Original subtitles

Gold mining prodigy...

That's $3 million right there on the table.

Parker schnabel is searching for his next big score.

This is wild.

Yeah.

Deep in the jungles of Brazil...

There's a huge amount of conflict over mining.

The only way to understand is to come here and see it.

That is cool.

And if there's an opportunity for us to invest

then I want to look at those opportunities.

Look, look, that's gold.

Look at these bad boys.

I did get fitted for a bulletproof vest, though.

That's a first.

Previously on Parker's trail...

Brazil's always been on my radar.

It's a huge gold producing country.

That is cool.

Pôrto velho is one of the last big frontier Goldfield areas.

Beautiful lookin' gold.

He's firing at us now.

It's Wilder than the wild west.

Is the mining on this river illegal right now?

That's up.

That's the government, like, cracking down on things.

This would be the perfect place to make an investment if it weren't illegal.

Can you ask if there's any legal operations around?

I want to look at more opportunities.

No, it's not.

In Brazil, on the hunt for the madeira river's billion dollar gold hot spots

an unknown boat approaches Parker schnabel and his crew.

My.

He says go away.

- Where did they even come from? - -Out of nowhere.

What was he saying?

To get the out of here right now,

or we're gonna... We're going after you.

Is this a normal thing around here?

We're good but we need to go back to the bridge right now.

We're coming into pôrto velho.

Okay, everybody, let's get together and have a talk really fast.

The message is clear. We are not welcome.

And so we just stay in the hotel

and wait for instructions. Let's go.

We've been identified as journalists.

This is not a region that takes kindly to those.

So, we're trying to pack up our bags as quickly as we can.

I wonder what this is all gonna mean.

That's our hotel. Let's go.

It's always a bit difficult when things like this happen.

It's definitely, like, it reminds you that

sometimes you're in the wild west.

And there's a lot of things that can go wrong.

I really don't want anybody to get hurt.

Right. Just here? Okay.

The morning after Parker's encounter with pirates

he gathers the team to discuss next steps.

Thank you, everybody for kind of keeping your cool

and not letting this blow up into something bigger than it is.

Obviously, there's some people that

probably just don't want any attention brought to what's going on around here.

Probably best we avoid that whole general area.

I mean, after this, the risk just went up,

'cause we're easily recognizable.

So, if you see someone spotting us,

taking pictures or something just let us know.

Fabiano's set us up to take us to another area.

Sounds like it's a lot safer and legal operations so...

Seems like the best move and,

Brazil is a huge gold producing country

so hopefully we can continue to find opportunities,

which is our goal.

Keep your profiles low.

We still have a long drive ahead.

Let's keep going. Thank you.

If we haven't got our, kind of, heads on us

making sure that we're taking in what's going on around us

then we could get in real trouble.

To find a safer area to prospect

the team follow a lead from local union mine boss, fabiano,

and drive 100 miles to rejoin the madeira river at mutum parana,

gateway to legalized gold-rich waters.

Every year dredges in this area

mine an estimated half a ton of gold worth $32 million.

There's supposed to be more legal activity there.

- Legal mining activity there. - Right.

I don't like being associated with illegal things at all.

I'm usually looking to get involved in something that.

I, like, provide some level of knowledge or expertise or have something to offer.

It's more jungle-ish so we're adding more wilderness factors.

To be honest, I'd rather take my chances with snakes and jaguars.

- They're way safer than humans. - Yeah. They are.

Yeah, they are.

We know exactly what jaguars are gonna do,

- but humans, you never know. - Yeah.

To tap into the local gold mining scene.

Parker's brought Brazilian gold mining expert, Larissa rodrigues.

What we've been seeing so far is like

a lot of sketchy places and like the illegal side of it.

And I hope Parker will find the legal operations he's looking for.

Who are we gonna see here?

Is it fabiano's mate?

- Magno. - Magno, right?

- Yeah, magno. - That's the name right?

Magneto? We're meeting a superhero?

Which one is Magneto?

The one who can control metal.

Yeah, so, can he just pull,

suck all the gold out of the ground?

Trip's over. So, if we meet... As soon as we meet Magneto

- we just load up the truck. - Just get out of here.

Let's find Magneto and find the gold.

