Gold dealing, they concluded, was a scam. Scott Lomu and George Wright, hapless heroes of Discoverys Jungle Gold, finally had to flee the country by plane to escape arrest and the armed militia who seemed to be pursuing them. First, their new landowner revealed the mining licence wasnt ready, so they couldnt film any actual work. We didnt want them to present Ghana as a lawless place where foreigners can come and engage in illegal mining, he explained. Then, in December 2014, they met Clint Mishleau. Press question mark to learn the rest of the keyboard shortcuts, https://twitter.com/JungleGeorgeVI/status/365907125215576064, https://twitter.com/JungleGoldScott/status/365907460332068864, https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCFDu1cQjqGaj-3wBYavW1Hg/videos, http://www.ghanaweb.com/GhanaHomePage/NewsArchive/artikel.php?ID=273569, http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/jungle-gold/videos/run-for-the-border-part-one.htm, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fS7g-l3-M5k. It was a humbling experience. I thank my parents. tailings, improve recoveries of existing milling operations and improve He was still there when I showed up six months later. Under Ghanaian law, Wright and Lomu could not physically mine. Comments: George Wright have accepted positions as members of the Companys We met that guy a few weeks back. When I asked them about this, they said the thought had not occurred to them. We really liked the people of Ghana, the people we worked with. When season two of Jungle Gold aired in August 2013, it flopped, competing with NFL for ratings. On the morning of May 11, the cast and crew arrived at Kotoka International Airport. What shocked me is how much seemingly relevant content never gets used. One op-ed, titled Jungle Gold: A Case Study in the Exploitation of Africa, captured the collective indignation that greeted the series. Hey guys i heard that their are NO more chinese people who are searching for gold. Jungle Gold an action-packed reality show about two Mormons from Utah mining for gold in Ghana was a hit when it premiered on the Discovery Channel in 2012. Months before the shoot, Lomu had paid a village chief $12,500 of his Utah investors money to secure a 25-acre plot of land an hour outside the town of Dunkwa, the epicenter of Ghanas gold rush. Sat 07 May PG-VL. Given Africans response to Season 1 in the States, Lomu had begged Raw not to air the show in Ghana, fearing retaliation. But they soon discovered a more viable option: gold mining. And one of their original crew had taken his own life. Not everyone celebrated their departure. Unfortunately, sometimes, some of those kids will turn to armed robbery, and theyll rob other miners. At any moment, a police vehicle, a military car, can come in and stop this plane, Lomu says in the finale. In 2010, they and a friend, Wally Macias, invested in a small operation and took turns flying out to work there. Last year we were forced to use mercury which was really hard for a lot of people. [via press release from Discovery] Theyd spent the past year trying to dramatize their daily lives for the cameras. The shows first season had been a hit, airing on Friday nights behind Gold Rush, Discovery Channels highest-rated show. Discovery moved the show from Friday to Sunday nights, where it competed with NFL football for the eyes of American men, their primary demographic. When the cast and crew arrived on the first day of filming, however, they found it crawling with Chinese miners. Only the most coldhearted, inhumane person could spend more than an hour in Ghana and think to do that.. It is really pathetic. It could be a painful reality but that's the way it is. The show not only increased the chances theyd be recognized, he thought, it also provided a detailed map to their Season 1 mining claim, which lay on the same road as Fahiakobo. In April 2013, six months after its U.S. premiere, Jungle Golds first season had debuted in Ghana on DStv, an African satellite network with 8 million subscribers. A soaring Mormon temple, one of only three on the continent, sits in the heart of Accras commercial district, surrounded by European embassies. Aboard a two-story mining dredge as it plies the brown waters of the Amazon jungle, he captures Guyanese miners laughing and telling jokes over lunch. Snow-covered peaks rose in the distance behind him. The stage is being set for a redemptive second season of Jungle Gold, they wrote. It was that simple. So now I'm just leaving this thing open . Upon meeting me, hed asked hopefully if I was with Raw, heralding the return of Jungle Gold. *Discovery Channel has been pushing this as a new season, though the May 29 new episode is listed as Season 2, Episode 9. I guess this is what your generation who grew up in a fancy world is all about. Under the section Danger and Risk, Raw wrote: It would be easy to paint Ghana as a dangerous and risky environment, and by our audiences standards it certainly is. Have you ever seen the show 'Gold Rush'? Scott Lomu and George Wright buying supplies during an episode of Jungle Gold. George Wright and Scott Lomu filming in Ghana for Jungle Gold. It may have been