Ice Road Truckers: How These Drivers Survive

[Serpo]

http://drivesteady.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Ice-Road-Truckers-image-41.jpg


(http://collider.com/director-john-moore-ice-road-truckers-3d-20-century-fox/34731/) Ice roads came into widespread use in the 1950′s when Canadian engineer John Denison designed a system of ice roads in Northern Canada. As is the case today, the ice road were to bring mines supplies. The ice roads were necessary since the terrain was unfit to construct a normal road and many supplies were too heavy to be flown in. Using the infographic below we show your how these truckers were able to survive the dangerous conditions
http://i.imgur.com/7PVml.jpg (http://i.imgur.com/7PVml.jpg)










http://drivesteady.com/ice-road-truckers

[Gaillo]

WTF happened to Australian diamond mining output? ??? :o

I detect the heavy hand of .gov in there somewhere...

[freespirit]

more ice strength data...

http://www.mvp-wc.usace.army.mil/ice/ice_load.html



Required Minimum IceDescription of
Thickness in inches Safe Moving Load
1-3/4 One person on skies
2 One person on foot or skates
3 One snowmobile
3 A group of people walking single file
7 A single passenger automobile
8 A 2-1/2 ton truck
9 A 3-1/2 ton truck
10 A 7 to 8 ton truck

[ximmy]

How do they get the truck out... do they just leave it there??
http://drivesteady.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Ice-Road-Truckers-image-41.jpg

[Serpo]

How do they get the truck out... do they just leave it there??
http://drivesteady.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Ice-Road-Truckers-image-41.jpg

I think the ice roads are littered with trucks like these.......above it says the ice can hold up 100,000lbs if truck is moving but only 60000lbs if stopped.....

[Serpo]

WTF happened to Australian diamond mining output? ??? :o

I detect the heavy hand of .gov in there somewhere...
Still plenty of Argyle pink diamonds being churned out as far as I know.....

[Joe King]

How do they get the truck out... do they just leave it there??

I have no idea. Perhaps a big tow truck? http://i959.photobucket.com/albums/ae71/donselmo/Smiley/dunno.gif
...but here's a couple more pics of it.


http://www.thedieselgypsy.com/ICE-Truck-X-2.jpg



http://www.thedieselgypsy.com/ICE-Truck-3.jpg

[Twisted Titan]

Dam that's dangerous work

[freespirit]

a number of years ago, i worked for a company that installed overhead boat lifts. working in the winter was best, since it gave us a decent platform to work from. sometimes, we would be driving down the lake early morning, with a pair of 2500 series dodge 4x4's, each pulling a 20' flat deck trailer loaded with steel, welders, torches, and all our other tools, followed by a mini excavator. usually, if we had at least 17-20 inches of ice, we were fairly safe. granted we weren't dealing with the loads those guys carry, but the hairs on your neck stand up the same when you hear that creaking, rumbling and cracking as you drive down the lake...lol

the most exciting part of the day was getting to and from the jobsite! lol

[freespirit]

one thing most people don't realize is that the ice is only flat on the top side...beneath the surface, the ice is more like an egg carton, with lots of peaks and valleys. therefore, you could be standing on 20" of ice, and 4ft from you, your buddy is standing on 12".

[Joe King]

So how do they get that truck out of the lake? I doubt they'd just leave it there.
The OP says the ice can't support a stopped truck, so if you tried to tow it out, it'd just bust back through the ice again as soon as it was pulled out, wouldn't it?
Or is it done from shore with a big long cable and pull til it comes out, busted ice or not?

[gunDriller]

i wonder if blimps could work.

[Twisted Titan]

Cant fly blimps is extreme weather.......... plus payload would make it cost prohibative even it was possible

[Neuro]

Attach huge buoys around the truck and wait for the Ice to melt? I don't think it is possible to pull it from the shore through the ice, the ice would crush the truck...

[Dogman]

They use cranes and winch trucks, the key is to spread the weight of the lifting machines over a wide footprint on the ice, so the weight is spread while lifting and pulling.

Think snowshoes vs bare boots, snowshoes spread the weight over the snow and you do not sink into it. They will use the same principle on the ice to get that truck out.

[freespirit]

i got to watch a dive crew retrieve a car that had gone thru the ice. they waited till the lake was open, then took a barge out, dove down, attached inflatable bags to the vehicle, then inflated them. once the car came to the surface, they surrounded it with a boom to contain any fluids on the surface. then they towed the vehicle to the shore where a tow truck was waiting to pull it the rest of the way out of the lake. i would think that this method would work in most situations, albeit on a larger scale.

once that truck was frozen in, which wouldn't take very long, it would be almost impossible to pull it free from the ice.

