Original subtitles

Narrator: Now, on the season finale of "bering sea gold"...

♪♪

...All winter...

The ice is so thin. It could go any minute.

This is freaking me out.

Narrator: ...The miners have waged war with thin, unstable ice.

Pull him in! Pull him in!

Bring him up. Bring him up now.

The air compressor's off.

Come...Up...Now.

♪♪

The end is near.

Narrator: But now they're out of time.

Shawn: The ice going to go out.

Today, we need to be fast. We need to be smooth.

We need to get it done quick.

A lot of water on top of the ice.

Time to get the hell out of here.

The ice is rotten, too damn warm.

There's a good chance we're going to lose all our gear.

Narrator: Rising temperatures are bringing a rapid end

To the already fragile ice.

Emily: You guys ready?

Now it's just a matter of scrambling.

I don't really care.

We're going to make it no matter what.

Man: Come on!

Narrator: It all...

-...Comes down... -Suck it up while you can.

-...To this. -3...2...1.

-- Captions by vitac -- www.Vitac.Com

Captions paid for by discovery communications

Man: Forecast for nome and coastal areas -- mostly sunny,

A warm front will push highs to mid-30s

With sustained temperatures above freezing.

Possible scattered showers this evening.

Narrator: The final hours of the ice mining season have arrived.

At the start of winter, the fleet faced off

With the thinnest ice they've ever encountered,

Ice that barely survived as the weeks went on.

And now with mother nature bearing down,

It doesn't stand a chance.

A warm front is headed for nome with temperatures

That will soften the already thinning ice

To a deadly pile of unworkable slush.

And as the shelf disintegrates,

The miners must pull their final ounces

And get to solid ground before the ice

And their dreams melt away.

This is it -- last dive before pull off the ice,

A lot of water on top of the ice.

Getting really warm.

The end is near.

Narrator: Mr. Gold, shawn pomrenke,

Readies for what will surely be his final dive of winter.

Oh, god. That's a [bleep] hole there.

It's not really ice mining anymore,

It's more like slush diving.

This is when it gets really crazy.

The equipment, the wet snow, it's all weighing on the ice

It could sink into the water at any time.

♪♪

Narrator: Still short on the ounces needed

To secure down payment on the tomcod claim,

Shawn's future is on the line,

And today's dive is all he's got.

♪♪

Let's get down there and mop up this last hole

And get out of here.

Yeah!

With the ice this thin, this is definitely going to be

The last dive of the season.

I need one last big haul to get what I need to buy the tomcod.

So, I'm going to push as long as I can until I get it.

Get it, buddy.

♪♪

Be honest with you, we should have been off the ice

A couple of days ago.

One good north wind, and all this slushy ice will be gone.

There's still a ton of gold on this spot.

There's no way we're going to leave it behind.

Thank you.

♪♪

♪♪

You're good on here. Alright, shawn.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

So, how's it going down there, shawn?

Seeing gold.

Yeah, there's good gold on it.

Hell, yeah. Wonderful.

We need every bit of it we can get.

Ran into a pack of great big boulders,

Like 10 of them spaced out.

Really good gold just filling the space between them.

Shawn: The gold's so good down here.

Now we just got to suck it up before this ice goes.

Shawn: Tomcod!

♪♪

Narrator: 15 miles east...

Kris: Come on. Let's go.

They got all hands on deck. The ice is going to go out.

We got to really push hard today.

I'm not that far away from my goal,

So we got to make it happen one way or another today.

Narrator: ...In the face of surging temperatures,

It's time for dr. Kris kelly to unveil his creation...

A makeshift operation composed of second-hand parts and scraps

That are now the kellys last shot for the season.

It's always a struggle, every day is a struggle.

I don't really care.

We're going to make this no matter.

Our season took a nosedive and literally went up in flames.

Get away!

[bleep]

But we're going to rise from this like a phoenix,

So we scrounged a pump engine...

An air compressor...

