George
Registered User
- Location
- Syracuse, Utah
We all made it back mostly in one piece. Some of us with ALL of our pieces, some others with most of their pieces.
Our first day we decided to run Poison Spider Mesa, Golden Spike, and Gold Bar Rim. Roll call went like this:
George - Tj
Old Dawg - Tj
Greenie Meanie - Yj
Aaron - Toy
& a Sacrifice - Tj
Unfortunately others didn't make it because of mechanical reasons.
As we started out we made our offerings to the Moab Gods for them to shine upon us. Obviously they had. The day for the most part was uneventful. Uneventful is a good thing. Our uneventful day was soon to change shortly after the Launching Pad on the Golden Spike Trail. As we were going along it was noticed that Old Dawg was missing from the tail of the pack. It's not uncommon for someone to disappear for a moment with the rolling terrain. Then it rang out over the radio. "Old Dawg has rolled over, get back here".
Although it seemed like an eternity as we all got ourselves turned around, word finally came that they were ok.
Upon reaching the rollover Old Dawg and Gareth were both out of the rig. Dawg a little battered from the seatbelt and jarring of the rig. Gareth, the driver, was missing a little surface skin from the shoulder and a few scratches.
So how did it happen? What is not shown in the picture is the actual obstacle that rolled them because of the angle from which the photo was taken. You see it's a steep vertical with a hole in it. When a locked vehicle goes up the front end unloads, drivers side rear goes into a hole then grabs traction and corkscrews the rig up and over. After falling over onto the side the vehicle slid back down to the bottom. this sliding is where Gareth lost some flesh to the slickrock.
Breaking away from the story for a moment I want to say this COULD have been a very bad rollover but wasn't because of simple common sense being used.
Everything in the rig was secured down so that nothing became a projectile when the vehicle went over.
When the vehicle went over Gareth (on the earth side of the vehicle) kept all of his body parts in the vehicle.
Because of the above everyone walked away just fine. I also want to credit the rollcage installed in the front cab area of the vehicle for maintaining the integrity of the rig REALLY minimizing damage to the rig.
Back to the story...
So here we are with the rig laid over. Everyone worked as an outstanding team. Sacrifice kept all the kids rounded up so we could work, the better half of team Greenie Meanie bandaged up Gareth, the lesser half of team Greenie Meanie worked the winch to right the vehicle, Aaron and myself worked on putting the rig back together, and Old Dawg spent most of his time being a royal pain in the *** getting in the way when we kept telling him to sit his *** down .
Back together? You see when the vehicle went over it lost the two drivers side spring. Just plain fell out. With a little winching and pulling on the vehicle we were able to put the two springs back in. After that was done we were ready to roll... until... there was all this metal noice coming out of the front end. Guess what? A third spring had also fallen out. After breaking all the tools out, AGAIN, we put the last spring in.
At this point we called it a day and returned the way we had come. There was simply too much trail ahead of us after putting the vehicle back together.
If you would like to look at the picts from this trip they are on my homepage in the picts section.
Our first day we decided to run Poison Spider Mesa, Golden Spike, and Gold Bar Rim. Roll call went like this:
George - Tj
Old Dawg - Tj
Greenie Meanie - Yj
Aaron - Toy
& a Sacrifice - Tj
Unfortunately others didn't make it because of mechanical reasons.
As we started out we made our offerings to the Moab Gods for them to shine upon us. Obviously they had. The day for the most part was uneventful. Uneventful is a good thing. Our uneventful day was soon to change shortly after the Launching Pad on the Golden Spike Trail. As we were going along it was noticed that Old Dawg was missing from the tail of the pack. It's not uncommon for someone to disappear for a moment with the rolling terrain. Then it rang out over the radio. "Old Dawg has rolled over, get back here".
Although it seemed like an eternity as we all got ourselves turned around, word finally came that they were ok.
Upon reaching the rollover Old Dawg and Gareth were both out of the rig. Dawg a little battered from the seatbelt and jarring of the rig. Gareth, the driver, was missing a little surface skin from the shoulder and a few scratches.
So how did it happen? What is not shown in the picture is the actual obstacle that rolled them because of the angle from which the photo was taken. You see it's a steep vertical with a hole in it. When a locked vehicle goes up the front end unloads, drivers side rear goes into a hole then grabs traction and corkscrews the rig up and over. After falling over onto the side the vehicle slid back down to the bottom. this sliding is where Gareth lost some flesh to the slickrock.
Breaking away from the story for a moment I want to say this COULD have been a very bad rollover but wasn't because of simple common sense being used.
Everything in the rig was secured down so that nothing became a projectile when the vehicle went over.
When the vehicle went over Gareth (on the earth side of the vehicle) kept all of his body parts in the vehicle.
Because of the above everyone walked away just fine. I also want to credit the rollcage installed in the front cab area of the vehicle for maintaining the integrity of the rig REALLY minimizing damage to the rig.
Back to the story...
So here we are with the rig laid over. Everyone worked as an outstanding team. Sacrifice kept all the kids rounded up so we could work, the better half of team Greenie Meanie bandaged up Gareth, the lesser half of team Greenie Meanie worked the winch to right the vehicle, Aaron and myself worked on putting the rig back together, and Old Dawg spent most of his time being a royal pain in the *** getting in the way when we kept telling him to sit his *** down .
Back together? You see when the vehicle went over it lost the two drivers side spring. Just plain fell out. With a little winching and pulling on the vehicle we were able to put the two springs back in. After that was done we were ready to roll... until... there was all this metal noice coming out of the front end. Guess what? A third spring had also fallen out. After breaking all the tools out, AGAIN, we put the last spring in.
At this point we called it a day and returned the way we had come. There was simply too much trail ahead of us after putting the vehicle back together.
If you would like to look at the picts from this trip they are on my homepage in the picts section.
