Well my own, is kinda different, the truck wasn't really stuck. It was back in my earlier days of plowing. I was plowing a residential drive about 150 long 20 feet wide, streight up to the garage. I was pushing the snow off to the side of the garage, and then backdragging infront of the doors. Well, there had been a freeze and thaw cycle, between storms. So where i had been pushing snow on the side of the garage was all icy. Well i was pushing about 8" of powder up the drive, when i made the turn off to the side and hit the pile. I hit the pile slow, and didn't raise the blade in time to stack the snow any higher. So I came in for a second attempt, and when i did the whole truck slid sideways towards the trim on the edge of the garage. Well the rib on the outside drivers side of the plow got stuck between the trim boards on edge of the garage. So what could i do, could go foward more damage, couldn't go backwards more damage, couldn't lift the plow or the board would come off. So what did i do? i disconnected the 8' fisher plow, and backed the truck up, then reconnected the plow. Talk about a pain in the @ss, moving that plow, was hard, disconnecting and reconnecting it in a full angle position was even harder. So the truck was stuck between two trim boards. Worst stuck story by employee. in 1995, the 1988 GMC 1500, was on its last year. It had been reduced to a residential plow truck, all it should have ever been ( only thats another story). The truck was set up with, a 4.3 V6, auto, 9' fisher plow. Well i had an employee with plenty of plowing experience, and just wasn't use to that plow set up. The regular driver of that truck was out sick, or had a weekend off or something. So i was going to have someone with less experience on the other guys route, because the truck was set up correctly. Well the drive came off a development road, went into the woods about 150', the drive was about 11' wide, went down a hill about an 8' drop over 75 feet, then back up the hill over 75'. The dip in the road was caused by a small stream at the bottom, the good news is, the roadbed was very wide where the stream was, the bad news was the there was a turn on the the stream bed. Well the employee, steve, was heading down the drive, with his 9' fisher and foil, came down the stream bed, tried to make the turn. However the turn he was trying to make was opposite the direction the snow was being cast. The end result was he didn't make the turn. The other driver new, that you had to go down the hill, very slow, and cast the snow in the same direction of the turn. This driver was trying to cast the snow all to one side, something he always has and still dose on residential drives. Anyways the gmc, went down the side of the stream bed, the rear bumper was about 8' from the edge of the drive, the front plow was about 20' from the stream, to give you a size of how wide this road bed was built. The employee got on the radio and said he was stuck with the gmc. No big deal the gmc got stuck on average of 2 times a storm. We pulled it out of ditches, when the fram was on the ground, with a 3/4 ton pick up. When he said bring the big truck ( at the time F 350 dump with sander), the big truck came, plowed out the drive, then sanded the p!ss out of the drive, and pulled the truck out. To this day, these two guys said that they almost needed the backhoe, for that one. So far, have never needed anything other than a truck to get a truck un stuck. Geoff
I have two stellar ones.the first involves an employee who was plowing with a 89 chevy we had that is equiped with a boss snow plow.He was plowing an apt complex that we do that has a very steep hill in it.Most of the time if it is very icy we don,t even do it .But like most there is always the erge to see just what a truck will do in the middle of a snow storm So in the dark of night he begin his trek down this steep hill,about half way down where the hil gets just alittle worse and tips to the left he and a blade full of snow jump the curb and strattle it down to were the water usually goes in to a 5x5 storm water intake.The pickup with the weight in the back is heavy enough to dislodge the lid a shoveit clear off allowing the front left side of the truck to drop into the hole.Needless to say the pickup I sent to pull him out quickly turned in to a tractor backhoe/crane to set the truck on the road and the lid back on the box.Second one goes back to when I was just a pup(16). We had a1973 int 1700 w/11ft plow and 10ft sander with an authentic Iowa DOT 1000mph crash bumper on it.This truck was minus the kind of radio that a 16 year old plow truck driver needed so a walkman that was capable of achiving noise levels loud enough to drown out the 392 w/5+2 trans was used.I was plowing my home church parking lot and had backed up to the entry to make another pass at the drive.This I did with out any trouble,stress on the truck or hint of my current situation. Approx 100yds down the drive I looked I my mirror to see a car following me abnormally close and at a weird angle,and as the fog in my plowers mind wore off I realize he was not following me but rather I was dragging him(I used that really cool bumper to hook on to his).As I jumped out of my truck and removed the blaring headset,I saw a family friend white,gripping the steering wheel as though he had just been thrown a life preserver after falling off the Titanic,his foot I'm sure jammed on the brak.As I get closer to the car he looks up at me a says couldn't you hear me honking?I said sorry no as I tucked my walkman deeper into my pocket.From then on or at least for the rest of the afternoon I turned it down a little.
