

We all talked about the weather possibly coming in,

and it looks like it's sneaking over here.

-So time to shift gears... -[thunder rumbling]

And get loaded and get out of here.

[thunder rumbling]

[narrator] It's a race against the weather

to get their supplies back to camp

as the approaching rain

threatens their only way back.

I feel like a bobblehead in here.

I think I'm gonna take a new route.

Gotta give her hell.

That wasn't too bad.

[horn tooting]

Here we go.

[bleep] monster!

[bleep] I love this truck, dude.

America! [bleep] yeah!

Man. I guarantee he's gonna be ready

for an adult beverage when he gets here though.

[Paul] I got him one ready.

-I mean, he definitely deserves it. -He deserves it, man.

-[Wes] That's for sure. -[Dustin yells] It's nerve-wracking.

He's right there!

There he is!

[Carlos] Good job, James!

[James] Yeah!

[Dustin] This is a real celebration.

-[Wes] Man. -[Dustin] For real.

-[James laughs] -[Wes] That's amazing.

[cheering]

-[horn tooting] -[cheering]

-Loosen it. -[Carlos] Oh, man. That loosened up already, huh?

[Dustin laughing]

Hell yeah, brother. Give me a hug.

Get in there. [bleep]

[Carlos] Good job, James.

-You deserve it, dude. -[James] Oh, [bleep]. Thank you.

I can't tell you how happy I am to have made it here.

But that was stressful.

[Dustin] I can't believe he made it.

We can start building the walkway.

Now we've got the supplies to do it.

We've got to get that dredge in the water.

[Dustin] Now we've got some boards.

Let's go finish that walkway, huh?

-[Carlos] Let's do it. -All right.

[James] Let's do it.

Aah!

[Carlos] This right here is hard.

[grunts]

[whirring]

[Paul] Let's see what we can do.

We need the walkway as our emergency escape.

And the only way it's going to be an emergency escape

is to have it higher than we've ever had it before.

I believe it's ready for a pipe.

You can see what happened to our last one.

[narrator] Two years ago...

It came up! It just came up right now!

[narrator] Heavy storms caused a massive flood

that annihilated everything in its path.

We're almost trapped.

Man, it's going over the boardwalk right now.

We lost everything. And everything's over.

We're like another ten, 12 feet higher.

[tool whirring]

[James] So, I don't think the flood's going to touch that.

[narrator] This walkway will be their lifeline

when the inevitable floods rip through Nugget Creek.

[whirring]

[whirring stops]

-What happened? -That one looks a little bent.

Yeah, well...

-[Dustin] Like it? -[Paul] I like that.

[whirring]

[Wes] So I'm gonna get this engine back on.

[grunts]

Found it had issues with the engine

after I already had it on,

so had to pull it off and change parts.

What I had to do today

set me back a little bit with this engine debacle.

But other than that, this thing is getting pretty close.

I'll, uh, get back to where I was at

and, uh, get this heater on,

and then I'll start plumbing all this.

I mean, it's gonna be pretty soon

and it's gonna be ready to go out there.

I am really ready to see what this thing does

because we're fixing to get into some big nuggets where we're going.

[clanging]

[Dustin] A little bit far in the middle one. Come on back.

[narrator] Over the next three days...

All right, let's slide that board.

...while Wes brings his Frankenstein dredge to life...

[Dustin] A little bit more.

That's plenty. I like it.

...the crew bring in over 80 feet of boards...

[Carlos] Like doing a tightrope.

Walking a tightrope without a net.

...and managed to anchor them 20 feet above the creek,

all the way to the wall.

This is one hell of a boardwalk.

It is now.

[Dustin] We just about finished this walkway.

So we're gonna walk all of the dredge...

Gigantic, probably 2,500-pound dredge,

piece by piece.

We're gonna walk it up over this walkway.

[Wes] No [bleep] problem.

Aw, look at that.

That's much better.

