"Keep going 24s": Gold Rush star Kevin Beets leads a round-the-clock push and reaches 680 ounces of gold

Gold Rush star Kevin Beets intensified his gold mining efforts by shifting his crew to a continuous 24-hour schedule as part of an ongoing push to reach a 1,000-ounce goal. As season 15 concluded, this strategy was implemented for only weeks. Kevin explained,

“We’ve been able to keep going 24s. And, like, if we really want to hit 1,000 ounces, that is what we’re going to have to keep doing. Pretty much till the end of the season.”

By maintaining round-the-clock operations, the team brought their Gold Rush season total up to 680 ounces, marking their most productive week to date.

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Gold Rush star Kevin Beets ramps up 24-hour mining in drive toward 1000-ounce season goal

Intensified work schedules and new reinforcements

To increase efficiency, Kevin Beets assigned foreman Brennan Ruault to keep the pay dirt stockpile full while the rest of the crew focused on feeding the wash plant around the clock. Brennan explained,

“Kevin did a pan for us and it looked really good actually, so I’m just working my ass off here with trying to keep that stockpile as big as we can out of the plant so night shift can run smoothly.”

Kevin brought in experienced miner Rick Johnson to assist Hunter Canning during night shifts. Johnson, a bank manager with over a dozen years of mining experience, joined the team and immediately went to work. Kevin reminded both operators,

“Don’t shut down because if we’re going to hit a thousand ounces, we’ve got to really run pretty much non-stop.”

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Complications during night shift operations

While the night crew operated the wash plant, an equipment issue emerged. At 2:32 a.m., Rick’s loader became stuck in deep mud. He informed Hunter that he was unable to move the vehicle because both side wheels were "spinning." With limited time to respond, Hunter had to quickly fill the hopper to maintain the wash plant's flow.

“If I can’t get him out quick enough, I’m just going to have to leave him there… I can’t let this hopper ever go dry,” he stated.

Hunter managed to stock the hopper with eight minutes of pay dirt, giving him just enough time to assist Rick.

“Rick’s sinking in quick sand and I have to get this hopper filled so I can go help him and tug him out,” Hunter said.

After securing the cable, the team extracted the stuck loader without halting gold recovery operations. Hunter confirmed that there was no shutdown, no loss of gold from whitewashing, and that the situation had been managed successfully.

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Final week yield and Gold Rush season total

During the weigh-in, Faith and Brennan monitored the running total as the scale increased steadily, ultimately reaching 205.58 ounces. Faith announced each milestone number during the process, while Brennan acknowledged that this was the "biggest" cleanup they had recorded in the Gold Rush season.

Additional nuggets recovered during processing added 4.14 ounces, pushing the total weekly recovery to 209.72 ounces. “There’s more,” Faith remarked while pouring out the gold pieces. The season total rose to 680 ounces, a significant increase from the 470 ounces achieved in the preceding five months. Kevin stated,

“It’s not quite double, but it does look like the extension has been paying out.”

The operation still needs approximately 320 ounces to reach the 1,000-ounce target. Kevin emphasized,

“That’s the biggest cleanup yet… So we’re well on our way, but can’t rest now. We still got a long way to 1,000 ounces.”

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Gold Rush season 15 is available to stream on Discovery+ and is also accessible on Max.