their worst nightmare, but it made gripping TV. G: When the show gets edited they are continually making editing choices between our daily life choices and events. The Minerals Commission claimed the crew had pushed ahead without adequate permissions and secretly asked the countrys National Security Agency to investigate them, fearing a stampede of greedy foreign miners, according to Buzzfeed. Inusah Fuseini, minister of lands and natural resources, said the show portrayed Ghana as a jungle, vowing to arrest the Mormons. I'm honestly not a fan of Reality tv at all, I want to watch good scripted shows with compelling stories. So, gold fever its addictive. mining company with profitable operations., Ensurge, Inc. is a Colorado-based holding company that has been engaged About Press Copyright Contact us Creators Advertise Developers Terms Privacy Policy & Safety How YouTube works Test new features Press Copyright Contact us Creators . The day before, he and the entire cast and crew of the Discovery Channel reality show Jungle Gold had fled a nearby village fearing an armed militia was after them. George Wright has been appointed as Vice President of Public Relations and. They were convinced theyd be arrested at the airport and imprisoned. We just like to do our thing, it's all we can do really. Keep 'em coming if you have them. There were more tweets during our reruns that Sunday [during a Season 1 marathon] than we got all of last year. Airing in the slot behind Gold Rush, it had helped Discovery dominate the Friday night cable ratings. 1975 ( MCMLXXV) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1975th year of the Common Era (CE) and Anno Domini (AD) designations, the 975th year of the 2nd millennium, the 75th year of the 20th century, and the 6th year of the 1970s decade. (The agency did not respond to questions about the status of its investigation.). They found almost no gold, sinking the last of their cash into the failed enterprise. That drippy wife should stop whining and deal with it while her husband a finally does a days work. become affiliated with a public mining company. It now occurred to him that theyd simply resumed filming after the August meeting. Ready to get to work in Africa!, Jungle Gold may have enraged Ghanaian ex-pats and officials, but it was a hit with Americas 1849-year-old demographic. People were actually angry! Donkor told me. He reappears with a gold bar he claims is worth $75,000. Big props to the crew if they really risked themselves like that to get the footage. Under Review. The men worked 18-hour days, commuting two hours over rutted dirt roads through poverty-stricken villages. Once the show ended, they pursued a few of the offers, but nothing came of them. Why anyone would give these clowns a penny of investment capital after all the stupid mistakes these guys have made for two years is beyond me. How does it feel to go to the poorest continent on the planet with the goal to take as much of the little wealth they have left? They needed to find money, fast. Maybe Utah poor is different to my poor. It described how miners were regularly killed or injured thanks to unsafe practices, with 150 dying when one unlicensed mine flooded, and how cyanide, lead and mercury, used to extract gold then dumped in rivers poisoned communities. So what do you watch instead? In the five years it takes a cocoa tree to fruit, he said, they often make poor decisions that cause them to be economically or physically displaced. The lure of foreign wages, he added, can incentivize village youth to drop out of school. Their dreams of getting rich in Ghana faded from view. I can hardly wait to see what drama they come up with next. In Ghana, non-Ghanaians are allowed to mine on plots of more than 25 acres, known as large-scale concessions. The first thing George and I thought when we landed in Ghana was, "I thought WE had problems". Viewers were shocked that Americans would broadcast illegal mining, and activists claimed throwing money at people unused to financial decision-making was a mistake. They have to prove the new claim is stacked with gold or their investors will pull funding. Lomu peeked out the compounds window, half expecting a military convoy to break down the gate and haul them away. Within one season, they were being accused of racism, exploitation, destroying the environment and even murder. We are Scott Lomu & George Wright, We can't speak to other reality shows but are happy to share about ours and what it's been like. Discovery had ordered 12 episodes, Wright said, but their abbreviated stay produced only enough material for six. The next day, Joy FM dispatched its Kumasi correspondent, Erastus Asare Donkor, to gather reactions to the story in the citys streets and markets. mining operations. When the United States Navy SEALs killed bin Laden during the operation, they captured a prize far greater and more valuable [], Click to email a link to a friend (Opens in new window), Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window), Click to share on Pinterest (Opens in new window), Click to share on Reddit (Opens in new window), Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window), on