An umbilical.

So, we're going to be a frankenstein-style operation

For whatever we need to make this work

Is what we're going to do.

With the ice about to collapse, it doesn't need to be pretty,

It just needs to work.

The ice is rotting. It's going to be dangerous.

We're going to take that risk.

That's good. We're good.

It's going to happen one way or another.

Narrator: Kris hopes his hodgepodge contraption

Will hang together just long enough

To get the ounces needed

To rent the boat of his dreams and explore the coast.

Yeah!

Got it.

We put everything together, and it's working! It's alive!

It's alive! Well, it's alive for right now.

But do I trust it to keep running?

For right now, it's working. Who needs a damn shed?

I just got to move fast right now before the ice breaks up,

But before everything shuts down.

♪♪

Narrator: With an early departure of chris's protégé,

Shaunna echohawk, the kellys will be under the gun

With a skeleton dive team

Going down first, andy's going down second,

And hopefully everything works out good.

We always pull it off. No fire is going to stop us.

We never failed, we just had a little stumble, you know?

So [bleep] on fire. That's no big deal in the kelly world.

You know, we just get new stuff.

You think this is first time we've ever had a fire?

Sadly, no. [ chuckles ]

Best-case scenario,

The equipment last more than a couple hours,

I get down there, I find some fresh gold, and I save the day.

Worst-case scenario, we weaken the ice after that inferno,

Everything starts breaking up above us,

And I get pinned underneath the ice, and I die.

I don't want to die. Let's just put it that way.

Good?

Okay.

Kris is down. Going to make good money.

♪♪

How's everything going down there, kris?

Kris: Good so far.

Good job. Be careful.

We got good suction.

♪♪

♪♪

You seeing good gold?

We're on gold!

Good job, kris.

It's not good gold, but it's okay.

We're on gold. That's all that matters.

Yeah, that's all that matters,

Is that you put this junk back together.

We're passing gold, baby.

The average person would come out and see what we're seeing --

Junk everywhere, dude.

Man: Yeah, well, it works, doesn't it?

Could be in 50 different pieces.

If it works, who gives a [bleep]

We're getting close to the edge of our hole

With the gold getting better.

We stay on track, we'll have 50 ounces.

Good job, kris.

I told everybody this is gonna work!

♪♪

Narrator: Coming up...

It's over, guys. The ice is rotten.

We stay out here any longer, it's a good chance

We're going to lose all our gear.

Now it's just a matter of scrambling.

We're going to go! Whoo!

Narrator: Nome is bracing for a warm front.

Once the above-freezing temperatures hit,

The thinning ice will be unable to survive.

It will crumble into the bering sea.

So, as the final moments of winter bear

Down on the fleet, captains must decide.

What is their breaking point?

♪♪

Emily: You guys ready?

♪♪

Out here on super shallow ice.

We're about to dive in the water.

Everything's running. Everything's good.

But this whole ice season has been a big question mark

On when the ice is finally going to go out.

Now it's just a matter of scrambling.

Narrator: ...Emily riedel's rolling the dice

On what may be the thinnest ice of any claim on the bering sea.

Emily: Temperatures are going up.

Not too long ago, 14 was open water.

The ice never really solidified

In the way that I would have wanted.

Once the ice starts to go, you know,

It's going to go fast.

You guys suiting up?

Hopefully that sexy gold we found to the east

Over there is going to continue on its way.

We'll find out in a minute.

Narrator: Emily's still shy of the funds needed to launch

Her upgraded summer fleet, so with time running out,

She's looking to reconnect with the pay streak

She was writing before the great storm forced her off the ice.

♪♪

Here we go. Five star, right.

Yeah. So, hopefully, there's lots of gold down there.

Emily: The ice is unstable as it is.

We can't afford to move right now,

So we just have to take whatever gold down there is left

And get out.

Mic check. Mic check.

Got you loud and clear.

Yeah, we're good to go.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

What's the bottom like?