- I'm guessing that's him. - -I think so.

Magno.

- Diego. - Parker.

- Magno. - Larissa.

Meu nome é Danny.

Was he a gold miner as well?

Yeah, he's a gold miner

15 years doing this job in the region.

- Cool. Back on the river. - Back on the river.

Local prospector magno

is taking the team on a three day trip 40 miles downriver.

To see legal gold mining dredges.

He's telling me that there's a place he knows there's a lot of gold.

- He can show us around there. - That would be awesome.

The gold in the madeira river comes from the andes mountain range.

Heavy rains erode solid gold ore

sending tiny specks of gold into the river,

where strong currents carry it along its 2000-mile length,

creating a never-ending stream of gold.

As the current slows it allows heavy gold

to drop to the riverbed where dredges mine it.

Did he have a dredge before?

Yeah, he's like, now that he doesn't have a dredge anymore

he's like independent worker,

so, he works for, like, dredge owners,

like, fixing the dredges also, like,

helping them to find gold veins.

So, it's all... Like, all this on the shore there is gold, like,

pretty much, like, all this area here.

Yeah, he says that this is a good area for prospecting.

Maybe we can see if we find some.

Should I do my first gold pan in Brazil?

I think you should.

- Let's go and have a look. - Yeah.

To find out how much gold might be in this part of the river...

What if we find something here?

A hefty slice of what Brazil has to offer.

Parker and magno test an exposed sandbar using a gold pan.

They sift away the lighter sand and dirt,

leaving the heavy gold behind.

Magno... magno's done.

What's the word, magno? Anything?

- A lot. - A lot?

Wow, it's fine, isn't it?

He says... It's the word for, like, small dots.

How's yours looking?

Come on. Can you see anything?

Yeah, there's lots there.

It's pretty good, isn't it?

Very fine.

In just two pans, Parker and magno

have proven this section of river holds high quantities of gold.

Well, that's a good start.

Yeah, actually a pretty decent pan too.

That tells me that there's quite an opportunity here.

All right.

- Let's go. - Board?

All aboard.

This is definitely gonna be very exciting.

We're going to an area where we know there's a lot of gold.

Let's go find a dredge.

The legal one.

Look at these bad boys.

Wow.

Look at that. That's so cool.

Parker and his team head towards a fofoca,

a group of dredges that gather together

to work a gold-rich area of the river.

Is this where we're going?

Yeah, this is Eliana's dredge we are visiting.

Hell.

Here we go.

Parker.

She owns it. She owns the place here.

Look at that. That's mad.

It's crazy.

We are very much in the guts of the mining industry.

We're in the guts of the Amazon.

We have got our finger, like, on the post.

She wants to take a picture with you

because she's like a fan.

On the madeira river in Brazil.

Parker's checking out Eliana soares' gold dredging operation.

How long has she owned this one?

- Long time. - Long time.

Her husband owned the dredge,

but then after a while he got ill,

so she had to take over the operation because there was nobody else.

Guys that were working here before

didn't accept, like, her as a leadership.

And now she has, like, a new team working for her.

She must be pretty tough.

Yeah. The manager used to say, like,

when she's coming they... They had to clean it all

because they know she's coming

and it has to be, like, very clean and organized.

She's just showing us around a little bit.

So let's... let's... Let's check it out.

Look at this place.

Nuts.

, mate, I've just seen the front of the suction.

Yeah, they have a pineapple.

The ten ton spearhead dredge

features a rotating cutter head known as a pineapple.

Once lowered into the water it churns up a bedrock slurry

sucking it onto the dredge where the gold is extracted.

How often do they have to replace that?

Do they make them themselves?

- They... - They do themselves.

It's really impressive and I can tell Parker is excited,

because he's just paying attention to a lot of details.

So, who knows. Maybe, he will consider investing here.

Quite an atmosphere on here?

It's like crazy going on everywhere.

The only thing that I've noticed is, like,

the, recovery systems are a little bit crude.

No riffles in the mats, just carpet.

I don't really know the efficiency of that.

Eliana catches gold by sucking the pay dirt up from the riverbed

and running it across eight sluice runs,

processing 500 gallons a minute.

- That is a big sluice. - Pretty big.

To allow Parker a closer look at Eliana's gold catching sluice

her crew shut down the water pumps.