So for the most part, the deuce sluice is finished,

except for just a little-- few knickknack things.

The engines are on, the pumps are on.

The plumbing is all done.

What I did with this deuce sluice

is the way I put it, the components together,

there's no way we can take it up there in one piece.

I'm gonna have to take it apart here

to get it up to the site.

And once we get up there,

it should be really easy to put it back together.

[whirring]

What I'm waiting for is to see gold in both sluice boxes.

That is the ultimate right there.

This year, we're doubling up on everything.

[Dustin] It is a lot of walking, guys.

Holy cow. All right.

[Carlos] This is the first thing that has to be down there

because the pontoon's the foundation of the deuce sluice.

[Paul] We're taking the boardwalk.

You've got to stay focused.

One misstep,

especially carrying this weight on our backs,

that's a long drop down.

[Dustin] I made a bad choice.

[grunting]

[narrator] The crew will rely on manpower alone

to get their 2,500-pound dredge components

along the narrow boardwalk,

twenty feet above the creek.

[Dustin] I've done more. I don't know why

it's so [bleep] hard for me right now.

[narrator] A fall from this height could be fatal.

[bleep] That's a wobbly [bleep] walkway.

[Dustin] Whoo!

That kicked my ass.

Whoa.

[debris clattering]

[Dustin] Holy cow!

That just about killed me.

[Paul] Dude, I got hung on every [bleep] tree down that trail.

[Dustin] I'm never doing that again.

[Paul] Holy [bleep]!

[Dustin] It got dangerous with two of them bitches, I promise.

All right, Wes, uh, we're gonna go get the engines.

I don't know how heavy they are, so we'll see.

Okay.

I'll start putting this together, and then, we'll go from there.

[Dustin] A lot of heavy stuff.

Walk up here with these engines on my back.

You got to earn your keep sometimes.

Let's do this.

I designed this thing and I forgot how it goes together.

Should have taken pictures of it.

I think I got the big pontoons turned around backwards.

I don't know. I've got two--

Oh, no, they're at the front.

Yeah, I got this [bleep] backwards.

[bleep]

[Dustin] All right, let's see what we got.

Struggling like crazy.

It feels like we're about to pass the hell out.

That valve's sticking out that far out the back,

that hurts. [bleep]

[grunts]

[panting]

[grunts angrily]

[Dustin] Just 'bout passed out.

That last section right there,

I started getting a little hazy.

There's a whole damn day, man.

Son of a bitch, James.

[grunts]

[grunting]

[sighs]

Ah, [bleep]!

[James] It's so heavy.

I just don't wanna pass the [bleep] out.

-[yells] -[Paul] Dustin!

[water gurgling]

[James] It's so heavy.

I just don't wanna pass the [bleep] out.

[yells]

[Paul] You all right?

Yeah, you got to do more than that.

Ready?

-You wanna just take it off? -Yeah, let's do that.

My right heel let go.

Look at it.

-Full ice slip. -Yep.

It's all good.

[narrator] At the wall dive site,

the crew have finally completed

the last of 50 trips

to bring in the 2,500-pound deuce sluice.

I am whooped.

Huh.

[Paul] Holy crap.

[Dustin] [bleep] Dude, it's [bleep] cooking out here.

I did not see this coming.

Ah! Good job, guys, today.

Everybody did wonderful.

-This is what I needed. -[tool whirring]

-I needed this. -[whirring]

[Paul] Can you believe we hiked the entire dredge here?

-[James] I'm just happy to see you here. -[Paul] Me too.

[Carlos] Yeah! Holy crap, dude.

[Paul] Yeah. It's starting to look like a dredge already.

[Wes] I love this.

Let's reconvene on this in the morning.

I don't have much left in me, y'all.

-Damn good day. -[Carlos] Hell yeah!

[Dustin] We finally got the dredge out here.

As soon as this dredge gets built,

then we have everything together.

We can go diving and find some gold.

We had a hard day, but it was great.