Definitely at the end of a sand cobble line.

Alright, poke away, brother.

♪♪

We're more or less in the same spot,

But, you know, he's working on his first hole,

And he'll have a better assessment here pretty quick.

That's not what I wanted to hear.

We might be to the end of that good [bleep] we were on.

Yeah.

We're just not really getting on it.

And with the ice as thin as it is,

I'm not feeling great about having the operation out here.

Mother, bering sea, like they're telling us to get out of here.

Yeah, let me know if it heats back up, dude.

Yeah.

♪♪

Narrator: As the warm front begins to wash over nome...

Temperatures continue to rise.

♪♪

But on the ice...

♪♪

Hey, I have good news.

What's that?

That is good news. Great, man!

Narrator: ...The kellys are staying hot, too.

This pot is rich. We're getting it good here.

Keep going. You're going good.

Narrator: And their ragtag operation is still holding together...

At least for now.

♪♪

I'm tired.

Kris, you've been down for four hours. Come on up now.

Yeah, okay.

Okay, you did a good job today, kris.

Let's put andy down for a while.

I'm coming up! Okay, come up.

♪♪

♪♪

That's our goal the whole time.

I think the gold's actually getting

A little bit better, too.

We're still getting gold.

I don't really care. Get ready. Get going.

Let's make it happen. Come on.

Toss it up.

Even though our frankenstein operation is not

The prettiest to look at,

It's still running, and we're still making gold.

My favorite time of the day --

Trying to get andy into in this [bleep] thing.

Yeah, I know. It's my favorite time of the day, too.

Now I just have to get my brother in the water.

We only need seven ounces,

So he's got to get the hell in there.

♪♪

You got to put this on fast.

♪♪

Okay, good.

Okay, be careful.

♪♪

Hey, look! We got him down!

You okay? Andy: Yeah, just hold on.

♪♪

Get all the gold you can get, buddy.

Thank god we got him in the water.

♪♪

Do or die time. We're just going to [bleep] get it done,

You know? No matter what, this is our final push.

♪♪

Gold's getting better.

Alright! It's going good. Everything's going good.

So, mining on the ice without a shed is kind of like

Driving your car without doors on it.

If someone drives by right now and sees us out here

Mining without a shed, they're going to think we're crazy,

But I don't really care what they think.

As long as I'm getting gold, that's all I care about.

I don't care what people think about me

Or I wouldn't be working with my dad

And brothers still.

Diver down, andy's making gold, everything works.

♪♪

Narrator: While the kellys keep the gold flowing...

♪♪

...Three miles west...

♪♪

What's it look like, jefe?

Narrator: ...Emily riedel's team is still coming up empty.

Well, that's not good, jefe.

Jeff: No. No. Not at all.

♪♪

What's up?

This isn't really working out down here.

Yeah, I'm not really feeling it.

Roger that. See you at the top.

♪♪

♪♪

That pay streak has run out,

And we're just not finding anything down there,

So there's not enough time to move the operation,

And we're out of good ground.

The bering sea is saying it's time to go.

So, maybe it's time to call it.

I mean, obviously, I put in quite a few hours

Down there with all these holes.

♪♪

Well, what do you want to do?

I don't know.

♪♪

We could wrap your dive up, jeff,

And start moving this stuff before it gets dark.

But definitely wanted to get a more productive day going.

We're not really where we want to be for summer,

But if I give up now,

This will be another failed ice mining season for me,

And I'm not willing to let that happen.

So, I'm going to think of something to do

To save this ice season.

♪♪

[bleep] want to check it out?

I'll give it a shot. That's my job.

Yeah, you got that extension down there,

If you just want to hop down, connect the hose,

And just take it out.

Sweet.

The only thing I can think to do

Is add another hose extension on

And try to reach ground that we haven't been able to access.

Under the current ice conditions,

Putting a hose extension on

And sending grant down after some gold is risky,

But the thought of getting more gold

Is just too tempting to resist.