Do they think they're catching most of the gold?

He thinks, he thinks that they're losing a lot.

That's not good. They know they have a problem, right?

Right now, Eliana's sluice box

captures up to three ounces a day.

But her crew think another $1200 worth of gold

could be heading straight back into the river.

What would be the best option for them here?

Is he asking what carpet?

I think it makes less of a difference what kind of carpet you use

and more of, like, giving a place for the gold to drop out.

This has the same effect right here,

is like how a riffle works.

And, so, if they have more of those

it might double their recovery rate.

Adding riffles to a sluice box

causes vortexes of swirling water

that send gold into the carpet creating more places

for the gold to be caught...

Instead of metal.

Parker thinks that folds in the carpet could act in a similar way.

So they could try just nailing some strips of carpet in here.

In just, like, every eight centimeters.

And, and that'll give a bunch more of these lips up here

and see if there's a bunch of gold in that piece.

Wouldn't cost anything to try it.

If that improves their recovery,

then they're gonna make more money.

Like, recovery rates should always be prioritized.

Hundreds of sluice boxes like this

that are losing gold,

we could go through and, like, increase everybody's recovery rate by probably...

At least 20%.

Larissa, we could just ask him, like,

if we could come back and see if it worked.

Before considering an investment,

Parker wants to see if his sluice run bush fix will catch more gold.

The dredge can run a test but it will take 24 hours.

So, the team check in with guide, magno, about other places to see.

So, he's saying that he knows, like, other mining lands.

We can spend the night if you want.

Is it, like, legal or illegal?

Do you want to go there?

I think we should.

Let's go.

Mining in the rainforest, particularly along the Amazon

is a, you know, pretty touchy subject.

But I think that seeing what's actually happening

is the best way to figure out what's going on

and... and what the impact is and why it's happening.

Magno is offering a chance to see an illegal gold mining operation

on protected land inside a national park.

So, we are just going inside the national park.

- So, of course it's illegal to mine here. - All right. Okay.

I really don't like that but I also think it's very important

for us, like, to connect with people,

to understand every part of the story.

We have to stop here and then we have to hike 30 minutes.

Sunset is in 22 minutes.

- Right. Let's get off. - Okay.

We're gonna be getting into places

where probably not many people have been before,

so that's a huge challenge for each one of us.

Diego's mobile hospital.

We're getting into a tougher place than before.

We better go.

Yeah, he's saying...

We should be careful here because there are many snakes and...

That's the time that the animals...

- Don't come out to play. - Came out to hunt. Yeah, exactly.

Welcome to the jungle.

The illegal mine site is nearly a mile deep into virgin rainforest.

Yeah, he was finding, like, that they're coming...

Every time he was coming in...

More inside of the jungle he was finding more gold.

That's why he ended up going...

- Gotcha. - Right there... Inside there.

What are you thinking, Larissa?

This area here is, like, illegal, illegal, illegal.

This is exactly what shouldn't be going on completely illegal.

You can ask magno, do the people here know we're coming?

They don't.

It's getting dark.

. That got atmospheric quick.

Holy.

Hell, it's like a whole village.

Huge.

A fire burning with nobody around it.

What the is going on around this place?

What the is going on around this place?

There's pumps, there's holes, there's, like clothes.

There's clearly people here.

Deep in Brazil's Amazon jungle,

Parker and his team arrive at the illegal mine camp

where they must now spend the night.

I know, it's like a whole village.

Magno has brought us to this area.

There's no one here.

But there's lots of signs of life.

I mean, I'm not panicking but...

It doesn't feel... great.

We should probably set up camp.

I don't wanna be out here in the dark.

Still a little jumpy.

Can you ask him if it's all right that we're here?

And that we can leave if it's not.

Each time government forces

crack down on illegal mines like this one,

they burn down structures and blow up equipment.

Is he leaving us?

He's just saying that we can stay here, it's fine.

But he'll just sleep with his friends, like

- I don't know exactly where, but... - Okay.

- Nearby. - -He'll just leave us for now.

That makes me feel a bit unnerved.

In the middle of nowhere at an illegal mine site.

It might be quite dangerous.

Like, should we have gotten into this situation? Maybe not.

