Ken Kerr Is MIA and 'Bering Sea Gold' Fans Are Worried About Him

Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers for Season 10 of Bering Sea Gold.

There’s something strangely satisfying about watching the dangers of gold mining, making the gold all the more valuable to us. On Bering Sea Gold, there’s no one better at getting to the gold than Ken Kerr. But Ken Kerr is nowhere to be seen so far in Season 10, and many of us are wondering what happened to him.

Ken Kerr and Shawn Pomrenke have been adversaries for years, but now Shawn is taking over Ken’s beloved (albeit sometimes finicky) Myrtle Irene. The Myrtle Irene is the largest dredge in the Nome, Alaska, mining scene, so Ken’s absence is a huge deal. Read on to find out what happened to Ken Kerr in Bering Sea Gold.

Honestly, even though Ken Kerr didn’t come into the picture until somewhat recently, Bering Sea Gold is just not the same without him! Some people don’t mind — he is definitely a divisive character between his pride and greed. However, others really miss his antagonistic qualities livening up the show. But in Season 10, he’s nowhere to be found.

Ken was not only the captain of the Myrtle Irene, but he built up the Arctic Sea and Arctic Gold Mining Companies with his business partner Dave Young. Apparently, the Myrtle Irene cost $3 million to buy, and at least another $1 million to fix up in recent years to make it operable for Bering Sea Gold. (We’ve seen why it needed to get fixed in multiple life-threatening situations.) 

Ken Kerr makes only one appearance in Season 10 of Bering Sea Gold, which is currently airing on the Discovery Channel. When the season begins, Ken’s adversary, Shawn, is the new captain of the Myrtle Irene, and fans have some theories as to why. Bering Sea Gold doesn’t really explain, but Ken appears briefly in the second episode to say he’s going to focus on beach mining for the time being.

However, that doesn’t seem to be a satisfactory enough answer since he was such a major part of prior seasons of Bering Sea Gold. Plus, if he really is leaving the show, wouldn’t he or the producers put out an official statement instead of an oddly placed, seemingly scripted cameo? This is how most fans of the show feel in regards to what happened to Ken Kerr.

The main theory of what happened to Ken Kerr seems to be that production no longer wanted him on the show due to a recent lawsuit. In 2018, Ken’s company Arctic Sea Mining failed to warn drivers of a cable in the middle of a road.

This resulted in two high schoolers getting severely injured while driving and suing for at least $100,000. While no news outlets have reported on the results, rumors are that Ken lost the lawsuit and paid the teenagers.

Another theory though is that because the incident with the cable was in 2018, and Ken still appeared on Bering Sea Gold after that, it could be a matter of ineptitude. While Ken has repeatedly been crowned the Gold King, many believe this is because he had the best and biggest dredge.

However, recently, he’s put the Myrtle Irene through a bit too much turmoil, and for all the millions of dollars it’s worth, fans believe that gold investors may want someone more like Shawn running it.

In all likelihood, it seems like Ken Kerr did leave Bering Sea Gold, but that he’s alive and as well as can be. Since he doesn’t have any social media that’s publicly available, it’s impossible to know exactly what he’s up to now, but despite his villainous characteristics, we’re all hoping he’s happy with whatever he's doing.

Watch new episodes of Bering Sea Gold Fridays around 9 p.m. EST on the Discovery Channel.