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

♪♪

You get that extension on?

Yeah, I got the extension on.

♪♪

Emily: Do you see where jeff left off?

Go check it out, maybe there's a ton of gold right there.

Roger that.

-Oh, nice,we're back in it then. -Yeah, we're back in.

Yes! Whoo!

You seeing some nice chunky gold at the end of that nozzle?

Whoo. Well, keep sucking it up!

Emily: A lot of heartbreak this season.

But we took a risk, it's risky being out here,

But we're finally seeing some gold, so it's worth it.

You know, sometimes you got to just kind of play with fire

A little bit to make some gold in the box.

Thanks for getting us on the gold.

I'm gonna guess [bleep] awesome end for this season.

-Yeah. -Whoo-hoo!

Yeah! [ laughs ]

Narrator: Coming up...

That's the air compressor surging.

-Breath. -Air.

It's raining out, all our air filters are wet.

[ through re-breather ] probably time to get the hell out of here.

Looks so good I can't even.

Oh, [bleep] yeah.

♪♪

♪♪

How's it going, ace? -It's going good.

-Yeah, it looks pretty good? -Yep.

Says the material looks real good.

That's good, just keep putting the gold in the box.

-I am. -Chris's creation is somehow

Still breathing as it sits on top of the ice,

Exposed the elements.

And he's taking everything, everything in his sight

Right now he's cleaning this whole area out.

Narrator: And the team's taking advantage of every second

The beast continues to survive.

-Hey, how's it going? -It's going great.

I'm taking in a lot of size like you told me to.

Gold's looking good.

I want to go farther out, to see what else is there,

But I can't. -No, just take what we can.

Let's just finish up today.

We'll do a gold clean out, we'll see if we got enough gold.

At this point, our time is getting more

And more limited.

And equipment's getting blasted by the wind the whole day,

But every minute we work is a couple more hundred dollars

In the box.

It's really hard to quit when you know you're on gold.

[ motor knocking, sputtering ]

That one motor's running funny, it's surging.

It's running it's surging a little bit.

[ surging ]

I'm feeling something done to the regulators,

Like every 10 or so breaths.

That's the air compressor surging.

The air compressor's taking a [bleep]

Brad: Ah, you're kidding me?

Hey, grab my umbilical. -Okay.

Kris: The air compressor is starting to give us problems,

Andy needs that air compressor to breathe underneath the water.

And usually my experience is,

Once one piece of equipment starts having a problem.

The rest are going to follow.

Brad: This sucks.

♪♪

Kris: I'm not taking any chances. We are done for the year.

Kris: I'm proud of my family.

We came together, we got all the equipment to work.

We made this work. That's what we do.

Sure this is probably just a pile of [bleep],

But it's our pile of [bleep] a bad ass

Gold getting pile of [bleep].

Hey, good job you killed it.

I think we got enough gold. Let's just go, come on.

We're out of here. That's it for the season.

It's time to go.

♪♪

Narrator: Three miles west.

♪♪

Emily: Damn that ice is thin. Whoo.

That's going to go any minute.

Last dive, picked up the trail of gold we left,

Which is awesome, but one good north wind and this ice is gone.

Alright, yes.

[bleep] way to find some g.G.

What a great way to end the season, man.

I'm tired, I'm tired.

Tired, but very happy about all the gold we made today.

We took some risks by staying out by adding the extension on,

But it paid off and think we did pretty damn well.

I won't know until the ounces are counted,

But I think we're pretty close to reaching our goal.

Yeah. Let's roll out of here. Start batten this down.

Narrator: As emily heads for shore...

♪♪

♪♪

...Twelve miles west.

One miner has yet to wave the white flag.

Tom: Yeah, seeing lots of gold.

Looking really good.

Narrator: Captain shawn pomrenke started the day

Before the rest of the fleet.

Tom: We're on it, there we go. Come on, baby.