But we're fine until we're not.

I don't think I'm gonna like this, but whatever.

What part of this is enjoyable?

What do you reckon?

Only two structures standing up.

We'll camp in one of those.

How many ropes are you tying up over there?

Bearing in mind it all looks like it's about to fall down at any given moment

because it's all charred and burnt.

If you don't know knots, tie lots.

That's my trick.

That's a piece of rope, Danny..

- Right. - -Let's go get some sleep.

Yeah, the trip has been a bit of a whirlwind so far

and it kinda has me thinking quite a bit about just...

Mining has to happen somewhere, but above all else,

there needs to be law and order.

In my mind.

We should be happy to be here around this beautiful forest, but...

There is just an illegal mining over there

and the destruction is just...

Awful. But at the same time,

it's very good to really understand

what's really happening inside of the jungle.

That was a night's sleep.

The next morning on the illegal mine camp...

- Hammocks. - Terrible, right?

Guide magno has not returned.

What are we gonna do?

We should definitely go check out

- what they're up to. - Yeah.

Let's just have a search around.

- Yeah? - -Let's get the out of here.

- Okay. Let's go. - Come on, let's go.

We should be careful.

We need to keep our eyes open.

Probably not the safest place, especially because of the illegality.

Yeah, it's not a place I want to hang around for long.

Like, where is everybody?

- Just gonna look from that bank. - -Okay.

What the?

My god, it's massive.

Miners here are searching for gold from ancient riverbeds

buried deep under the forest.

Twenty acres of jungle have already been laid bare from this operation.

But it's a fraction of the 30,000 acres

flattened by illegal mining every year.

You can see how, like,

you get a few thousand people doing this,

and it'd be quite the impact.

Is this all ground that's basically dead?

Yeah, it's all dead.

If you leave this area like that, it won't recover

because it's... the soil is too damaged here.,

and even if we recover it,

it will never be the same.

The pit will be here forever.

Let's let's divide and conquer here.

How do you wanna divide?

- Me... me and you, Larissa. - Okay.

- You two. - Yeah.

Okay. That's good.

Come on, let's go.

Parker and Diego head off in search of their guide magno.

I feel like this might be a bad idea.

Probably already spotted our camp last night.

Do you hear the engine there?

- Yes, you going over there? - Yeah. Yeah.

While Danny and Larissa head in the opposite direction.

Here, they... they're processing it.

Here we go. There.

It's... it's hard for me to feel comfortable

inside of an illegal operation.

But I'm trying to find solutions to end illegal mining.

That's why I'm here.

I want to see what the reality is.

They were... yeah, they are the ones working in this area.

How long... how long has he been here?

Two months, they're like,

coming and going, coming and going

because of the police.

I'm interested to know if he likes being here.

They earn... says it's... it's a very hard work,

but they earn more.

So like, if they work in the city,

they will make like, 1,000-2,000 reais a month.

And here they make 10,000-15,000.

What he's saying, he's like,

"yeah, we may look like we're like, all these poor guys,

but we are not."

But he wants us... he wanted to show us the gold.

I was not expecting that answer.

I wasn't.

But I like when people are honest,

even though they are not, like, doing the right thing.

I mean, maybe this is a way for us to get to the root of the problem, you know?

Yeah. Yeah.

Do you want a coffee?

Yeah, I love a coffee.

Can we see the gold?

- There it is! - There it is.

The gold is over there.

There you go, look.

They are both guessing 50 grams.

I think 51.

51.8.

You don't need... you don't need the weight.

- You know it by... - just looking by it.

Fifty-one grams is worth just over $3,000.

But how many day's work is that?

Twelve hours.

That is very rich.

So, from this pan of gold, they'll get 30% of it.

Right, right.

And the other 70%... Is with the owner of like,

- the sluice box, the pumps, - the engine. - Okay.

These people here, they're working for commission.

Even though it's a small percentage,

it's pretty good income for them.

But what bothers me the most

is someone is really profiting from this chaos, you know?

That's the problem.

Not them, they're not.

Someone is.

There's nobody in here.

Go look back there.

Waiting for their guide magno to return

I'm not sure that we should be surprising illegal miners.

This might be a bad idea.

Parker and his team explore an illegal gold mining operation

in the middle of the Amazon jungle.