Well i was plowing a small 100' X 18' drive with my '97 diesel chevy ,8' diamond plow.I made a couple of p***es down the drive way and was just trying to clear just another foot of snow for this customer when BAM I was stuck.Not only was I stuck but i was stuck on and angle of a very steep hill it looked like i could make it but the truck shifted to much.Could not get out with my 4 wheel drive .it just made it worse.Good thing it was not far from my house,went home and got my backhoe and pulled myself out and saved probably a $100 from a tow.
I am posting this story that was shared with me, however, I have changed the names to protect the innocent! The scene (as told by Fred): The driveway went up hill with a line of trees on the right side, on the left side it sloped away starting gradually at the road and increasing as you went up the hill. At the top of the hill the driveway made a loop to the left around the house and connected back onto the driveway. On the backside of the loop was a serious drop-off and on the front side was the cliff. The joke between me and Barney was that one slip and you would tumble through 2 time zones before you stopped rolling. One other thing that needs to be mentioned. This was my first year plowing and the whole thing was a learning experience for me. Anyway, we had finished plowing all of our commercial jobs (it was 1:30 a.m. at this point) Barney had gone out to take care of a driveway behind his house, and I went over to do this driveway, which by the way Barney had plowed every time up until now. We had close to 12 inches of snow on the ground also. So I started plowing uphill and around the loop and started back down the hill. By the time that I had gotten near the bottom of the hill I was pushing quite the mound of snow. I noticed that near the bottom that it flattened out on the right side, PERFECT place to put this mountain of snow WRONG!! As I pushed it over I found out why it was flat, with 12+ inches on the ground it covered up the slope and I just drove off the edge of the driveway and onto the slope. I was on all four tires but almost on my side. The only thing that kept me from rolling the truck was the plow. At that time I tried calling Barney.....NO ANSWER! So I started digging out. Must have shoveled several tons of freaking snow, all the way around the truck, but still no traction. Barney was still unreachable....so more digging. After nearly an hour of digging and trying to contact Barney, he got through to me. "WHERE THE @@@@ ARE YOU!!!!" Barney yelled. "I've been trying to get hold of you because I got stuck out behind my house, and it has taken me an hour to get myself unstuck" I said, "chill out", (I had only tumbled through one time zone and was more stuck than he was) I told him what had happened and that I needed some serious help. He called his other driver who had just finished up himself and was on his way to bed. They both showed up a while later and luckily they were able to hook up a chain to the plow and pull me 20 feet or so onto the road without any damage to the plow or truck. And that is the story.
Hi Guys - I saw the thread and thought I would cut and paste a stuck story I just lived this week. I am supervising a 16-man logging operation in Hornepayne Ontario. Although it is not about snow, I'm glad this didn't happen at 35 below. I am still recovering from this one - biggest of my career. Sorry for the length, I'll do a shorter snow story soon. My week, to this point, has been a 64 hour effort at work, and I still have Friday to look forward to. Monday was an early start to meet the Spruce Falls helicopter @ Mooseland to view the 5-year logging plan. I got "home" to Hornypain at 4:35pm, crawled into bed to get rid of my kerosene headache, an promply got a call at 5:15 pm telling me the following: Mostly a Qoute "John - while you were away, we managed to get a grapple skidder stuck in a swamp. Well, that was no big deal because Jeff went in with the Tigercat Feller Buncher and got him out. But then, Jeff broke through the root mat and started to sink fast. Amos then tried to go around him with the skidder to try the winch but he got stuck again. However, the winch was in line with the F/B, so we winched the skidder closer to the F/B before the winch broke. Oh Oh. Then, Jeff walked out to get the Timberjack 618 F/B to cut a brush mat to allow him to pull out the skidder and then, no problem, we two would pull out the Tigercat. That was going good until the 618 broke through and sunk 7 feet." I listened to this BS story intently, and it got better... "Then, we figured we might have a problem (!) so We asked Raymond ( the unrelated roadbuilder) to bring his new hoe in and dig out the Tigercat. He was doing good - walking around all over until he spun a track and went down 8 feet on the drivers side. It was at this point that we figured we should call you". Well, so much for my early evening and a good night's sleep. Don't even start anything, just pump water from the engine bays - I'm on my way. I left Hornypain at 5:30, got there at 6:45 to find 1.5 million dollars worth of logging equipment spread over 1/2 acre, all about 7-8 feet below the moss. Only one was in danger of flooding, so I set up a pump and a 3-man brigade to man it all night to ensure we had living and breathing engines in the morning. The owner of the new hoe was pretty green - the breather was full of water, the engine smoking raw fuel and the gl*** and side panels re-arranged. We cut the air intake system open at the turbo to give it air. It was his machine that we put the snorkle and pumps to. All this started because they didn't have someone there with experience to say, whoa - lets have a thought here and get home early. I got on the radio phone to Hearst - I wanted a 992 Deere John, a 5800 Linkbelt, a 400 Komatsu or a 345 Cat A.S.A.