On tonight’s Gold Rush, the Hoffman crew have a nightmare episode following a string of setbacks — including washplant Rusty Red breaking down and a truck slamming into a boulder.
Todd and his crew now have three plants in operation, with Freddy Dodge’s Rusty Red in Fairplay, Colorado, running full of paydirt laced with gold, as we learned last week.
But legal issues and now equipment problems are plaguing the team and especially Dodge, who has sunk all of his savings into this one mining site betting on a huge payday.
Dodge is merrily pushing over 200 yards of gold-rich paydirt an hour, but just as things are looking up calamity strikes when a bearing breaks — bringing the whole operation to a halt.
Dodge calls mechanic Juan Ibarra to investigate the engine, and the news is not good. Juan calls Todd, who groans in disbelief and puts his head in his hands when he hears the bad news.
This comes on the heels of last week’s show when Dodge surprised Todd and the crew with the happy news of lifted restrictions so they can mine Fairplay. But locals are fuming and even waging a lawsuit.
Now all the work and the excitement of making Fairplay viable again seems to be falling away. Todd says Juan is needed at Double Trouble too. But as you can see from our exclusive clip, his repair work is just beginning…
Gold Rush airs Friday at 9/8c on Discovery.