A Plea For HELP! To Anyone Within A Reasonable Distance Of American Fork Canyon

[sawtooth4x4]

AWESOME. if i lived there yet i'd be all over helping out. SAVE THE YOTA

 

[jentzschman]

Just saw this. I could have helped as well. Hope you guys got it out safely.

 

[Team1k]

Hey that spot looks very similar to my avatar.... Basically what i had to do was winch up to the trees way out ahead of where you are, then had a buddy with a winch behind me attach to my rear bumper, then slowly we both pulled and it slid me back straight onto the road. It then was easier to go forward than back so he kept a little tension on the line to keep my rear end on the trail while i used my winch to pull me across that shale area. Coming back i had no issues. It could be worse. There could be snow on the trail like there was for me.

Good luck!

Edit: Just realized you stated your winch is dead. I will be interested to hear how they recover this. Maybe run a line from a rig behind up to a snatch block in front of the rig?

 

[Kevin B.]

Save that 4Runner, it's too pretty to die!

I'm free to come up in the morning, if it's still necessary.

 

[TurboMinivan]

Just saw this. I could have helped as well.

Crap! Me, too.

I even just tried calling Josh but got no answer. After leaving voice mail, I sent a text. He replied and said simply: No dice, it's spending the night. Way sketchy.

FYI

 

[TurboMinivan]

I'm free to come up in the morning, if it's still necessary.

Sounds like it will be. I have to work from 8:30am to 9pm, so I'm out.

 

[sixstringsteve]

We werent able to recover it. its in a really bad spot. we got the come along, a winch, some snatch blocks, and the pullpal all working at the same time, but it just wanted to slide more downhill. We weren't feeling good about it so we unhooked it and left it there. Its going to take an extremely skilled team to extract it without rolling it. ID recommend at least 2 maybe 3 pull palls, lots of shovels, and lots of straps and snatch blocks. There are zero trees to tie to.

The op is a great guy and he was very prepared. It was just a bad situation. even if he was with a buddy up there, it wouldnt have helped. Great guy who is lucky to be alive.

I would be happy to loan my pull pal to anyone willing to help. This is going to take a Kurt or a Maverick or a Mbryson type of expert to extract. Its very risky and if you're tied to the runner and it starts rolling downhill things could get really ugly fast.

Many thanks to kyle and Andrew and josh.

 

[Kevin B.]

I'm no Curt or Maverick and I don't know how much use my truck will be, but I have straps and a comealong and a shovel, and I'm free all morning if anybody is going back up.

Steve, Andrew, is there any chance a pair of channels for the tires could be dug to help guide the truck back onto the trail?

 

[sixstringsteve]

Its in a really bad spot, on about a 40° side hill. The downhill tires are non loose shale that keep giving way and the uphill tires are in rocky hard dirt. It wouldn't take much to send that truck rolling 500+ feet down the hill, dragging anything else attached to it.

No vehicle cab get closer than 50 feet to it. Its going to rrwuire multiple winches, and even then we still may lose it downhill.

I think the safest bet would be to get 40+ people up there with ropes to drag it back onto the trail. Then if things got sketchy and it started rolling, everyone could let go.

That, or get a helicopter or backhoe to lift it out. Its seriously close to going over the edge. I think a strong wind could send it over.

 

[sixstringsteve]

There's no way to get uphill if it. We managed to get a pull pal working, but if it failed it could have gotten ugly. There might be a slight chance of someone going off trail and getting their rig in front of him, but chances are very slim and its dangerous.

I think the best effort is to hook a pull pal in front of the runner, then winch it forward from behind, hoping it doesn't roll off the side and take you with it.

If someone can extract this safely, they deserve a medal.

 

[sixstringsteve]

I believe it can be recovered safely, bit its going to take more skill than the 3 of us have.

 

[cruiseroutfit]

You have a GPS coordinate of its location? I'm trying to wrap my head around which switchback corner that is. Very last one before the rock slide or one down? I'd love to head up there and help out but I would literally have to leave right now and work through the night. I'm leaving the country tomorrow and am just finishing up my packing. I a spare Pull-Pal will help, mine is available while I am out, along with any of my recover gear.

So the side hill between the two roads, your guessing 40* angle?

Did you make any attempt to repair or hot wire the winch? What kind of winch? Possibly just a solenoid that can be temporarily bypassed?

Any trees ahead of the truck within several hundred feet?

 

[snwbrdr852]

Yeah, it's still there. Steve's posts describe the situation a lot better than I could. It's bad...
Not that I don't appreciate all the offers for help, but it would seriously require probably an entire day up there, thinking, planning, digging, winching, etc and it could still go bad in a heartbeat.
So it truly is a job for the elite (not that I'm making any judgments about you guys, just sayin).

But I can tell you guys hands down, this is my new forum of choice. I know this is more locally based, but the amount and quality of responses I got here is ten times any other forum. You guys are awesome.
Kurt, your reputation precedes you and I really appreciate the concern and willingness to help, but I don't want to have any part of screwing up your trip. To answer your questions though, no I haven't had a chance to really mess with the winch yet, bringing it back from the dead may be possible. But there's really nothing anywhere nearby to hook up to. Oh, and when I said the "top" of Mary Ellen Gulch, I meant it... AFTER the last switchback.

Steve, Andrew, and Kyle - we may not have gotten it out, but you guys are still heroes in my book. "Thanks" doesn't cut it, but thanks anyway.

 

[TRD270]

Well that was an interesting drive home, came around a corner and not one....two...three... but four mountain lions in the road. Two beat feet really fast into the brush and two hung out in the road which made me nervous since I had no doors or top

 

[Tonkaman]

We could always leave it there to use as a demonstration during our quarterly training day....

 

[gijohn40]

any chance you can take a line over the sides of the truck and hook to the bottom of the downhill side and just pull alittle upwards... This might help keep it from going over the side...

Leaving it there is not an option... its suppose to rain the next few days.... which mean the ground is going to get softer and make it even easier for this to roll on its own...

 

[UNSTUCK]

I say get it insured today for a specific value, say $20k. Then get that winch fixed and have at it. If it rolls, you win, if you pull it out, you win.

I could give you all day friday if it is still up there. I take orders really well.

 

[Kevin B.]

We've extracted some vehicles from very dangerous/sketchy spots and what I've learned is that you can't always use the vehicle's traditional attachment points. Is it possible to get a vehicle facing the driver's door? Then, attach to the frame and pull it back toward the trail. Pulling it from the front or rear isn't going to work.

Not where he's at, no, you can't get a vehicle facing the door. It's a shelf road. Steve said you can't get a truck past him, either, and if he's on the very top then there's not even a switchback above him to put a truck at. I wonder if maybe two or three pullpals at 270* would keep him from sliding, then a pull from the rear to pendelum him back to the road?

I don't suppose there's a connector to Snowbird like on top of Mineral, is there?

I have all day Friday too, if there's going to be an another attempt.

 

[sLcREX]

This is pretty crazy, glad to see the support of the forum in times like these. I hope you guys are able to recover the vehicle safely.

 

[UFAB]

We have several recovery cables out to 200 feet and a few winches. Be watching this thread. Available later today or tomorrow.

Good luck.

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