[Joe King]

Attach huge buoys around the truck and wait for the Ice to melt? I don't think it is possible to pull it from the shore through the ice, the ice would crush the truck...
Yea, I knew that'd be extremely impractical, but I was just throwing an idea out there because I'm at a loss as to how they could get it out and would really like to know how it's done.
I'm assuming that the ice around the truck, seeing as it's already broken, would not be able to support the forces involved with having another large vehicle parked nearby while pulling and lifting the stuck truck.

[Joe King]

i got to watch a dive crew retrieve a car that had gone thru the ice. they waited till the lake was open, then took a barge out, dove down, attached inflatable bags to the vehicle, then inflated them. once the car came to the surface, they surrounded it with a boom to contain any fluids on the surface. then they towed the vehicle to the shore where a tow truck was waiting to pull it the rest of the way out of the lake. i would think that this method would work in most situations, albeit on a larger scale.

once that truck was frozen in, which wouldn't take very long, it would be almost impossible to pull it free from the ice.Good answer. However, I have a couple questions.

If the road is only accessable in the Winter time, how do they get the tow truck there after the ice is gone, to be able to pull it to shore?

How do they get the barge there after melt? Are most of those lakes up there all connected and navigable for a barge like that?
I ask that because I was assuming that this accident occured in the far North and was only accessable during warmer months by air or small vehicles incapable of carrying any real load. Certainly not a big truck like that one.

If the lakes are accessable to a barge, why don't they just carry supplies that way during the warmer months?

[Tumbleweed]

I've driven a big rig with double bulk tanker trailers through mountains in winter time grossing 116,000 pounds. Hitting black ice or white outs in a snow storm at night is a SOB. Watching your trailers in your rearview mirrors starting to slide is scary as hell. What ever those guys get paid for doing what they do it's not enough.

[Dogman]

I've driven a big rig with double bulk tanker trailers through mountains in winter time grossing 116,000 pounds. Hitting black ice or white outs in a snow storm at night is a SOB. Watching your trailers in your rearview mirrors starting to slide is scary as hell. What ever those guys get paid for doing what they do it's not enough. Down here tandem trailers are called "wiggle wagons". And on icy roads, No thank you! :o

[freespirit]

Good answer. However, I have a couple questions.

If the road is only accessable in the Winter time, how do they get the tow truck there after the ice is gone, to be able to pull it to shore?

How do they get the barge there after melt? Are most of those lakes up there all connected and navigable for a barge like that?
I ask that because I was assuming that this accident occured in the far North and was only accessable during warmer months by air or small vehicles incapable of carrying any real load. Certainly not a big truck like that one.

If the lakes are accessable to a barge, why don't they just carry supplies that way during the warmer months?

well, for starters, the lakes in that area are likely not "barge-friendly", but there are vehicles capable of a retrieval like that.
for example, a mercedes-benz Unimog would be able to get into the least likely places to take a vehicle, and although a barge provides an excellent work platform, just about any boat you can put a gas powered compressor, bags and dive gear on would suffice to get you to the trapped vehicle. this sort of salvage operation is definitely not cheap, the crew i got to watch were billing $1200/hr to retrieve the car...and it took them almost 9 hours start to finish. i imagine that an operation like the one mentioned could potentially cost maybe $3,000-$5,000/hr or more.

also there are the environmental costs to consider as well...with the car i saw, the owner was being billed over $1000/day in environmental fees due to the gas, oil and coolant that leached into the water from the vehicle.


as far as the use of a barge (if possible) for warmer months, it would not be cost effective to drive goods to the dock, load from the truck to the barge, then transport, then unload to another truck or possibly another barge, then to a final truck for delivery.

[Joe King]

Ok, you drive your Unimogs loaded with a boat, inflatable pontoons, winches and anything else needed to float it and pull it to shore for $5k an hour. I'm in.

Then what?
You now have a big heavy truck on shore, presumably still fully loaded. How do you get it "home"? Can the Unimogs carry it?

[freespirit]

not my problem...you asked how i would get it out of the lake. what the owner does with it after that is their problem.

as far as the load is concerned, the insurance company would write that off, i imagine.

[Tumbleweed]

It makes me tense just watching a video like this because I've driven a big rig on ice in the mountains. :o


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zpnjYljWWco&feature=results_video&playnext=1&list=PLA6EF27C053529821