Diego, I'm not sure if we're supposed to be here.

Hey!

Most of the people here right now are not working

because they got scared from us yesterday.

They thought we were police.

Okay.

You look like a policeman.

They shoot at us, I'm gonna hide behind you.

I hope they don't shoot police.

He wants to show you that way because they're working over there.

, it's not cool.

It's kind of crazy that... that, you know, they're in a national park just like,

doing their thing.

It's quite in your face.

It'll just slowly eat the jungle.

Can you ask him if there's gold in the upper material

or do they just have to wash that

to get down to the better stuff that's at the bottom?

So yeah, mud, no gold, sand, gold,

and the bedrock is where most of the gold is.

To uncover the gold beneath the jungle floor,

miners here use a method called hydraulic mining,

blasting a wall of dirt with a jet of water,

breaking it down into a gold-rich slurry.

This is then pumped 200 feet

to hand-built sluice boxes where the gold is captured.

Without like, heavy equipment or more machinery,

this is the only way of doing it.

I'm guessing everything here came in by hand.

They build this set-up,

and the government's just gonna come and blow it up.

So, they probably only need to go for a little while until it pays for itself.

Mines like these are often raided by the police.

So miners build makeshift wash plants

out of trees and rope,

allowing them to quickly rebuild their operation if it's destroyed.

My god, if you did this kind of stuff in america...

You're going to jail for sure.

You're going to jail, you'd get 20 years.

He's asking if you wanna speak with them.

No.

I wanna get out of here. I've seen enough.

This is the kind of stuff that gives mining as a whole a bad name, right?

It's like, you're in a national park in the Amazon basin and...

It's, you know... Not a very big footprint here,

but multiply it by probably 1,000 or something

and it has a huge impact.

- All right, chaps. - Hey.

How was it?

They have 51 grams of gold.

- How long a time? - Twelve hours.

- Really? - Yeah.

Yeah, it's decent ground.

But it doesn't matter, we're in a national park.

Yeah, exactly.

Yeah, I definitely don't wanna be any part of this, really.

- Let's go? - Yeah.

Let's go.

I think we already saw what we needed to see here.

But it was very interesting to see a different side of the coin.

And I think we're ready to continue.

Right, let's get back to Eliana's.

It's a six-hour boat journey

back to Eliana's legal gold dredge,

where the team will see the results of Parker's sluice bush fix

and just how good the madeira river gold yields can be.

How do you feel like the trip's going so far?

You know, the world needs mining,

but mining should be done in places

where environmental protection is prioritized.

Like, what's happening in the Yukon right now,

there's a big conservation movement,

they're shutting down mining areas, that's fine.

The only way to not deal with the like,

ethical and moral problems with it

is just to do exactly what is legal.

Getting dark.

The last thing I wanna be doing

is going in this river in the middle of the night.

He's telling us to be very careful.

We need to pay attention to this part.

At this time of night, in the jungle wilderness,

the crew must rely on head lamps

to guide their way through the sand bars,

caiman alligators, and debris.

Log.

Careful.

, now this is gonna take forever.

Dan.

I see lights.

There we go.

Making our float ill a.

Thank for that.

Eliana's dredge is part of a legally permitted fofoca,

a group of gold dredges who gather at the gold-rich hot spots

to run 24-hour operations.

My god, dredges look mental in the dark.

Look at that.

Crazy.

It's like a floating metal city

in the middle of the jungle.

Officially, one of the most atmospheric places

I've ever approached.

- There's more welding over there. - -Yeah.

Do you think they're just constantly rebuilding and fixing?

Eliana said that the cutter heads

last between one and three days.

And I'm guessing that's what most of these people are doing,

that we see welding, is building new ones of those.

Just an unbelievable atmosphere.

Wow. Oof.

Nice one.

Thanks, magno.

The team will spend the night on Eliana's dredge.

Diego, can you ask Eliana,

do they do more work at night because it's cooler?

They never stop.

Right, but like, I see a lot of people welding

and cutting right now.

It just seems more action happening at night.

I would rather work night.

Yeah, it's fresher.

Way better right now.

Tomorrow morning, Eliana's crew will clean up the gold

that went through Parker's improved sluice box,

and Parker will figure out if it's worth an investment.