Narrator: And with tomcod on the line,

He's the last one still in the water.

Yeah!

Tom: I'm liking it.

Muy bien.

[ thunder rumbles ]

♪♪

It's starting to rain.

♪♪

Tom: We have all those moisture in the air

I keep freezing up.

It's actually starting to rain pretty good out here.

We might want to get things towed to shore.

Narrator: While warm weather is an arch enemy of rotting ice,

So as rain, as it pounds away at the shelf,

Expediting the already rapid melting process.

♪♪

Son of a bitch.

Narrator: And rain presents additional challenges

For ice divers crazy enough to try to mine through it.

Tom: It's raining out, all our air filters are wet,

Any air he's breathing is freezing

Soon as it goes through his umbilical,

Locking his regulator right up.

Regulator locked up, he loses air, that's not...

Shawn: But I'm hauling so good, I can't [bleep] leave right here.

This is the kind of dive you want to end on.

Nice-looking gold.

Hopefully we can tote the box back, it's gonna be heavy.

Well, that was a good four hours.

High time to get the hell out of here.

You reckon we got enough gold in the box?

Oh, I hope so. I hope so.

This last run was pretty damn good.

-Ah, I'm coming up. -Get aboard.

Boo-yah. That'll do just fine.

♪♪

Rather unsettling to have your ice covered in water.

♪♪

That was a good last dive.

We got a good spot to come back to.

Shawn: I'm exhausted. I've worked every muscle

In my body, the long dives like this can get risky.

Bering sea always tempts you to stay out there longer,

But I know when enough's enough and I'll live to tell the tale.

And that tale is going to end with me owning the tom cut.

Tom: Box looks great.

Shawn: Time to get the hell out of here.

Yeah, before the ocean swallows our sluice box.

We're going to go ahead and get our stuff off the ice

Before it blows away,

And we have to buy all new equipment next year.

Oh, you're hooked on the sled, josh.

[ engine revs ]

Can't wait to see what the box looks like.

Yeah, let's go.

Narrator: Coming up...

This is probably the best cleanup in ice mining

We've ever done in our lives.

There we just broke over 10.

Honestly, like my whole future summer season

Depends on the outcome of this cleanup.

11, 12, 13, hallelujah, it's raining gold.

[ tapping ]

I see people on social media they're talking about, you know,

Vernon's out here beating his head against a wall

And he's a dumb ass because he never gets any gold.

Well, you knuckleheads look at the damn leader board.

Team wild ranger has consistently been

At the top of the leader board

As far as diver operated cyclone dredgers are concerned.

The one year we didn't was when I had that phony-ass little

Poor-ass sub-dredge out here, we didn't do good that year.

So just because I don't like some kind of goofy girl

That just got goosed in the school yard

And say, whoopie kai-yay if I get a half an ounce of gold

In the box we're not after a small amounts of gold.

You know, we're back to the point now

Where we're done with the learning curve.

We pretty much got this crap figured out.

It all depends on the weather.

Every time it's been stabbing cold this year.

Remind me of my ex-wife, the cobra.

That's what they're doing with the weather around here,

Like a crazy ex-wife who lives in the house with you.

And won't leave.

You know, and every now and then

She'll nice enough, you know, and but that --

How often does that happen, you know?

You could tell them vernon said that.

♪♪

Narrator: Spring has come to nome.

As ice mining drips into the rearview mirror,

Now for the fleet, there's one last matter of business

To tend to.

After all the blood, sweat, and tears,

Did they accomplish what they came for?

♪♪

♪♪

Man: This is our last clean out out of the season.

Kris: I want to say I'm really happy

That we all came together at the end.

I know we're fighting a lot this season.

I know it's been a lot of problems,

But we rebuild, we keep going,

And that's the way you should do it.

Narrator: Captain kris brought the family's operation

Back from the dead

For one last shot at hitting their season goal.

Our frankenstein operation was enough to get us back

On the gold and get what we need.