(F).P. - nothing smaller and with cables no smaller than 1 and 1/4 inches, and big clevises, and some grub. No equipment till morning, and no hot meal tonight because I got in a 1:30 am. Next day at noon (!), the biggest hoe in Hearst, a 345 Cat, showed up. I had my guys cutting black poplar all morning into 24 foot lengths by chainsaw because our two F/B's on site were stuck and the third is in Hearst for major repairs. Three guys on saws, being shifted off by anyone I saw stand still for 2 minutes. The remaining two grapples were busy building the brush mat. I had to build 350' of brush mat total - that's alot of trees when it goes down two layers deep. We managed to get the hoe and the skidder out on Tuesday. The hoe limped out and I put my mechanic onto it directly to try to get it going because I figured we would need it to help get the F/B's out. Same with the skidder. Filters, grease, etc. Left at dark and, again, no supper because Hornypain rolls up the streets at 10 pm. Wednesday, day 3, we used the two hoes on a double-wide brush mat to yard the 860 out. Four hours later, an lots of cable pulling and shovelling of black muck, it was out. Then, I put the mechanic on it too because I wanted it to go and whack another 50-70 poplar for brush mat. By now, the third skidder was living again, so the remaining 100 feet of brushmat went faster. The Timberjack 618 was also in sideways with the tracks going the wrong way, and 4 hours later again, it too was out. BTW - I got to the restaurant at 9 pm. These guys are not used to working steady and hard like was the program. I made it very clear that if any skidder stopped work for coffee, I would change the operator and the old operator will then come and see me for his next job (chainsaw, shovel, pump, cleaning machines). All in all, the guys did work very well on a really bad situation. I need a break today. Anyway, back to normal today, except that now I am off my fuel routine because I missed fuel delivery on Tuesday during all the fun and we are running low. We burned a lot building the brushmat. Last night, I layed off three delimber operators because they are caught up with all the redirection of skidder power. Ho Hum. Well, that was my week, how wuz yores?
December of 1997 was a lousy year for snow exept for one storm two days before christmas and almost ruined my truck and was seriously thinking of starting a new business. The day started out with a 2 to 4 inch accumulation and we ended up with 18 inches. So we were all prepared for the storm thanks to the weather men's prediction....ha ha. Picked my wife up from work early and thought before dropping her off I could plow a few more driveways. After a few we plowed, we went to a new customers house which had a very steep and winding driveway up a hill (yes, I was nuts for taking this in the first place) which might I add on either side of the driveway was steep inclines. First we tried driving up to the top of the hill because I knew I couldn't push the snow up the driveway with my 97 GMC 1 ton dump with duel wheels. But that didn't work so then I tried to back up the driveway and got 1/2 way up and the truck slid sideways off the driveway down the incline sideways and very close to some trees. Also had my sander full and almost tipping the truck over. We were so steep that my wife had to put her feet on the passenger door to leverage herself. Called my driver with the 77 dodge powerwagon, hooked the chain up and all he could do is spin all tires. Another guy came along with his Chevy and he did nothing but spin. So we took the plow off and hooked both trucks up and finally got free after demolitioning all her shrubs in the front of her yard. I never admitted being there, and surprisingly the customers never complained about the bushes but called and asked why I didn't plow. By the way, we were left for dead by the towing companys that we called and said would be there in an hour. Five hours later we freed up and still now tow truck!!!!
Best thing you can carry for towing is one of them braided nylon straps. It works so much better to be able to bounce on the end of the strap as opposed to having to dead pull on a chain. I actually managed to pop my buddy out when he got his tandem Pete stuck in sand. I was able to sit on pavement with my S-10 and give him enough bounce to start him moving instead of jigging in the sand. You can rally hammer the end of the strap and not tear things up like you would with a chain. And the moving rig imparts SO much more energy than one trying to pull from a dead start.