I don't really remember an experience like this.

Like, the dredges are crazy.

But yeah, there's a lot of factors and stars have to align

to really find a very real opportunity.

We'll see what tomorrow has in store for us.

The coffee is ready, by the way.

All right, perfect.

- Wow. - -She baked the cake for us.

One of the stranger places I've had a coffee and a piece of cake.

Yeah, right?

They're very organized here.

Kitchen's really organized.

They have laundry, plants.

Female details, you know, that makes a difference.

Like, you guys,

you always think like, this is bull,

but it's not.

After a night on Eliana's dredge,

Parker is helping manager osmar

with the gold cleanup.

That's how they did the mats.

We just did a cleanup.

Some things require no language in common.

On a normal day's run,

the dredge can bring in up to three ounces,

around $5,000 of gold.

Now, after running for 24 hours

with Parker's new carpet riffles in place,

it's time for the cleanup.

The sluice carpets containing gold

and heavy dirt are emptied into a bucket

with Mercury, which naturally attracts gold.

After an hour, the heavy Mercury and gold should be at the bottom

and the water and dirt can be taken off the top.

He's basically just panning.

- Right. - In a barrel.

- With Mercury. - With Mercury.

Is that dangerous?

I mean, it's not good.

Mercury is a heavily poisonous material.

If it finds its way into the river, it can kill wildlife

and contaminate drinking water.

I don't know how much gets lost,

but some operations put it in the sluice box,

and that's where it's really bad.

For me, the Mercury use is... is a big problem around here,

because miners are so used to it

and they don't wanna phase out with it.

So, I really think that we need to find a way

to go to Mercury-free processes.

Now he's gonna put it through like, a fine cloth,

and squeeze all the extra Mercury out

and then have and a little ball left.

Will that ball be a ball of gold, basically?

- More or less. - -Exactly what it is.

The Mercury and gold mix is heated

to a high temperature, leaving pure gold,

but sending highly toxic Mercury fumes into the air.

If you breathe it in, it's really bad.

That's how it people.

I really don't like the use of Mercury.

So, there's no need to do it in that way.

She wants from you and that we go upstairs

so that we can see gold.

While they wait for the Mercury to be burnt off.

Eliana breaks down her costs.

Yeah.

Yeah, she uses fuel for pretty much everything in here, right?

Okay. Without fuel, it's impossible to run.

She's going to...

To grab the gold,

from the process, so we can see.

Let's find out how much they got.

Wow.

- 104? - 104, yeah.

104 grams, or 3.4 ounces of gold

means a 13% improvement on the dredge's usual daily total.

At this rate, Eliana's dredging business

could be worth over $2,000,000 in gold each year.

It worked great.

It was very cool to see.

Eliana is amazing.

She runs an awesome little setup here.

She's a really like, warm, welcoming person.

But I won't get involved in an operation

that's using a ton of Mercury.

And... I don't know.

Obviously, it's quite a volatile region.

It only takes one law to change

for something that was legal to become illegal.

You know, I'm all for risk, but not that kind of risk.

So, we should probably go.

Will you thank her for the hospitality

and say sorry we can't stay longer?

Eliana's story was interesting

because like, there are ways of being legal.

It kind of gives me hope.

But I wouldn't advise him to invest in this area here to be honest,

because like, the environment is so tricky.

Then, the people that already have the permits,

they have a risk of not getting them renewed.

I feel like we've seen everything there is to be seen.

And actually learned a hell of a lot.

But time to move on now.

Like, a big part of this trip is looking for opportunity, right?

The gun's still loaded and finding more ground, but...

Obviously, this isn't the area for it.

We need to see what else is going on in Brazil.

Next time on Parker's trail...

The biggest gold nugget was discovered in serra pelada in the '80s.

A collector would probably pay like, a hundred million.

We're going somewhere that has the biggest gold rush

in recent history in the world.

That's the serra pelada pit.

What, the lake is?

Billions of dollars worth of gold got found

in that hole by hand.

The people are alive still.

He found 1,000 kilos of gold in 15 days.

I don't think I've ever met anybody

that's found that much gold in that amount of time.

It's hard to believe that they would have gotten it all.

"What's left?"

That question really bothers me.