We did what we came to do, we just got to weigh the gold.

This is probably the best cleanup in ice mining

We've ever done in our lives, so glad we stuck it out.

I'm glad everything worked together.

Here we go. There's over 10 ounces in here today, easy.

Man: One.

Two, three...

We only need seven. Remember that.

Five?

Six

There's our, there's our seven ounces for fifty.

Eight. There we just broke over 10.

There's 11.

Oh, come on baby 12. Come on 13.

Oh, we did real good this time, man.

13. Oh, my god.

I thought we were going to get 14 there for a second.

-13.3 that's real good. -13.3.

Give me some love, people.

Everybody stuck it out here, together.

Narrator: 13.3 ounces,

Is worth over $21 thousand.

And the fighting kellys end the season

Savoring the sweet taste of success.

I'm so happy we made this work. I wasn't leaving.

No, I'm a failure. We made our goals.

We made over our goal.

You know, this is like the first time we've ever hit a marker.

You know, this is going to be like a trend in our life

From now on, where everything we go,

We hit, we make it work and we keep moving on.

Ice mining is always brutal, but this winter

We face the toughest challenge we've ever faced.

Now we can lease the boat and we can start our real journey

Up the coast to elim.

If we can make it through this winter,

We can make it through anything.

This right here. 13 ounces is what not quitting does.

I know with a lot of extra work, but we made it.

♪♪

Narrator: Across town...

♪♪

Emily: You guys, this is our last clean up,

Last bit of gold for the ice mining season of 2020.

Narrator: After years of profitless ice seasons,

Emily: It's been a hard run, I'm proud of us

For getting this far like we killed it out there.

Narrator: Emily riedel is hoping to

Finally break her ice mining jinx.

Honestly, like my whole future summer season

Depends on the outcome of this cleanup,

Because I can't justify getting in that second dredge

Going unless this is over 60, honestly.

But we'll see.

One, two, three.

Eight.

Ten.

Hallelujah, it's raining gold 14.

16.

Point five.

Yeah! Hey!

Narrator: 16.5 ounces is worth over $26 thousand,

And despite being nearly shut out on the first half of winter,

Emily ends on her biggest haul of the season and hits her goal.

I can officially call this my first successful ice

Mining season. Mine, too.

Lucky number 7, man.

Seventh season's the charm, man. Like we had a lot of failure

This year, but it actually ended up

Being my best ice mining season ever,

Including my hardest, as it turns out.

Now, I have enough gold together to get two dredges

Launched this summer.

It's awesome about this clean up.

It's awesome to finally see that ice mining.

But there's no rest for the wicked

Because I got to start getting ready for summer.

Start right away. Boss is buying drinks tonight.

Narrator: Two miles west...

♪♪

Shawn: Final cleanup.

Narrator: After completing his first ice mining season,

In nearly three years...

The ice season is never easy.

Will mr. Gold be able to secure the down payment

For the valuable tomcod claim?

Looks like a good one, we need 30 big chunky gold.

We're into something big here.

Look at that.

Seven, ten. Third of the way there.

Two thirds of the way there. 20 ounces.

There's 30 tomcod's mine. Hell yeah.

We own the tomcod now.

Whoo!

What a hell of a season.

Narrator: 34.5 ounces is worth over $55,000.

-Tomcod's mine. -And captain shawn pomrenke

Is now the proud owner of the tomcod claim.

Shawn: Set out with a goal, we hit it.

Ice is never easy, but this season we killed it.

Every ice mining season's a grind,

But I pushed it to make sure that at the end of this season,

I own the tomcod.

I got everything I wanted this season and a little more.

But there's no rest for the weary.

Summer's right around the corner.

I've worked my whole life to get to this moment.

Of owning a big claim like this.

I just set my family up for life.

It's a really good feeling.

Narrator: Mr. Gold lives up to his name,

Emily reaches her goal to fund a summer expansion,

And the kellys may be going on that trip

Up the coast after all.