Discovery announces limited-run Gold Rush spinoff series, on Discovery special presents details on classified bin Laden intel, http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1124.html, Discovery announces limited-run Gold Rush spinoff series, Discovery Channels Alaskan Bush People recap: A Wolfpack Divided, Discovery special presents details on classified bin Laden intel, Single Ladies Decide if Country Livin is for Them in Farmer Wants a Wife. What do they think of this? The California gold rush of the mid19th century coincided with the Mormon pioneers arrival in Utah. Back in 2009, Scott Lomu and George Wright, two clean living Mormons, were trying to find a way to make money after suffering huge losses when the housing bubble popped the year before. She was crying hysterically. Theres more chance if drippy wife getting off her ass and getting a part time job, Dru kelly why so bitter? (DStv, they later learned, chose not to air the second season in Africa. The show premiered in the US in October 2012 to widespread horror, particularly from African Americans. Literally, I have never been so scared, Wright told me. Invigorated by this new prospect, the three men invested in a small-scale operation near the mining town of Obuasi, a four-hour drive from Accra, and took turns traveling to Ghana over the next three months. George Wright and Scott Lomu, former real estate investors that lost everything in the 2008 crash, make the life-altering decision to travel to Ghana in West Africa to hunt for gold. How, in less than a year, did its cast and crew get accused of everything from manipulating Ghanaians to murdering them? His optimistic nature notwithstanding, Lomu saw more cause for hope in Ghanas relationship to Mormonism. They forfeited the cash and moved to a less profitable site. And yet they also felt a strange sense of calm. But they had not received permission from the Minerals Commission to film mining lands. I mean, not logical enough to actually do it, but they clearly considered the idea (and had a relative in the field) before diving in. In April 2015, they were hired by Utah-based mining company Ensurge to share their mining expertise in Guyana and help attract investors. But where? As chronicled in their Contact Jed Lipinski at jed.lipinski@gmail.com. From [], Do the Alaskan Bush People get paid? Find out more about our policy and your choices, including how to opt-out. Watch part 1 unfold here: http://dsc.discovery.com/tv-shows/jungle-gold/videos/run-for-the-border-part-one.htm. Scott Lomu and George Wright, . We lost a ton of money! Wright said. There are plenty of other channels. There was also an image problem. We were entirely without expectations, Wright told news.com.au. He moved to Utah in 2000, and when the Olympics Winter Games came to Salt Lake City two years later, he rented furnished houses and apartments to people in town for the event. After averaging 2.65 million viewers a week during its first season on Discovery Channel last fall, Jungle Gold is back, having started Season 2 on Aug. 11 (now airing on Sundays). provide mining consultation worldwide. According to Lomu, Raw later paid Akwesi $3,000 for his troubles. . He was crushed to learn I was not. | Learn more about Scott Lomu's work experience, education, connections . RELATED: GOLD RUSH SEASON 4 PREMIERE DATE In Gold Rush South America, premiering Aug. 2 at 9pm ET/PT, Gold Rush crew leaders Todd Hoffman, Dakota Fred and Parker Schnabel take their operations to find new, gold-rich ground in preparation for Gold Rush Season 4, which Discovery says will premiere in the fall. Can you tell us your secret at being perfect such as yourself. Big fan of the show, one my friends is from Ghana and I got him watching the show as well. (Both Discovery Channel and Raw, which was acquired by Discovery in 2014, declined to comment for this story.). Lomu learned what he needed to know about reality TV, put . What was the viewer reaction following the season premiere of Jungle Gold? By the time the season ended, three Change.org petitions had called for the shows cancellation, drawing a total of 3,000 supporters from the U.S., Europe, South America, Australia, and across West Africa. Ref: http://travel.state.gov/travel/cis_pa_tw/cis/cis_1124.html Why moan about something just find something else to watch. That February, 5 million people watched the Season 2 finale of Gold Rush, continuing its two-year run as the most-watched cable show on Friday nights. Scott and George test out a brand new claim after racking up huge debts on the Romaso gold mine. We met him last year. A task force created by President John Mahama had flushed dozens of Chinese miners from the area, leaving many of the villages men unemployed. And deal with it while her husband a finally does a days work, however, they and a,. So now I & # x27 ; s work experience, education, connections and haul them.... On plots of more than an hour in Ghana for Jungle Gold not to air the show Ghana. Be a painful reality but that & # x27 ; s work experience, education connections! With compelling stories option: Gold mining, Dru kelly why so bitter had. 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