Bering Sea Gold

Narrator: Nome, alaska.

Shawn: Finding little bits here and there,

But mr. Gold's not happy with just okay.

Narrator: With the summer mining season nearing the halfway mark...

Pissing me off.

...Much of the dredging fleet is hitting rock bottom.

Zeke: kind of frustrating, dude.

All those other dredges,

Do you really think they're having to look this hard?

Zeke: Havilah is really striking out under my leadership.

We need to really deliver some good cleanup.

Narrator: Desperate for gold, and running out of time...

Kris: These little setbacks, they're just learning.

You can bail a million times.

You only need to make it one time big.

Narrator: ...There's nowhere to go but up.

Oh!

No!

Captions paid for by discovery communications

7 miles west of nome, on the tomcod claim...

Getting a little ridiculous, isn't it?

Yeah. This sucks.

Starting to piss me off.

Scratching and clawing for 300 ounces

To prop up dad's inland operation,

For shawn pomrenke, frustration is boiling over.

Shawn: Tomcod's getting picked over.

The gold that's in close,

The stuff that pays the bills and buys new equipment,

I've taken it.

So now it's either I have to go bigger and go deeper,

Or I have to find a new area.

I want to find the spot

That's gonna get us up over that 300-ounce mark

So we can get the hell out of the tomcod

And go find some real gold.

And there it is. There's the bluffs.

Narrator: This winter, shawn risked it all to strike gold...

We're out in the middle of nowhere.

...On a remote claim 100 miles from town.

You get 300 ounces, then maybe you can go to the bluff, maybe.

Narrator: After making a deal with steve to return...

Shawn: Just thought I'd bring you a little father's day gift.

Your dream is to go to bluff?

You got the chance to go to bluff, I guess, go to bluff.

...And holding him to his word...

We got to get on some gold.

...Mr. Gold is a tantalizing 58 ounces away.

I'm gonna go ahead and fire her back up and do another cut.

Shawn: Oh, man. He ain't going back on his word.

He said, "once you get 300 ounces,

You can go to the bluff." we're almost there.

I've never felt so close to my gold.

You're done spending. It's my turn.

I'm exhausted, tired.

Not being on gold sucks. It takes a lot out of you.

If I had thought about how many people I had to take care of

And how much money I have to make every year

To take care of the people, I'd probably never sleep.

So I just keep my mind at task.

And we got to get gold, and that's what we got to do.

Let's see what's in here.

That stuff looks good.

I like the way it's got nice wash gravel in it.

Here we go. Let's try this out.

Come on. Come on.

Come on.

Still ain't that great.

But...At least we're seeing something here.

A little bit coarser gold.

Seeing some color now.

About time.

we covered over half the claim.

Oh, yeah. We're gonna run.

Now we're settling for mediocre pans

Because we can't spend any more time prospecting.

I got to hit my goal so we can get the hell out of here

And go to bluff, 'cause I'm tired of this stuff.

Narrator: 2 miles to the east, on the rockwall claim...

Zeke: We need to get a lot of gold today, guys.

...Captain zeke tenhoff is in desperate need of a payday.

The owner of the parent company that owns the havilah,

He's coming to town the next couple of days.

And what the corporate boss wants is to see big cleanups.

Narrator: Tasked with producing a massive 500 ounces

For his new corporate masters,

The newly minted cgo -- corporate gold officer --

Has recovered just 39 ounces so far.

So what we need to do is, just basically,

Like, lifeboat it, where we'll just pull both anchors.

And then I'll just have you guys drag me around real slow.

We got to cover some ground --

Like, serious ground in this area.

And see where these pay streaks start.

Now, with the boss coming to town

And his job potentially on the line,

Zeke is pulling out all the stops,

Planning to be dragged under the boat

Just to find a pay streak.

Zeke: ah

Getting a little bumpy up here.

We need to put some gold in this box, dude.

Not my normal feeling

To have somebody under the boat with my motors running.

Ah

It is pretty difficult to work right now,

'cause we're getting yanked around.

I can barely control this nozzle.

It's whipping around on me.

But I want to find some more gold.

Holy

You're doing a great job, zeke.

You're doing really, really good, brother.

Scott: They sure has put a lot of pressure on this young guy.

There's a lot at stake for him, his reputation.

I mean, he's always ran the little small, quick dredge.

Here he's on this big goliath.

Tell him, kind of -- oh

This is where we want to be, right here.

All right. Stay here for a second.

All right. I'm kicking it out of gear.

And mark a way point that says there's some gold here.

And I'm trying to figure out,

Like, what the parameters are here.

I can see it's still going out that way,

'cause there's all these little sparkles right over here,

Tons of little pieces of gold.

We got to take advantage of this.

Narrator: After finally finding

A potentially job-saving hot spot,

There's just one problem...

What?

Yeah.

Narrator: Five years ago...

Who's starting me off?

$50,000. $50,000 bill.

...The state of alaska

Put lucrative lots of offshore-mining ground

Up for sale.

$56,000.

Unfortunately for zeke,

The gold he's found is on a neighboring claim...

Track 38, alaska.

Owned by... The bid -- $67,000.

...Mr. Gold himself.

All right. I'm coming back up.

Scott: Roger.

In order to follow that gold,

I'm gonna have to make some kind of arrangement

With shawn, hopefully.

Otherwise, I'm gonna have to pick up and move over

To some other property that I'm not familiar with.

That's time that I don't have.

Really, it's the only plot that, like, I've seen

That's, like, satisfactory.

Kind of feels like what we're going for.

Narrator: While zeke needs to make a deal,

Back in town...

Vernon: Ready to go?

...In nome harbor...

Yeah, I think so.

I think we're right there. -All right.

Well, let go of that stern line.

And I'll flip it around, and they can let go of the headline.

...Halfway through the dredging season, and drowning in debt,

Captain vernon adkison is finally ready to go mining.

This is probably the most stressful time in my life.

You know, I've been trying to get

All this damn equipment put together.

And money going out, but no money coming in.

Narrator: After throwing away 100 grand on a boat

That wasn't capable of launching his $250,000 subdredge...

Well, consequently I had to build this other boat,

This 30-foot raft over here,

To launch and recover the subdredge with.

Narrator: ...Vernon is relying on a makeshift raft

To jump-start his season.

I need to get a dredge down there and producing,

Producing to the max.

And I'm two months behind on my rent here in nome.

My mortgage is behind. Everything is behind.

all right. Here we go.

We're off to the races.

I'm not making any gold with the subdredge yet.

So, if I don't make 150 ounces this season, it's all over.

God only knows what's gonna happen to me.

Time to turn a profit.

Yeah, we're all in position.

All right.

So now, it's a matter of getting the bot in the water.

So, let's get on with the show, here.

Yeah, I'm just checking all the systems right now.

All right. We're ready to go.

We have to hook up the discharge

And start making some money for vernon.

Narrator: After months of sitting idle...

It's a surreal moment.

...Vernon's beloved subdredge

Is finally ready to be lowered into the water.

Everyone's been waiting a long time for this.