We got the dredge out.

We got a ton of work done.

[grunts]

[panting]

[Dustin] All right. Let's lay some boards down.

Maybe a cross and some boards. I don't know.

[narrator] It's taken nearly two weeks,

but Wes has assembled the deuce sluice.

Now they must wrestle this 12-foot long,

one and a quarter ton double dredge into the water.

[Paul] You might be able to just drag it right on through there...

[Dustin] All right. See. Here's my issue, guys.

What I need is control of this thing

so it doesn't rub against the wall

and break off of Wes' hard work.

All right, all right.

So, we're going to try to protect

the sides of this thing.

In a big way.

Okay.

Now, this is a great moment right here.

I'm, uh, pretty happy to see the deuce sluice going.

And this is a big day for us.

I mean, if everything works out like it's supposed to,

twice the dredging, twice the gold,

like giving birth to a child.

It's gonna be an awesome freaking goddamn dredge, man.

[Dustin] All right, first things first.

Let's see if we can budge this thing.

I need it to slide straight,

and then turn, not turn, and go down.

Just head straight first.

Then we're going to turn it if we can.

Absolutely.

[Dustin] Let's see if we can move this thing, guys.

-You guys ready? -[crew] Yep. Ready.

-[Dustin] Go! -[all grunting]

[Dustin] Goddamn, that's heavy. [bleep]

That's heavy.

Oh, my God, I can't believe how heavy that is.

[Carlos] For Wes' sake, I really sure hope it floats.

[Dustin exhales] Ready, and...

All right. Little bit at a time, little bit at a time.

She's not going to go easy, but it moved.

All right, ready? And...

[all grunting]

[straining]

[bleep] Goddamn!

-Are we there yet? -[Dustin] Let's go all the way,

almost to where he's standing straight

-and then try to pivot it. -[Paul] All right.

Once it's pivoted, we'll use the skyline to drag it out.

[Paul] All right.

And go!

[grunting]

-Yeah! -Want me to push your way?

We got one more like that. Just like that. Just like that.

Ready.

-[Paul] Yeah. -One, two, three.

[grunting]

[narrator] They manhandle the deuce sluice...

-[Dustin] That's just about it, right? -[Paul] Yep.

[narrator] ...close enough to hand over to the skyline winches

for the final ten feet.

[Wes] When you start pulling the back of it over,

we might be able to push on the front too,

maybe it will come over a little bit.

All right, everybody, beware. When I pull on this,

this bolt could shoot out of the wall at any moment.

Watch your eyes.

[whirring]

-[Dustin] Another two feet. -[Wes] Hang on a second.

Let me see if we can get that board underneath it.

This is good. We're on the...

We're on this,

but it's against that log right there.

Here we go.

-[Carlos] Yeah. There it goes. -[Paul] Got it.

[whirring]

[cheering and laughing]

-[all cheering] -[bleep]

[laughing]

Better tie that [bleep] thing up.

[cheering]

[Wes] Yep, she floats.

[Dustin] Dredge is in the water.

Scoot it right over. It went really well for us.

But the deuce sluice looks like a damn houseboat to me.

It better live up to its name because...

we got a lot of riding on this right now.

[Wes] We got the deuce sluice floating.

We just have to put the, uh, foot valves on now, primer up,

and see if it sucks up some material.

[water gurgling]

So this is our new sluice for this year,

the deuce sluice.

[narrator] Wes' deuce sluice is finally in the water.

And this feat of bush engineering,

is the most advanced dredge they've ever had.

I've got a bilge pump out of a boat.

That pumps water into the foot valve.

Once I get one foot valve filled up,

it'll prime the other three

in the time it would normally take us to get one running.

And we have a reserve tank up at the top.

So, for some reason, the compressor quit,

they still have air.

Having this dredge built like this

gives us two divers in the water.

So, if we're only able to spend five hours dredging in one day,

that's ten hours of dredge time.

All combined together, we've got two of everything,

so it means at least twice as much gold this year.

[water gurgling]

[Wes] Hell yeah!

-Love it! -[cheering]

[narrator] At the wall dive site,

the deuce sluice is finally ready

to start dredging for gold.

[Carlos] It went pretty all right, you know.

The dredge is in the water.

From here on out, it's dredge, dredge, dredge.

Finally time to start dredging and get gold.

We know there's going to be large nuggets here.

We got a six ounce nugget downstream last year.

This year, we're in an area that I'm...

99% that nobody has messed with.

As soon as we can get two divers in the water,

I think we're going to find larger nuggets

and way more gold than we've ever found before.

[narrator] But to move the deuce sluice

into the best position for dredging,

they must be able to maneuver it using the skyline.

Tie that rope onto me.

When I hang that big, stupid thing off of here or something...

Going up.

[narrator] Their new dredge is almost twice the weight

of their old one,

and the skyline winches don't have the power

to lift it straight up.

[grunting]

[narrator] The simple solution,

double the pulleys

to cut the force required to lift it by half.

[Dustin grunts]

I'm trying to set up this, uh, pulley system,

but it's real, real heavy.

Wes came up with this,

and all it is, is more pulleys.

This right here is a two-to-one.

We're trying to make a four-to-one.

We'll see if it works.

[grunts]

Come on.

[straining]

[grunting]

[grunting]

God [bleep]!

Mmm.

[grunting]

I think I broke something in my hands.

Ouch.

Yep. Something happened.

[grunts in pain]

[bleep]

Holy [bleep]!

That was something.

[yells]

I'm trying to tie knots with my hand not working.

Ow!

It all hurts.

It hurts so [bleep] bad.

Goddamn!

[bleep]

I got hurt.

[bleep]

[Carlos] What?

[Dustin] See? Watch the knuckle.

And it goes to the left instead of straight down.

[Carlos] How did you do that?

[Dustin] I don't even know how that's possible.

That hurts like hell.

It's like I broke it or something. I don't know.

It kind of feels like a disaster.

I couldn't even tell you what I did.

One of my tendons has slipped over

on one of my knuckles and it hurts like hell.

I can't bend my finger without a lot of pain right now.

[bleep]

Every year I do this stupid [bleep], man.

Look, it won't even open.

What is happening?

Look at that. You see it?

-[Paul] Yeah, it's going sideways. -[Dustin] It's just--

I hate this.

[Carlos] So right now, we have no idea

what happened with Dustin's hand.

If it's that injured, that could ruin his season

for the entire freaking year, man.

We have no idea how this is gonna turn out, amigo.

[Dustin grunting in pain]

[bleep]

Let's get ready to dive!

Yeah!

-[narrator] On the all new season... -[Carlos] We're divin'!

-[narrator] ...of Gold Rush: White Water... -Whoo-hoo!

[Dustin] Back to classic white water.

We're gonna be the first people to dig here.

-This could be it. -[Paul] [bleep], dude.

That's going to be a permanent gravesite.

[Carlos] I'm not gonna dive here. Absolutely not.

[Dustin] Are you gonna get over this or not?

[Carlos] Are you [bleep] serious?

Nobody's keeping you here.

You're a world-class prick, dude.

You cross me, I will cut you loose.

That is it.

I could lose everything.

-[yells] -Whoo!

[screams]

-[Dustin] I'm bringing my loved one out. -Hey, y'all.

[Dustin] And I'm putting her in the most dangerous situation

you can put a human.

[woman] I don't like it. I can't breathe. I'm freaking out.

[Dustin] Can't find no goddamn gold.

-[Wes] Nothing in the box yet. -[bleep]

[Dustin] I need this to pay off,

and I need it to pay off soon.

We're on borrowed time.

[man] Diver up! Diver up! Diver up!

[yelling]

[Dustin] We're failing in a big way.

At some point, the money starts to run out.